He has a special Role created for him on The Wiki Tree House Discord Server (formerly the Wikipediocracy Server), "BANNED," which, paradoxically, was created to prevent him from being banned by the many Mods he irritated.That role allowed him to post in some channels, but his abuse in the Level One channel "The Smithery" led that to be revoked. He is allowed to comment freely in a Level Two channel that had been created for unrestrained griping, "Flame Wars," which has been renamed "Free Speech." Few use it except for Graaf. In order to keep Graaf within limits, I was given a Role, Admin, allowing me to delete posts. I had used it in The Smithery, until the Owner made it unnecessary by revoking his privileges there. In the Flame Wars channel, he started pinging me, as he was using that channel to hurl trolling comments about me or addressed to me. So I warned him that I'd delete there as well, if he continued. He responded with repeated pings, typical Graaf adolescent "you can't make me." I really didn't care, I just deleted those comments and he started making more, till the Owner simply said "stop pinging," and he did. His story is that he respects the owners and will obey them, but not "fake mods" or "trollmods," not realizing that the Owners have authorized the mods, they are acting for the mods. Or he does realize and it was all and remains trolling, his idea of lulz.
But we don't care. I have no problem with him getting what he wants, only with cluttering up a forum with useless garbage that does discourage participation. He has commented today on the Server. Since it is, in part, a response to the question here, I'm putting it here. It is pure trolling, demanding interaction or "you are a coward," the refrain of trolls since the internet was invented.
[3:49 PM]Myself:@[JuiceBeetle] / wrote: "We tried to change this "craziness" for weeks, spending hours to reason with him."
[3:50 PM]Myself:Strelnikov wrote: "But he still has the "Wikipedia Sucks" Discord to lean on, right"
[3:55 PM]Myself:Yeh, [JuiceBeetle], Steln is right. You/we wanted to reason with me. Well, take your change and Abd too in this free-speech arena. So me your cards, and I sow mine. Or are you too much chicken without your F* troll tools, Sweety? Because that's what I think, you are just like Abd a sad loser with only a keyboard and not even a blocking tool here. Losers who can not even win from me with a blocking tool, and for sure not without!
He will probably be allowed to rant in that channel as long as he likes, subject to restrictions as needed. Pinging people who have explicitly requested otherwise is an offense, and had he continued that, he'd have been actually banned as before. What I found worked was setting clear boundaries, not arguing about them even when they were attacked as "against the rules" -- Graaf imagines that if there is no explicit rule against something, it is "against the rules" for someone with moderator or admin tools to warn and enforce ad hoc rules -- and then to enforcing the warning to stop the behavior, with action and, again, little or no comment. From my point of view, JuiceBeetle went far beyond what was necessary, perhaps on the idea that Graaf would listen to reason.
But a person can listen to reason while blocked, and may decide to promise to follow rules as declared by site management, and then unblock can be considered. It is not necessary to prove anything to anyone. But JuiceBeetle is a Wikipedia critic who has been harmed or insulted by admin blocking behavior, and such can be very reluctant to block.
Blocking is not banning, however, and is a temporary measure, improperly used for punishment or even bullying. It was clear that JuiceBeetle was acting here with support from Owners. That is actually enough. It's an offensive burden on moderators to demand that every action be justified in advance. So sane owners will not demand that. Appeal process can be created that will not be disruptive, etc.
Perhaps we will get to see this here.