You're right that the end impact is the same for OP. I don't think GP is arguing that this should necessarily soften consequences. It's pretty important to know who is responsible for this outcome and what consequences can fix the situation, though!
I believe GP's intended direction was that there may be very different conversations there depending on whether this is (1) a platform potentially abusing its users vs. (2) a platform's _user(s)_ potentially abusing other users.