Sorry, I’m name flipping while on the phone. Correction made.
I didn’t tell him he can’t get involved I pointed out that he was doing the same thing I was. The only difference is that I was being polite about it and not making it personal.
Oh! You were being polite about things?
I didn’t know that it was polite to make backhanded comments about the site or the moderation team so openly like that.
Nothing backhanded or impolite about it, my criticisms were fair and polite, nothing uncivil about it.
I didn’t start this public thread to discuss it but as long as Typhoon wanted to do so then is this not the place to have the discussion?
Is simply disagreeing with you to be considered rude?
That kind of refutes the entire premise that as a part of free speech we have a right to redress grievances with those in charge doesn’t it?
Here is where you’re wrong. If you hadn’t noticed we went from being a free speech site to being a moderated site - right in this thread.
I posted the rules and the site was updated with them. Did you miss that?
You don’t have a right to redress grievances here. We have the right to delete anything that we think is total crap and we have the right to kick your ass off this site.
You and your friends were belly aching for moderation FOR MONTHS. Here it is. Keep pushing me.
Welcome to the Political Bullpen
Welcome to Political Bullpen! We were gone for a while but now we’re back to give libertarians and conservatives a place to call home. Your views won’t be censored here. It’s your right to speak freely and let your voice… read more
What are you showing me that the announcement needs to get updated? Who cares. Read the rules.
Stop trying to bully me into losing my temper and violating the rules. I’ve told you before that won’t work.
Oh my gosh…give it a rest with the victim card. You are in control of your own emotions and reactions. Own it. You keep fooling around with me and pushing buttons all across this site and I am directly telling you that I am not going to tolerate it anymore. You are on notice.
This is your last warning. If you don’t want to get banned permanently then I suggest you take a break for a while because that’s where you’re at. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
I disagree with this, sorry but I support what Patriot was attempting to do. So please don’t hold all of us accountable.
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The intent is not to create a heavy-handed moderated site over the long term. Quite the opposite. The intent is to conduct a purge of those who do not support free speech and who consistently wage personal attacks. Once the purge and moderation period is complete, things will go back to normal. We got the the green light to do this.
Free speech doesn’t give someone the right to suppress the speech of someone else by being a total asshole. We are going to fix that.
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Well personally the experiment was doomed to fail from get go.
If you find a solution I’m sure there are millions of other sites would implement it.
Freedom of speech with all it’s glory has that downside, in which we are now witnessing. People aren’t willing to accept the bad with the good. It’s just not human nature IMO.
We have had challenges in the past to be sure. Those challenges primarily came from being censored by big tech, getting kicked off hosting providers, things like that. Those things tend to come with the territory of hosting a free speech site. The scary thing is I’ve been at this for two decades now and I’m used to having to move sites, change domain names, turn on my own servers/ASN at a remote farm, and all the other ash and trash that comes from dealing with those who have an agenda and want to control what’s on the internet.
In 20 years of hosting sites and communities just like this one, this is a new experience for me. Sure, I have had to ban hundreds if not thousands of people in that time frame for being stupid. This is something different. I am absolutely gobsmacked by the level of disrespect that a few of you have shown me, my moderators, this community, and this site. It’s beyond disappointing, but I don’t believe in throwing the baby out with the bathwater. There is nothing wrong with this community, there is nothing wrong with free speech, and there is nothing wrong with discussing uncomfortable topics. There is something wrong with a few of you here who are trying to stop that. Before any of you react to that statement, please don’t. On this matter we can agree to disagree. However, I did not build this place for you to ruin it. I did not offer all of you seeking refuge from harassment at other sites a place to call home just so you could harass other people here that you found to be disagreeable. If you cannot tolerate free speech then you are not welcome here. If you constantly need to shout others down, insult them, or just fill up one of their threads with a bunch of garbage…you aren’t welcome here. You can either leave on your own or I will show you the door. Either way, you aren’t staying.
I do want to thank Ty and Kelly for stepping up to the plate over these past few weeks and months. I especially appreciate their willingness to volunteer regarding this matter. No one deserves the type of abuse and disrespect that many of you have shown them - those who have should be ashamed of themselves.
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We all make assumptions regarding our active cyber-community members based upon what they post and our own perception of their state of mind.
I must say that you seem to be proud of the notion that you manage to “wind people up”. Perhaps you hone in on what you see as a weakness and deliberately needle someone.
Seems plausible…and sadistic.
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According to the current Users list, we have 290 members. The list has been growing slowly but steadily. I look forward to an ever-growing population of users that appreciate what is available here.
I still visit a political discussion site that has upwards of 14,000 users…and multitudes of biased moderators.
I am extremely thankful for what we have here. 
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I’m pretty sure we used to visit the same site and I got banned because of wrong think.
I don’t feel nervous posting here. I actually feel free to say what I want which is rare nowadays.
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Since I have the same username there, I’m not hard to find. 
I try not to use community size as an indicator of a successful community anymore. Most of those old and larger communities have a massive inactive user base. If a site has been around for 10 years or so think about all of the people who only signed up to reply to one particular topic.
I used to be all about the numbers but now I am more about frequency - we crank out just as many OPs as some of the larger forums. Some days are slower than others but that’s any forum. On average our engagement is high.
We also have fairly high anonymous page view rates. It generally takes the average reader of a forum anywhere from 6 months to a year to create an account. While this domain has been around for some time, this site is only 7 months old.
From my view slow and steady wins the race. PB isn’t going anywhere and I have no plans on ever shutting it down. Thankfully, despite some of the naysayers here we are becoming more and more successful.
Don’t take my word for it though, look at the Alexa rankings:
So while our member base remains small (and is about to get even smaller) our site continues to grow, our reach continues to expand, and our words are getting to more and more people every single day.
That’s the point.
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By comparison - here are the Alexa metrics for PoliticalForum (dot com). A much larger and older site than ours. We aren’t that far behind and in a few months we will likely surpass them, globally.
We are already ranking higher than them in the United States.
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I know this is a free speech site, but that does not mean people feel free to express their views without fear of attack or abuse. I think when you can achieve that, the interaction rate of current users would rise, instead of just being a broadcaster for a few with the loudest voices and fervent aggression.
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That’s where we are headed and my rule generally has been…express your views, but don’t be an asshole. It’s a pretty simple rule to follow and anyone who was on Freebird, or any of the other sites before Freebird, will recognize that statement and that it used to be the one and only rule we had.
For a more polite and PG-rated version - it’s the Golden Rule. I can’t take any credit for the simplicity and brilliance of it.
We are going to get back to that kind of operating environment. I just needed some time to square my family stuff away. Life happens.
Personal attacks are a real pet peeve of mine because in 99% of instances most people wouldn’t have the spine to run their mouth in public to someone physically the way they do sitting in the comfort of their own home.
While we go through this phase of purging the bad actors, personal attacks will follow the table of penalties that are now in effect site wide.
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