I was reading over a forum post by Eightball today and saw some comments from some members that disturbed me. It reminded me of the old freedom of speech argument; some say in a free society we have the right to say whatever we want; others say that freedom of speech carries with it a responsibility. I happen to agree with the latter. As the old freedom of speech argument goes you don't have the right to yell "Fire!" in a crowded building and cause a panic. I agree with that. Freedom of speech carries with it a burden and a lot of responsibilty.

Eightball and I own and pay for this site and as long as we do, we reserve the right to edit, remove, and adjust content anyway we choose.

However, that does not mean we are going to cancel a member's account for personal reasons or without just cause.

You can trust that we will give everyone a wide berth here. You can express your opinions and say what you think, and while we may not agree with you,or even passionately disagree with what you, we're not going to remove or edit your post.

In the case of the member whose account was deleted, and what seems to have caused a controversy, the member was removed for the benefit of this site and every member. While the person who was removed had the right to express his/her views and we have absolutely no problem with that, wen the member began to denigrate and ridicule others for their beliefs and continued to do that to the point of harassment, we notified the member that these personal attack type of posts were not going to be tolerated. The member was warned that further abuses of this site's policies would not be tolerated. Despite our warning, the member continued his/her denigration of others and their beliefs. In light of this particular member's flagrant disregard and intolerance for the beliefs of others and because his/her posts amounted to little more than vitriolic personal attacks, the member was removed from this site.

Some members felt we were excercing censorship and removing members for expressing their beliefs and posted these opinions on the forum. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could be further from the truth.

For one thing, this isn't a democracy to here. But, that being said, we don't believe in censorship - and we've written many newsletters articles against censorship. On the other hand, we will not allow this site to degenerate into another MySpace-type, where there's always something untoward going on - like the woman who pretended to be 13 years-old and drove a child to commit suicide. I don't think any of you want this site to be another MySpace or Facebook; because if that is what you wanted you wouldn't be here. We truly believe we are off to a good start here and that 99.9% of the people who are members are good people. That's the kind of members we want and teh kind of site we wanted to create; a place where everyone could come, feel comfortable, have fun and express themselves without fear of ridicule or harassment.

But, we know, as this site grows, it will become more and more difficult for Eightball and I to keep an eye on everything. That's why the "Report Abuse" buttons exist on this site. Any member can report abusive content, and either EB or I will go take a look and decide if the content is abusive, and if so we will notify the member responsible and remove the abusive content. We are not going to ban or cancel anyone without warning or without just cause. We certainly will not going to remove anyone without justification or without notifying them first.

Here are some examples of topics that might be considered controversial that we're not going to censor - even though the discussions might get quite spicy and we might vehemently disagree with the opinions expressed.

We're in an election year here in the United States, and that's always a time when passions run high and everyone has an opinion. Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama will be running against John McCain. If you're for John McCain you're not going to like much that Clinton or Obama supporters post since much of it will be anti-McCain. And, if you're a Clinton or Obama supporter I can almost assure you that you're not going to like what McCain fans post. Whether you support Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, or John McCain, you have every right to express your opinion and to disagree with others' opinions. You do not have the right, however, to call someone a stupid, ignorant, moron because they happen to like Clinton - or Obama - or McCain. You can disagree respectfully with others without lowering the discussion to a personal level.

Politics and religion are two subjects that lend themselves to highly-charged emotional discourse. That's fine. Most of the members here are Christian. We might have a few atheists, or Muslims, or Jewish folks. Even though your beliefs are strong and deeply held, you must be tolerant - because no matter what you believe not everyone is going to share your beliefs. But everyone here has the right to express them.

EB and I are not fascists. We want you to express your opinions and share your thoughts. In fact, we encourage you to do so . We don't agree with a lot of opinions expressed here, but we strongly believe in your right to express them - as long as you don't engage in ridicule of others, hate-monger, or denigrate others.

We don't take removing someone from this site lightly and no one will ever be removed for expressing their beliefs, opinions, or sharing their thoughts on this site.

Tags: Free Speech Censorship Opinion Beliefs Clinton Obama McCain

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