Contact information for banned user removed

[Heather]

I have removed a post that contained contact information for Fent. The reasons why I did this are still being looked into. I apologize to Fent for creating this post, before I had actual proof of what occurred. Such a fuss was made that I really was worried for the members of this site, and at this point I'm not sure if my post was justified. This post may be modified again if and when I do receive that proof.

I also retract my statement that all the moderators agree on this issue, as I do not believe this is the case. There appears to be at least one moderator who was against the actions taken. I hope that in the future all moderators would take a stand for any action that they felt was unjust. I don't expect all moderators to always agree, just that they will say something when they don't. Otherwise I become the liar when I make statements based on what I'm being told, and not how things really are. Also, moderators aren't allowed to discuss moderator topics with anyone else, and such is cause for removal.

Please use discretion when talking on the Internet to anyone. Do not give out ANY personal information. I will allow this thread to remain open to address any concerns about internet safety.

[MorningStar]

Thank you, Heather. I really appreciate you looking out for everyone's safety. :)

[Moksha]

This is a bit extraneous, but I hope Sgallan can return sometime. :)

[skalenfehl]

This is a bit extraneous, but I hope Sgallan can return sometime. :)

This isn't about sgallan.

[Alaskagain]

WHAT???!!! You mean Sgallan is Still HERE?????

(Sorry sgallan!)

Moksha, you are so funny.

[Guest GreenMum]

After much thought and debate... I was wondering if I, too, can have my information and profile and such removed...

I don't feel this site is conducive to my growth as an LDS woman... and actually have found some of the posts here blasphemous and wrong! I don't want to associate with any group that allows things of such nature.

I came here under the assumption it was an LDS community and the more I see, the less I feel like it is nurturing that area of my life.

Thank you.

Green Mum

[skalenfehl]

GreenMum, this site is frequented by people from all walks of life with all levels of faith and understanding. Even we as LDS members are at various stages of spiritual growth. The great thing about this site is that we can discuss and try to sort through it all while growing and making friends.

[MaidservantX]

Your post makes me sad, Green Mum, and I'm sorry you don't feel you can participate fully and make this site all that you personally would like it to be. There are a lot of different people here in differing places in life and the site does not dictate every thing that goes on -- only watching out that specific rules are not broken.

I have been a part of this site and its predecessor for over a year. I have seen the good and the bad. I have felt like being here and making the site better and better and better is well worth my time despite the 'bad', the challenges, and the growing pains.

Everyone is free to blog, give their testimony, start forum threads, join in chat, build up their profile page, submit news content, and much, much more! Again, other than specific rule breaking -- if there is something that you think could and should be better, including being more in line with what the gospel is and should be, then the best idea in my opinion is for each of us to take responsibility for participating (if you otherwise have time). I believe it is possible for the Holy Ghost to join us on this website, and that is what I am hoping and preparing for when I write the things I write here on lds.net. There will continue to be positive changes and improvements and goings on on lds.net -- and you can be a part of that.

Thank you for all staff and members who do so much!

[WillowTheWhisp]

One of the things which I find good about this site is that provided people treat others with respect then many points of view are aired and even non members have a right to their opinions.

[SomeoneCares]

This is an open letter to the banned user, who has been keeping us very busy lately. I know that someone will make sure she gets to read it.

You are not alone. You've been here with us a long time now, so I know it must hurt to feel driven off and forcibly seperated from your friends. Despite what happenned, Heavenly Father still loves you. So do your friends, including me.

It took great courage to admit to the things you did. Most of us would be too ashamed to talk about them. However, you went perhaps too far in the other direction. You know how Heavenly Father feels about that stuff, so I don't need to remind you. You have some very strange ideas, but you have a good heart.

Something you don't seem to realize is the forums and chat are seperate. In chat, everyone knows you. We're used to your blunt honesty and bursts of excitement over the smallest things. We know how you tend to get a bit childish when you feel that someone hasn't been treating you fairly. You make us smile, you make us laugh, and we like having you around. We miss you!

