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Lately, perusing the guild has made me a little more than concerned. I see quote trees, often and complete disregard for punctuation, and general spam. I'd like to keep this guild as free and management as low-key as possible, but, guys, this is not okay. The aforementioned are not what this guild was created to be a harbour for, and I'd like to pose this warning before I and the crew have to start taking serious action.

As a whole, this is a guild for discussion, not chatter. Careening off in a discussion to tell everyone what happened to you in school today or other, off-topic babble about your personal life is not appropriate, and needs to stop. We have a few threads where general chatter is permitted- the Jew Above Me thread, the PYP thread, and even the welcome thread or the periodic holiday stickies. Please, use those. I'm not going to be extremely strict and get on your case for the occasional side remarks or even conversations, but don't start a "today this girl did this to me in school" thought in the middle of a discussion. It's rude, and I'm extremely fed up with it.

I'm also not trying to be a grammar b***h, and I'm not here to criticize your online behaviour, but the basic rules of typing and/or replying to a post are being blatantly ignored. Don't make a quote tree several miles long in a thread, it's aggravating to all reading and won't be tolerated. If English is your first language, it'd help a lot if you tried to at least take a few extra seconds to think about what you're typing. Maybe change a one- or two-word response to a serious topic to an actual sentence, or even multiple lines. You are, however minutely, representing the entire Jewish population on Gaia. You're not representing Yellowcard fans or Inuyasha fangirls, you're representing the Jewish people.

I'm not singling out any one specific user- I promise you that. I'm speaking to those several users who are shifting this guild's underlying atmosphere from respectful and smart to nonsensical and chatty.

I'm not asking you to completely change the way you act online. Just clean up and think about what you're doing in here.

I don't really have anything new to say, but since people are really getting lax with their post quality, I figured I would draw some more attention to this very unused and unseen thread. Please follow these rules; they were made for a reason!

EDIT: I actually do have something to add to this!

Opinions/Discussing:
This kind of goes along with the respect issue that Kia brought up, but please note that when somebody brings up a topic, there are multiple viewpoints. No person is always right or wrong; some topics have no right or wrong answers, either. Also take into account the way that you phrase something; it is easy to offend somebody else and not even realize it.
For example, I could say:
"You're wrong!" or "You're a stupid idiot who doesn't know what they are talking about."
On the other hand, I could say, "Can you please check your sources? I'm not sure if your facts are right."
Now think honestly about which one is better. Sometimes something as simple as that can make the difference between an intelligent discussion and ....well, something completely different.

UPDATE: 6/26/07: Please do read the whole thing, though I do know it's slightly long. sweatdrop

We've had a few people quit the guild recently and I want to make one thing explicitly clear:


This is a guild for discussion. The point of this is for Jews to get together and talk about anything- be it religion, politics, or even getting wisdom teeth pulled. It doesn't matter. What does matter is that not everybody will agree with you, and you can't expect them to. As Jews, we've probably dealt with some manner of persecution in our lives, or at the absolute least, know somebody who has been through some manner of it. Then what gives any of us the right to do the same?

I'm not asking anybody to change their beliefs. Heck, a lot of mine could be viewed as crazy, too liberal, too conservative, or whatever. All I ask is for you to genuinely listen to what the other person is saying without throwing a tantrum when you find somebody who doesn't believe the same. Don't make assumptions about things you don't know. I'll admit- at first I was seriously freaked out by the thought of polygamy. And while I still don't want that type of relationship for myself, I at least respect and understand better those that have it.

Part of the reason why the world is so horrible today is because nobody actually listens. Whether in debating the color of an apple or world politics, people often assume that they're right and there's no other side to things. Please take the time NOT to be like that.

NOTE: Even if you're not Jewish, the same thing still applies. Chances are, everybody has had their share of problems.


Another thing: keep it clean, and keep it respectful. I don't mean to be the evil grammar/PG-13 tyrant, but I've had several complaints from younger members about the atmosphere. I'm not asking you guys to ignore more mature topics, nor do I think you should have to. Just please don't add needless swearing and the like. I know that when anybody goes on the Internet, they are making a choice to see what is out there, no matter how what it's like. But come on! This is the Jewish Gaians Guild- it should at least be better than the Chatterbox! blaugh


Sorry for the rant, but a lot of this really needed to be said. I'm sorry if it somehow offended anybody, but I sincerely hope you took the time to read it.