Far enough, but that just goes back to the original problem that the OP ran up against. If they had earned that credibility, if they had built up months of history of comments that proved it, what would it matter if they could be purged instantly? If I linked my main alt, and it got a purge and a ban because someone on the admin team doesn't like me bringing this up, then I would lose all the credibility I had, if I didn't back it up in the Internet Wayback Machine like the kbin.social OP did.
So I understand why you might question my credibility, but at the same time, you seem to be bolstering the merit of discussing the issue.