As the title suggests, I hope to present this blog as calmly and professionally as possible. I do not wish to stir up trouble, create a plethora of irate comments below, or "cause drama" as many people say, and hope nobody else does so. I am not meaning to direct any attacks at anybody; I am merely stating my opinion in a non-angry tone. Please do not accuse me of "starting an argument" or "instigating drama" (or if you wanted to get really creative, accuse me of "trolling") because if you did, you'd obviously have the wrong intentions and have misread this blog.
Furthermore, I am here to warn you about something. In the spaces below, I will be posting my own, honest opinions about certain matters concerning this wiki, especially in chat. If you are for whatever reason insulted by other people's opinions, I suggest you hit that big red "x" in the top-right corner of your computer monitor, or immediatly go elsewhere on the wiki. Henceforth, if you try to argue my opinion, or call it "incorrect" or anything along those lines, then you, good sir (or ma'am), are a bigot (I'm allowed to say that, right?) and I recommend hastily visiting your nearest therapist.
Current Matters with Chat[]
As many have witnessed, two users have recently been kicked from chat, those users being Mikhail Volkov and Robert McRoberts. Now, the former and I have been talking via private message, and we have come to the conclusion that the reason for his kicking was highly inappropriate and unnecessary. Mr. Volkov was kicked from chat for talking about "immigrants" and emigration, after a fellow user (not a chat mod, mind you, but a normal user) warned him not to talk about that topic, as it might be "offensive to others". This leads me to interject: are you serious??? First off, ironically enough, Mr. Volkov is an immigrant himself (as am I, might I add). How could an immigrant talking about emigration possibly find anything offensive in the matter? On the other hand, I can't begin to fathom how anybody else (non-immigrants, a.k.a. Americans) could be offended by that topic.
When Mikhail calmly and intelligently stood up and argued his case on why talking about emigration should be allowed and not to be outlawed because "it is offensive", he was then kicked, along with McRoberts (for a completely unrelated matter, which I do not feel necessary to discuss). Mikhail then rejoined chat a minute or so later.
Now, you are probably thinking "okay, he was kicked from chat, but then rejoined a minute later. What is the big problem?" The problem is not the fact that he was simply kicked, but that he was kicked for talking about something so silly as emigration. He is and immigrant. I am an immigrant, and I do not feel insulted in the least about a fellow immigrant talking about emigration. In fact, emigration is a virtue in the USA, and it should be celebrated, not censored because "it is offensive or can cause problems". That is ridiculous. And it is likely that an admin will argue here, saying that "he was not kicked for talking about immigration, but because he was arguing". That leads me to my next point.
Arguing VS. Defending Your Case[]
Everybody here is so uptight about "arguing" and "drama". They think those things are what is tearing the wiki apart, when really it is the lack of it. Ironic, I know. Don't believe me, I'm sure. Yet, it is true. And I'd love to explain.
Mikhail was not "arguing" as some people may think. He was standing his ground, and defending his case as to why emigration is not (or should not be) a brittle topic. There is a very fine line between "arguing" and "defending your case", and I believe many people here seem to neglect seeing the difference. Arguing involves anger. It involves caps raging, a surplus of exclamation marks, offensive tones and bold wording, and occasionally, cursing. When arguing, one simply attempts to enforce their belief or point upon somebody, rather than suggest it. For example: right now, I am defending my case, and lightly debating without the use of any angry or stern tones, or without losing my cool. To my clear understanding, Mikhail was doing the same. He is an immigrant, as I said plenty times above, and he strongly felt that outlawing the word "immigrant" was superfluous, so he challenged that. Kicking him from chat because of defending his case is simply not intelligent.
Debating: another term to discuss. Debates happen often on the wiki; on both the wiki itself and chat. The debates can range from a wide range of topics: problems on the wiki, roleplay, pages; or more realistic and worldy things, such as politics (which, as I understand has recently and injustly been outlawed), happenings else-where, or of course, history. I often take part in these debates, and I must say, I enjoy them thoroughly. Many people often misconcept these simple debates for, you guessed it, arguing, and immediatly take action. However, I wish for everybody here to learn the difference between 'debating' and 'arguing', because yes, they are very different. Even if sometimes people get aggresive in said debates, it is no reason to kick them on sight. Homo sapiens love to debate; in fact, some, such as myself, thrive on it and can't get enough of it. I'll admit it, I'm a debater. I'm captain of my debate team at school (I play sports, too :P), and love getting in debates. However, I'm sick of times that when I'm in a friendly debate/discussion over worldy matters with a friend on chat, somebody wise has to step forward and say "enough with the arguing!".
Politics and Religion[]
You know I had to address this. That's right, I'm still not over this. I was going to write a separate blog for this, but I thought I might as well write it here. I have found recent actions by the admin team concerning two "scandalous" topics, politics and religion, to be utterly unacceptable and disgusting. So, this will be my last stand in an attempt to rectify our rights concerning talking about these topics. However, as I wish to return to the real point of this blog (a request), I will keep this one relatively short and sweet.
