BlackSky

To hello@blacksky.app, support@blacksky.app

Subject: Suspension?

I am writing because I have attempted to access and participate on BlackSky from a self-hosted PDS and using BlackSky’s own PDS and I have not been successful. I would like to be successful.

Before I get into the details, the main question I’m asking is: am I (Asher Wolfstein) permanently suspended from BlackSky?

If the answer is yes, then, I’d like to know why and if I have any chance for a successful appeal.
If the answer is no, then, I’d like to restore access to my accounts.

If I am permanently suspended and a successful appeal is not in the stars, then, thank you for your time. I will pursue things elsewhere, much like I did when I was permanently suspended from BlueSky.

To answer these inquiries, you will most likely need to go over the history below:

I had an account on bsky.app for 8 months with the following DID: did:plc:v2j2g5pdghrwazhbw6gvxtdp

At https://pdsls.dev/at://did:plc:v2j2g5pdghrwazhbw6gvxtdp#logs you can see that on March 6, 2025 I change my alias from asherwolfstein.bsky.social to asher.wolfste.in.

On May 31, 2025 BlueSky Moderation permanently suspended this account. As such, I did not have a chance to change the alias to anything else.

On January 25, 2026, I brought a self-hosted PDS online located at atproto.asherwolfnet.link.

I initially created an account there asherwolfstein.atproto.asherwolfnet.link with the DID did:plc:alwsn4ef2trjn55iqewybfxa

At https://pdsls.dev/at://did:plc:alwsn4ef2trjn55iqewybfxa#logs you can see that on January 26, 2026, I changed the registered alias for asherwolfstein.atproto.asherwolfnet.link to asher.wolfste.in.

On February 7, 2026 I sent an e-mail to hello@blacksky.app stating that, at first, things were going great. However, within days, BlueSky moderation suspended that DID on their appview bsky.app (which I had logged into, seeing as I didn’t create an account on bsky.app). I’m not concerned about that. In the e-mail I write that after that suspension I was unable to access my timeline/data through staging.blacksky.community despite being able to log in.

On March 13, 2026 I change my alias for did:plc:alwsn4ef2trjn55iqewybfxa from asher.wolfste.in to stein.asherwolfnet.link, but the results were the same. When you compare https://blacksky.community/profile/stein.asherwolfnet.link to https://pdsls.dev/at://did:plc:alwsn4ef2trjn55iqewybfxa/app.bsky.feed.post the issue is obvious.

I have not received any notice or indication from BlackSky Moderation that did:plc:alwsn4ef2trjn55iqewybfxa (now stein.aherwolfnet.link) has been suspended.

I was eventually told it was a bug and that I should provide a HAR file. I opted not to do that and try something else. Eventually I was informed my problem had been fixed in a pull request. I replied that it had not been fixed and that I had moved on to try a different solution, and the results of that are why I’m writing today.

I created a BlackSky “native” account on March 23, 2026, asherwolfstein.myatproto.social with following DID: did:plc:s2nrqnvnv5jbccwr3gkw6yt4

On the same day, I registered the alias asher.wolfste.in. As soon as I did that I appeared to run into the same problem. And so, I changed my alias back to asherwolfstein.myatproto.social hoping that the issue with the original alias might clear up.

However, the reason became obvious: the account had been “taken down,” as reported at https://pdsls.dev/at://did:plc:s2nrqnvnv5jbccwr3gkw6yt4

I believe the only post I made was one that said “Hello BlackSky.” Yet, I’m suspended without notice or explanation.

If stein.asherwolfnet.link was permanently suspended, this would make more sense as it would be evasion of suspension. However, throughout the troubleshooting e-mail exchange, despite the nature of the situation and my BlueSky suspension being made clear, I was never informed that I was suspended from the appview even after two follow up requests.

