Ah - we all have choices, but the most cherished "right" we seem to give ourselves is a core belief that goes on the lines of "If I don't approve of something, then you must not do it".    (Jeeze, we even have a teenage girl out here who wants to have all circuses banned on the grounds she read somewhere that a circus animal had once been mistreated: she disapproves, therefore none of us must go to a circus again.   You get the drift.)

On this site we appear to have two schools of thought: on one side "I disapprove of censorship, therefore you must let me say whatever I like", and on the other "I disapprove of inappropriate language, therefore you must not say anything that I deem to be inappropriate".

The problem, I think, is that both sides are right.   And then again, both sides are wrong.

Is there no limit to what may be said under the concept of freedom of speech? Well, in law, ethics and simple peer pressure there are limits.   Pedeophiles are not allowed to make recruiting speeches outside kindergartens, and neo-Nazis are not allowed to disrupt synagoge services by chanting obscenities at those attending.   The rights of citizens to quiet congregation sometimes over rules the rights of others to make noise.

On the other hand, to prevent honest discourse, purely on the grounds that you do not like the language being used, is extremely hard to defend. And will, in my view, inevitably lead to the worst excesses of political correctness.   (I once worked on a site where the dress code actually contained the clause "On dress down days, jeans may be worn provided that they are nice".   Honest.   Oh boy, did the cube police there have fun and games at the expense of the rest)

But sometimes the Freedom-Of-Speech brigade offer the viewpoint that "if you don't like what is being said on this site, then go somewhere else".   This must be spurious - for those proponents will repeat the same theme at every other site: until the goers away have nowhere left to go to. I do not think that would be a satisfactory outcome.

If that is true, then the same logic dictates that the Freedom-Of-Speech Brigade should not be given their marching orders, as well.

It looks as we have a debate here that is the chat room equivalent of the abortion wars.   Both sides, knowing that they are right, will go to extraordinary lengths to show that the other side is wrong.   And there is no middle ground: a partial abortion would not satisfy either faction.

I think that our volunteers are in the unwholesome position of being required to perform partial abortions on our threads.   And neither side can be satisfied.   One day, with impunity, the howling morons insult all and sundry for no apparent reason, and on another day sensible chat goes down the drain because the plug is pulled when the flames became a tad too high.

Should mudchat have moderators, or should we advocate total freedom of speech regardless of what may then be said? Perhaps that should be in accord with the wishes of the majority, but again, perhaps not.

How about adopting an additional pre-fix to the subject line of threads: say, "UM" for an unmoderated thread, and "MOD" for a moderated one.   That way, the freethinkers could have their UM threads and scream and rant and swear to their hearts content.   Those who do not want to listen could stay away, having been suitably warned.

Likewise, if you go to a MOD thread, and use offensive language, then it would be no surprise to you if your contribution was to vanish sometime soon after you posted it.

Just a thought.   And it would introduce a requirement that the moderators could kill a single contribution to a thread - is that technically possible?

But, I implore you, which ever side you place yourself, always remember: every single joke ever cracked, that was funny, had in it the power to offend someone somewhere.    Don't lets make humor illegal at MudCat.