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shakran · 02-20-2007, 07:46 AM

I think we're all looking at this wrong. The politics board has a bad rep with a lot of the users and I frankly don't know why. Of COURSE we fight in here. That's an integral part of politics. It's called "debate" people, not "let's all get along and hug each other and give each other puppies."

Is politics for everyone? No, but then I don't spend much time in Trampoline either. To each his own. If you want everything to be pleasant and rosy, maybe this forum isn't for you but believe it or not, some of us LIKE debate, and can argue with each other without it turning personal.

But as long as we're going to have this debate forum, there are basic rules of debate that we should follow. Citing sources is one of them. I can argue that Bush shouldn't be president because he was the Grand Dragon of the Texas KKK, but if I don't cite a source on that, people won't, and should not, take it seriously. (No, he wasn't, if you were wondering).

We get too many people coming through here making outlandish claims and failing to back it up. Am I gonna waste time debating their points when it's not even clear that their points even happened? Of course not. Cite your sources or don't be surprised if your ideas are rejected out of hand.

And while we're on the subject of citing sources, digg, fark, and especially wikipedia are NOT legitimate sources. They can point you in the direction of a legitimate source, but anything that's written and edited by anonymous people on the internet is automatically suspect.

In short, if you want to get into a political debate, you should know what you're talking about, be able to PROVE that you know what you're talking about, and you should EXPECT to have your ideas attacked. That's the definition of a debate.

02-20-2007, 07:46 AM	#31 (permalink)
shakran Tone.	I think we're all looking at this wrong. The politics board has a bad rep with a lot of the users and I frankly don't know why. Of COURSE we fight in here. That's an integral part of politics. It's called "debate" people, not "let's all get along and hug each other and give each other puppies." Is politics for everyone? No, but then I don't spend much time in Trampoline either. To each his own. If you want everything to be pleasant and rosy, maybe this forum isn't for you but believe it or not, some of us LIKE debate, and can argue with each other without it turning personal. But as long as we're going to have this debate forum, there are basic rules of debate that we should follow. Citing sources is one of them. I can argue that Bush shouldn't be president because he was the Grand Dragon of the Texas KKK, but if I don't cite a source on that, people won't, and should not, take it seriously. (No, he wasn't, if you were wondering). We get too many people coming through here making outlandish claims and failing to back it up. Am I gonna waste time debating their points when it's not even clear that their points even happened? Of course not. Cite your sources or don't be surprised if your ideas are rejected out of hand. And while we're on the subject of citing sources, digg, fark, and especially wikipedia are NOT legitimate sources. They can point you in the direction of a legitimate source, but anything that's written and edited by anonymous people on the internet is automatically suspect. In short, if you want to get into a political debate, you should know what you're talking about, be able to PROVE that you know what you're talking about, and you should EXPECT to have your ideas attacked. That's the definition of a debate.