Being the troubleshooter I am, I decided to see if it was a vestige from the bsky.app suspension. On March 23, 2026, an hour after the last handle change, I made another account at lucifereal.myatproto.social with the DID: did:plc:yyjrxontv5wa5etiggnjcgrb

I did not change my handle on that account. I didn’t do anything on that account except edit my profile. Things appeared to be working fine. Then, I changed my profile name to “Asher Wolfstein” and my profile bio to “My name is Asher Kadar Wolfstein.”

Within a short amount of time, almost instantly, the account was “taken down” (there aren’t dates to that on pdsls.dev unfortunately): https://pdsls.dev/at://did:plc:yyjrxontv5wa5etiggnjcgrb#logs

What’s interesting here is that I have other accounts on the self-hosted PDS, which are viewable here: https://pdsls.dev/atproto.asherwolfnet.link#repos

I list these despite knowing that publishing this, which I have at https://asherwolfstein.com/blacksky, will most likely get all of them permanently suspended by some mechanism. I say it like that because I believe third-parties are involved as per my original support e-mail.

One of those accounts is radicalindividualism.atproto.asherwolfnet.link with the DID: did:plc:bcwa5ow3jigypcnad7jlmsn6

This account’s alias was change on April 2, 2026, at the time of its creation, to radicalindividualism.org.

In comparison to the previous accounts that all referenced my name, this account hasn’t been permanently suspended from any service and has operated just fine (so far, probably until now) on both bsky.app and blacksky.app. It’s even participated in the app.bsky.* namespace on the atproto network from the bsky.app appview (as it’s not a BlueSky account): https://bsky.app/profile/radicalindividualism.org in much the same manner as my previous accounts.

It is clear to me, after this troubleshooting, that any reference to my name “Asher Wolfstein” is being suspended. I don’t know if it’s due to a top-down moderation policy I may have crossed, or if there’s a third-party that is tracking my name and reporting my existence anywhere within the app.bsky.* namespace on the atproto decentralized network.

The reason a third-party might be doing that are numerous, and there may be multiple individuals involved. What I do know is that their potential actions are specifically targeted at me, and are most likely the result of me talking about my grievances with several parties on my own timeline. As I understand it, depending on who they are, they either:

1) See these posts as a harassment campaign despite my posting being almost identical in contention as theirs are to this day. The only real difference, in my opinion, is that I have never had many followers while their accounts enjoy a significant following. They tend to describe this disparity as me being a “broken nobody.”

They have the right to express this opinion about me and about my timeline, so that’s not my issue.. The original point of contention for a couple of them was a post I made describing the use of my timeline as similar to a list of other people that happened to include them and who they now identify as their abuser. This they did not deny, only acknowledge that they were acting differently moving forward, and yet, I was permanently suspended while they were not.

I stated that my postings were similar, and they didn’t deny it, and yet, I’m permanently suspended across platforms, it now seems, and they are not; or,

2) Are an individual that has inserted themselves into my current situation with other people due to an unrelated situation and relationship from the past and views the asymmetrical adjudication in favor of those who claim bigotry and harassment as an opportunity to silence and frustrate me.

Because of these individuals, and their tendency to abuse my public narrative (my history, my stances, my beliefs, my behavior, etc.), I need to make clear that I am not actually silenced. I do not see this as a free-speech issue. Appview providers can do whatever is in their right to do, and I respect that. I have not made another account on bsky.app servers since the permanent suspension, and I don’t intend to. Once I’m suspended from somewhere, I have no reason to circumvent that.

I can post anywhere I’m able to post, and since I am in control of my own website at asherwolfstein.com, then I’m good. I do not believe I’m owed an audience.

I do believe that I should be treated fairly and equally as anyone else, and that is not happening.

