Questionable Suspension of KembaWalker

[JustinSane]

This moderator action was questioned in the thread the "infraction" occurred in, on the general board, and Yuri Vaultin asked that any who disagreed with his decision post here. I appreciate the invitation for honest criticism, and am following his suggestion.

In the thread "Jonas Valanciunas: 7-footer has the makings of a star", OP was a link to and three paragraph excerpt from a Yahoo Sports blog entry. KembaWalker posted second. In its entirety, the post was: "this thread will go well". The poster was suspended for attempted thread derailment. In a later post, Yuri Vaultin (possibly a Raptors and/or Valanciunas fan judging from some suggestions in the thread of moderator bias; I don't know one way or the other, though if true it may have been wiser to have a different moderator sanction the poster to avoid the appearance of bias) explained the reason for the suspension and stated the same post would have drawn the same response regardless of the (comparable) player the thread had been about.

I understand why he would say that, but in this instance I feel the post was on-topic, whereas if the thread had been about the other example players the moderator offered (Harden, Rose and Anthony) I could understand classifying it as attempted derailment. While personally I'm a big fan of Valanciunas, any regular participant in RealGM basketball forums knows that the Raptors have an unusually passionate, active fan base (see for instance a 97 page thread on whether they should have taken Drummond over Ross).

While brief, KembaWalker's post seemed to me to be an attempt to remind everyone of that fact, and that given Valanciunas' somewhat unique position as the most promising young player the Raptors have had in some time, an usually spirited discussion should be expected. Basically, he seemed to be saying that board dynamics should be considered part of the context of the topic. If that is what he meant, I agree with him. It is of course possible he was trolling, but in an ambiguous case it seems better to me to give the poster the benefit of the doubt (unless prior history weighs against him, which I wouldn't know).

[Yuri Vaultin]

This moderator action was questioned in the thread the "infraction" occurred in, on the general board, and Yuri Vaultin asked that any who disagreed with his decision post here. I appreciate the invitation for honest criticism, and am following his suggestion.

In the thread "Jonas Valanciunas: 7-footer has the makings of a star", OP was a link to and three paragraph excerpt from a Yahoo Sports blog entry. KembaWalker posted second. In its entirety, the post was: "this thread will go well". The poster was suspended for attempted thread derailment. In a later post, Yuri Vaultin (possibly a Raptors and/or Valanciunas fan judging from some suggestions in the thread of moderator bias; I don't know one way or the other, though if true it may have been wiser to have a different moderator sanction the poster to avoid the appearance of bias) explained the reason for the suspension and stated the same post would have drawn the same response regardless of the (comparable) player the thread had been about.

For the record, I didn't request the suspension.

I understand why he would say that, but in this instance I feel the post was on-topic, whereas if the thread had been about the other example players the moderator offered (Harden, Rose and Anthony) I could understand classifying it as attempted derailment. While personally I'm a big fan of Valanciunas, any regular participant in RealGM basketball forums knows that the Raptors have an unusually passionate, active fan base (see for instance a 97 page thread on whether they should have taken Drummond over Ross).

While brief, KembaWalker's post seemed to me to be an attempt to remind everyone of that fact, and that given Valanciunas' somewhat unique position as the most promising young player the Raptors have had in some time, an usually spirited discussion should be expected. Basically, he seemed to be saying that board dynamics should be considered part of the context of the topic. If that is what he meant, I agree with him. It is of course possible he was trolling, but in an ambiguous case it seems better to me to give the poster the benefit of the doubt (unless prior history weighs against him, which I wouldn't know).

Considering Kemba has a history of derailing threads with "observations" I think I was in the right. This is not his first, second or third infraction... (all from different mods I may add and all in less than 1 year). His only intent was to derail any and all discussion in the thread and dismiss any points in the article because it was about a Raptor player as more or less pointed out by this:

its not even a thread its just a blog article he ripped off another website and posted here with no actual discussion. get over it. if it wasnt about a player you liked you'd have locked it

This was an opinion piece on yahoo that a poster shared to start discussion. I would not have locked it if it was about another player on another team - that was a complete assumption on Kemba's part.

We welcome all posters to join the discussion on the GB - all we ask is that you treat posters and fans of other teams with some respect and if you post, do so in a respectful manner.

[advanced]

there is generally an established protocol on the forum that when a thread is going to be clearly locked, any post goes. you can see any locked thread and see people saying "lol op is stupid" "what a (Please Use More Appropriate Word) thread" etc etc and it gets locked and nobody is ever punished.

there is also an established protocol where threads about rookies, especially ones with little substance and low debating potential (IE a thread about someone being a future superstar based on 2 preseason games) would get locked and told to "move into the rookie thread" as a few rookie threads already have.

