Joe Zhang wrote: Yet another guy who needs to write paragraphs and paragraphs just to let us know he's an idiot.

Although I don't agree with Chris at all, I don't think it's cool to call him an idiot.  Some people are concise, others are not.  Doesn't make a person an idiot for being long-winded.

Chris Newton wrote: If JB closes a thread or revokes membership it can come off looking immature (packing up your toys and going home kind of thing), turn people off, etc.

I'm hard pressed to find a thread that John or any of us mods have shut down because the opinions held in those threads run counter to our opinions.  Someone might point out any threads on SUPERMAN RETURNS as evidence of this, but one need only check the months long, over 100 pages of replies on the movie board to the film to understand that it took a very long time to get to the point where discussion became verboten.  It's not as if JB one day woke up and declared all discussion should come to an end. The same could be said for the Moore thread on LOST GIRLS, a topic, I might add, that popped back up in this thread and, as I'm posting in it now, hasn't been locked down at all.

As far as revoking membership and that, in and of itself, making the board appear immature, I'd have to cry foul on that as well.  All boards revoke membership.  All of them.  They do it for any of a number of reasons.  To generalize and say that revocation of membership is immature would be to call out every board on the net as being immature.  I find that most people who follow the net party line that the JBF bans members because they don't agree with prevailing thought have absolutely no idea why a member was banned in the first place. I've never, in all the time I've been a mod, had a discussion with JB and the other mods about banning someone because they don't agree with me.  That's certainly never been a criteria for any of us, John included. 

Listen, people are going to find any of a number of reasons to be turned off about anything.  Lots of people get slighted all the time for one little infraction or misunderstanding.  That can't be helped.  This board isn't PC.  I like it that way.  I think most do.  Take a little more time to discover why a ton of people love this place instead, as I can only infer by reading what I perceive to be the tone of your posts from day one, of coming off as someone who already had a preconceived notion of what this place was all about and who posts from that position.

JohnMietus wrote: Grandiose, uninformed sweeping generalizations, on the other hand... ...may not make you come across like an idiot, but do tend to further a reputation for being an asshole. For example. [edited to add] I know I qualify in that category. Others might, too. I'm just sayin'.

True, but I think it's better to talk about the points you don't agree with or call out those grandiose, uninformed, sweeping generalizations rather than falling back on the easy out of name calling.

I'm just sayin'.

Let's force ourselves to remember, for just a wee little moment, that this board is "my toys", and if I see someone refusing to play nicely with the other kids, or breaking the toys, I kick 'em out of the playroom. Tell me you would do otherwise.