Intent and Malicious Discussion / Oatlife's Appeal

[Jackal 709]

To preface the post this is intended to be a discussion pertaining to the ultimate decision on the appeal, clarifying my position, and cover what I was going to post on it.

My Position : 

While Oatlife did intentionally mass, and shouldn't have, the long-term effect of the mass is nonexistent. Furthermore, it wasn't in a standard DB where EVERYONE on that side experiences it either as the person being killed or watching it. The situation itself was enclosed to a small group of people who were all seemingly messing around and didn't care due to it not effecting their experience. To clarify I'm not saying kill your friend(s) on the server over and over but have some sense of empathy and forgiveness given it was a one off situation and at least a year ago.

As for alting if you are actually thinking of appealing of course don't evade soon after a ban like this one. However, with veteran mass bans and perma bans of this nature most people simply won't care enough to actually appeal assuming they don't already have an interest to play again. Furthermore, I think it's worth covering what Oatlife actually did while alting. As he mentioned he was able to become an officer in Rangers, 2LT, which isn't something that happens overnight or to people wreaking havoc on the server. Lastly Oatlife was forthcoming with alting and was transparent throughout the appeal. He didn't have to reveal that he was alting just to incriminate himself but to illustrate that he had changed in some relative way.

Because of all of this I would've seen no issue with unbanning Oatlife. Furthermore, why wouldn't we consider unbanning Oatlife when we've unbanned and allowed people to play on the server who have affected the server negatively LONG-TERM. We've unbanned cheaters like Tora, Ozzy, Topshot, etc who affected the server in an incredibly negative way. BUT I do believe that these same players did have an opportunity to play again and show how they've changed, if at all, but for most of these same people that was because of a banwipe. And there probably won't be a ban wipe ever again because of the negative consequences that bring with it. 
So unban Oatlife at that point and give him an opportunity to move past a Mass RDM that happened over a year ago.


The Denial Reason :

While I understand why you would deny the thread I think it's important to deal with appeals of this nature case by case. If you are willing to forgive the "Intentional MassRDM" why can't we move past the ban evading especially when Oatlife did nothing wrong both in his faction and in regard to staff? The dude wasn't toxic while alting and wasn't seemingly rdming or massing. Furthermore, Staff can differentiate the maliciousness of the actual MassRDM but not the ban evading but why can't we be understanding in that regard indiscriminately when applicable. 

 

 

WITH THAT lets discuss the topic, counterpoints, etc. And maybe through discussion I can change your mind and elaborate more as to how that decision is counterintuitive.


 

Edit : For those with dissenting opinions feel free to make a comment on the thread so we can have a back and forth instead of just reacting. Defeats the whole purpose of the post otherwise.

Edited September 4, 2021 by Jackal

[Ziggy 1,353]

Oatlife is a friend of mine, so my opinion on this situation is bias, but what I will say is this:

 

My most recent interaction with Oatlife in a GG setting was during SWRP. Over the span of this time, Oatlife led two different factions as well as being appointed as my 2iC for pilots later down the road. While in these positions, he was one of the few people that I could rely on to be responsible and mature. (Note this period of time took place after his ban from MRP)

I think that in relation to this appeal, denying someone because they admitted to using alts is a justified response, but in the end we should aim to look at intention. He didn't alt to cause havoc or be malicious, but instead managed to hold an officer position in 75R and contribute to the leadership of US. Of course it is a violation of the rules, but I think that Jackal made a strong point in saying that no long-term negative impact was created. If Oatlife really had bad intentions, I think he'd just be using an alt right now to ban evade, but that isn't the case. 

He made an appeal and was as transparent as possible with the community, so I see literally 0 reason to believe he is going to be a negative influence on the community if allowed to return. I don't think someone who is being 100% transparent on their wrong-doings in the past is someone who hasn't learned from those mistakes. 

[Gythem 311]

6 hours ago, Jackal said:

The situation itself was enclosed to a small group of people who were all seemingly messing around and didn't care due to it not effecting their experience.

