Edict #14
November 21, 2021
It was recently suggested by Alex Lorien that me considering a Tier 1 or Tier 2 penalty over a “Discord spat” was excessive. I agree that the very first thing that occurred in this unfortunate change of events was a “Discord spat.” But Alex has continued to escalate this to the point where my hands are now tied.
Earlier in the week, an innocuous Discord moderation took place. Alex may have violated the Discord channel rule against profanity (either inadvertently or not knowing the full rule), and a moderator reminded Alex about the rule. Frankly, this should all have ended there.
Alex’s first action was to “pull rank” on the moderator, suggesting that because his member rank was Captain and may be higher than the channel’s moderator (it wasn’t, but that’s besides the point), he could overrule the moderator. When the moderator pointed out that it was his position in the club (either a member of TECH, or an operator appointed by TECH, as per the club’s bylaws), Alex expressed surprise that a club position like being appointed a moderator of the channel overrules club rank (of course it does, it has always done so for the last 20 years).
When the “pulling rank” action did not work, Alex’s second action was to question the authority of TECH and the channel rules. This led to the moderator, and a second moderator answering Alex’s questions, and the second moderator provided a link to the TECH bylaw, and explaining the procedure for changing a bylaw or reviewing a Discord rule. A third moderator then corrected the second moderator (the second moderator thought it had been six years since the Discord rules were updated, where the third moderator pointed out they had been updated six months ago). Alex then asked the third moderator his earlier questions for the other moderators. The third moderator gave similar answers, and provided quotes from the bylaws, and again explained the procedure for changing the bylaws. I have reviewed the logs in question, and the moderators appeared to do their best to be polite and informative of where Alex can find the information he is looking for and how to initiate changes.
Alex’s third action was to then become insulative or abusive of the third moderator in the public channel. His responsive became increasingly sarcastic and passive-aggressive. He implied that the moderator was “talking down” to him. He told the moderator that part of problem with TECH was that the members of TECH (which this moderator was) was unable or ill-suited to socially moderate a chat room. The third moderator reminded that it was hard to read tone in a text-based medium. Alex continued his earlier language. By this time other members were expressing that they were uncomfortable with the tone the discussion had taken, and the first moderator asked for it to stop. The discussion did not stop, Alex continued, and the third moderator suggested an alternative approach for Alex to email TECH with any suggestions. Alex continued his earlier approach.
The first moderator then again tried to stop the discussion in the #public channel, this time successfully. He asked to speak to Alex in a DM to de-escalate the situation. In that DM, Alex said he would continue to tried to get the bylaws and rules changed by his earlier approach in #public. The moderator had to repeatedly tell him that #public was not the forum, and it need to happen in Command for a bylaw change or TECH for a rule review. Alex kept telling the moderator that that the moderator was wrong, and that Alex would continue his approach in DIscord. Alex also suggested that the second and second moderator were bullying him, which I did not see at all in my review of the logs. Alex then started insulting the second and third moderators, implying a history he had with both of them (that I can’t see possibly existing, and Alex did not clarify that when I raised it later on). Alex said he would be complaining about them, and the complaints would be a problem for Rob’s term as president.
The first moderator was concerned about the DM he had with Alex, and flagged it for review. TECH reviewed it, and decided that an immediate ban from Discord was required to prevent this from continuing. It was then referred to me as President for review.
I asked to clarify some comments he made to the first moderator (and then in reply to TECH’s email re the Discord ban) about the complaints in Rob’s term. Alex replied back that he believed the issues he planed to raise in the club would take longer than two weeks (and therefore go into Rob’s term) in part because: “This would have been on top of the complaints about how I felt belittled and bullied by two senior people I would be making, and so envisaged that taking a long time as I expect it would be emotive to other members of the club who may have ideas of their own regarding anything I raised.”. In other words, Alex made it clear his approach now was instead of suggesting changes to the TECH bylaw or the rules, or how the bylaw operates in practice, he planed to direct his comments again two volunteers of the club personally, in the hope of stirring up other members to also comment publicly about these two volunteers. Let me clear that this would be unacceptable against any member of STF.
After that email I was particularly worried. Alex had shown a willingness to publicly abuse and insult volunteers if he was not happy with the message. Besides the effect that has on those volunteers, it made other members uncomfortable in what should be an inviting chat room venue. Alex had made it clear that he was willing to use unacceptable methods to continue some perceived vendetta against these volunteers. All in response to a minor “Discord spat”.
My worries led me to think that we may be a Terms of Service situation, which could mean a Tier 1 or 2 penalty under our bylaws. Alex had earlier said he did not want more email exchanges, but our bylaws require me to give him an opportunity to respond, so I laid out my concerns in as much detail as I could, with references to the logs whenever possible.
Alex replied back to my email today. The email is a further escalation. Instead of clarifying, explaining, commenting on his earlier actions that led us to this point, Alex escalated the situation. Specifically, he has claimed to report our “illegal” actions to eight different agencies/companies for them to investigate STF. Alex said he is not threatening me or the rest of the STF, but he is making a “promise” of action to come.
And that, for me, is the final escalation. For STF to operate, we have to be able to enforce our polices without being threatened with legal action. To be clear, I have no concern with Alex (or any member) from disagree with club polices and/or how they are enforced. I have had issues like that in the past, and we have processes that work for addressing that and making changes in the club. Being abusive to the volunteers who are simply explaining the process, threatening to drag those volunteers down in a public forum in the hope other people will also bring down those individuals, and then threatening legal action are not only inappropriate actions, but they are completely inconsistent with how this club operates, and violates the Terms of Service. It is also clear throughout all of this that Alex has no interest in changing his approach, and will continue to escalate when challenged.
Therefore, I have no choice but to permanently ban Alex Lorien. This ban includes all STF-controlled resources on third-party platforms.
Daniel Lerner
Prsident