I think Che hit it on the head. We all headed down the same path together and these new rules are meant to help weed out the posters who are not adding value and are only here to disrupt the forum for the fun of it. The rest will continue on and try to get along with one another and maybe learn to listen to each other more. It will take time to shed some old habits of debate (myself included), but I think it will prove to be a better forum and a more productive forum for those who chose to stay.
There are many options as Che has pointed out with his use of the “ignore option”. Personally I don’t use it, I scan through looking at the names and skip over those who I know to be disingenuous. I have placed my PM box on block all users which has helped reduce the spam. If people can just be content with accepting each other’s opinions, standing behind all your own posts by keeping to one login name and refraining from attacks then there really isn’t any downside to this change to a moderated forum.
Psy and Ginger didnt just decide this over night. We have all witnessed the path that this forum has taken. A few years ago many will remember that we were getting spikes of over 400 visitors reading posts at one time here on fornits. Now we don’t get anywhere near that. Part of the reason is that fornits just isn’t a very safe place to be when you consider all the people trying to attack and revealing and selling of posters identity, talking of IP numbers, building web pages dedicated to humiliating kids etc.
If you look at Nigels posts for example you can see that he had a lot more to say and share with us but never did. He always made the point to say “I am not saying Aspen Ranch was a good choice” which showed he was afraid to speak openly here. We can all admit that it isn’t safe here for survivors or program parents to speak their mind. But these changes may lead to a slow change in the culture here on fornits and lead to a better tolerant base of posters.
Change always takes time and is most difficult at its' onset.
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