The strategy you describe was the one we were following, but other members are now complaining about the double standard, since we're still enforcing the guidelines for other members. For instance, Mammuthus recently decided to go inactive when he received a 1-day suspension because of what he felt was inconsistent moderating, and SLPx followed shortly thereafter.
I believe moderating is as much art as science, but as time goes by and moderating remains a significant issue I'm becoming more and more convinced that participation here should be contingent upon demonstration of some minimum level of competence for both discussion and logical thinking.
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--EvC Forum Administrator