The forums are another matter. Some people go to both, but a lot of the people who visit the forums don't visit chat, and they don't know you. Try to see it from their perspective. All of a sudden this stranger shows up and starts talking about the things you did. How do you think they felt about that? They don't know that you are a well-meaning, genuinely caring person. They just saw you as an incredible pervert looking for shock value. You may have posted what you did to keep it away from where it was inappropriate, and you were right to do so, but the forum members didn't have any context to know why you might have a good reason to say all that. Never mind the poorly handled mess about the unexplained change of site rules.

You didn't understand the forum/chat split, so you overreacted when people were negative towards you. Your behavior after that point wasn't out of line, but it didn't help incline people to trust you or see things from your point of view. I'm not sure if you get this, but you were banned for trying to get people to contact you, and not for your post. As on the forum, many of the moderators don't know you, and they were concerned that you were trying to offer inappropriate products and services to the members. I know you wouldn't do that, but the others did not. Not everyone knows about the church you are creating and the values you hold dear. It's like you're trying to tap out a song and have people guess what it is. The tune is in your head, but all they hear is disconnected tapping. Sometimes things are so intimately familiar to us that we have trouble imagining how other people can't understand them. It's like that for the church too. Sometimes people can hear the tune so loud in their minds, they don't understand how other people only get the taps.

Your behavior needed to stop, but I don't think you really deserved to be banned. [omitted] Maybe you won't be coming back here, but it's not too late to come back to church. Never mind the name removal. You know in your heart that Heavenly Father wants you to return to Him. You have too sweet a spirit to convince me otherwise. I hope you will remember the tune. Life can be so lonely if all you notice from Heavenly Father is the tapping.

You got too angry and upset, and now this has happenned. Please try to learn from the experience.

[aruth5000]

and we call ourselves mormons .. what ever happened to forgivness ... i guess this is a special case right .. ya try explaining that one to god ... you know im not sure i like this so much anymore and im afaird to say you guys may not see much anymore ... you know this really makes me sick ..

[VisionOfLehi]

and we call ourselves mormons .. what ever happened to forgivness ... i guess this is a special case right .. ya try explaining that one to god ... you know im not sure i like this so much anymore and im afaird to say you guys may not see much anymore ... you know this really makes me sick ..

President Hinckley said you can forgive a man, but that does not mean you ever have to do business with him again.

[I_hate_this]

I am a naturally defensive person, and so I make bad choices sometimes. I don't know why it is so difficult for me to ignore when I feel attacked, but it is. It's probably another side effect of how I was treated growing up, and it is something I would like to work on, but not here.

I have been trying to leave for a long time now, and every time I think it's going to happen, someone steps up and escalates the problem. Then I escalate it back... but before I manage to calm down and try to fix things, I experience the fallout from what I did before. It's a viscious cycle, but it rarely gets as bad as it did this time. What started out as a simple misunderstanding got way out of hand. I accept responsibility for my part in that.

I have made a lot of people angry, and I'm sorry. Even if I'm not sorry for the beliefs I hold dear, I'm sorry to everyone I have offended, including Heather. I've come to realise how much my actions have harmed others, and my faith requires me to do what I can to make up for it. So here I am, eating crow. It tastes awful. Nothing at all like chicken.

By writing this, I am not trying to have my ban removed, or solicit a response, an apology, or permission to say goodbye. I am simply owning up to my mistakes.

I have some kind of defensiveness problem, and I need help. You have no idea how painful and embarassing it is to admit that... I'm actually crying with shame as I write this. Please, help me... I'm not asking anyone here to talk to me about it, I'm not asking for attention. Please help me just by not baiting me. You can be my friend or forget me entirely, but please, help me leave this in the past. I don't want to hurt or upset anyone.

You can remove what I have written or keep it here, whatever you like. It's ok if you want to make me a forbidden topic on the site... in fact that's probably for the best. I thought today at work that I was finished with this place, then someone told me about this thread. I don't entirely agree with Heather's version of the story, so I couldn't help but write to her and some other people. I keep leaving, only to be drawn back in. I've spent most of tonight trying to write this message, instead of the one I might prefer to write. It hasn't been easy at all. What is being implied about me in this thread is very hard to ignore.

