Political hatred again has it's consequences

[Mike]

The personal insult from BruceMirken was the last straw. The post was deleted and he has been booted. Once again, someone's political hatred has crossed the line, assumptions blindly made and conclusions wrongly drawn. He made a decision to voluntarily leave but had to attempted to childishly "stick it to the man" which was a personal attack on me because I'm the one who must police this site. He could have just left quietly if he dislikes me that much. I didn't want him to leave, that was his decision but the manner in which he choose caused me to boot and ban him.

Most of us here feel music, especially Paul's music, is a common ground for co-operation. Anyone who has been here for any period of time already knows that it is very rare for me to have to "censor". This is because most people use common sense and follow the rules. You break the rules and there are consequences. Again I have been very flexible but from the perspective of my opposition, I guess the odd censorship, and policing done on this site keeps discussions on the up and up. I wrongly opened up a political forum a year or so ago and some people on the extreme one side of the scale still had some ill feelings of the basic rule on most message boards or what are referred to as blogs. Policing is done on every responsible blog, period. Where there is no policing, there is general chaos and massive, extreme and radical points of view. No thanks, if you feel you need to do that, just go to those sites for those types of discussions and come here to talk music.

Please don't be surprised or shocked when a post here or there must be deleted. I'm not going to dig up examples but if someone wishes to list out some popular boards or blogs that have moderators such as paulmccartney.com please do so.

A brief discussion on this "here" may be a good exercise for those who have any questions of what happened. Please, no personal insults.

[Mike]

Thanks, that's a pretty good analogy, wish I thought of it

I think of this site not really "my place" but more like a community building that I lease. I hate formalities but there has to be some kind of rule of law or some bully will come in and take over the community and run things the way he wants just because he can.

I'll tell you it's times like these that seriously make me think, why do I do this. Why do I rack up my credit cards to keep this freakin site going. I've got a total of zero save for retirement or my two remaining kids educations. I was unable to support post secondary education for my older children. I try to make it up them in other ways.

So you see my money problems with this site are far, far more important to me than somebody crying about a little censorship or what I call policing.

[michaelk]

MAJOR RETHINK IN PROGRESS

[EddieV]

Mike

It is your site, so what you did is OK. Your are doing a great job. We decided I think last year not discuss political subjects, so we have to follow this

EddieV

[little lamb dragonfly]

Without getting into any specifics, I found Bruce's post to be eloquent and spot on. I imagine that most people on this site probably agree with him, but enjoy Macca-central too much to defend him. Furthermore, I think the "blind assumptions" he made have a fair amount of reasonable suspicion behind them. Will you allow comments like mine to exist, since they clearly disagree with yours? No personal insults here!

[mommasturn]

It is amazing that some comments are so concentrated upon while others are not even blinked at.

Someones simple opinion about a tune they just don't care for ends up a battle ground while other peoples off color crude humor doesn't get corrected at all.

I was hoping for a bit of music tutallage, but I find some posts quite offensive.

Enjoying a song or fastforwarding it is everyone's choice. So many political comments should be saved for November and go vote your opinion. Don't ruin people's music experience by hiding behind your computer screen. If what you post isn't what you would say out loud to everyone's face then perhaps you shouldn't be typing it in.

NOW, let's all discuss the top10 Paul songs so we can hear some positive stuff.

[Mike]

An opinion is just that, an opinion. One shouldn't assume that most of the people who frequent here this site agree with your politics just because some people are more vocal than others. I really don't care about who thinks who has rights to post what ever they want. Posts will get deleted, removed, censored or whatever you want to call it, just like they do on Paul's official site. Though they are paid staff and take much more time to explain themselves than I do and are more politically correct, the bottom line is that posts that break the rules are removed there as they are here.

Why on earth do some of you feel you have the right to post anything you want ? And then get offended when it's removed. Give us all a break and educate yourselves a bit about the internet.

"Will you allow comments like mine to exist, since they clearly disagree with yours?" nice smart ass remark that again was unnecessary but you just felt like you had to say it. That says a lot about yourself.

For a political side that claims to be so tolerant of personal choices, some sure don't seem to practice that anymore. So if I was a long-haired atheist, child molesting terrorist, on welfare, and living in a tree, I'd be ok, and you would be tolerant of my choices, but since I support Bush on a few issues, I'm a despicable person. Go figure. And to think I supported Clinton as well until, certain practices came to light, then I got critical.

I really don't want this to turn into a tit for tat political debate so let's cap it off. We all know when politics gets involved, sides are taken and things get nasty. I mean it's like the chocolate vs vanilla debate. That can get so destructive and then someone throws in strawberry and things go to hell. A napoleanoic war. Is that even a word ?

[michaelk]

MAJOR RETHINK IN PROGRESS

[little lamb dragonfly]

Mike, I think you are a cool guy. I just disagree with the way you handled the situation with Bruce and I voiced that. In addition, I am a bit disappointed with the way you maligned liberals in your last post; I imagine most everyone here would like to put an end to the ridiculousness which began with the debate over the song Freedom and continues here... but isn't it throwing fuel on the fire to grossly exaggerate beyond any semblance of any kind of reality the "tolerance" of liberals: We too hate terrorists and love Macca!

[Mike]

I really should be more clear, sorry. I'm referring to the one's defending NAMBLA and terrorists rights not all liberals as I am one myself with a few very strong conservative beliefs. I guess then I'm in the middle ?