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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pawsplay" data-source="post: 5520585" data-attributes="member: 15538">I've been called a jerk, and recently. I thought it was insulting and petty, and make the mod in question come across as more than a little jerk-ish to me. I know it's not a policy to revisit or discuss specific incidents in public, but I would like to say something generally about the experience. If someone seriously trolls me, and I respond with a single one-liner, that does not in any way insult their charater or worth as a human being, and that clearly indicates I am declining to respond further, and I walk away... and then I get called a "jerk" for that, yeah, that kind of upsets me. The other guy was being a jerk, I just let him know I was offended. I don't take it personally. Mod was having a bad day, doesn't like me, thought I was someone else, etc. Maybe they just see things differently than I do. The thing is, when the mod hammer comes down, there is no opportunity to have a friendly discussion about differing viewpoints. And THAT is why I think mods should refrain from name-calling, unless the forum is going to afford regular users the same discretion in calling people out. Mod authority does not legitamize name-calling; rather, as an authority figure, I would imagine mods would be held to a higher level of restraint. A number of years ago on RPGnet, I had a couple of mod run-ins, including one bizarre and seriously disturbing misunderstanding in which a mod claimed I was attacking Gareth Michael-Skarka when I was actually defending him, and another in which I lost my cool over being called a racist. Then a mod came back and issued me a warning for "continuing to argue" because someone else posted some trolling comments in a contentious thread I had participated in the week before (!). When I asked about the reason for my warning, I was accused of trolling the mods. So I made a short announcement I was taking a break from the boards. A breather should help everyone clear their heads, right? A couple of mods came back, locked the thread, and proceeded to viciously insult me. So in a moment of lacking in self-preservation instinct, right before beginning my vacation from the board, I reported (using the board's report feature) one of the mods in question. That resulted in my immediate perma-ban. I've never seen an issue of that nature come up on EnWorld. But it does raise my hackles when I see mods shooting from behind the mod shield. Dude, not cool. Seriously.In my experience, there are very few problems that cannot be solved by:User X, please refrain from Y as you appear to be doing in this thread.followed by a short vacation if they in fact do Y. I've never felt the need to peramanently ban anybody, except for violating bandwidth or the terms of their bans; enough vacations and the posters in question either fly right, or they lose interest because half the time they can't post. Week-bans go away. Locked threads fade from the mind. But when you call someone a jerk, there's not a good way to undo that, unless you are willing to apologize.</blockquote>

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