BruceZ is the single most important poster on 2+2 for probability and math topics. This is primarily a gambling forum, after all. Sure he's an a--hole sometimes, even on math topics. But he's also brilliant and a key asset to the success and popularity of the 2+2 forums.

Allowing the politards to run him out of town is another step towards the death of 2+2 forums.

+1. You can't have it both ways.

Worse comes to worse people lose respect for them for their actions as diligent attackers or their reaction to attack. Not much point in adding punishment on top of punishment.

LOL

So he made the math and probability trains run on time. It still seems like he was harmed by a self-inflicted gunshot would instead of being run out of town.

Old news, beau.

The entire reason why things move forward is because of math, probability and statistics.

He absolutely can. His de-modding has no effect on his ability to participate in topics he excels at. Perhaps sometime down the road he will be re-greened... have patience.

When I first heard he was demodded, I guessed he'd stepped down in protest. Maybe in a way he did by not letting it drop.

What could Bruce have said in the Mod forum, ultimately giving him the de-modding? That's the issue here I think.

We non-mod posters will probably not know. Bruce almost certainly have had it at this point. According to Mat earlier itt Bruce could give the consent for showing what went on in the Mod forum. Won't happen I'm afraid.


Bruce, please continue posting, especially the stuff you are best in. Being a black poster like me can be better than being a green one!

Since Bruce has gone silent, I'll give a quick synopsis from my perspective.

I had considered the matter closed. Despite many moderators disagreeing with me, I was not going to risk losing a poster as valuable as Bruce by taking away his mod status. And the fact remains that as a moderator in probability he did nothing wrong and is perfect in that particular role. So I was willing to essentially ignore all the other issues that came up.

I made the unpopular decision and asked Bruce to remain silent on the matter.

Instead he came into the mod forum and insulted his fellow moderators. I felt I had no choice. This site NEEDS the large number of volunteer moderators we have. I can't damage that relationship to keep one poster, even though losing him is tragic considering the foundation of this website.

If he would just keep posting and privately make amends with the rest of the mod team, in time it would be easy to also reinstate his mod status. That's my hope and request. People quit moderating and keep on posting all the time. It's really no big deal.

I would have preferred that everything leading to these events stayed more private, but they didn't. Hopefully my posting this now doesn't make things worse.

lol @ op

lol @ pvn

One should know when licking one's wounds is the right move.

Getting this witch hunt is like being in the middle of a storm. All you can do is riding it out, no chance trying to fight it. Must have been a new experience for Bruce.

Ego comes into play, protecting itself. Some *******s will comment on this now for a long time if Bruce posts. He is pretty much done with 2+2 I think. Maybe waiting half a year and coming back a fresh man, older, humbler and wiser?

I am not making a coherent argument here, I just feel the need to publicly thank BruceZ for all he has done for me.


The math homework thread and the probability subforum are one of the best places of the whole internet and he plays a huge part in that.

a) He made me a better poker player thanks to his handling of and posts in the probability forum. One of the reasons I keep buying 2+2 books is the (somewhat irrational) hope that one of the authors turns out to be him.

b) He made me a better teacher. I teach mostly other subjects, but his way of explaining things hits the nail on the head so well sometimes, it makes me wanna stop doing it because I am so much worse at it than he is. And this motivates me to get better. It is not only that he is obviously brilliant and knows his stuff, furthermore he can explain things in a way that is exceptionally rare. Sometimes he presents just a solution, sometimes the way to a solution and sometimes he will guide you to your own solution. He has such a good instinct about when to use which method of teaching, as a teacher myself, it blows my mind a little. And he shows these good instincts as a mod in the probability subforum too. It doesn't even need a sticky for Christ's sake. And I do not remember anyone there ever really complaining about his modding.

I do not know how he treats other mods, I am pretty sure it must be hard to be on the receiving end of his anger, but he treats the people reading his math and probability posts with patience, generosity, and (sometimes sharp edged) kindness. And I can't thank him (and 2+2) enough for that.

Expecting him to just keep silent and go back to working for free when the company he's doing that free work for has stabbed him in the back is ridiculous.

This entire thing was handled poorly from that start. The people attacking him did so in direct violation of 2+2's TOC, but no one enforced the rules to deal with them. Instead, we enforce rules on the victim who's responding as anyone would in his situation? You are turning this forum into a haven for witch hunts. Allowing a mob of trolls to run things because you "need" them is unacceptable, and it will cost you a lot more posters and mods in the long run.

Stabbed him in the back? GMAFB.

Complaining about this being a witch hunt is #notagoodlook considering we actually found a witch. The people who are still on #teambruce all conveniently forget that Bruce CONFIRMEd the allegations when he doubled down on the posts.

More like up-front, imo.

Absolutely. Brucez has given quite a lot to this site. A group of poster, in direct violation of site wide rules, attacked him and tried to tear him down. He responded in an entirely predictable manner and was punished for it. That's back stabbing to me.

Maybe mat figured out that the spirit of the rules isn't intended to protect unabashed racists from criticism.

Except that that was never the point of this. The point is that the thing you speak of does not give anyone the right to gang up and bully the living crap out of another poster. Some of the site rules on 2+2 exist for the exact purpose of preventing that.

It seems that the rule maker disagrees, considering I wasn't sanctioned at all.

Or maybe he's just giving into the mob because he thinks there are too many to deal with that problem.

Yes, Ted, that was my criticism of his approach.

That's empirically false. The case was closed, Bruce was still green. Bruce stabbed himself in the back by self-immolating in the mod forum.

pvn, I think you went out harder than necessary on Bruce. I can spot something unrelenting in your behavior.