Changing the tone

I like dialogue and I like spirited discussion but gradually the rhetoric has heated up here on the old blog. I have gotten a few emails from people who would like to comment but feel the heat is pretty hot here. They feel they would have to be snarky and nasty just to survive. I intend to change the tone.

So, if you comment here observe the following:

Posts may be rejected if they include defamation, threats, namecalling, profanity, ad hominem attacks, disruptive comments, or anything else that I think creates a hostile environment for people to engage in civil dialogue. Disagreement is fine as long as it is done in a respectful manner.

Some comments are mixed. I may contact a commenter with the remedy if I have time. If you don’t see your comment up within 24 hours, you can assume it was rejected. If that is the case, and you want to complain, send an email.

I have the comment moderation on and I know how to use it.

8 thoughts on “Changing the tone”

  1. I have asked EXODUS. Nothing. I think they are afraid that such a statement might be misinterpreted as a validation of the gay lifestyle. They say they are against it, but they won’t make it “front page”.

  2. Well, I have been vocal about it. I have the only anti-bullying curriculum out there from a conservative mainstream perspective. About NARTH and Exodus, ask them. I would love to see conservative get fired up about the issue.

  3. Speaking of changing the tone, how about a very clear and very public statement on the EXODUS and NARTH homepages condemning violence against gays? How about an article from EXODUS or NARTH about what Christian’s can do to decrease hatred of and violence towards gays?

    You won’t find anything like that if you search the EXODUS site. I’m not suggesting that they condone it, only that they are not very public in condemning it.

  4. grantdale – I am laughing. Well, I was laughing. On so many levels, prolonging a commercial blog scam with Wayne just seems funny. Well, I don’t think sinner would qualify as name calling. I would call myself that. Probably depends on the context and the adjective that preceded it. I won’t go there or else I would have to reject my own post 🙂

  5. Yeah, it’s your blog Warren 🙂

    Not sure we’d have a comment on his editorial policy therefore Jim. Oh, wait… just a minute… yes…

    Also noticed Wayen Besen has recently made a similar announcement (although the comments here beg no comparison to the one’s over there. Eye watering and ear curling, and more than a few apparently orginating from Atlanta for some odd reason /smirk).

    I’ll have to ask — ’cause it’ll play on my mind otherwise — but you and Wayne haven’t had a head-to-head and made a mutual decision about how best to prolong some commercial blogging scam have you!!!

    PS: does name calling include “sinner”?

  6. You are correct that this has been a difficult call for me. I really value the give and take but it is quite time consuming. Also, making judgment calls will mean I will be inconsistent at times I am sure. I already have comments moderation on but let almost everything through. I intend to be more stringent.

    Comments like letters to the editor would actually be fine. However, I think the dynamism of just chatting is great too if it can be respectful and to the point.

    Also, I think the time wasting element of it all is that I get many requests to back up various points that I have already spoken to in past posts or I do not have time to do. As I conceive a blog, it is a place of hopefully informed opinion but not a peer reviewed outlet. I shoot from the hip sometimes and have backed off of some things because commenters have provided alternative ways of thinking that are challenging. So I will see how this works.

  7. I’d be interested in seeing how this works out. I have similar concerns about comments, which is why I haven’t enabled them (yet?) on my site.

    For one, I’m not sure what role comments can best play on a site in which such divisive issues are covered. I think comments add significant value in Ex-gay Watch, for example, but that is due, partly I think, to the tremendous self-policing that the site operators and regular commenters put into it. But it does take time an denergy/ I barely have time as it is; I don’t even know where to begin when it comes to comments.

    I think your ground rules are good. I’d be interested in seeing how much time and effort it takes on your part to enforce them. Also whether you think in the end if a constructive dialog is achieved, especially when comments may be held in moderation for a considerable amount of time.

    My guess would be that moderated comments may take on more of a “Letter to the editor” quality, rather than conversations back and forth along a thread. For example, assuming grantdale has already offered their opinions on this thread, I have no way of either adding or countering anything they said, because I haven’t seen them yet.

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