Rule Number 1

[Troy Spiral (13)]

I know myself i hadnt actually read this thing in awhile , just thought i'd point it out specificly. Its been edited slightly a bit recently but its still the same rule as always.

Rule No. 1.

Play Nice. Unlike a lot of boards, we like to try and keep ours jerk-free.

You should feel comfortable to express your opinions freely, even if they might be unpopular opinions - we're not going for a homogenized, dull community here. But when voicing an opinion, always do so with tact and avoid inciting others when possible.

Examples of what we want to avoid:

Blatant Personal Attacks - Name calling, threatening or other attacks directly on another poster or non-poster.  "Direct Insults"  If someone calls another poster an "asshole" or some such,  and its not clear they were teasing, that's a fairly clear, obvious break of the DGN rules and they need to be talked to and/or dealt with in one way or another.

"Outing" of People - Some people have very controversial ideas they prefer to keep private. If you're privy to knowledge of another person's views, do not make those views public without permission of said person.

Personal Arguments - Heated personal relationship arguments and other very private personal "fighting" between individual posters should be taken off the board into email, IM or otherwise.

Blatantly Disruptive Posts - Many threads change subjects during the course of conversation , but deliberately ruining topics that were intended to be serious discussion, on a regular basis, is a sure sign of a jerk.

Blatantly Inciting Anger - It's fine to discuss things openly and frankly, and healthy debate is great. But don't incite anger in others purposely.

Blatantly Disruptive Activity - Any activity that slows the service of DGN. Any sort of anti-DGN "hacking" activity, denial of service attacks and the like are obviously not in spirit with the philosophy of DGN.

[Troy Spiral (13)]

Recent comments on the DGN "play nice" rules:

Inflammatory, somewhat abrasive posts do tend to cause people to become overly emotional. Not saying that justifies anyone's actions, but its something to take into consideration.

Direct Insults and name calling are especially disliked on DGN and apt to cause problems there is a bit of that above, and its being dealt with by several mods and posters. Its rare that we ever ban anyone, but we try hard (and yes its a lot of work) to keep the place generally tactful by asking people to curb their inflammatory remarks. What does that mean exactly? Its a case by case judgment call as always.

DGN is setup intentionally to be a haven from overly rude/obnoxious people.

DGN expects at least a minimum of tact and manners.  Do we always get that from all members all the time?  No.  Do we ban people for a few random rude comments? No.  But if it becomes a pattern, its better that they just move along.

We do argue, and occasionally we do insult one another , but if it goes on for an extended period , or is deemed just too rude, those people wont be around long.

The DGN staff, what is and isn't "allowed" on DGN.  If you want to be rude and insulting, that's fine no ones telling anyone how they personally should feel.  Its just not wanted on DGN.

There's plenty of boards / email groups that do allow people to openly and purposely be rude, feel free to use them to be abrasive all you want.

Full DGN Rules and FAQ:

http://www.detroitgothic.net/index.php?showtopic=131

[wheresmypiggy]

I dont see anything on racisim. How far can you go. Obviously there is no line to cross.

[Troy Spiral (13)]

Blatantly Disruptive Posts

Blatantly Inciting Anger

Racism would fall under both of the above. But we've hesitated to try and form a specific definition about what racism is because its so broadly defined in so many different ways by so many different people.

The DGN rules are left a bit "generalized" so that they can be enforced with flexibility.

Many of the few people that have been banned over the 5+ years DGN has been around , has been due to continued racist remarks. (rare when anyone would get banned for any single comment, usually is due to them not curbing or cutting out their negative behavior after being asked at least once to stop)

Blatant, clear examples of repeated racism, and direct repeated examples of directly insulting other posters are two key reasons for most of the bans in the past.