Rule Change (New Staff Power)

[Heat]

You know what i'm just not going to respond anymore because I don't feel like getting misrepresented.

Then perhaps you should concentrate on representing yourself more clearly. I'm not saying that to be insulting, but a forum is a verbal medium; so communication is sort of important.

Let's just say that the scenario painted in this thread is accurate. It's actually the opposite, but we'll go with it for the moment. A civil war breaks out among the Staff. One or two want a certain member banned so badly they can taste it. Others disagree violently and aren't afraid of making it clear. The rest decide not to get involved. What's the worst that can happen? Every Staff member has access to the ban function, with options to determine the ban length. Purging is also standard kit, which erases everything about a member except their profile page.

Point is that no high-order action of this nature is completely irreversible. Even purged accounts can be reinstated from database backups, though I believe not unscathed (I think kudos and reputation levels are lost). The reason this doesn't happen as a matter of course is that purging is reserved for spammers - and I don't think we want those things back.

This for me is an issue of trust. Mods have powers unavailable to grassroots members, and Admins even more arcane powers that would have you screaming for the hills if you only knew. Possibly. Being on Staff means being in a position of trust - like any relationship, if that trust isn't there then nothing is; and nothing is going to restore it.

I'm responding now since I didn't have time to at school.

Here's what i'll happily concede:

I messed up thinking my argument was original. I had my opinions, but didn't think through the application, or the fact that the "possibility" I spoke of was a well known fact, and not any new information I thought I was providing.
However, the reason I said I was being misrepresented, is one that dates back to many other posts on these forums. I have become increasingly agitated with this. Notice how I said "possibility" neutrally, I think you realize this, and realize that I simply just didn't understand the entire broader view. Contrary, many many times where I have felt misrepresented on this forum, it's when people jump to extremes for no reason even when I specifically go out of my way to clarify what I am not saying. I won't name past conflicts, even though I definitely would like to. 

But, this misrepresentation can be seen in SteelCurtain's post, reasoning for why I am frustrated being how when I say "Possibility that some sort of conflicting judgement could end up in unfair action taking place" I say this very neutrally for a reason, not suggesting that it will. I even responded to Steel clarifying this. However, Steel, like the other people I have gotten mad at in the past, still pushed this willfully ignorant and ever-so-frustrating notion that I was claiming that "Staff is corrupt", and had a "Low opinion/expectation of staff". It's this mindset that people have, I can never understand, that somehow someone has to be either incredibly in favor of one side, or the other. Simply because I suggested something slightly in favor of one side, especially clarifying that this suggestion was only that the possibility of a single scenario could occur, DOES NOT mean I am extreme in this view, and to suggest this repeatedly after being corrected, not only is willful ignorance, but a failure to attempt to have a proper, meaningful, cooperative conversation with others. That is exactly why I am frustrated whenever I feel misrepresented, and I hope Stimbo, you understand where I am coming from.