A bit of a ridiculous rule. I mean, they're banned so why can't we talk about the reason for It etc in a polite, reapectful mannwe??

'Polite respectful manner'
Most of those who want to discuss a certain ban in the SB don't do it politely or respectfully. I think it's a good rule to follow the rule. No support at all. I think if someone wants to know why someone is banned, it's better to just message a mod/staff about it.

Users who are banned are allowed to send in an email asking for a ban repeal.

Personally no support. From my experience while on occasion some talks can be civil, most of the time it  causes a lot of drama or even at times can just be the banned user themselves creating a second account to argue about their ban.

Even if the intention was wanting to talk about the user in a polite and respectful way, most likely drama would still occur. Besides, that isn't the only reason for not discussing banned users. The biggest reason for not discussing banned users is out of respect for that user and their privacy. Staff isn't going to discuss the reasons they were banned because it really isn't anyone else's business. The reason you are getting the same answer in private is because even in private it still isn't anyone else's business why the ban happened, and because 9/10 times the banned user is already out there telling their friends a different story anyway. Not only would it be a violation of their privacy, it would only create more drama. This is not something that is going to change.

I don't see a coldness in Ashton's post, or a sarcastic remark? Ashton doesn't have that attitude about banned users, and neither does anyone else on staff. It's a misconception by some that we feel that way, but we don't. 

My interpretation of that remark was in no way connecting this discussion to that event, at all. Never even entered my mind. I figured it was referring to the fact that another staff (Jess) had already posted a "no support" before. 

We don't want to have to ask every important discussion to the forums. The majority of users have asked that those discussions be taken from the chat to the forums. They have not expressed this publicly, and have come to staff through other means to ask this. Of course we can't screenshot this type of thing though. We have asked (and I believe this is on that other site that Pat posted in an update somewhere, it's been a while though so the url does not come to mind at the moment) though that in the next site version that is currently being worked on, that there be multiple chatrooms and the ability for users to create their own chatrooms in which they can do things like debate certain topics. That was intended to happen in the site version we are on now, and the only reason it was taken down is that there were no moderating tools whatsoever included in the chat software which left us rather helpless if someone came in and started to cause some real trouble. And no one is warned "on the record" when being asked to move those discussions, they're just being asked to move them. If they don't comply and start to argue at that point and it becomes an issue then a warning on the record is probably going to result, but just being asked to move it in and of itself isn't a warning that sticks around. 

I feel like I can stand in the mid-point of you guys. Cause I know the rules and I try to be respectful always (I can fail too ok?) I think myself, I have been in a couple (2-3 maybe) of situations where I feel like a user is breaking the rules and seems like staff don't do anything about it. When I say something, staff calls me out. So naturally my first thought is: Staff don't like me even if I'm pointing out something that's not ok. Turns out my comment was the one breaking the rules (14BM knows what I mean cause she answered my ticket) Then I came around to understand what was wrong, and how everything happened. But who was right or wrong is not what I'm talking about; me and one of my friends were discussing this the other day. What I'm trying to get at sometimes is, it looks like staff are biased towards users and allow some of them to do stuff that woudn't allow others to do, when we clearly know thats not the case. I THINk I can pinpoint the moment where the misunderstanding happens; Not all situations are the same and they ought to be treated differently. The blanket policy like broken mentioned is what makes it LOOK (PLEASE look at the caps, im not saying this is how it works) that staff sometimes do their job and sometimes not and that it depends on the user. (That's how it's viewed from users perspective and being told to "drop it and take it to rmail/support ticket" doesn't help. [Though i'm not debating this way to act since it's to prevent a heated and awkward feeling in the shout box and i find it understandable, besides that staff usually address towards user in a polite manner]) How can we fill this gap of comumnication though? (I'm not sure how many of you can agree to my statement here) But here its my possible solution. Having sub-rule pages. What does this implies? Having the number of usual rules in the same place (A page that a user can read and not take excessively amounts of time and understand the basics of the rules of conduct) And on each rule have a link that would take you to a nice compilation of cases and examples of the rules, when it is applied and when it's not. (Which is optional to read and most likely to only be used as reference) It's obvious that not all cases and situations can be put as an example, cause that way it would certainly be massive. But it could range from situations where its easily to point out the mistake, to those (like my case) where you think you're doing nothing wrong when you really are. I believe this would help define for example what is mini-modding, what is not among other stuff. The sub rules page would only have around 10 examples each maybe and let us understand the difference and importance of context and wording. And still specify that any situation out of the ones portrayed are to be handled by the discretion of staff. maybe these sub-rules could be handled in the forums via threads. So they can be edited without as much trouble after the agreement of the staff department. or any other media where the users can see it and it isn't as exclusive as the actual rules page editing and modification-wise. Also this way, whenever rules of conduct are updated. It would be nice to maybe have staff link it and announce its updated, like advertisement, how they did when they were hiring. (This was my friends idea <3) So those users who are usually just bound to look at things wrong and just assume things, stop saying that staff secretly change the rules and do it for the sole purpose of having new reasons to warn and ban users. Sadly though some people are always looking for reasons to criticize and will just twist words to be able to, and that's the kind of things we cant do anything about.

That's a really good suggestion Pretzel and staff have actually been working on something similar to that for a while now. There's gonna be a rather lighthearted re-write of the rules for the main rules page, the idea is something kind of comical to make you smile but at the same time getting the point across, then a link to somewhere else that can be edited and give a more in-depth explanation/details as to what the rules mean, with examples. I'm not sure yet if the edited area will happen in forums, or if there will be some other area on site that will be created for that purpose, but I am wondering if maybe we should just stick with forums so that questions can be asked specifically to clear up any confusion.

Oh I know broken hehe. I did understand that, it makes total sense. ^_^