I wanted to give my two pesos and I'm sure other people want to as well. IP said come to the flame bucket so here I am. I wasn't there for the situation but here's the way I see things.
Duplex is infamous and a repeat offender. He also instigates this kind of reaction from people constantly, whether an admin is there to see it or not. Though as a repeat offender, it seems like his punishment should scale as well because it's pretty clear that he never learns his lesson. Personally I never see him talking trash as a clear "offense" because it's real simple to just mute him. However, if Duplex's form of agitation is against the rules, then he's hardly new to starting trouble.
I've played with Tarquin maybe two whole days since I started on Valve 2. I've never seen or heard him get out of line but people seem to like to give him shit. I've also heard from people he's the resident pubstar. It's completely possible that egos just collided here and Tarquin wouldn't let it go resulting in his ban. Oh and LOL @ getting raged at a 5 minute ban.
Admining or modding anything on the internet is a pretty thankless job. Don't disrespect admins and mods. They do it for free. They do it for us. They put up with a lot of shit and spend a lot of their free time they can be doing other things to make the servers a great place for everyone.
If you think you're being mistreated, reason with the mods POLITELY (I know that's hard for some of you) or just talk to DF. Be thankful you're treated with any amount of fairness. The internets is not a democracy. You don't have a right to play on these servers, it's a privilege. DF and IP are completely within their right to pluck a number from 1-32 out of a hat and permaban your ass just for shits and giggles.
And before you fuckers say it, no I'm not kissing ass. I was a head mod on a 100k+ member website for 2 years so I know what a shitty job it is. Hug your admins today!
Edit: Use your god damn mute button and minus a lot of respect points to Adder for sincerely defending Duplex.