Are forum veterans above the rules?

Alonso

For the past few months subtledoctor and FinneousPJ have been trolling me. Subtledoctor has been especially annoying:

Here he tried to make fun of me (“I would laugh at you”) and accused me of trying to deceive the game developers. I was not the only one feeling disrespected. In that occasion he apologized.

At first I was happy with an apology, but two weeks later he insulted me and tried to make fun of me again, meaning that his apology was insincere. I reported him and an administrator asked him to stop, which he did, but only for some time.

He kept bugging me and I kept reporting him, but it was useless. A few weeks later he hijacked my thread and accused me and others of lying (“it's not true. Honestly it's starting to seem a bit suspicious”).

Why has nothing been done about this? Why are the administrators ignoring my complaints? I know this guy is a veteran of the forums, he has posted more than 5,000 messages and published some content. Is that the reason? Does this mean that the veterans are above the rules? Seriously, I just want him to leave me alone!

Cahir

Oh boy, don't you think you're overreacting a bit? I've read the threads pointed out by you and maybe in the second one @subtledoctor went too hard on you, but I bet he didn't meant to be a jerk. And they were trying to be as helpful as they can most of the time.

Mr2150

I think that intent and tone all have a bearing on the discussion. I'm going to assume they don't mean to cause you any kind of upset and that they are trying to be helpful, and in general they have. Reading those isolated examples and yes, the tone or style can be aggressive and quite sharp sometimes, but I don't read them as offensive for the sake of being offensive.

That's the role of the moderators, to take an objective view of the situation.

This forum contains a wide variety of people with different views and different levels of understanding - those that are 'further ahead' in understanding should be patient with those that are not. If you recognise their behaviour as trolling then I would try to ignore it.

That said, I'm not defending any kind of behaviour and certainly regardless of their intent, if you are feeling victimised by someone then you should complain.

It's ok to disagree, it's ok to argue, it's not ok to victimise people.

Ulb

Disagreeing with you is not trolling. You seem to take things way too personal.
On a forum -also called a discussion board- things can get a bit though when different opinions collide, that's perfectly normal.
If you think someone insulted you or made comments that go against the TOS, report it to the admins/moderators but don't start drama threats, especially not in general modding.
Thanks

JuliusBorisov

First, this thread didn't belong to the Modding section, so I moved it. As the thread title focuses on the rules, I think the Site Resources subforum is the appropriate place.

Second, this forum has a report feature. If you think that something or somebody violates the site rules, just use this feature - and your report will be looked at by all moderators and admins. In your case, @Alonso, the reports you made were looked at and actions were taken accordingly. If you have something new to report, please, do.

Third, nobody is above the site rules, no matter how long ago he or she has registered on the forum and no matter how many posts he or she has. But I reiterate, that in order to report someone, you should use the Flag system.

At last, all the things mentioned in the OP, could be written in a PM to any of the site moderators. I seriously think the fact it's now open to everyone doesn't help at all. This is why, in order to reduce the risks, I'm closing this thread. If you (any of you) have something to add to the discussion, feel free to PM any moderator.