Asher Wolfstein

Follow Up

From support@blacksky.app

Hi Asher,
I am looking into this and wanted to have information when I respond. For context, as I look into all of the accounts, if Bluesky suspends you, our server automatically copies the suspension, and we have to manually undo it on our end. This process is not immediate because we have to be notified by the user (as you have already done, thank you!), and then we have to look into the account against our TOS. If there isn’t a violation, we undo the suspension. Also, Bluesky does not send emails to people not on their server, and since we are not informed, we cannot send an email unless we are the ones who initiated the suspension. Please give me until the end of tomorrow with an update. I appreciate your patience.

On Friday, April 10, 2026 01:42:21 PM (-06:00), Blacksky Algorithms wrote:

Thank you for reaching out! All decisions are made based on our community guidelines and terms of service, and accounts/posts are only labeled, taken down, or suspended (not reinstated after a Bluesky ban) if they have also gone against those community guidelines and terms of service. We have investigated your accounts, and they violate our community guidelines listed above, so they will not be reinstated. This decision is final.

On Fri, 10 Apr 2026 20:03:45 +0000, Asher Wolfstein replied:

Thank you for informing me. Your decision is clear and I have no intent to appeal or circumvent this.

As you should be aware per the previous e-mail this correspondence is being published on my website at https://asherwolfstein.com/blacksky/ as a form of reporting on the moderation policies of the new “decentralized” social media networks and platforms (which I have done before and will be doing in the future).

In light of this, so as not only to educate myself, but to educate my readers, would you be generous enough to outline exactly what the violation was?

Particularly in regards to asherwolfstein.myatproto.social (did:plc:s2nrqnvnv5jbccwr3gkw6yt4), and lucifereal.myatproto.social (did:plc:yyjrxontv5wa5etiggnjcgrb) considering that they made no posts that violate the TOS from as far as I can see, unless introductory posts are against TOS?

Or, for example, radicalindividualism.org (did:plc:bcwa5ow3jigypcnad7jlmsn6), now also permanently suspended from BlueSky (and so, I presume, BlackSky), whose three replies don’t violate TOS as far as I can tell, unless, asking a question and replying in support with a bit of side-eye qualifies?

I suspect it’s because stein.asherwolfnet.link (did:plc:alwsn4ef2trjn55iqewybfxa) was permanently suspended due to most likely violating TOS once, which, I understand that one fine. However, seeing as how I was never informed of this full suspension until just now, it’s a bit backwards (in my opinion) to file the other accounts as “evasion of suspension” (that’s the only reason I can conclude considering their contents) since I wasn’t evading anything. I didn’t know I was permanently suspended, so I wasn’t evading, and if I wasn’t evading then how could I violate the terms? Unless, of course, intent does not factor into this.

Again, I am not disputing your decision.

I have no interest in doing so. I will not be replying with arguments on why these are unfair or wrong as I don’t want to waste anyone’s time, and I know it will be so.

All I’m interested in is the reasoning, that is, if it suits BlackSky Moderation to tell me.

If not, well, that’s a statement on it’s own.

Thanks for your time and consideration,

Asher Wolfstein

As Well…

Some people might wonder if I’m aware of how ridiculous I sound when I claim that seemingly innocuous events must hinge on being all about me.

I wonder at that too, because it is ridiculous and not something I’ve ever really said without a good reason.

I wasn’t going to address this because there’s nothing to argue about. It’s a pathetic distraction. There won’t be a defense because it’s unnecessary. This is what I said:

Asher Wolfstein @asherwolfstein Apr 2 (at https://x.com/asherwolfstein/status/2039909313511371154)

If Liana Kerzner isn't "talking about my husband and myself" in Episodes 161 and 163 of It's Not Therapy (links below) then, why aren't those on YouTube too? They are conspicuously absent. (Link to https://www.youtube.com/@itsnottherapy3689/videos)

And I put it in quotes because it is, at this point, ridiculous to pretend as if she isn't, when Episode 161 - Are You (Accidentally) An A**hole? devotes a significant amount of time (3/4 perhaps?) to a 'cautionary' tale that... it's us. (Link to https://nottherapyshow.podbean.com/e/are-you-accidentally-an-ahole/)

We don't "see ourselves" in the negative behavior. We "see ourselves," as I've always written, in all the context; the scaffolding of the indexical targeting; the just-specific-enough points from which the listener can generate an inferential reference.

