I would like to publicly express my thanks to the Forum moderators for taking out the garbage. The forums are now much more pleasant.
I had gotten to a point where I was visiting much less, because there was much hostility and negativity in so many threads. And when I did visit, the feeling was like that of watching an accident on the freeway (facinating, disgusting, and depressing); I didn’t really want to watch, but I almost couldn’t help it.
Now that things have been cleaned up here, I am really enjoying the forums much more now.
welcome back! I say if people are happy, they are doing there job.
Here I would like to apoligise for all flame wars I have started, which I assure you were not intentional, and also to say that while I do not persona;;y agree with the mods getting rid of RR Redneck and Lotus098, I know people felt strongly against them and that it had to be done for the good of the forum.
Thanks guys, you’ve made this a great place.
…I’ll mention my support of the action taken by the moderators…Chip on shoulders attitude we can do without…and I agree the ambience now does seem more calm and pleasant.
Gang, the truth is we are all moderators of the forum. Some are more proactive, while others choose to take a back seat. Whenever we see inappropriate behavior here, we need to alert Bergie, and let him deal with it.
The most unfortunate thing about the Lotus situation is that it blew up on a long holiday weekend. I feel a little guilty about this, because a number of us, especially me, tried repeatedly to get him to straighten up, thus prolonging the agony.
My sympathy and empathy are with Bergie as a result. In my opinion, it is a very fine line we walk here, between over reporting incidents, and letting things get out of hand. Lotus was most awkward in that regard.
This needs to be a fun and friendly place to talk about trains, while not becoming an excessive burden to our host. Let’s all work together to keep it that way.
By the way, I can say Lotus has been watching this forum sonce he was booted, and he has asked me to post this:
I too am somewhat thankful that I got kicked off, I have learned a valuable lesson, and this may have saved me some pain later in life. Sadly I had to learn it the hard way. I am asking you people for a second chance, I realize some of you tried to warn me, and I am deeply sorry that I didn’t listen. I will do so in the future, that what these forums are about it listening to one another. What I did was giving the forums in general a bad name, and causing unneeded strife between the members. I am sorry I caused any of you, like zardoz, to leave. There is a time and a place for everything, and what I said was wholly uncalled for, and most importantly not where it belonged. I may have been thick headed, but I can grantee if Bergie, our fabulous moderator, lets me back in, you won’t regret it a bit.
Being the forum moderator is definately a thankless job, and I’ve had my share of them. They have to make unpopular decisions at times and take a lot of grief about them. I missed the incident(s) over the Thanksgiving weekend that seem to be the cause of all this, but I’m sure Bergie (or whoever made the decision) did the right thing.
I had some positive hopes for James, he seemed to be coming around from repeating radical websites and insulting people that didn’t agree with him to starting to ask intellegent questions, more into an intellegent debate than flinging insults.
Maybe the moderator, after James has a cooling off period, will let him back in.
…Sounds like Lotus might be appreciating a hard lesson…He did seem to have lots of early learned knowledge of the subjects we deal with on here…Hope he uses this recent experience to make him a better person.
As Railfans, we are nothing, if not passionate about our vocations, and avocations. Sometimes that passion gets a little out of control, and passion becomes anger. It is at that point we need to back off and cool down. The moderators have a thankless job…Zardoz, TomDiehl,Big_Boy4005, and Cherokee woman were right on the mark.