Castle

I can't put it any better than Packard did. As for the warning, @Bickendan, go to Castle's profile page. As an admin, you should see something that says warning. Click on it, and it will list what he has, with descriptions. The most recent one says "violation of personal info rule" or something similar. I agree we need to look in to the mechanics. He claims he never saw it, but nevertheless he did earn it, which is the larger issue. We let a lot of things slide, he probably earned dozens of warnings that were never issued. If he wants to come back, he needs to agree to tone it down. His posting is nearly non-stop trolling. Wordforge may be intended mostly as a free speech board, but anybody who sees that as a license to troll and spam non-stop is eventually going to find himself on the outside.

Side note: it's interesting to me that there has never been any passionate defense of lesbian shoes, as he and Castle were both banned for ultimately the same reason. Just because Skrain was far less clever about it, doesn't change the similarity in that both contribute little else than spam and troll.

Skrain is clearly a purely constructed persona. Castle, on the other hand, is a real person who picks targets because he dislikes them; dials it up to 110% for effect, and while that extra 10% is fake the 100% is all him; and has genuine meltdowns when he loses sobriety. There is sincerity and pathos to Castle's trolling that is entirely lacking from lesbian shoes'. That, I think, is the difference. It shouldn't matter, because the disruption to the rest of the board is the same either way, but to some people it does matter.

Here is some free advice, use the ban feature and set a ban expiration date like most forums do.

The "if they ask to come back" seems like just a tactic to provide a little humiliation to banned person. Yes, I know that WF tradition didn't start with you guys. The only time someone should have to come crawling back hat in hand is if their ban really is intended to be permenant.

This thread is very telling on many levels...about the owners...and certain posters.


Not that any of the things it tells are very surprising.

I get that point, and I agree that we don't necessarily need to go by something just because it's tradition. But we don't really have a lot of standards for behavior besides the common sense rule mentioned in the first sentence of what rules there are. That's there specifically for somebody like John Castle or Skrain Ducat. They aren't here because they like the other posters or care about Wordforge. If we put up a bunch of specific rules like "do X and you get a two week ban," that just gives trolls more things to exploit.

If Castle's multiple melt downs both here and on Facebook have demonstrated anything, it is that he lacks common sense. For example, it is a distinct lack of common sense that suggests somebody can repeatedly troll the board itself and not be asked to leave. Yeah, no specific rule or clearly outlined punishment is going to be written about that.

But because this is Wordforge, we don't really want to permaban anybody. Believe it or not, I want Castle to come back and wouldn't be bothered too much by Skrain returning, either. But as long as he goes on with the tantrums, demanding that we not only let him back but give him special treatment when he returns, that's just a non-starter.

Exactly.

Surely, with that logic, you may as well just dump the rules entirely? What's wrong with a couple of extra rules where clarification is needed?

why shouldn't there be such a rule? Seems to me that the only reluctance would be others getting caught up in it, such as Face. Board is yours now. The rules are what you decide.

why is is it? If you think he should come back then surely that's all there is to it?

Despite all that, a banning should still be fair.

The "Because we're WF and we're a special snowflake" reply to any discussion about rules is old and really doesn't amount to much.

There is a reason most forums are ran with some degree of formality and specific rules and it's not because the owners are all jackbooted thugs.

Is he asking for special treatment?

That's right, they are rescinded by humiliating the condemned and stroking our egos...

'tis the WF way.

I love this thread.

That's what she said!

[to Krieg]

Hey-O!

The Facebook Castle meltdown is almost more entertaining as the last meltdown here.

If it's any good, perhaps someone can copy and paste it for those of us who aren't quite mad enough to have a Facebook account? Unless it's private, of course.

When he melted down in 2012 we posted it and it seemed fine, but one or two posts allude to his Blue Room info so I'd be reluctant to do it again without the o.k. (maybe @gul can clairfy?). Suffice it to say that if you post in his thread there you'll get at lest 4-5 ranting posts almost immediately in return, most of which include his malfunctioning capslock along with demands and conditions of the board owners for his return, even though he has no bargaining position.

It's 280 posts long and >220 of them are John Castle having a complete break with reality. No way in hell am I gonna cut and paste it all. Besides, he's such a caricature now that you could probably write them yourself.

I'm pretty sure copying and pasting from Facebook would violate some policies. Yeah, there is precedent from the last time, but I'd say no, unless we get Castle's permission on that. He's still a member of this community on a certain level.

I don't like this board that much anymore.

Bummer.

Castle is actually defending a reasonable position, but he's also forgetting the bit where he threatened the board.

Ah, ok. You're all correct, of course; forget I asked.

You've lost your mind. *shun*

That's the fascinating thing with this--and so many things Castle: He starts out from actually quite a strong and supportable position. Then he proceeds to act idiotic and abusive and derail his own thread to the point that his message is lost and anyone who had the ability or interest in supporting him gives up in frustration.

This situation and the thread about asking for donations. Both opened up great opportunities to beat people with big sticks for their hypocrisy and/or pettiness, but the opportunity got lost in the 10 posts in a row of foaming at the mouth and trying to bite his own face while The Usual Suspects poked him with a stick.

Here we've got Anc revealing himself to be the petty little fascist that he is and while a good chunk of the board disapproves, it's like, "forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown."

IMO, repeated use of the expression "biting [one's] own face" should be a bannable offense.

Bummer.

Assuming I had one to lose in the first place.......