Special high standards apply in this forum. Great Debates is meant for respectful, intelligent, serious, well thought-out, slower-paced debates about all kinds of interesting issues. This forum is not limited to politics
*. There will be no tolerance for insulting other posters, personal attacks on politicians** or others, and trolling. This is not the place for distorting your opponents' statements, one-liners, snarky posts, charged language, polls, nitpicking, chatter, tired jokes, or answering without reading the whole thread. For example, instead of using charged wording in calling your opponent's statement a "lie," you should be writing that this statement is "untrue," "incorrect" or "mistaken."
Only respond if you have a new argument or viewpoint to add, not just to reiterate previous points or to say that you agree or disagree. Providing citations and explaining your reasoning is encouraged. We can selectively disable members' posting privileges just in this forum and we will use this feature. Moderators will have the power to delete, close, or move posts and threads based on their arbitrary judgments about what is appropriate in this forum, not just based on whether they are following our forum Terms of Service. Even higher standards will be used when judging new threads. Thread titles must be descriptive. Members need to have at least three posts elsewhere and be registered for a day before they can start new threads.
This forum is an experiment. Our
Politics and Other Controversies forum will remain unchanged.
*Edited to add: Political discussion is permitted in the Great Debates forum but limited to ideas, concepts, proposals, or bills in Congress that reach across the national spectrum at the Federal level, i.e., the topic has to be ‘great’ in scope or impact in order to be a great debate. Participants in our debates must post with intelligence, maturity, politeness, and critical thinking rather than emotion or mere partisanship.
**Edited to add: There will be no party bashing or derisive remarks about specific candidates or current holders of political offices. Comparing specific candidates to Hitler, Stalin, etc. is unacceptable in Great Debates. Those who wish to participate in such discussions are encouraged to visit the Politics and Other Controversies forum.
Additions were provided for clarification by the Great Debates Moderating Team: Mightyqueen801, Mike from back east, and Rachel NewYork
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