I came across user X's account and noticed they were suspended.

May I know why they were suspended? The suspension was certainly not discussed anywhere.

  • $\begingroup$ Good question Graviton. Personally I think it's a bad idea to not reveal suspension reasons. See this question where I raised the issue. $\endgroup$ – John Duffield Jul 11 '18 at 13:27

I am going to give the canonical answer for these types of questions and then close. If anyone else answers, or comments speculating, that answer or comment will be deleted.

Moderators don't discuss suspensions. This is because when a user is suspended, we don't mean to publicly shame them. We want to take them out of the action for a bit, and then reintroduce them to the community. Discussing what exactly a user did wrong or encouraging speculation is the wrong way to do that.

We also don't want to present arguments "against" a person at a time when they are not capable of participating in their own "defense." At the end of the suspension if the user wants to have a (respectful, reasonable) discussion about their activities and your response you'd be fine to do so even if it publicly embarrasses them.

If you think a user was suspended incorrectly, or a moderator was acting in bad faith, please, contact the community managers using the "Contact" form at the bottom of the page. They are much better equipped to deal with concerns than we are (do keep in mind though that the inflammatory content that lead to the suspension is often deleted).

There is a public reason given at the top of every suspended user's profile; in this case

This account is temporarily suspended for rule violations. The suspension period ends in 2 days.

That's as far as the knowledge goes. Sometimes the suspension messages are more specific ("voting irregularities", "rude or abusive behavior", etc). Beyond that, we're not allowed to say, which I think you'll agree makes sense. We don't need a bunch of people whispering "oh, user so-and-so did such-and-such, and oh, he/she's coming back tomorrow!" We don't need that.

After this question, speculation questions about suspensions will be deleted promptly. Also, to be clear: this rule applies to chat too. Conversations in chat speculating about suspended users will be redirected to other more productive channels (heh, bad pun, sorry).

Thank you for understanding.

Some helpful reading may be A Day in the Penalty Box.


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