But we don't "see ourselves" in the finer details, because they aren't true. Many of those things didn't happen.

That *doesn't* mean it's, thus, not us, as I've responded in the past, because... pretending it's not, particularly regarding Episode 161, is quite ridiculous.

It is frankly way over the line of "benefit of the doubt," much like how the episode goes way past several lines with disturbing ease.

So, I will say, yeah, all the surrounding details are *very* 'reasonably' us (it's us), and there are a lot.

The finer points, the character-damaging ones (as she might call them) are false. They're *supposed* to be us, but they're false. She is, beyond a reasonable doubt, "talking about us."

Here too. If you peruse her YouTube channel, it was established who wanted their part taken down 5 months ago. (Link to https://nottherapyshow.podbean.com/e/duty-of-care-supportive-or-stifling/)

I didn't place those comments *after,* I say this because Liana places import on that in her past narrative revisions despite it being false then too. (Link to https://asherwolfstein.com/and-then-theres-this/)

Here are 2 falsehoods right on the surface:

1 She says she "loaned" us a lot of money.

2. She says I raged at/insulted her before disappearing for an extended period.

1. She never made "loans" to either of us. As far as we remember, we never agreed to any loans. She paid my husband for work and gave him friendly gifts that she made clear were gifts.

The only personal money she gave me was two birthday gifts: a dinner at a fancy restaurant, and a comic anthology plus issues. Beyond that was money for delivered web hosting services, which she can still access as promised.

Please take it off my hands: (Link to https://www.ebay.com/itm/358385605598)

Those were definitely not loans, and they weren't gifts either, as I had to *file them on my taxes,* which, yes, we *can* pay.

2. I didn't 'drive-by' insult or attack her rhetorically before disappearing for an extended period. Nothing I said before that disappearance was about her. There was no insult, sentiment, or statement directed to her about her.

She took a 4 word sentence that I had deleted within hours about someone else, and decided for herself it was a "jab" at her. It wasn't. I had replaced it with a more balanced reaction of "oh well, that happened" after I calmed down. I have never obscured these facts.

I thought that was strange too, but, in the social position she had found herself, that I had contributed to, and [given] her reaction, I didn't think it was the appropriate time to point out that none [of] what I said was "about her" and that I didn't think that about her at all.

By the way, that demonstrates modulation of affect in response to the context of others' feelings, if we want to be technical, but... do we? It seems like that's not that important unless an expert says it on the radio.

It was at this point, when I was moving on, that Liana made what I said about someone else[,] about her, as she was reacting to its potential implications emotionally.

She then reinforced the dismissive "therapy-speak" abuse of the other party who *very publicly* stated I was experiencing symptoms that I wasn't *after* blocking me, someone with a well-advertised Masters in Counseling who has never talked to me before.

She reinforced the dismissal I had already conveyed as "inappropriate" for clear reasons to someone with a personality disorder that's extremely keen on reacting to dismissals. It's not that she's responsible for my reaction, as she's not.

It's that, after her relationship with the other party, and with me, she knows this. It's not a misremembering or a misunderstanding. I had just expressed it.

She actively refuted it with... her perceptions and experience? I guess?

To the very person who she had explain it to her in the first place. The very same person she thanked for helping her understand the other party as a "BPD whisperer."

The same person she now portrays as an uninsightful, dangerously impulsive, incompetent.

Tragic.

I immediately disconnected.

Two-and-a-half weeks later I came back and apologized, meeting every one of Liana's criteria for a "good apology" as best I could, while Liana, in her apology to me after, which I have also not obscured, failed to meet those same standards.

This was when I was "fed up" with the double standard and began acting *like* Liana (from my point of view) *to* Liana. That's when I said the phrase she has since repeated as "having zero empathy"; when I was *mimicking* her.

