Question about site rules...

[superheroinevengeance]

Ive been role-playing here for year, but the point in time when there was few regulations and rules until now. I have been recently told that past rule violations, such as a bump within 24 hours or not labeling something NSFW, never roll off our "records". Which means, in time, as accidents or honest mistakes occur (not serial rule violations but periodic at best), we grow closer to, I assume, a lifetime banishment with no forgiveness.

I can commit something as horrible as domestic violence and it will roll off my record in seven years, but mistakes I have made on this site a year or more ago are still held against me.

Why does the administration of this site not forgive mistakes over a matter of time? I only ask because a member of the administration told me today they was not aware of such a policy.

 

[Staine]

I've seen this question answered before so I'll take a shot at it, but until a higher staff member answers I wouldn't take my answer as fact.

Anyway, from what I understand it's because it would be impossible or at the very least impractical for the staff to track when each violation was made and by whom and remove them individually after, say, a year, so the only other option would be to periodically wipe every single violation off at once which would mean no accountability. I could be misremembering the answer, but I think that was it?

 

[Staine]

Here you go, this was the same thing, answered by an Officer who definitely knows what they are talking about more than I do! Hope this helps!

 

[obieblu]

When I was a debate forum moderator, we did keep track of violations and wiped out a first offense after 6 months. If there was a second in that time, it took a year to wipe off the first one. These accommodated "just having a bad day" violations. (Violent threats and sexual harassment were insta-bans, which happened pretty regularly on a forum that debated things like abortion and race relations.) We very specifically did not want an environment where decently well-behaved users felt a sword of Damocles over their heads from accruing incredibly minor infractions over the years.

My violations here have been for things like I bumped 3 minutes early. Believe me, the anxiety attack that caused me was more than sufficient punishment for bumping the 3 forums I'm on around 11am (which the other two didn't punish me for). I really hate that something like that would count against me years in the future considering no one was made 'unsafe' by it. Coming from a background in forum moderation in a very 'passionate' environment, and even having a published scientific paper on online forum sociology to my name, and being a UX manager who's responsibility is to be the users' advocate in planning digital systems, I think about this kind of thing a lot, from both sides.

 

[superheroinevengeance]

Hi superheroinevengeance,

I understand the frustration, trust me - we don't like to impart post restrictions or anything of the sort, but the fact remains that it is the responsibility of all our members to be and stay current with the Site Rules and make sure they are following them. We don't begin removing privileges, for most rule violations (especially the smaller ones, like bump violations), until the fourth time a member has broken our rules, which is a pretty lenient policy. We also do not ban for bump offenses, as seen in the Site Rules & the Action Policies below it.

For things like unlabeled NSFW, spam, harassment, etc. a ban is taken into consideration because these things can cause serious harm or consequences for other members, which we do need to take into account to make sure all of our members can use BMR safely and comfortably.

Please feel free to reach out if you ever have any questions or need clarifications on any of the site rules, staff is always here to help and happy to guide our members through the site.

I am on a three week posting ban for a third bump offense, so I am confused by your statement.