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DECISION – 'aristarchus':
Introduction:
Actions have consequences. This is not a matter of free speech or censorship.
Doxing "Doxing or doxxing is the act of publicly revealing previously private personal information about an individual or organization, usually via the internet." This is the definition upon which we are basing this decision. Legally, the term does not appear to be well-defined in the US but doxing is also covered by laws relating to harassment, threats, and abuse. Elsewhere in the world, the definitions are sometimes more clearly defined but might cover a broader interpretation than the US definitions. Which interpretation is applicable could depend on the location of the perpetrator.
Background:
We first noticed that something was amiss in late 2020. Submissions from 'aristarchus' would contain certain words, phrases and names which were apparently unconnected with the rest of the content. We were unable to understand their significance at that time, but they would be meaningful to the intended victim. (Story submissions by 'aristarchus' often contain additional material that he has inserted himself.) In almost all cases we removed them prior to posting the submission as a story because they had no bearing on the rest of the submission.
In late 2021 the doxing became more blatant both in comments that were made to stories and as well as on IRC. We also contacted the victim (by now it was obvious to us who it was) who responded and explained what had been published, where and when. We also discovered additional material that had not been seen by the victim. He had been suffering this abuse for a considerable time.
Please Note:
This investigation is not something that has been carried out purely on a whim by the admins on this site. During it we have consulted with and taken advice from a representative of the board of directors. (As an aside, SoylentNews PBC has never been 'run' by 'TheMightyBuzzard' or any of the current admin staff whose names you know well.) This is a serious matter and the investigation was conducted with utmost discretion by a very small team.
To ensure that 'aristarchus' is aware of this Decision he will receive an Admin-to-User message and an email to the address associated with his username drawing his attention to it.
Publishing Personal Information:
It is now apparent that 'aristarchus' has doxed at least one person in our community, and possibly others who may have left the site rather than suffer the harassment. This is not a single act, but has taken place repeatedly over a significant period of time.
'aristarchus' has published the victim's full name, where the victim lives, and the victim's employer. Presumably he believes this information to be accurate. We have seen additional comments that contain threats and state very personal information, such that posting them here would likely do further damage. We are trying to be discreet. If it were you, would you want us to air all the information that has been revealed? This action might also have placed other members of the victim's family at risk from abuse or embarrassment.
It is obvious that 'aristarchus' has conducted research away from this site. SoylentNews PBC does not hold such information nor has it been ever been declared in any comments.
We can only guess at the true reason behind these disclosures: at the very least it appears to be a smear campaign.
What We Have Done So Far:
- The victim has a full copy of all the evidence that we have been able to trace to date. The evidence was all publicly accessible. We are not aware of a compromise of any other community members' information. We are not going to indicate where this information might be found.
- We have made a separate backup of the database to ensure that evidence should not be lost.
- We have removed personal information from database comments and IRC logs where possible.
- It is entirely for the victim to decide whether to seek legal redress in this matter.
Options:
There are 2 options open to us.
(1) Permanent Ban
- 'aristarchus' will face a full and permanent ban from this community.
- His account(s) will be completely disabled.
- Any further posting he may make to the site will be treated as Spam.
(2) Temporary Ban
- 'aristarchus' will face a temporary ban of 3 months where his account(s) will be disabled. He will be able to restore his 'aristarchus' account when his ban ends. His conduct during this time will be taken into consideration before his account is reactivated.
- During the ban 'aristarchus' may still post on the site as an 'Anonymous Coward', with all the limitations that are associated with that i.e. no journal, no ability to moderate, etc. Whether he wishes to make his identity known in his AC posts is entirely up to him.
- During and subsequent to the ban he is to act as we would expect any other member of this community to act. He is not to disrupt other discussions nor is he to continue to complain about his treatment. The ban is entirely a consequence of his own actions. We will not discuss this matter publicly. If he has complaints he may contact us via email as usual.
- He is to refrain immediately and completely from harassing other members of this community.
- Any serious future abuses by 'aristarchus' can result in a permanent ban being imposed without further warning.
We acknowledge that 'aristarchus' regularly makes insightful and interesting observations and we recognize that he has many supporters on this site. That is why we have offered the option of a conditional Temporary ban.
Action/Conclusion:
'aristarchus' must now decide which ban he wishes to accept. This is not negotiable – there are no other options open to him. If he does not respond either by commenting here or by email within 48 hours of the release of this Decision then we will assume that he has chosen the Temporary Ban and he is bound by the conditions stated within it. He may elect to change to a Permanent ban at any time.
For legal reasons we do not intend to comment further. The community can now see why several of the site admins have been putting in long working days, sometimes in excess of 12 hours since just before Christmas. We are exhausted and need to have a period of normal activity so that we can recover. We urge the community to be circumspect and restrained in the discussions to this Decision – there is little to be gained from inflaming the current situation any further. We ask you not to speculate about the identity of the victim.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @08:58PM (15 children)
So nothing illegal happened, yet aristarchus is getting the ban hammer because he violated what most people would consider basic civility.
