Please provide any relevant context for the context of your posts. The country you live in, culture you are part of...

I think there used to be an optional field for Location in the user profiles. I don't know why but I think it was specifically removed at one point. I kinda liked being able to get a sense of where someone was from. It also helped with understanding the source of the occasional language issue that popped up. But I'm not entirely sure whether exposing such details would be beneficial in dealing with controversial topics. While it might help someone with a mind to try and understand someone's opposing point of view, someone with a point of view that is entrenched within them may just end up thinking or posting, "Oh you're [X] so you're part of the problem and you're never going to convince me otherwise." Not having that information front and center takes that element off the table, at least for a little while.

Demanding citations to back up arguments was something that was positively embraced by quite a number of people in the Lounge for some time. I think citation demands in the Lounge have actually declined over the past couple years, I suspect actually due to an overall decrease in controversial topics. And it seems to me that the decrease in controversial topics in the Lounge is actually due more to users thinking, "This is a game development site, why would I discuss that topic here?" rather than due to actions on the part of moderators. So I wonder if part of the issue is that we're all out of practice and if a potential solution is a larger number of users (non-mods) adopting stricter standards of debate.

Also, I just want to say that this has been a pretty awesome discussion and it's really cool to see a community trying to sort out a set of workable guidelines rather than go for the easy blanket ban. These kind of discussions are one of the things that I love about this site.

I don't know where you got the idea that my views are US-centric (I live here at present, but I'm not from here, and my views don't align, for the most part, with those of americans).

But no, I'm saying that if you are stating opinions, without ever bothering to go read the relevant literature (be that for your own locale, fine), then you are indeed uninformed.

How about allowing mods to tag a specific post as inaccurate, aggressive, or otherwise undesirable?

[citation needed]?

(the link could point to the forum FAQ that jbadams is describing)

There's a draft of potential new rules under discussion here. Incase anyone (like myself) was 'Following' this thread and missed the new thread.

You can ban racism and sexism without banning discussions of gender and race. The latter approach only helps ensure that the industry largely stays its current predominantly-male, predominantly-white demographic.

However, where do we draw the line?

For example, I find the quoted statement both racist and sexist. Its like you are suggesting that white men are worth less than other demographics to the industry.

I strongly disagree that the white male demographic should be discriminated against to meet some quota. A person should be treated equally regardless of race or gender.

You remind me of the challenges I had growing up as a extremely poor white male.

For example, there was this one time during my undergraduate where an error caused by government red tape withheld my GI bill funds. I couldn't get a scholarship when I graduated high school so I had to wait until I was 24 basically. I had joined the army to earn my GI bill.

I went to the financial aid office and asked for assistance. The lady there was a black woman. She refused to help me. She at one point became so angry that she threw here pen at the wall and yelled "A little white boy like you doesn't need financial aid! Why don't you have your parents pay for it!" (yes, she actually said that)

By then I have been back and forth with the veterans office and the financial aid office probably 6 times. I left the room reduced to tears.

My parents are so poor that they couldn't even afford to drive to my graduation. When I graduated (a few times), there was nobody there to take pictures with. Yet at the same time students with affirmative action scholarships had parents show up in brand new Mercedes. There were even times when I had to send what money I had back to my parents so they could not have their electricity shut off.

I have been fighting an uphill battle against racial and sexual discrimination my entire adult life. Am I less of a human being because I have a penis? ..because my skin is white?

Are my skills and abilities not important to you?

I strongly disagree with censorship, especially when its being used to uphold the political ideology of the staff.

Moderation only works when its neutral. When you use moderation as a form of political censorship, that's when you have become unprofessional.

In order to ban threads that disagree with affirmative action, you would also have to ban thread that describe gender inequality and a need for affirmative action.

When books are challenged, restricted, removed, or banned, an atmosphere of suppression exists…. The fear of the consequences of censorship is as damaging as, or perhaps more damaging than, the actual censorship attempt. After all, when a published work is banned, it can usually be found elsewhere. Unexpressed ideas, unpublished works, unpurchased books are lost forever. -robert p doyle

Society's needs come before the individual's needs. -adolf hitler