The Rules
What I Expect
Your participation on this site is encouraged. The MT letters address important topics, and I am certain that one of MT’s goals in requesting that they be shared is to stimulate debate.
That said, many of the examples of debatein the Blogosphere could more accurately be described as verbal assaults. So that everyone feels free to express opinions without the threat of incoming missile fire, there are some rules, and I will enforce them:
- I expect civility. All comments will be moderated, and registration is required.
- Threaded discussions are supported, but in that same spirit of civility, personal attacks will result in rejection of your comments. The line I draw is simply this: If you feel a deep desire to use words like stupid, moronic, idiotic, or any of the dozens of more severely abusive terms available in the English language, you can do so only if it is the idea, position, or assertion you are labeling and not the person, and then only if you make it clear that such is your personal opinion. Sound complicated? It isn’t. Examples:
Prohibited: President Obama is an idiot.
Allowed:I consider President Obama’s economic policies to be idiotic.
Prohibited: Dick Cheney is the devil incarnate.
Allowed: Dick Cheney’s approach to international relations was devilish in my opinion.
- Comments must be relevant to the topic of the original post. If a thread strays off topic, no problem; that’s the nature of discussions. But if the topic is public education and your comment is about electrostatic precipitators, it’s going to be rejected.
- Up to 2 links can be included in a single comment, but the links must also be relevant to the topic. You may not use comments as a mechanism for generating clickthroughs for your Amazon associate account. If you own a site with content relevant to Mark Twain, use the Contact Form to email me and I will link to your site.
Privacy
Your registration information will not be shared with any other party for any purpose. The sole purpose of registration is to help eliminate the spam that plagues unrestricted blogs. You may certainly use an alias if you prefer, but the email address you enter will be verified.
Your email address will not be used for any purpose other than personal communication in response to your emails or comments. In most cases, this would only occur if (1) you email asking specific questions, or (2) you post a comment that must be rejected but that has content I would like to post if you are willing to make revisions. Your email address will never be sold or provided to another party, and it will never be used for sales, marketing, or any other form of promotion.