This is true. We all thought it was hilarious. The problem was that I couldn't treat one person any differently than what was stated in the rules. Similar thing happened with Vac, who later got unbanned (except he massed post-war DB).

6 hours ago, Jackal said:

If you are willing to forgive the "Intentional MassRDM" why can't we move past the ban evading especially when Oatlife did nothing wrong both in his faction and in regard to staff? The dude wasn't toxic while alting and wasn't seemingly rdming or massing. Furthermore, Staff can differentiate the maliciousness of the actual MassRDM but not the ban evading but why can't we be understanding in that regard indiscriminately when applicable. 

I agree with this as well. We had to change the MassRDM rules for this reason. If these rules would've been changed prior to Oatlife's ban he would've been back with very little issues. Ban Evasion wouldn't be something negative to treat on a case by case basis. ie Railgunner will never be unbanned, but someone like Oatlife/KAP can be.

 

I know I'm not really in the community much anymore but since this involves me I thought I'd give my opinion, especially since I was the one who banned him.

Edited September 4, 2021 by Gythem

[Vibe 1,088]

I just think its weird that we need a Zach Snyder cut of evidence to ban someone for hacking but we ban a dude permanently for getting on a server he enjoys and doing absolutely nothing malicious. People have literally charged back and cheated and still been unbanned even thought they negatively affected the server and community as a whole. 

[Mr_Fortnite 43]

28 minutes ago, Vibe said:

I just think its weird that we need a Zach Snyder cut of evidence to ban someone for hacking but we ban a dude permanently for getting on a server he enjoys and doing absolutely nothing malicious. People have literally charged back and cheated and still been unbanned even thought they negatively affected the server and community as a whole. 

Yeah. I've seen multiple people +1 ban appeals for cheaters. I've also seen the same people -1 someone because they were slightly annoying. I am not talking about my situation here

 

In my situation, I think that I was a little toxic and I did deserve to be punished for that, I do think that I have learned and grown over the time. I just don't understand how some people said that I am worse than a cheater. A cheater is someone that has an extremely unfair advantage and ruins the server experience as a whole. The old super admin sold cheats and it had 0 repercussions for doing so. 

 

If you are permanently banned it is 100% server politics on whether or not you are allowed to come back. Even if you are in the right or the wrong, if you are friends with the right people your ban isn't permanent

Edited September 4, 2021 by mrfortnite

[StillWohMi 63]

... weren't they banned because of ban evasion?

[Aparh 383]

15 minutes ago, StillWohMi said:

weren't they banned because of ban evasion? 

I believe the original ban was due to intentionally mass rdming

 

11 hours ago, mrfortnite said:

If you are permanently banned it is 100% server politic

I agree with this part of your statement. 
 

my opinion on this subject is that an unban should have been issued. The mass RDM ban shouldn’t have gone through to begin with. I understand rules need to be enforced but there’s circumstances where things should be changed. With oatlife being a vet player at the time of the ban and the mass rdm not actually affecting anyone besides people who were going along with it there should of been a different consequence ( in game RP punishment).  One of the main issues with this mass rdm ban is while it was intentional, it was non malicious and staff at the time never took that into consideration 
 

as far as the ban evading go, im not too sure but i think its been excused in the past. At the end of the day it was an  harmless evade that was actually beneficial to the server. I think staff team should look at this case again and re-evaluate their decision

Edited September 4, 2021 by Aparh

[Ziggy 1,353]

On 9/3/2021 at 11:46 PM, mrfortnite said:

If you are permanently banned it is 100% server politics on whether or not you are allowed to come back. Even if you are in the right or the wrong, if you are friends with the right people your ban isn't permanent

This is an iffy way to communicate the reality, because it's hinting that only through corruption do we choose who gets to come back and who doesn't in every case. I think that a better way to put this would be that permanent bans are mostly server politics because they are often from veteran players who have an expectation to understand the rules through and through. In the end, it doesn't matter who they are friends with because overall community opinion on the specifics will either amplify or outweigh those voices regardless. That community opinion doesn't always go the way of the appealer, as we saw with Oatlife when he had a 5:1 ratio in favor of unbanning him from various community members, but still had his appeal denied. The politics that are the deciding factors on a veteran player's appeal is whether or not they did something malicious/something that has long-term negative impact and whether or not they show remorse/understanding for their mistake. 

