I think that posting that someone is banned and why they were banned is not mainly about punishing them. It’s about helping people understand what the moderation team is doing, how rule-breaking is handled, and why someone no longer has access to the forum. For example, it helps us to understand if the moderation team are acting on inadequate information, or inconsistently between different people. The fact that publishing this information harms people is an unfortunate side effect, after the main effect of improving transparency and keeping people informed.
It doesn’t even really feel right to call them harmed by the publication. If people are harmed by other people knowing they misuse the voting system, I’d say they were mainly harmed by their own misuse of the system, not by someone reporting on it.
I just don’t buy that it reflects some fundamental lack of integrity that we all need to know about
Then you needn’t object to the moderation team talking about what they did!
It’s about helping people understand what the moderation team is doing, how rule-breaking is handled, and why someone no longer has access to the forum.
It’s unclear to me that naming names materially advances the first two goals. As to the third, the suspended user could have the option of having their name disclosed. Otherwise, I don’t think we’re entitled to an explanation of why a particular poster isn’t active anymore.
I think that posting that someone is banned and why they were banned is not mainly about punishing them. It’s about helping people understand what the moderation team is doing, how rule-breaking is handled, and why someone no longer has access to the forum. For example, it helps us to understand if the moderation team are acting on inadequate information, or inconsistently between different people. The fact that publishing this information harms people is an unfortunate side effect, after the main effect of improving transparency and keeping people informed.
It doesn’t even really feel right to call them harmed by the publication. If people are harmed by other people knowing they misuse the voting system, I’d say they were mainly harmed by their own misuse of the system, not by someone reporting on it.
Then you needn’t object to the moderation team talking about what they did!
It’s unclear to me that naming names materially advances the first two goals. As to the third, the suspended user could have the option of having their name disclosed. Otherwise, I don’t think we’re entitled to an explanation of why a particular poster isn’t active anymore.