> there is no indication that he was riling people up for the sake of it, and no indication that he would've become the incessant ban-dodger had he known he was banned.

Point of order: he did discover he was banned, and he did dodge it.

(I have no problem with this, because he shouldn't have been banned, and because we long ago reached the point where it's perfectly reasonable for a user to trust their own judgement over that of a moderator.)