The issue with Oatlife's situation is that he showed both remorse/understanding for his mistakes and proved that both of his violations caused no long-term negative impact and were not malicious, but was denied anyway. 

 

There are two options when it comes to situations like this, and they are:

1. Pretend that we enforce every rule no matter what with no exceptions and keep this player banned for the literal reason of rule-breaking.

2. Be normal people and come to the bigger understanding that he didn't do anything truly malicious and should be unbanned because he's proved himself worth of one through his appeal. 

Edited September 5, 2021 by bishopil

[Proggy 3,818]

Can someone jog my memory of the incident that initially got him banned?

Was it on Charikar? I think I may have been there as a 2GA off to the sides when it happened.
If it's the same incident I'm remembering, I would definitely +1 for an unban with time served, if that's the only thing he's banned for.

*edit* nvm I read through his appeal and yeah, I def remember standing off to the sides of that when he got banned.

Disregarding the Ban Evasion stuff, I do think intentional mass being a perm ban should be taken case by case.
The punishment should honestly be temporary (even if it's still a long punishment like 6 months to a year) for most cases and only extended to permanent if certain criteria is met. A permanent ban for shooting one rpg at friends in peacetime when the server was at its lowest pop does not seem fitting.

Edited September 5, 2021 by proggy

[Party 67]

Since non of y’all know why it got denied/ overruled. 1. Denied for the ban evasion.

2. Jake said he is not willing to unban him for reasons he doesn’t want to make public. We had a long discussion on the appeal in staff discord and Jake said his reason. So pls chill out.

[Jackal 709]

4 hours ago, Party said:

Since non of y’all know why it got denied/ overruled. 1. Denied for the ban evasion.

Yeah we know that from the post on the appeal it was denied for ban evasion. The whole point of the thread is to discuss the difference between someone maliciously ban evading and an individual just playing the server. Furthermore, the initial ban was for Mass RDM which also wasn't a malicious mass. I.E. running into a DB and gunning everyone down, tryout, etc. I am trying to understand why it's hard to be the least bit understanding with people actually showing change.

The other issue with that decision is that if Oatlife, when making the appeal, didn't include his ban evading he would be playing the server now. So why penalize a player for being transparent and open about their past mistakes.
 

4 hours ago, Party said:

2. Jake said he is not willing to unban him for reasons he doesn’t want to make public. We had a long discussion on the appeal in staff discord and Jake said his reason. So pls chill out.

But this is precisely the issue. Seemingly nitpicking and keeping Oatlife banned for ban evading after he admitted to it comes off as Jake, assuming what you are saying is true, trying to have ANY reason to keep him banned. Also, I can't imagine why in this circumstance the ACTUAL reason wouldn't be openly stated on the appeal. Especially because giving the ACTUAL reason helps Oatlife improve assuming he hasn't already. If anything it's just disingenuous to do otherwise.
So we can't just "chill out" if this is the discretion that staff take when determining decisions on ban appeals and other staff related decisions. Especially when it seems that the decision was determined by the Super Admin of MRP and other staff being complicit.

Edited September 7, 2021 by Jackal

[Party 67]

Man idk what to tell you lol all I did was giving you guys the information I have. Idk what is the reason but when we asked Jake he said he doesn’t want anyone else to know so don’t come attacking me. But in any case him ban evading was the reason it got denied is the same reason duglas got denied any many other ( I can find other appeals if you really want me to) so this situation is no different. As I said before and it was mainly me and bish who discussed it and I gave him counter argument to everything he said. Either way it doesn’t matter cuz jake said he has a reason for him to not get unbanned and well he is SA and he is SA for a very good fucking reason so idk why your little friend group (or not I truly don’t know if you are lol) wanting this guy to get unbanned so bad when there is 20 reasons for him not to, the decision was made by the super admin so you need to understand that.

