The entire issue of political postings here being a problem is that in the past, political discussions turned into fights amongst the members here. That and flying related content dried up and all the forum was being used for was to fight with each other about which side is better.
It was ME that brought it to Todds attention, it was ME who had the issue with it in the beginning.
Todd started this forum over 20 years ago, when the previous gyroplane forum became unstable and was sometimes up and running and sometimes not, with threats it would be closed soon. Todd was very interested in gyros and owned a gyro and was fairly new at gyros back then and saw the value in keeping a gyro forum going... So he made this one, privately... Sent me a link to it and I said lets do this and made a public announcement and the rest is history, It is still here up and running 20 years later.
But understand this.... Todd lost interest in gyros years ago. And with that interest gone, he isn't here daily checking on what's going on, here on the forum. He would have no idea how things are going unless someone is able to contact him and bring him up to speed.
Seems like the last few times he was notified of some dumb stuff, there was major distractions going on here with all the political stuff and name calling and threats and so on. If any of you reading this were here back then, you know how bad it was. Not only did it bother Todd, but he leans on the left side of the aisle and most of the noise and ugliness was from people on the right side of the aisle.... So the attacks weren't just a distraction to the forum but also a attack on Todds beliefs and values. So he just simply made the decision to just leave out politics altogether.
Now myself, I really don't have a issue with some light political talk here... So as long as it doesn't bait people into arguing with each other or it taking away from the flying topics. I likely would NOT have deleted Bens post. But if Bens post stirred up some back and forth between members here and things began to get ugly then I would delete it all.
Yeah, Idk... I am a member on several other forums and they allow political talk on them, but they will eventually step in if things get personal between members in those discussions. Seems for the most part, on those forums, people can discuss their differences without stirring up drama and it doesn't spill over into other parts of those forums. That wasn't the case here.... Maybe folks who fly gyrocopters are just a special kind of people and we can't talk politics without being nasty to each other or writing in bold letters " SKY WOLVERINES " or some other dumb stuff.
at any rate, the rules are what they are and although the current moderation staff have made some questionable decisions with how they have moderated, they haven't done anything that conflicts with Todds wishes. Just try to understand and respect that and remember that this forum is for flying stuff, and light off topic stuff and I think all would be fine. If you have internet and can log on here, then you can also log onto facebook and on facebook you can talk about so much more, use facebook for those discussions and you'll feel better!
