[Resolved] Ban appeal

[Armolitskiy]

In-Game name: Armolitskiy
Time of Ban:

20:07

Date of Ban:

07-26-23

Steam ID:

STEAM_0:1:241690392

Reason for Ban:

Racism/hate speech

Additional Comments:
I don't care what skin color a person really is, and I, like all normal people, am annoyed when someone spams n-words or says stupid and unfunny jokes about other races. I don't think it's funny. It seems to me that the admin overdid it or was offended by something or felt that my jokes or some words could be offensive to someone. If that's the case, then I apologize and won't say that anymore.

Yes, I sometimes get very angry when I play this game, because the balance of the teams is often wrong and some nerds just kill me all the time and I can't do anything about it, that's why I sometimes write nasty things in the chat, for which I ask you to forgive me.

I would understand if I was constantly spamming n-word, but I didn't do that.

I just want to play and talk to people in a chat.

I don't deserve permaban, replace it with a one-week ban or something, please.

Also, I haven't heard anyone complain about me (except admins, who sometimes mute me).

 

[VintagePC]

Apologies for the delay. Your appeal has been received and I'll get back to you shortly once I have a chance to review the details.

 

[VintagePC]

It would appear that you already have 4 separate mute/silence infractions on record with us:
- Two for inappropriate language
- One for transphobic remarks
- One for voicespam.

Additionally, I'm also informed that you were banned from the Official TF2C Discord for similar reasons.

These prior infractions are all considered when deciding subsequent punishments and you are somewhat correct that under normal circumstances this many infractions would have resulted in a medium-length comms ban.

The reason this was a permanent ban is that you were observed typing symbols in chat which appear to be in the context of support for the Russian war in Ukraine.




As it stands:

Z (military symbol) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Note especially the following excerpts:

Due to its association with the war in Ukraine, the Z has become a militarist symbol in Russian propaganda[9] and is used by Russian civilians to indicate support for the invasion. The symbol has subsequently been banned from public display in various countries, and its use has been criminalized by several European governments.

International Censure (By governments)

• Czech Republic – as part of a ban on publicly supporting the invasion, the Ministry of the Interior has classified the "Z" symbol as an equivalent to the swastika.[84][59]
• Estonia – in April 2022, a ban was issued by the Riigikogu.[85]
• Georgia – the ban of symbols is proposed by Lelo for Georgia opposition party.[86]
• Germany – the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community said that using "Z" to indicate support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine is a felony punishable by up to three years in prison.[87][88][89]
  
  • In April 2022, the vehicle registration office in Herford, North Rhine-Westphalia ceased issuing vehicle registration plates with the letter combination "HF-Z" due to the use of the letter "Z" as a symbol of a war of aggression.[90]

Our EU servers are located in Germany and we are very clear about this in our Server Rules, both on hate speech (in consideration of those that consider these symbols to be pro- fascist and/or genocidal) and content that is considered illegal in the jurisdictions where our servers reside.

I'm therefore concluding this ban is within our established policies and will not be overturned at this time.

 

[Armolitskiy]

I didn't send these messages seriously. There's no context, it's mischief, just jokes. Is it really that hard to understand?

 

[VintagePC]

I suppose you were also joking when you said "admins are fucking morons" and then immediately felt the need to point out an admin was from Ukraine, or when you said

Spoiler

"trans are not humans"

We don't accept "I was joking" as an excuse for rule violations and I've said as much in other appeals that have tried the same line for racism, transphobia, whatever. Frankly, if that's your sense of humour to a public audience, we have nothing further to discuss. I don't particularly care what you say in private in the company of your friends as jokes, but we will have none of that in our servers in the interest of keeping them friendly for everyone.

You got called on your actions, had your three strikes, and these are the consequences.