I'm a firm believer that the passion most of us have for music prevents such silliness. Remove the music and Mudcat would very quickly be hijacked by about thirty people who would babble on endlessly with their political and racial agendas (agendae?). Another twenty would hang around constantly just for the fun of baiting both sides.

Keep in mind that most of the people who rant, DON'T have other outlets for their anger. If they got into these kinds of arguements in Pubs, there'd be fights galore. On the net you can say just about anything, and chances are nobody's gonna kill you.

The balance on Mudcat continues to favour music topics by a WIDE margin. As long as that keeps up, it'll attract (mostly) reasonable people.

Rick