This is a Civilized Place for Public Discussion

Please treat this discussion forum with the same respect you would a public park. We, too, are a shared community resource—a place for reasoned discussion, philosophical inquiry, and sustained conversation.

These are not hard and fast rules. They are guidelines meant to guide community judgment and moderation, and to keep this a civil and constructive place for public discourse.

Improve the Discussion

Help us make this a great place for discussion by always adding something positive to the discussion, however small. If you are not sure your post adds to the conversation, think over what you want to say and try again later.

Before starting a new topic, consider whether the discussion is already underway elsewhere, and take a moment to read what has already been said so your contribution moves the conversation forward.

The topics discussed here matter to us, and we want you to act as if they matter to you, too. Be respectful of the topics and the people discussing them, even if you disagree with some of what is being said.

This forum prioritizes thoughtful engagement over rapid responses. Therefore:

  • Posts should not consist primarily of unsupported ideological assertions, slogans, or generalized talking points that do not engage the specific argument or question under discussion.
  • Posts should aim to provide reasons, analysis, or constructive questions that move the conversation forward.

Posts failing to observe these points may be removed at moderator discretion, and repeated failure to engage substantively with discussions may result in further moderator action.

Be Agreeable, Even When You Disagree

You may wish to respond by disagreeing. That’s fine. But remember to criticize ideas, not people. Please avoid:

  • Name-calling
  • Ad hominem attacks
  • Responding to a post’s tone instead of its actual content
  • Knee-jerk contradiction

If you are not habitually applying the principle of charity, then you are not yet engaging in philosophical discussion.

Read others charitably, address the substance of their arguments, and explain your reasons clearly. Provide thoughtful insights that improve the conversation.

No Bad Faith Participation

Bad faith participants engage in debate not to seek understanding or test ideas, but to win, provoke, exhaust, or derail.

Signs of bad faith participation include:

  • Sealioning: repeatedly demanding evidence or justification beyond what is reasonable, to wear down their target interlocutor
  • JAQing off (Just Asking Questions): destructive participation by means of seemingly innocent questions
  • Moving goalposts: shifting the criteria for a satisfactory answer after the previous criteria have already been met
  • Intentional strawmanning: misrepresenting an argument despite clarification
  • Refusing to concede: never acknowledging when a point has been fairly made or a counterargument has succeeded
  • Topic sabotage: redirecting discussions toward unrelated pet theories and opinions

These behaviours are often very subtle, and moderators will have to use their judgment based on patterns, not individual posts. Members who habitually exhibit these behaviors, even while technically following the other rules, are not engaging in good-faith philosophy. They may be warned, have their posts deleted, or be suspended.

Your Participation Counts

The conversations we have here set the tone for every new arrival. Help us influence the future of this community by choosing to engage in discussions that make this forum an interesting place to be—and avoiding those that do not.

Discourse provides tools that enable the community to collectively identify the best (and worst) contributions: bookmarks, likes, flags, replies, edits, watching, muting and so forth. Use these tools to improve your own experience, and everyone else’s, too.

Let’s leave our community better than we found it.

If You See a Problem, Flag It

Moderators have special authority; they are responsible for this forum. But so are you. With your help, moderators can be community facilitators, not just janitors or police.

When you see rule-breaking or disruptive behavior, don’t reply—just flag it. Replying encourages bad behavior by acknowledging it, consumes your energy, and wastes everyone’s time. Just flag it. If enough flags accrue, action will be taken, either automatically or by moderator intervention.

In order to maintain our community, moderators may remove content or restrict accounts where necessary to enforce forum rules, maintain community safety, or comply with legal obligations. Moderators do not preview new posts; the moderators and site operators take no responsibility for any content posted by the community.

How We Handle Reports

When content is flagged or reported:

  • Moderators review reports as soon as reasonably possible.
  • Content that appears illegal or clearly violates forum rules may be removed immediately.
  • Moderators may issue warnings, remove content, suspend accounts, or ban users depending on severity.
  • In serious cases involving potential illegal content, information may be preserved and shared with relevant authorities where legally required.

We aim to apply moderation consistently, but decisions are made by humans and may involve judgment.

Always Be Civil

Nothing sabotages a healthy conversation like rudeness:

  • Be civil. Don’t post anything that a reasonable person would consider offensive, abusive, or hate speech.
  • Keep it clean. Don’t post anything obscene or sexually explicit.
  • Respect each other. Don’t harass anyone, impersonate people, or expose their private information.
  • Respect our forum. Don’t post spam or otherwise vandalize the forum.

These are not concrete terms with precise definitions—avoid even the appearance of any of these things. If you’re unsure, ask yourself how you would feel if your post was featured on the front page of a major news site.

This is a public forum, and search engines index these discussions. Keep the language, links, and images safe for family and friends.

