Board Thread:General Wiki Discussion/@comment-36052213-20180802015552/@comment-25052433-20180804182222

I'll keep this rather short (or try to anyway.) I can see the merit in the complaints, especially those of misgendering, which I feel can be an emotionally damaging act, especially if done in malice with full awareness of the situation. I won't pretend to fully understand the complete rollercoaster of emotions and adjustments that must go into revealing your true self to the world, but I can certainly see where comments trying to derail or discredit that can be extremely harmful. I certainly hope that Helel can take this as a learning experience when it comes to future interactions with trans individuals and gain some empathy to the very human core of such matters.

Moving forward though, I am opposed to the demotion based on the grounds that while these complaints can be seen a valid, I do not agree that they warrant a demotion. We have B-Crats and senior admins such as myself, Cleric and others who can take these complaints to Helel in private and explain to him why these issues matter. If future problems show up, then this can be used to demonstrate that he has been addressed on this, and then a demotion can be discussed.

I simply feel, especially knowing Helel and how much he does care about this community, this site and its advancement, that a demotion is overkill in this case. Jumping straight to this level seems a be more reactive than proactive, which should always be the goal.

All of us possess the ability to learn and improve as people, and in too many situations we seem to confuse punishment with learning. It's not the same thing and the two don't need to always join hands.