Kemba rightly had the belief that thread would be locked. with these 2 facts combined its definitely apparent that KembaWalkers suspension was the unfair result of a lack of consistency in moderation and a biased moderator with an agenda. a warning is understandable, suspension is totally unfair. Free Kemba

[Yuri Vaultin]

there is generally an established protocol on the forum that when a thread is going to be clearly locked, any post goes. you can see any locked thread and see people saying "lol op is stupid" "what a (Please Use More Appropriate Word) thread" etc etc and it gets locked and nobody is ever punished.

there is also an established protocol where threads about rookies, especially ones with little substance and low debating potential (IE a thread about someone being a future superstar based on 2 preseason games) would get locked and told to "move into the rookie thread" as a few rookie threads already have.

Kemba rightly had the belief that thread would be locked. with these 2 facts combined its definitely apparent that KembaWalkers suspension was the unfair result of a lack of consistency in moderation and a biased moderator with an agenda. a warning is understandable, suspension is totally unfair. Free Kemba

What part of "I didn't request the suspension" do you not quite understand? Should I try to draw pictures, perhaps a comic strip breaking it down for you?

By the way, please read the rules on the GB as you clearly have not.

[advanced]

there is generally an established protocol on the forum that when a thread is going to be clearly locked, any post goes. you can see any locked thread and see people saying "lol op is stupid" "what a (Please Use More Appropriate Word) thread" etc etc and it gets locked and nobody is ever punished.

there is also an established protocol where threads about rookies, especially ones with little substance and low debating potential (IE a thread about someone being a future superstar based on 2 preseason games) would get locked and told to "move into the rookie thread" as a few rookie threads already have.

Kemba rightly had the belief that thread would be locked. with these 2 facts combined its definitely apparent that KembaWalkers suspension was the unfair result of a lack of consistency in moderation and a biased moderator with an agenda. a warning is understandable, suspension is totally unfair. Free Kemba

What part of "I didn't request the suspension" do you not quite understand? Should I try to draw pictures, perhaps a comic strip breaking it down for you?

By the way, please read the rules on the GB as you clearly have not.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1208646

people are allowed to say things like

you really are a dingbat

Holy effing ****. Nobody can really think of something this stupid, can they?

Nice trolling OP.

We need some trolling variety outside of the typical and repetitive: "Kobe sucksss" or "Kobe rulesss" type of ****.

and get nothing, but Kemba gets suspended for saying "this will end well"

[Yuri Vaultin]

There is a button that looks like this: !

Please use it.

[advanced]

i dont feel the need to because posts like that don't bother me. its bothering that my friend KembaWalker got suspended from posting for something so trivial. posters shouldnt be punished for moderator inconsistency

[HornetJail]

What part of "I didn't request the suspension" do you not quite understand? Should I try to draw pictures, perhaps a comic strip breaking it down for you?

Then I'd like to hear something from the mod that did.

I really don't think consistency in punishments is too much to ask for.

[Howard Mass]

If the user has a question about action taken against their account, they can contact me.

[advanced]

by the time any justice is served his suspension will probably be up. this is the feedback forum afterall, i hope the admins recognize the negative feedback here, on the GB, and on the bobcats board toward this suspension and fix it.

[Yuri Vaultin]

What part of "I didn't request the suspension" do you not quite understand? Should I try to draw pictures, perhaps a comic strip breaking it down for you?

Then I'd like to hear something from the mod that did.

I really don't think consistency in punishments is too much to ask for.

I agree with the punishment. He is a repeat offender. Unless he is Lindsay Lohan, most repeat offenders receive harsher punishment each time and get far less leeway than they otherwise would.

[advanced]

its pretty debatable whether his post is even an attempted derailment. he just pointed out how difficult it will be to get unbiased opinions of a Raptor player on the GB from either side, and the pointlessness of trying to assess the situation fairly either way after a couple preseason games. its a tad arbitrary that Valanciunas is allowed to have his own thread, when other rookie opinion is kept in the rookies thread. this contributes to the problem of inconsistency that lead to unfair suspensions like this.

posts like this from that thread just show how spot on Kemba was

Why don't u guys relax. Just accept that Jonas is a true franchise all star already. (Just look at his preseason numbers and tell me otherwise, not to mention the kid has been beasting it in the euroleague since he was in diapers). Maybe the reason why he got suspended is cause he blatantly refuses to accept that. I'm not being sarcastic either. On a board full of raptors fans, this becomes our board; so get with the popular opinion or get out.

Bobcats board says FREE KEMBA: viewtopic.php?f=53&t=1206477&start=30

[Kenyon009]

It's a forum dude. You guys need to get out more, get drunk there's a ton of dumb bitches out there. Screw one and wait a few months to make another account. Not to hard guys it's a public community provide something insightful on here or GTFO. KW decided to be a moron and got treated like one.

[HornetJail]

It's a forum dude. You guys need to get out more, get drunk there's a ton of dumb bitches out there. Screw one and wait a few months to make another account. Not to hard guys it's a public community provide something insightful on here or GTFO. KW decided to be a moron and got treated like one.

It's funny because you just posted the exact thing that the mods are cracking down on that board.

[Howard Mass]

I'll say it again.

If the user has a question about action taken against their account, they can contact me.