I'm glad it registered, but I'm disappointed at the insight.

These are 2 false claims among many. One is currently very easy to verify on my website: (Link to https://asherwolfstein.com/liana-kerzner-redlianaks-exchange-with-asher-wolfstein-september-2024/)

The Mundane, Boring Answer

This was Liana’s answer to my question today:

Oh, classic Liana.

Notice the language real quick.

1. I’m still a “stalker,” so everything she ever says about “stalkers” includes me. That means its about me.
2. I was “set off,” and not only that, I was “set off” by something very specific she decided, and I venture to say that it’s not simply because that’s what my thread started with. Liana doesn’t have any problem understanding context or an entire text when it’s not inconvenient to do so. She only has ‘trouble’ discerning the context when it’s someone she wants to denigrate and discredit. I write ‘trouble’ because she doesn’t have trouble. That’s how you put it when you give her the benefit of the doubt, which, she doesn’t deserve.

But there’s the answer: It was a glitch in the auto forward from Podbean to YouTube.

Essentially, this is how it stands:

Asher: If Liana Kerzner isn’t “talking about my husband and myself” in Episodes 161 and 163 of It’s Not Therapy (links below) then, why aren’t those on YouTube too?

Liana: Because of an auto-forward glitch between Podbean and YouTube.

Asher: Yeah, I’ve noticed that before as well, and that’s what I chalked it up to. It’s odd that it happens so rarely and it just happens to those two specific episodes, but, if you say it’s a glitch, then it’s a glitch.

Done.

It’s not an argument.

It doesn’t *need* (as she’d write to her Discord) to be about me.

But, why this Skeet now? Why reframe it in a discrediting way? To answer that, I highly encourage the reader to read the thread, and the links, particularly https://asherwolfstein.com/and-then-theres-this/, which I can only assume she must be aware of now, and draw your own conclusions.

Merryjest

Here’s my husband’s response:

Notice the rude label on my husband’s account that’s missing from Liana’s? Well, it’s not by Liana’s hand as far as we know, which she stated was likely what we thought on the radio due to *ANONYMOUS* e-mails she’s now citing on a radio show broadcast to millions of people. The only place that “blamed Liana” for that was the *ANONYMOUS* e-mail, and boy was she quick to pick up on that in order to, once again, place herself at the center of someone else’s alleged collapse.

The rude label is there, as far as we know, due to Maus (Merryjest) posting similar Skeets as this one, repeatedly, about other people.

Here, Maus is subtly pointing out that I was never a client of Liana Kares.

That’s because I had the good sense to never mix therapy/counseling/coaching with friendship (strict roles are extremely important to my care). Despite this, Liana attempted, in a fit of extended “trauma response,” to become my counselor anyway, at least from my point of view, to which I firmly said, “No, uh-huh, boundary.”

This was the first time in more than a decade I had to tell someone else one of my boundaries.

So, Asher, Why Even Ask?

Kerzner portrays this as a just the quirky nonsensical hazards of the job, I guess, like she’s beset by the most nonsensical of people that no one protects from themselves. Tragic.

But, it isn’t entirely nonsensical. It isn’t entirely ‘all in my head,’ which, I thought we were past those notions? Then again, Liana likes to live like it’s when she was famous.

Every account I had from the self-hosted PDS that I had ever used to log into bsky.app are all now suspended. I made this post today at 12:56 PM MDT. It is now 8:47 PM MDT. This occurred over a span of approximately 7 hours.

Right on cue, as if, I don’t know, someone was doing exactly what I described in this very post.

It’s pretty dramatic.

Do I think it’s Liana? No. It most likely has nothing to do with her.

I have to write this so that she can’t legitimately insert herself into the center of all my problems, which, I do in vain because only she seems to be able to tell you exactly why I do anything. /s

Do I think it’s someone in particular? Oh yes, yes I do.