I'm known for being non-judgmental, but when I'm judged, I can't handle it. I don't want to be like this anymore. I want to learn how to lose a fight. I think this is a good way to start, but it sure isn't fun.

[Moksha]

I feel that it is my responsibility to embrace as many different types of people as I can. Hopefully, I can touch them and they can touch me, so that in the end our contact will have made us not only better people, but respecters of the Great Request as well.

[MaidservantX]

I love you and like you and I appreciate your post and I think it took courage. I can see "everyone"s point of view . . . plus I have my own! ha ha.

I support the staff and moderators of LDS Mormon Network and the decisions they make. It isn't an easy job. They try to think of a lot of angles.

I don't know what else to say. I'm not sure how "we" all got to this point.

[WillowTheWhisp]

and we call ourselves mormons .. what ever happened to forgivness ... i guess this is a special case right .. ya try explaining that one to god ... you know im not sure i like this so much anymore and im afaird to say you guys may not see much anymore ... you know this really makes me sick ..

President Hinckley said you can forgive a man, but that does not mean you ever have to do business with him again.

Forgiveness does not mean that we permit the continuation of the thing which needed to be forgiven. If someone hurts you you do not have to let them continue to hurt you even though you may forgive them for doing so.

If something is posted on this site which contravenes the rules of the site then surely it should be removed. If the poster accepts that and doesn't do it again then all will surely be forgiven and forgotten, but if each time an offending post is removed it were to be reposted then what should be done? I know what I would do, as I have done elsewhere, if the poster refused to accept the board policy.

I don't know what the problem was behind this thread, the cause for someone to be banned and the problems which followed it but I cannot imagine that the decision would have been taken lightly. As a moderator elsewhere I know how difficult the job can be sometimes and it can be a thankless task but I'm sure the people who run this site try to do the best they can in the best interests of all the members and if sometimes that results in an unpopular decision being made I know they will not have made the judgement lightly.

I don't know the identity of the person who was banned but assume they have rejoined in a new name in order to make the earlier post - I can appreciate the feelings behind that post and the struggle which the person must have gone through in order to make it. Personally I always try to see all sides of a situation and I would like to wish you well, I_hate_this and hope that you will win your struggle to accept criticism or judgement without taking offence. Sometimes humility requires a great deal of strength which is often perceived by the World as weakness until they learn to understand it.

[Elphaba]

. . . and even non members have a right to their opinions.

Thank goodness Willow! I can't keep my mouth shut.

Elphaba

[WillowTheWhisp]

You must be feeling better

[nallags]

This is a bit extraneous, but I hope Sgallan can return sometime.

Nah..... he is a godless heathen who shouldn't be posting on religious boards. My guess is he wouldn't last a week before somebody complained and a specific moderator would ban him again.

[Guest Seraphim]

Your name looks like Sgallan spelled backwards.

[nallags]

Wow... what a coincidence.

[Guest Seraphim]

Wow... what a coincidence.

I know. I hope Sgallan joins us when his ban is lifted. :)

[Shell72]

President Hinckley said you can forgive a man, but that does not mean you ever have to do business with him again.

I don't recall God ever saying anything like that.

[Heather]

and we call ourselves mormons .. what ever happened to forgivness ... i guess this is a special case right .. ya try explaining that one to god ... you know im not sure i like this so much anymore and im afaird to say you guys may not see much anymore ... you know this really makes me sick ..

It's one thing for me to get emails on it. That I'm use to and I'm fine with that. But when a banned users sends threatening emails to one of the moderators, that's where I draw the line. Whether that email was sent by or in behalf of the person, it's something I take very seriously. That's where I feel it's my duty to remove contact information from the site and make sure that I inform others to take caution. Most of the moderators think I give way too many second chances, but I think people can change, and if someone want to conform to the rules of the site and be a part of it, I'm all for it. But if you go after one of the moderators, any compassion I have is out the window. This isn't about forgiveness. She isn't looking for a second chance. She doesn't want to be a part of the site. This is about cause and effect; actions and consequence.

[WillowTheWhisp]

I don't recall God ever saying anything like that.

Well Jesus did say, "Go, and sin no more."