Edited September 7, 2021 by Party

[Jackal 709]

31 minutes ago, Party said:

Man idk what to tell you lol all I did was giving you guys the information I have. Idk what is the reason but when we asked Jake he said he doesn’t want anyone else to know so don’t come attacking me. 

Yeah and as the post prefaced it's a discussion. You should kinda expect a response to your post. Furthermore, I haven't attacked you I'm just trying to have a back and forth.
 

31 minutes ago, Party said:

But in any case him ban evading was the reason it got denied is the same reason duglas got denied any many other ( I can find other appeals if you really want me to) so this situation is no different.

I personally don't care about past instances or examples of other people doing "similar" things because these situations should be dealt with case by case. That is because they are all typically very much different unlike what you are trying to push. For example, Duglas was banned for extensive racism not a meaningless mass and was kept banned because of the racism and previous permas according to the appeal. 
So as I've made clear prior my stance is to deal with these appeals "case by case" and not precedent.
 

31 minutes ago, Party said:

 Either way it doesn’t matter cuz jake said he has a reason for him to not get unbanned and well he is SA and he is SA for a very good fucking reason

That literally holds no relevance to the decision. Jake or any executive all have the capacity to be wrong or do wrong. Pulling rank in a situation like this more so illustrates you being complicit with abuse of power. I do not care about appeals to authority in a discussion like this because ALL authority have the compacity to be wrong.
 

31 minutes ago, Party said:

 so idk why your little friend group (or not I truly don’t know if you are lol) wanting this guy to get unbanned so bad when there is 20 reasons for him not to

If you don't know if I'm in a friendgroup or not why throw out the claim like that? Regardless I made the post out of my own accord because I thought that it would be both a meaningful discussion and bring to light issues that may/may not be already present in the staff team. But I don't really know how "being in a friendgroup" is even relevant to the discussion. I believe that Oatlife should've been unbanned it's pretty simple.
Also, you say there are 20 reasons for him to stay banned so list 5 so that Oatlife can improve upon it.

 

31 minutes ago, Party said:

the decision was made by the super admin so you need to understand that.

After the two most recent posts you've made it's been made clear that the super admin made the decision but that doesn't excuse the decision through and through. Also, it doesn't explain why Jake didn't just post on it himself if he has as much power as you are trying to portray. I do not care about the rank that made the decision I care about the decision itself because no one on the server, other than Garnet, can just make any decision they want when they want especially without criticism.
 

Edited September 7, 2021 by Jackal

[Party 67]

@Jackali would love to know the reason as well but I guess we can either hear it from @Jakeor  outlife and we’ll Jake broke both of his arms today so yeah.

[Ziggy 1,353]

49 minutes ago, Party said:

I gave him counter argument to everything he said.

Bro every time I asked you a question or tried to explain a concept to you, you said "there isn't a point to talk about this" or "this debate is pointless". 

 

49 minutes ago, Party said:

so idk why your little friend group (or not I truly don’t know if you are lol) wanting this guy to get unbanned so bad when there is 20 reasons for him not to

We gave you 100 reasons he should while your only argument against it was "rules are rules", when we clearly have seen fluidity with them in the past. Also our "friendgroup" of a grand total of two people are on this thread trying to get this player unbanned because we

1. Have good reason to and can defend our argument

2. Know him well

Don't paint it as "this friendgroup just wants their friend unbanned!", when that's only half of the picture. It's me and Jackal trying to create conversation around an appeal we feel should be looked at again. Obviously he is our friend and we do want him unbanned, but we know that this player has a defendable appeal. There are a number of other veterans that I am friends with and are banned, but I didn't encourage those players to appeal and argue this hard because those players didn't have a situation like Oatlife's. 

Edited September 7, 2021 by bishopil