Jeez this post blew up overnight. I have skimmed through all of the comments and I figured I would clear up a few declarations made by others about my position. Currently as many of you stated, there is not a set of rules currently for multiplayer servers, this is a problem. Players do not know what the bans are for and what they can be banned for and for how long the ban will last.
Secondly, it is not racist to have the name "CCP Virus" or etc, nor is it racist to be a troll. Obviously overt racist messages could and should be bannable, but the issue currently is many of these reports are being given as "cheating" and the user is banned for extensive periods only to have access restored late, affecting their ability to play the game they have paid for. Arguably, until they release an actual set of rules and expected behaviors and implement a proper ban system, they should hold off on going ban crazy, especially if the previous bans had been given in "good faith" of the Chinese moderators reports, which again we can see are reported as cheating. Even trolling/provoking others should not be bannable unless the trolling involves purposefully losing games, overt racism, etc. And even in such cases where someone is just re-posting racist flag words, a chat ban should be the first step implemented. Sure, some of the players may actually be cheating but based on the information we have seen, and the lack of transparency involving bans on TW's servers, it is hard to believe all of the bans given so far are just.
About politics in this game, before any of this came up, I would have been happy just enjoying the game myself and would have never brought anything politically related to these forums. This is just something that raises concerns for me as an owner of the product. What if I take a vacation and wish to play bannerlord multiplayer overseas on my laptop and end up wrongfully banned for 10+ years from ALL multiplayer servers? Being right wing or left wing has absolutely nothing to do with this situation, and this is NOT an attempt to be racist or inflammatory towards anyone. This is just about wishing we can get some transparency on the ban system so we players can know what to expect.
The first step for TW would be to implement a multiplayer code of conduct, as well as a simple report function in which players make the reports and can tag up to a few reasons and include evidence. They should not be handing out such extensive bans to players who had no idea what rules TW expects, especially considering the game is still in early access.
Ultimately, I will continue to raise awareness about this issue until we can get some transparency on the matter, and the faster we can get TW to fix their multiplayer ban systems, the less likely it will be a problem in the future. I will say this again, I absolutely love this game and not playing it due to "bad faith" actions from the devs is the last thing I would want to happen. Hopefully everyone here regardless of what you think personally of the evidence can agree that more transparency and a new ban system would likely fix all of the issues everyone has brought up here. It can help limit toxicity of the chat (as some Chinese users here have said they personally have experienced) and help clear up the legitimacy of the bans being reported on the EA servers.