Did treating Weimar Germany fairly mean appeasement?

Would a less punitive settlement with Weimar Germany simply have been appeasement at the treaty table?

No; the proposal is to treat the democratic Weimar Republic as a participant in the order before humiliation and weakness helped a more aggressive regime gain support.

Equal treatment of the Weimar Republic is distinguished here from appeasing a later aggressive dictatorship. Punitive rhetoric and repeated coercion made the democratic government look weak at home. A settlement that restored some status could have strengthened Germans willing to work inside the postwar order. The naval-treaty system offered one practical arena for recognition without dismantling every land-war restriction.