Quote Originally Posted by phantom View Post
what was your first clue??? your not part of the 'in crowd', either deal with it or go elsewhere. there is one law for you and me and another law for them and their favorites, the people that rise to be 'senior members', and eventually moderators. of course they will deny it and probably call me a troll, but as an observer ive seen it a lot here.
You're not a troll. But not a good observer either. I'm a relatively new moderator and didn't ask for it and so far I have never really found this in-club you're talking about, not as a member and not as a moderator with a bit more insight. Except if you mean that long-standing members know eachother relatively well, but that kinda comes with hanging out for a while, no?


Quote Originally Posted by phantom View Post
so debating something like 9/11 has to be done in such a way that it does not offend your sensibilities? its a controversial issue and divides much of the world so your not going to like some of the opinions you hear, if a debate forum does not allow freedom of expression, especially politically: just close it down as its not worth a and has pretty much become an exclusive 'old boys club'. if your going to 'moderate' people as soon as they post something which does not conform to your particular set of morals, then any 'debate' is without worth and it is also probably one of the main reasons this place has lost so many members.
This is mostly correct, except that the policy here has always been that you should state your opinion with some respect towards other members and in a non-inflammatory way, which is quite possible and has nothing to do with demanding that everybody agrees with anyone's opinion, it's about not starting flamewars. I've seen a forum where this wasn't enforced and the conclusion they came to was to close down the politics section completely because they saw how it affected relations between members who could otherwise be good friends.

In the last months I've often seen Shibumi make very short posts that only seemed to serve the purpose of ridiculing America or other behaviour that could be seen as trolling, so even if he was joking, it's entirely plausible that some would think he only claimed that so his troll post would not be deleted and he wouldn't be infracted. I remember a time where he would make lengthier posts and explain his opinions etc. and IIRC he didn't have a lot of trouble with Backroom moderators then. If he came here to debate, then he should do so and not post a few lines that make him look like he hates the USA and wants nothing but to troll Americans.

I've also taken the liberty to edit your quote a bit since your use of language does not comply with forum rules either, maybe you should read them and note that the forum aims to be PG-13, which means if you look for an adult forum, you may well be wrong here, which I hope isn't our fault.