Why I banned Damar Stiehl

G

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Recently, this forum thread was brought to my attention and I was informed that a member going by the handle of Damar Stiehl was exhibiting rude and hateful behavior. After reading of several occasions where Damar Stiehl harrassed members of the Christian Gamers Alliance community, I contacted him privately, hoping to settle the matter peacefully. This is what I sent to him:

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]As the leader of the Christian Gamers Alliance, I have a responsibility to watch over and govern the Christian members of the community that participate in forum discussions. During your participation on these forums, you have repeatedly and maliciously attacked members under my charge, and I will no longer tolerate such behavior.

If you do not reply with a statement promising to at least try to behave like a courteous participant in our community and then keep that promise, then I will delete your forum account. Should you decide to return to our forums under another name, I will locate you by your IP address, ban it, and contact your Internet service provider and ask them to cancel your service on grounds of harrassment.

I am called to balance my desire to witness to unbelievers and my responsibility to watch over this community every day. I do not appreciate having rude, inconsiderate, and irresponsible people forcing such decisions on me. I am giving you this warning because I believe that people can change, given the proper discipline, but also so that you know exactly where you stand.

Please consider either correcting your behavior and apologizing to members you have so viciously attacked or simply ceasing your visits to our forums.

I mentioned my desire to witness to unbelievers earlier, and it is a very strong desire. But I understand that when a person refuses the Gospel, they are responsible for that decision. I pray that you take a look around this community and see that, even among members who are still young and maturing in the faith, there is a great deal of love and compassion to those who approach us in like manner.

This was his reply:

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Yawn. Go try to muscle someone else around, prayboy. Here's a little bit of conventional wisdom: don't try to scare a lobster with a bare ass, and a network admin with an IP trace or a ban.

Be thankful I'm staying on Cheryl's forums, I could go spill my venom somewhere else, too. Let her decide whether she wants me or not, AIIT?! Now go away, child.

I have edited his user account so that he cannot post, banned his e-mail address, and banned his IP address. If provoked further, I will contact his Internet service provider and request that they cancel his service as most Acceptable Usage Policies forbid harrassment of others.

His IP address is currently 65.124.125.2. A whois query returned the following results:

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Qwest Communications NET-QWEST-BLKS-4 (NET-65-112-0-0-1)
                                 65.112.0.0 - 65.127.255.255
EMBER CORPORATION Q0724-65-124-125-0 (NET-65-124-125-0-1)
                                 65.124.125.0 - 65.124.125.31

# ARIN WHOIS database, last updated 2003-02-22 20:00
# Enter ? for additional hints on searching ARIN's WHOIS database.

While I allow free speech on the Christian Gamers Alliance community forums, my efforts and the efforts of the many others who have built this community were not intended to provide a place for hateful non-Christians to derive a perverse pleasure from angering others but to bless fellow Christians and witness to unbelievers receptive to the Gospel message.

I have taken great care not to react harshly in this situation and I now present evidence of that to all who wish to read. There are non-Christians who have conducted themselves with courtesy on this board and I have no intention of removing them from the board. No forum user yet has exhibited the wilfully ignorant anger and hatred shown by Damar Stiehl. I hope--and pray--that none will ever again.

If Damar Stiehl should return under another guise, forum administrators are free to ban him at will and contact his Internet service provider with evidence of his harassment.

In conclusion, disrespect such as this will not be tolerated. While free speech will not be quelled, I will not allow the cause of free speech to allow inconsiderate members to harass others. I do not enjoy performing these administrative duties, nor do I appreciate the inevitable interruption from more important duties that these hateful outbursts cause, but I will moderate these forums in order to govern justly.

Good night and God bless.
 
While at times Damar had entertaining and thought provoking things to say, anybody dumb enough to reply that way to a warning deserves what they get.
 
I just checked the e-mail address....we've dealt with Olgerth in the past. Took him a while to leave but we suceeded when we put all his posts in his own little thread and ignored them.
 
So this isn't his first time, huh.
Oh well...I found him a worthy challenge to discuss God with, a challenge to talk to and a challenge to get to think.
Regardless, he's gone, and who now to disturb the quiet?
Entertaining, that's the word, Kohael.
Awww, but I'm sad. He never DID respond to my 6:0 triumph on him about Hypocrisy in 3D...poo.
Yeah, but I don't think he was being dumb in his reply email. I think what he wanted to do was just getting under Tek's skin so that he would be banned. He no longer cared.
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] (CCGR @ Feb. 23 2003,5:14)]I just checked the e-mail address....we've dealt with Olgerth in the past.  Took him a while to leave but we suceeded when we put all his  posts in his own little thread and ignored them.
Wow, he behaved better this time.
 
He didn't swear. He didn't threaten. He didn't seem to break any rules that I'm aware of. Sure he was unpleasant, but he didn't do anything that I haven't done in the past, even though EVERY thread of his was as bad as my worst.

I notice I'm in a minority of one here, but I'm not sure a banning was justified.

Eon
 
He did swear. look at just about any of his posts. He was asked on multiple occasions to stop using profanity in the boards and disregarded our requests. It was his complete lack of respect for our rules that warrented his ban.


Cory
 
You're more professional in your arguments as well Eon.
 
Well, if you can't fight fair and win - what are you really proving? Just that you want to win more - always a dubious standard of rightness, I think.

Eon
 
He responded to a message exhorting him to be nice by insulting the admin. If somebody did that in my IRC chan or forum, I'd do the same thing no matter what sort of contributions they'd made in the past. Sorry Eon, but I totally support Tek in this.
 
I had no idea who Damar was, nor did I know anything about his posting styles. But after exploring a few of the topics to see what I can add my two cents to, I did notice a handful of quite offensive posting that sounded more like an attack and less like a curious mind.

1. I'm very proud of Tek and his continued efforts to protect us and to keep this a clean and safe place for us all.

2. Damar lashed out on us because he was angry. Something about the light of Christ bugged him and it probably cracked whatever world Satan put around his eyes. As such, I'd like to suggest that each one of us pray for Damar, that whatever work God has started in his heart continues to burn until he may finally understand the agape love we all share.

3. I also noticed some of your replies to Damar, and I must say that I am impressed. You attempted to handle Damar as cooly as you could and tried your very best to bring truth and understanding to his prejudiced mind. I praise God for such a wonderful group!
 
For one, he minused the n in Damm so that he could use it for swearing purposes, not like in ####ation, and he frequently swore but the board had the words modified to be "#"s.
I never did any namecalling, now did I? Sure I taunted him and challenged him, something he rarely, if ever, took up on, and all he did was jump from the safety of his computer up and down and miss every logical point I had to make and just go on a bashing storm.
Malohaut, I don't think you're talking about me when you say that last bit: I was very driving against him, as you can see in my posts. I don't know why, I just was.
And Eon, it's not a matter of rightness: it's just a manner of controlling the content on the board. We're not here to win. We're here to debate about God, or discuss Him calmly with other believers in Christ's death/resurrection. If someone opposes God, we discuss it, debate, sometimes fiercely, on both sides, and sometimes the Christians just take the side of "God says so."
 
Hm, He didnt act the same as before...maybe he grew up a bit
wink.gif
 
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