I am ashamed.

[tek_heretik]

This is the Community Cafe portion of the forum where members can "take the load off" and vent about anything, even if it's not Linux-related. Plus, threads can, at times, veer off in all sorts of directions, as I, a nid-30's Linux-using Catholic (who does go to mass every Sunday), have seen.

@Qq

It all depend on how you view the unborn children. If you view them as human life, then the taking of that life is tantamount to murder, and murder is immoral. If you see it otherwise, then you'll think otherwise.


BTW, Shimapan. Not all Christian Churches, especially the RCC, view the first few chapters of Genesis as literal.

Agreed.

[Snowhog]

People, please!

This thread has strayed way off topic, and has ventured into charged territory. Discussing religion or politics has the potential to become emotional charged, and turn into, if not actual, perceived intolerance.

I'm closing this thread.

[SteveRiley]

Reopened, as Snowhog beat me to it

vw72, thank you for your kind comments.

Speaking as one of the administrators here, we are fully aware that our more lenient stance about non-Kubuntu and non-Linux topics is rather different than many other technical forums. This is by design. For the most part, we maintain civil discussions about sensitive topics. Occasionally they may go off the rails, and when that happens, one of the administrators will deal privately with the person(s) responsible.

You asked for a policy; here it is. The only thing expressly disallowed are personal attacks against other members. We intentionally do not censor much at all, while we also exercise differing degrees of control depending on the particular forum topic. A discussion like this is certainly allowed in the Social / Casual Talk subforum and the other subfourms within Community Cafe. But sometimes even there they can get out of control, as I would characterize this particular thread now. I plan to close it after this post. We would very quickly redirect such a discussion if it were to emerge on one of the subforums specifically intended for discussing Kubuntu topics. Knowing this, individual members are free to choose which forums they're interested in, and follow only those.

The character of an online forum reflects its members. Many of you have become close friends during the two years I've been here, and I'm sure others feel the same. We talk amongst ourselves about the topics we like: politics, religion, social matters, current events, and -- yes -- Kubuntu. I suspect that many of our members relish the ability to make their own voices heard on these non-technical topics. While I don't necessarily agree with everything, I do read everything -- even before I became an admin. And like in every other community, newcomers are welcome, but they should understand that the obligation rests on them to find how they can fit in with the larger group, rather than on the larger group to readjust itself for each new member.

Finally, the purpose of my original post was not to seek consolation. Rather, I simply had to vent some major frustration after I read the article, and I thought to myself, what other place can I do this safely than my new home, populated with so many friends? You'll note that, at the same time, I am probably one of the few members here who will defend Microsoft from time to time in other posts. Having worked inside the belly of the beast for 11 years, and still being engaged in a number of projects there even today, I have a perspective that most observers of Redmond can't possess. It's proper for me to take advantage of that, to praise the good things, to correct misconceptions, and to criticize the bad things. When correcting or criticizing, in particular, I strive to make my points factual and defensible. There is far too much unsubstantiated opinion and downright bloviating gas-baggery about operating systems. C'mon, guys, it's not like software is a religion or anything