Along with the very clear Code of Conduct on the moderation about page we are finally seeing libertarians come to grips with reality. Been a long time coming, glad you political yahoos have obtained a smidgen of realization; though sadly I'm pretty confident saying it'll get buried as a one-off witch hunt and the Repub... LIBERTARIANS will go back to their stupid fREEdumb positions where they unironically try and cancel education, books, democracy and people.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @09:16PM (4 children)
... and the rules of the site. So, kind of making private decisions on private facilities. Seems pretty libertarian so far. If Aristarchus wants to have his own site, let him. Nobody here seems to care. Still pretty libertarian.
Ooooh, I'm sorry, I didn't see the problem at first. My bad.
You're confusing libertarians and progressive democrats. Yeah, easy mistake to make.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @09:59PM (3 children)
One moron triggered, check! Yet another libertarian failure of basic comprehension. Thanks for doling out the lulz, maybe one day libertarians will create a viable political party instead of being republicans that like to smoke pot or the crazy weird fascist anarchists that threaten to rip a hole in the space time continuum.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 04 2022, @12:51AM (2 children)
"fascist anarchists"
... fascist ... anarchists...
Hm. That is a very impressive contradiction in terms. Fascists are authoritarian corporatists with a dirigiste, redistributory approach to economies, while anarchists are not any of those things. They're broken in completely different ways.
Want to try that rant again? More clarity, less foaming this time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 06 2022, @05:16AM (1 child)
Don't know what else to call supposed "libertarians" that screech about freedoms then turn around and support authoritarian corporate government with logic going as deep as "der fREEEEE markETTTTTTT!" Perhaps society will develop a term for such paradoxical viewpoints that self described libertarians that voted for Trump 2X claim to hold.
Don't blame the anthropologist!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 06 2022, @04:30PM
I'm not blaming anybody.
I'm suggesting that you take a few summer courses on political science and learn to formulate your thoughts more coherently, but that's on you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @09:31PM (1 child)
> We have seen additional comments that contain threats and state very personal information
> It is entirely for the victim to decide whether to seek legal redress in this matter.
https://www.criminaldefenselawyer.com/resources/federal-stalking-and-harassment-laws.htm [criminaldefenselawyer.com]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @10:00PM
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @10:23PM (7 children)
Just think about it, this is the perfect crime to accuse aristarchus with, to justify censoring him, kinda like this:
Q.Who was doxxed by aristarchus?
A. We cannot tell you without doxxing the victim.
Q.What did aristarchus do that doxxed the victim?
A. See answer above.
So we have no victim, we have no accuser (except Ronan, or Rogan), we have no evidence of the action, so obviously Ari must be banned. Even better than accusations of sockpuppetry!
And finally, we offer aristarchus two options: he can plead guilty, and take a permanent ban, or he can plead guilty and take a temporary ban. Funny, I think he predicted that when his six-month mod-ban was over next month, some other pretext would be found.
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @10:38PM (6 children)
Yup!
I mean he may be guilty, but the lack of transparency is troubling. If he has the doxxing info then he can just flood AC comments with it, which makes this whole thing rather stinky.
The downmodding of these points shows the clear bias of the site. Regardless of whether the claims are real the above comment points out a very real problem that everyone should think about, doubly so for those that are self-described "freedom of speech absolutists." Time to acknowledge the limits of that phrase and if this community is to stop cannibalizing itself we need more transparency instead of the vague assurances by staff. Yes there is a need a protect privacy, but that also highlights the problems of the site where a certain group of very anonymous people gets access to private information, with the bonus of that group having a history of mildly abusing their positions.
Good luck yall!
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @10:53PM (5 children)
Stalking and harassment are not free speech. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @11:25PM (4 children)
You are corrext, though have a *woosh* for missing how that was the point. Totally reasonable to put limits on speech, but are we only going to use the US legal standard? Where is the line? How does that didfer from a Cide of Conduct that libertarians are so fond of freaking out over?
Truly free speech on SN is dead, and true to form in a most hypocritical manner.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 03 2022, @11:57PM
Most jurisdictions have laws prohibiting stalking and harassment. The line is where legislators and reasonable people deem behavior becomes unreasonable.
Wrong and you've just had it explained it to you.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 04 2022, @12:55AM (2 children)
Soylentnews was never a free speech site.
Never.
It always had limits. Some were imposed externally (kiddie porn makes governments kick down doors and shut down servers, for example) while others were internal, but it was always limited speech.
I have no idea what made you think anything different.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 04 2022, @02:23AM (1 child)
Oh gee how could anyone come to such a conclusion? You must be new here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 04 2022, @04:08AM
Totally new here. Yup, only been around since the discussions about creating it were going on, in the buckfeta days.
Been involved in many of those discussions, including ones on limitation in speech.
Tell yourself whatever little lies help you sleep at night, but there was always a crystal clear recognition that there would have to be limitations, even if only to keep the FBI from tearing the place up in yet another childporn-based PR exercise to bolster their relevance.