I can't speak for that user, but I ran a forum from around 1997 to 2008 (directly involved until 2005). Interventions helped. This only works with moderators

I can't speak for that user, but I ran a forum from around 1997 to 2008 (directly involved until 2005). Interventions helped. This only works with moderators who aren't narcissistic, megalomaniacal and/or sociopathic (marginally or beyond). When snark got to be irritating, we would issue a written warning privately. If that went ignored, we'd revoke posting privileges for a day or two (sometimes longer if it's a bad case). Worst offenders got banned. This worked fairly well because our forum was invite only, a bit like Gmail's early days. If we found that troublesome users were invited from the same set of accounts, we'd issue warnings to the entire tree, so to speak, or in the worst case, kill it with lightning. Above all else, mods were forbidden from identifying themselves in any way as mods as long as they had the privilege (this will cycle on and off as needed between a select pool of users). We also had some peculiar rules : http://eksith.wordpress.com/2012/11/27/harshest-forum-rules-ever/ http://eksith.wordpress.com/2012/11/27/harshest-forum-rules-... As they say, most people are basically good. Sometimes they are surprisingly unaware of how hurtful their posts can be. There's a dehumanizing effect introduced when your communications are filtered through text and suddenly there isn't a "person" per-se at the other end. When this is pointed out to them, usually they understand and adjust themselves. There are exceptions to this, of course, and the best way to deal with them is to not interact, entertain or in any way give them an audience. Hellbanning in this regard isn't my favorite technique, but it seems to work to some degree. Now that would only be acceptable if its application is flawless. Sadly, from from what we've seen so far, it isn't. Edit: Just remembered that I wrote a (longer) spiel about this a little while ago http://eksith.wordpress.com/2012/04/29/re-wordpress-com-forum-options/ http://eksith.wordpress.com/2012/04/29/re-wordpress-com-foru...