Keep It Tidy

Make the effort to put things in the right place, so that we can spend more time discussing and less cleaning up. So:

  • Don’t forget to choose the right category. Don’t start a topic in the wrong category; please read the category definitions.
  • Don’t cross-post the same thing in multiple topics.
  • Don’t post no-content or purely reactive replies (e.g., “+1”, “Agreed”, or similar).
  • Don’t divert a topic by changing it midstream.
  • Don’t sign your posts—every post has your profile information attached to it.
  • Stay focused on the topic under discussion; persistent attempts to redirect discussions toward unrelated ideological debates may be moderated.

Rather than posting “+1” or “Agreed”, use the Like button. Rather than taking an existing topic in a radically different direction, use Reply as a Linked Topic.

Post Only Your Own Stuff

You may not post anything digital that belongs to someone else without permission. You may not post descriptions of, links to, or methods for stealing someone’s intellectual property (software, video, audio, images), or for breaking any other law.

Starting New Discussions

Don’t start a new discussion unless you are:

a) Genuinely interested in the topic you’ve begun and are willing to engage those who engage you.

b) Able to write a thoughtful OP of reasonable length that illustrates this interest, and to provide arguments for any position you intend to advocate.

c) Capable of writing a decent title that accurately and concisely describes the content of your OP.

d) Starting an original topic, i.e. a similar discussion is not already active (and not a copypasta from elsewhere on the internet. Plagiarists will be banned).

For more help: see How to Write an OP.

Addenda:

  1. No bumps allowed. If you want to attract replies, think of a better way.
  2. If we feel you are unfairly monopolizing space on the front page, we reserve the right to delete your topics regardless of content.

Members

Types of members who are welcome here:

Those with a genuine interest in/curiosity about philosophy and the ability to express this in an intelligent way, and those who are willing to give their interlocutors a fair reading and not make unwarranted assumptions about their intentions (i.e. intelligent, interested and charitable posters).

Types of members who are NOT welcome here:

Evangelists: Those who must convince everyone that their religion, ideology, political persuasion, or philosophical theory is the only one worth having.

Racists, homophobes, sexists, Nazi sympathisers, etc.: We don’t consider your views worthy of debate, and you’ll be banned for espousing them.

Advertisers, spammers, self-promoters: No links to personal websites. Instant deletion of post followed by a potential ban.

Trolls: You know who you are. You won’t last long

Sockpuppets: You may be banned. The onus is on you to explain to us if you are using the same IP for multiple accounts.

AI

Posts that appear to be substantially generated by AI may be removed at moderator discretion. What Counts as AI-Generated?

Social Media

We want to encourage thoughtful posts, not just share quote-tweet or viral clips with little to no substance. As a result, posts containing links and embeds to social media are deleted, shorts as well. Full feature videos, if relevant to the discussion and accompanied by original content of the posters, may be left standing. This is at moderator discretion.

How Moderation Works

Any member who is an admin or a moderator has the right to edit or delete your post or topic. If your post is edited, you’ll receive a notification and the edit history will be visible. If you want to check who the admins and moderators are, visit the about page.

If you notice a change that you object to, you have the right to appeal, which you can do by replying to the notification message, contacting a moderator or an admin via private message or chat, or by starting a new topic in the Feedback category. You’ll get a fair hearing, if not necessarily the result that you want.

Moderator Conduct

In discussions, a moderator is subject to the same guidelines as everyone else, and shouldn’t, under normal circumstances*, moderate their interlocutors. You can report a moderator or ask that a moderator be moderated in the same way as you would any other poster by flagging their posts or by sending a private message to another moderator. In other words, moderators as posters don’t have a special set of guidelines to operate under, and in this capacity they should be treated like other posters. When it comes to moderating decisions, however, the Feedback category, or, again, a private message, can be used to complain about their actions. Please do not use other topics to make these complaints or your comments will be deemed off-topic and will be subject to deletion. Feedback topics should also be kept on-topic with regard to the specific complaint being made.

(*Exceptional circumstances may include instances of racism, extreme flaming, etc. When the decision is very obvious, the action needs to be taken quickly, and there may be no one else on duty to do it.)

Bans

Admins have the right to ban members. We don’t do that lightly, and you will probably be warned about your behaviour if you are under consideration for a ban. However, if you are a spammer, troll, racist or in some other way obviously unsuited to the forum, a summary ban will be applied. Bans are permanent and non-negotiable. Returning banned members will be rebanned.

The above guidelines are in place to help us maintain a high standard of discussion and debate, and they will be enforced. If you feel from the get-go that their very existence impinges on your right to free speech, this is probably not the place for you.

Safety Contact

If you need to report illegal content, serious safety concerns, or moderation issues that cannot be handled through flags or direct messages, you may contact the Operator directly:

[email protected]

Please include links to the relevant content where possible.

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This site is operated by your friendly moderator team and you, the community. If you have any further questions about how things should work here, open a new topic in Feedback and let’s discuss! If there’s a critical or urgent issue that can’t be handled by a meta topic or flag, contact the moderators.