..... I don't mind thick skin, people being blunt and all that. I can work with it as long as their target arguments, not people. It's the thick skulls that bother me - people who come, write toxic things thinking they can, because they have right to free speech. What they seem to forget is that insulting the other people is forbidden.
People seem to not understand meaning of being "civil", "mature" and how to "behave".
Honestly, the only way to make the community grow and make it better is to follow simple rules. First of them is to respect another person and her/his opinions, even if you disagree with that opinion.
You know why I try to be a good person? Because I treat others how I'd like to be treated. Because in doing otherwise lies destruction and complete annihilation all the man can achieve.
For me, I tend to be pretty straight forward with my views and opinions on various subjects and certainly not afraid to toss some punches at someone's argument..... I grew up in a family where you cut the BS and get to the point.... but on forums, over the years, I've ended up making much longer-winded posts to further explain my positions/opinions as way too many people were taking my posts the completely wrong way and I'd just end up writing a lot more to further explain my position anyways.
I treat others as I'd expect them to treat me..... and at the same time, when someone treats me a certain way, I reflect it back at them so that they're treated the same way they're treating me.
I don't take any of it personally and it doesn't ruin my day, it's just an internet forum, so when the debate/conversation returns back to normal, I can easily continue having a civil discussion with the same person who tossed crap at me.... and I certainly try to avoid dragging what happened in one thread into other threads to drag things out.
It may not seem like it to some in here, and I imagine I seem like quite the knowitall jackazz who loves to attack people, but I don't go out of my way to target members or their views and if someone has a different opinion other than my own, I can respect their differences and I can understand their position to a degree, but I will still counter their opinions with my own opinions so that others looking on don't end up thinking everybody agrees with their opinions/positions..... and when they start to get snippy with me, I'll just get snippy back, but I will very rarely ever start it..... I may just try and finish it
But indeed... some people will try and use "I have the right to free speech" to defend anything they say or do in here, as if there are no consequences to their actions..... but Internet Forums are not a Democracy, they're a Dictatorship, run by those who own & operate the forum in question..... if something gets out of hand, if something illegal occurs within their forum, they're the ones who have to answer for it in most cases, so they set the ground rules and we follow them.
Being a Forum Admin/Mod a few times over the years, I never forget this and if I do something wrong in here or I go over the line where the forum rules lay, I accept the moderator's actions without b*tching about "Freedom of Speech/Expression."
