Board Rules

[Laika]

The message board rules have been expressed in paragraph form a few times over the years. We have organized them into a more specific list. Below the rules is some commentary - this is a bit of guidance on the justification for some of the rules and how they will be enforced.

 

BOARD RULES

1. No personal attacks

2. No discriminatory comments or slurs

3. No doxxing other members

4. No spam

5. No solicitation

6. No blatantly political posts

7. The moderators have the right to edit or delete any post or topic, or ban any user, at their discretion and without warning

8. No public posting that is overtly critical of moderators, a moderator, or any moderation decision

 

COMMENTARY

1. Some light ribbing is fine and can be fun. This message board has a long history of free speech and open criticism. It may be okay to call someone an idiot because their post about baseball is just horrible, or all of their posts are horrible. This rule is not a license to freely post whatever stupid opinion about baseball you might have. If you come here to defend sac bunts, you will get dragged and the moderators won't help you. When things get too venomous or too personal, the line will have been crossed. The moderators will be on watch for specific posters continuing to go at each other in different threads. Ongoing feuds between specific posters can derail threads and distract from worthwhile conversation. The key consideration is the intent of the post; posts that the moderators, in their sole discretion, interpret as targeted at another poster with malicious intent or with intent to incite negative reactions will be punishable.

2. Blatantly racist, sexist, bigoted, homophobic, etc. comments, language, or images will not be tolerated. When it comes to this rule, intent does not matter; even if you don't mean any harm the use of any slur is punishable.

3. If you post personal information about another poster without their permission you will be severely punished.

6. Posts about the intersection of politics and baseball are okay, even if they express a form of personal opinion. Baseball has a long political history. Posts or threads that are purely about political opinions with no relation to baseball are not okay - historically, these posts have lead to deep rifts between board members. The moderators will use their discretion to determine if a line of discussion has veered completely away from baseball.

7. You may or may not get a warning before deletion or punishment. The moderators can ban you or delete a post for any reason they see fit, even if there is no obvious violation of these rules; the rules are not intended to cover any and all possible transgressions.

8. Continuous public complaining about a moderator or moderation does two negative things: it hinders the independence and discretion the moderators need to perform their work and it hurts public perception of moderation on the message board. If a specific post is against the rules you can report the post - this is the preferred way of bringing something to the moderators' attention. The moderators do not owe the board an explanation for any decision to or to not discipline a poster or delete something. If you have a general comment to make to the moderators you can PM one of us - your feedback will be read and considered.

[Laika]

Shouldn't have to even say this but:

 

It is against the rules to tell other members to die, kill themselves, "find a rope", or anything like that.

 

As usual, you're more likely to be caught/banned if it is part of an exchange that looks to be a serious personal affront, or a board-polluting saga.

 

So stop doing this. Thanks.