A few weeks ago I was still a Romanian citizen in WarEra and I had several arguments with people from the Romanian government. I disagreed with some of the things they were doing, I said so openly and I probably pushed the subject more than they liked. Eventually I was removed from the Romanian Discord because I was considered “too aggressive”.
What bothers me is not the fact that a Discord has moderation. Obviously it should. If someone insults people, threatens them, spams channels or causes problems on purpose, remove him if necessary. But in my case I was never shown a clear rule that I had broken. “Too aggressive” can mean almost anything. And when the people deciding what is too aggressive are also the people you are criticizing, that becomes a problem very quickly.
The Romanian Discord is also not some random server between friends. It is the place where Romanian players are sent, where government members talk to citizens and where a large part of the Romanian community actually communicates. So I do not really accept the idea that the people who currently have admin permissions can simply decide who belongs there based on whether they like that person or not. They can control the server technically, sure. That does not mean the Romanian community belongs to them.
If I broke a rule, tell me which one. That is all. If I insulted somebody, point to the message. If I harassed somebody, show it. If I spammed or threatened people, sanction me. But if the real issue is that I criticized the government too much or that people did not like the way I argued, then that is something completely different.
And there is another obvious issue. If I criticize a member of the government, and the same people I am arguing with also have the power to remove me from the main Romanian community, then they are basically deciding their own case. That should bother people even if they completely disagree with me.
I am not writing this because I want to come back. I already left Romania and applied for citizenship somewhere else. For me, that part is over. I am writing it because the same thing can happen to somebody else tomorrow. A new player joins Romania, gets involved, starts caring about the country and at some point disagrees with the people running it. Does he get to argue with them, or does he stay welcome only as long as he does not become inconvenient?
This could be fixed very easily. Have clear rules. Apply them to everyone. When someone is punished, explain exactly why. And when the problem is a political argument with someone from the government, maybe that same person should not be the one deciding the punishment.
That is really all I am saying.
The Romanian community should not belong to whoever happens to be president, minister or Discord admin at this moment. Those people will change sooner or later. The community is supposed to stay.
If the answer to criticism is simply to remove the person criticizing you, then you are not solving a problem.