Damn. I come to the Coffee House to completely get away from all the drama of my everyday life (and I have a lot right now). When I want to be serious I have plenty of other forums where I can interact with others in that fashion. This forum has pretty much been one of the very few things that have kept me from going crazy and continuing to move forward (my roommate's dog being right up there too).
I've seen the in-fighting BS creep into the forum from time to time and every time the community comes out worse for it with overly sensitive people making dramatic exits (it's just a forum!) and people that should be friends ending up divided. Life's too short for this. Do I think the forums needed help dealing with the spammers? Yes. Do I think they needed member moderators of any kind? No, that just breeds exactly the crap storm we keep seeing (warranted or not).
Now the arguments have even made it to this thread? The whole reason this thread was created was to placate a few members who complained (a couple of which were very vocal and never visit the Coffee House normally anyway - they just feel that everyone must live the way they think they should). I feel like I've gone to the Improv and the comedian on stage keeps getting interrupted and told to be serious and respectable. I find it particularly annoying because I tend to like almost everyone I meet and I hate watching people I consider friends of mine going after each other. I realize, maybe more than most (don't ask), that all of this is just a symptom or microcosm of what's happening all over the world right now, but it's time for it to stop. Just let it go!
Maybe we can get one of the new moderators to move all of these discussions
upstairs...
I'm off to go sit with the dog and look out the window for a while.