this admin is willing to go above the community mods’ head

This doesn't make any sense. Admins are responsible for their users wherever they are. If an account is overposting from an instance, the admin is well within their rights to address it, as you said.

~~BPR. This could have been handled better but I don't think that the admin was powertripping.~~

EDIT: I'm changing my take to YDI / UDI (user deserved it). See discussion with the admin, his usage of power was 100% justified.

IMO what Philip did wrong:

• the issue was in a single community, so he should've let that community's mods handle it. If the user was doing this shit across multiple communities it would be different.
• lack of transparency on what's considered [un]acceptable behaviour for ponder.cat users. A single "be nice" would be enough to justifiably get rid of Cat.
• direct escalation, like OP said. Philip's initial comment lecturing Cat doesn't sound like an admin speaking officially; but when he does, it pops out of nowhere.

In the meantime, look at all Cat's replies in the linked thread: the user is not just being spammy, they are being uncooperative, belittling other users, and passive aggressive. This sort of behaviour should not be given a free pass, and I do think that, if Philip dug across Cat's post/comment history, he would find more reasons to ban the user from his instance... at least if his instance had some rule against poor behaviour.

Internet etiquette has dictates for dealing with undesirable yet not rule-breaking behavior that was just ignored here.

A lot of those dictates boil down to "report, ignore, move on". Reporting would do nothing, and ignoring would be bad advice - because bad behaviour tends to spread. Eventually you aren't just blocking a single person, but a whole lot... or leaving the space because why bother. As such, users in communities with lax moderation tend to monitor each other's behaviour a bit, and this is not a bad thing.

After the exchange I've had with spujb in this thread, I'm convinced of their bad-faith intentions for posting it. In that comment chain, I told them that I had not reported the thread for removal, which is still true at the time of this comment. However, let it be noted that the post is in violation of the sidebar rules, specifically

• Post only about bans or other sanctions that you have received from a mod or admin.

and

• Don't harass mods or brigade comms. Don't word your posts in a way that would trigger such harassment and brigades.

No sanction was imposed on spujb, they are fully a third-party to this matter. Their post title and body is deliberately inflammatory towards @PhilipTheBucket@ponder.cat and ponder.cat as a whole.

Additionally, the post runs afoul of a post guideline:

3. Provide a screenshot of the relevant modlog entry (don't de-obfuscate mod names).

This post has all the markings of a punitive reaction by sbujb to criticism (both direct and via downvotes) levied against them in another thread on this comm. I am aware that this very comment could read that way as well; my justification is that I attempted to communicate directly with OP, whose response was the equivalent of sticking their fingers into their ears and singing off-key, loudly, while running away.

In the event that I do make a formal report, I will use the preceeding text of this comment, and update the comment to indicate that I've done so. Absent that, any action taken on the post will be for reasons that do not involve a report from me.

This community should be a tool against mod/admin authority and abuse, not a weapon to settle a grudge.

Same admin that asked if he was in the wrong for banning someone that reported a comment that he thought was fine. Response was basically unanimous that he was in the wrong.

Naturally, he doubled down and decided that he was absolutely in the right. I blocked him and the instance and am definitely happy with that choice.

In the linked thread here, the admin even says "This is a super weird and authoritarian philosophy," when someone called out the bans as power tripping 🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄 because e-stalking people and banning them for participating in other communities is absolutely not authoritarian at all

(Y)DI + this is an unmarked [META] post + no admin action was taken against the account + history of behavior + it looks silly to make a wholeass new thread after getting cratered to oblivion in the original one

Phil's "mistake", if we're insisting there is one, was not approaching the account-hopper with "You post a lot, and most of it is questionable trash. Please don't shovel shit from this instance anymore if you want to remain."

Okay one more instance to add to the list of instances for me to avoid.

Wait, that was an actual person and not a bot?