They did contact the original owner - who promised (reputedly) to take care of it. Then disappeared (yet again, after repeatedly having done so in the past so many times before). It's even possible that they did this out of some kind of spite? But perhaps not, maybe it's merely irresponsibility, and even that due to ADHD or some such, who knows (I did not read through every comment, just enough to know this much).
It is not merely users going rouge (edit: no you know what, fuck it, I'm leaving this spelling exactly as it is, bc it's 2025 baby! and this apparently is how we roll now) there are posts (not merely moderator reports, which don't federate particularly with their older software) where they are made aware, and the admins chose to ignore the situation each time rather than ban the person involved. They actively shielded them from consequences, rather than merely allowing them to do whatever. Thus necessitating others to take steps of their own to deal with matters.
Seeing how "responsible" they are, nobody believes the red scare issue - especially people who are ACTUALLY leftist as opposed to whatever fucked up thing tankies are to begin with, and then like that squared (three times over) and possibly reversed and shifted further into the imaginary dimension, to describe whatever the heck Hexbear has going on specifically. Regardless of political views. imho at least, ofc:-).