Posted by WC (gen. coord) on November 05, 2008 at 19:58:31
This is Soap Box #2 -- our second try at having a political discussion forum. In my opinion it's worked out fine for the most. There were a couple of sharp, edgy exchanges, and maybe a couple of posts that were sort of silly in my opinion, but nothing horrible, terribly ungracious or over the top, I think. We had banned political discussions and taken down Soap Box #1 because it got so ugly. People were getting upset and it made life hell for us. At the time it seemed counter-productive to the goals of our site to have such a forum.
We had too much of a "unity" thing in the cult and it's good to be able to be different, stand for what we believe, respect that we all see things differently, and be able to have a civil exchange of views. (I realize this statement itself could be interpreted as a political stance, that I am for plurality, which I am. But please spare me the arguments, don't make me the target of debate and don't force me to defend my views! Last time, people were reading into everything, and if we so much as made a simple statement like that, people would jump all over us and call us anything from left, right, too religious, anti-god, to you-name-it.)
Anyway, if we decide to keep Soap Box, it will remain a board with little or no moderation. We may still have to delete posts here and there if they go too far. I like that Soap box remains a board we don't have to care about so much.