Is it possible it’s simply BlueSky? Yeah. Or two other people with motive? Yeah.

I consider a lot of possibilities at every turn. I always have. She’s watched me do it multiple times.

But that’s not as exciting for Liana to portray accurately is it? It’s much more exciting, and unfortunately believable to many ignorant of mental health conditions, that I always leap to it being her, and that it’s 100% about me, and then foam at the mouth as I laser focus on it like a madman for months on end.

Fuck, that sounds interesting to me too! Sign me up for the show!

And that’s the thing. When Liana executes these prolonged campaigns of ridiculousness, it makes every further reframing that much more “believable” as it reinforces the bias in most people. Which, you know, I call that stigmatizing, but according to Liana, “everybody’s a little bit stigma-d!” 9.9

And not everyone is biased, some are simply trusting, like me. I trusted Liana was telling things accurately. When she said someone screamed at her, I always assumed it was over Zoom. I assumed this because she would say things like, “How does one scream over text?” Only later did I realize she uses that term whenever she feels like it to, well, describe text conversations.

And that led me to believe, naively, that whatever interpretation she had for why Emily Schooley did things, or any other critic, she was probably right. She would know better than I about the people in her life. I did that out of my trust in who I thought was an accurate friend.

And I was wrong.

This is the source of my responses to people saying, “Nobody listens to her Asher. No one takes her seriously.”

1. This isn’t true, as I’ve experienced the opposite; and, worse,
2. No one ever seems to notice what an insult this is to me, and to anyone else they consider less important, like the guy in the mental hospital that knew who Liana was the second I described her being on television because he used to watch the show. Then I’m told, “Well, Asher, consider who’s telling you this.”

I had a friend who is a friend of the family who hated gay people. He didn’t hate me, but he knew I was gay. He wished all the gay people would disappear, except, of course, me, for some reason. My mother reality checked him and said, “Then who is Asher supposed to be with?” In this bigoted person’s mind (at the time), I was an exception because *he* knew me.

I am not the exception.

My friend who said that, which was Kevin Henry by the way, an individual featured in my chat transcripts with Liana, ignored the fact that… *I’m* that audience.

I am that person they are sweeping away like the detritus of society, never to be considered legitimately.

They’re talking about a type of person, and that person includes me!

I don’t magically change into someone else just because *you* know me. I’m not some rare exception in every category.

And I don’t suddenly transform into a tragic uncontrollable madman because *Liana* knew me and continues to center my life around her.

The truth is people do listen to her. They do take her seriously. I did! They do trust her enough to believe what she says, if they are naive, or they see affirmations of their biases in what she says whenever it’s about someone who’s *supposed* to be ridiculous.

And so I know, when she says this type of thing, there’s a gaggle of people actively pursuing it, dunking on them, and vying for relevancy around her. I was on the fringe of that, but I didn’t care much for it (or see it, to be honest), and sometimes I laughed or thought, “Wow!” or added a tidbit to her theory in private, but that wasn’t really my thing because I recognize that *I have no real knowledge of why anyone does anything.*

And I know that those people will influence others, and they will influence others, and before you know it everyone’s talking about someone I don’t recognize… when they dare to talk. And my rejection of being powerless against that reality is why they might not be daring enough to do so in public.

Who knows?

I don’t!

Who’s Stalking Liana Kerzner?

Could it be…

This guy?

Of all the “stalkers” out there, we never seem to hear about Mr. Wesley Onrot, Slave of Beatrice Vaisman (who, you should know, is a famous woman, and not his wife as far as I know). Mr. Onrot even talks to himself in public online!

You’d think this would be a prime example of the quirky nonsensical hazards of the job, as she’s beset by the most nonsensical of people that no one protects from themselves. Tragic.

But, I’ve never heard of this guy until *I* found him trying to understand more about my situation with Liana and who Liana Kerzner is.

I mean, seriously, this guy would be way funnier.

But…

It’s not about being quirky and funny, is it?