I've been arguing the same thing in comment threads all week and past week, and I am still arguing the same thing. Why would you outlaw people talking about this stuff? These are normal conversation topics: you'll hear people talking about this stuff at parties, get-togethers, work, anywhere and anytime in life, this stuff will come up. It says in the rules that talking about religion is not allowed (note: says nothing about politics). This rule really needs to be editted and revised. What it should say is "no discriminating other's religions", or "no talking about religious stereotypes". Those rules are fine, and perfectly acceptable. However, no talking about religion in general is just immature, and completely sad. The reasoning for this rule is because, once again, "people might get offended by it". If I recall, this is a 13+ wiki. How can anybody get offended by simply talking about religion, and other religion's beliefs? For example, I am Christian. Orthodox, to be exact. I don't believe in the Hindu's beliefs, their deities, or anything for that matter. However, I accept those beliefs and acknowledge them. Despite the fact that I'm Christian, I would never get insulted if I met a follower of the Hindu faith, and he said something along the lines like "praise Rama" or "may Vishnu be with you". If there are people out there who get upset by people saying this, I must say, you are, by definition, ignorant. In conclusion concerning religion: talking about it should be allowed. On the wiki itself and chat. Discussing, anazlying, comparing, and contrasting other religions should be allowed, as well as discussiong, analyzing, comparing, and contrasting religions' differet beliefs. Discriminating somebody because of their religion, however, that is crossing the line.
Politics, on the other hand, outlawing that is just downright silly. Who cares what other people's political views are? Some people like Mitt Romney, some people like Barack Obama. I happen to be indifferent on both. I say this once again, if anybody out there is in the least insulted if somebody said "I like Mitt Romney" when you are an avid Obama supporter, than you are, you guessed it, a bigot and ignorant. Politics runs the world. This wiki is only for people aged thirteen and up. I'd guess that thirteen year-olds are mature enough to discuss something that runs the world. As I said, if you find politics to be a shaky topic to talk about, then you will have much trouble in the world.
Also, about politics on the wiki itself. Why can't we make blogs about politics? There's no rule against it. The only argument(s) that ever commenced from politics on the wiki was about whether or not politics should be allowed. Perhaps if we tried it, people would see it doesn't cause as many issues as you think. Also, for those of you who are saying "this is a POTCO fanon wiki; this is no place for blogs about politics", let me tell you this: there are numerous blogs on here that are completely irrelevant and have nothing to do with POTCO or fanon. I've seen blogs about video games, wrestling, the Hunger Games, vacations, school, and many more. Saying political blogs isn't allowed because it doesn't relate to POTCO is completely invalid.
Miscellaneous Things[]
A few other things I wish to address to certain people, but not too in-depth:
- Stop getting so annoyed and pestered when people talk about Nazism. For many Americans, it is a shakey subject, but it really shouldn't be. It's history, you talk about it in school, so why not on here? People always talk about the British Empire with no trouble, when really the British Empire is probably responsible for the death of millions more than the Nazis. As long as people aren't supporting or encouraging Nazi beliefs or ideology, I don't see why talking about Nazism shouldn't be allowed.
- We need to review what a "troll" is. I've noticed a lot of people, when somebody does something they don't approve of, they call them a troll, or any other name of the same caliber.
- People keep on accusing others of "starting drama". For some reason, that phrase annoys me. First of all, drama isn't necessarily a bad thing. Only in this context it is. Half the time though, nobody started any drama. The only drama that starts is by the people who accuse others of starting drama! (Read that sentence again, it'll make sense, I promise).
My Request[]
You may have noticed that the title of this blog mentions a request, but you've yet to see an actual request. Well, here it is. I calmly and professionally request that everybody - users and admins (though especially the latter) - would stop hammering down on people because they talk about average, every day topics such as "emigration", or "politics". You only say these things are offensive, but are they really? Going back to the incident in which Mikhail and I were talking about emigration in chat; nobody was offended in that situation. You guys just assume people are going to be offended, so outlaw it without a second chance. Maybe, if we test this stuff out, rather than jumping to conclusions, you'll find nobody gets insulted by this stuff.
In Conclusion[]
In conclusion, I'd like to have you walk away with these ideas fresh in the forefront of your thinking: politics, religion, and matters along those lines are not bad. They don't offend anybody, at all. True, discriminating somebody based on politics or religion is and can be offensive, but that can happen with virtually anything. The topics themselves are not offensive. Also, it is no secret that this wiki, in the past week (or the past month, perhaps), has been failing. Numerous users have been leaving, almost all for the same reason: "too much drama". The source of this drama is unhappy users. The source of unhappy users is, I believe to be, the uptightness and strict regulation by the admin team. Anybody can tell you that, in previous months, I have loved and worshipped the admin team. I still do. I respect each and every one of them. However, the issue is that admins are trying to protect newer users by censoring (to an extreme) things such as politics and religion, when this is not necessary. It is for that reason that the older users are considering to, or have already, left the wiki. Mikhail and I have been talking, and we are both on the verge of leaving the wiki due to the uptightness. As a final statement, I'd like to request that the admins relax, and don't regulate and censor bloody everything. It isn't offending or hurting anybody. The people on this wiki are not immature, and I know they can handle this stuff. If they can't handle talking about who they think should be president of their country, then they really don't belong on an online network of any type. Please, admins, end the harsh regulation. By making it, you think you are preserving members and saving the wiki, but it is really the reason they are leaving.