Community Chat: Religion Constitution (Rules)
Community Chat: Religion Constitution
The following Constitution applies to all members and posters on the Community Chat: Religion forum. If any user requires clarification on any aspects of the Constitution, please post the question, privately or in public.
1. Mission Statement
The purpose of the Community Chat: Religion forum is to foster meaningful discussion of non-trivial topics. People hold a wide range of opinions on these topics, but there are few universally-accepted answers. Forum members may have a wide-range of motivations; some may wish to inform, others to practice debate, others to challenge beliefs, others to learn, etc. So long as these goals can be pursued via meaningful discussion, they are not at odds with the purpose of Community Chat: Religion. In order to foster the goal of meaningful discussion, we accept the following guidelines:
1. Treat all users respectfully, even when we passionately disagree with them.
2. Posts should contain information on the topic at hand, not about any person(s) taking part in the discussion (i.e., we are discussing ideas, not each other).
3. Responding in kind is not the correct way to address a breech of guidelines (i.e., two wrongs don't make a right. We will not try to justify our own actions by pointing to the actions of another).
4. Posts should not provoke others to behave in a way that is contrary to the guidelines or rules of the forum.
2. Rules
1. Anyone is free to post their ideas, comments, questions, or statements in any thread they like, as long as it is in context and respectful.
2. No member may post abusive messages against or about other forum members.
3. No member may post abusive or disrespectful messages against individuals, philosophies, beliefs, organizations, or lifestyles.
4. Threads will fall into two categories, “Nice” and “Hot”. In addition to the rules above, posts in the threads labeled “Nice” may not contain any material considered offensive, uncomfortable or upsetting to any party, under any circumstances. All unlabeled threads are considered “Hot”.
5. Users may request new threads (or old threads to be bumped) on any subject they desire, as long as it is appropriate to the rules and mission statement of the forum.
Abuse means ungrounded attacks, slander, insults or denigration. It may be necessary in debate to include a comment, grounded and supported by fact which is unavoidably uncomfortable or even hurtful. This is not considered abuse. Abuse refers to situations in which the accusation is not grounded, or is disrespectful or hurtful without necessity.
3. Punishment and Procedures
A forum member always has the right to stop participating in a thread.
All forum members should bring up issues via PM or rmail (all moderators use their RPoL names as their forum user names. A list of moderators will be included.) Each issue will be decided separately, and reciprocal hostility will be dealt with independently of the source that inspired it. We will explain any decision to anyone who wishes to hear it.
Following a post in which a member’s message seems unclear, which a member is responding to what may be an incorrect interpretation of another member’s post, or in which a post is phrased such that it may unintentionally be interpreted as disrespectful or abusive, a moderator will publicly post in the same thread to attempt to explain the member’s intentions and correct any misunderstandings. The member may in turn correct the moderator, if the moderator’s interpretation was incorrect.
Following a post including a minor or unclear violation of the rules, a moderator will publicly post in the same thread that it is inappropriate and request the original poster edit or remove it. The original poster has 24 hours to comply. After that time a moderator may edit or delete the offending post.
Following a post including a major violation of the rules, a moderator will delete or modify the post immediately, and move the post content to a private thread for later discussion.
Following any moderator action, a member may appeal the decision, in private messages, explaining why the behavior was not in violation and asking the moderators’ reasons for censuring it. The moderators will take a vote among them. The total vote and opinions may be shared, if requested, but an individual moderator’s vote may be with-held. If a decision is appealed, the original post will be permitted, and a moderator will post a clarification stating such.
When moderators are taking corrective action as moderators, they will clearly label this post, by using a capitalized heading and colored text.
All posts in “Nice” threads will be subject to much heavier scrutiny than posts in “Hot” threads. Posts unacceptable in “Nice” threads may be copied over to a “Hot” thread, if it is acceptable there.
A member who regularly posts hostility, inappropriate content, or serves to block communication will talk with a moderator directly via a private channel to resolve the problem. If the problem cannot be resolved, the member will temporarily or permanently have his or her posting privileges revoked.
Moderators will not censure or revoke posting privileges unless it's in violation of the rules of the forum or the RPoL rules, or the user is making open communication impossible. Moderators will seek to be fair to all parties whenever possible.
The moderators are beholden to all the rules as all other members on the forum
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:03, Mon 27 Sept 2010.
