RULES. Special high standards apply in this forum - ALL posters MUST read this (Congress, conspiracy)
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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.
*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
Last edited by Rachel NewYork; 11-15-2022 at 12:52 PM..
Reason: Edited additions in red.
1. Trolling is strictly forbidden in Great Debates. Trolling is defined as posting to annoy or offend, rather than to inform. In other words, posting just to generate a negative reaction from, or create dissension among, other members.* Rude comments, heated ranting, obscene or implied obscene language, etc. will not be tolerated in Great Debates. Please keep your responses to others on this forum respectful. If you can't handle respectful debate, then Great Debates is not the forum for you.
2. Posting unsubstantiated stories, news parodies, hoaxes, or conspiracy theories in Great Debates will result in a warning at the very least. At the most, it will be viewed as trolling.
3. Please don't post one-liners or similar wisecrack and brusque responses to others' posts. This is a debate forum and those who wish to participate in Great Debates are expected to put more effort into presenting cogent and well thought-out posts here.
4. Please don't make denigrating generalizations about any group of people. Such comments are unacceptable in Great Debates as they inevitably lead to personal attacks, flaming and other inappropriate posts**
5. Please don't post in red. This is the font color used by moderators throughout all the City-Data forums for post edits and other moderator actions.
There is a "report post" icon located in the upper right-hand corner of every post made on the City-Data forums. For those unfamiliar with it, the icon is in the shape of a triangle with a red border. Rather than respond to insulting and inappropriate posts, please report them instead by clicking on this icon. A moderator will review the reported post and take any necessary, appropriate action.
Thank you.
*This working definition of "trolling" is credited to forum member Poncho_NM.
**Credited to moderator PJSaturn.
Last edited by Rachel NewYork; 02-15-2022 at 09:13 AM..
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