I don't if this will help ... probably won't ... but as a relative outsider, who has just looked at a few threads, in response to an email from the owner ...
Most of the threads seem to have the same structure: there will be an interesting or provocative piece to start with, followed by a long exchange of banal personal insults among members. No doubt fun for them (else why would they do it?) but really really BORING for anyone else. You learn nothing from them.
Perhaps it would be helpful to look at other discussion boards with a similar purpose, and see if there is anything to be learned from them. I think you would see that many suffer from the same problem, although not always to the same degree.
I happen to know of one discussion forum, ostensibly for Political Conservatives but with about an equal number of conservatives and liberals taking part, which is really excellent. Personal verbal attacks almost never happen -- and the reason is, any post which anyone finds objectionable can be "flagged," the owner has a look, and if it is indeed an attack on a person, rather than their ideas, the attacker is warned. It almost never, according to the owner, has to go any further.
Very rarely, a really snotty Lefty who thinks he has stumbled onto a freak show ("intelligent conservatives? the very idea! I'll show 'em") jumps in and tries to blow things up. But that is rare.
So on this thread, we have had some really good discussions, on the foundations of conservatism -- Edmund Burke and social change -- on the intellectual weaknesses, or not, of American conservatism -- on the mutation of liberalism in the late 60s -- on the "canon" and multiculturalism -- and of course on Iraq and terrorism abd the nature of Islam. And many other things, especially good books (it being an inherently book-oriented site we are part of). The site has attracted a number of professors, and an equal number of serving military men, and several pastors. (The latter two categories lean to the conservative side and the first one probably has a slight majority of liberals.)
Anyway, maybe if the administrator here announced a new "No Personal Attacks" policy, and became ruthless in pruning people who could not control themselves, the board would start attracting people who are not interested in reading endless playground-level tit-for-tat exchanges of insults.
There are many subjects which are both interesting and vital to discuss: poverty and inequality in the US; the national health care plans that are going to be proposed soon; what to do in Afghanistan; and what to do in Iraq. Plus racial preferences, gay marriage and the state of the family in general; globalization and third-world poverty; crime and punishment.
But it's pointless for anyone to spend a bit of time crafting an interesting post on any of these subjects, if the thread degenerates into a slanging match.
Most of the threads seem to have the same structure: there will be an interesting or provocative piece to start with, followed by a long exchange of banal personal insults among members. No doubt fun for them (else why would they do it?) but really really BORING for anyone else. You learn nothing from them.
Perhaps it would be helpful to look at other discussion boards with a similar purpose, and see if there is anything to be learned from them. I think you would see that many suffer from the same problem, although not always to the same degree.
I happen to know of one discussion forum, ostensibly for Political Conservatives but with about an equal number of conservatives and liberals taking part, which is really excellent. Personal verbal attacks almost never happen -- and the reason is, any post which anyone finds objectionable can be "flagged," the owner has a look, and if it is indeed an attack on a person, rather than their ideas, the attacker is warned. It almost never, according to the owner, has to go any further.
Very rarely, a really snotty Lefty who thinks he has stumbled onto a freak show ("intelligent conservatives? the very idea! I'll show 'em") jumps in and tries to blow things up. But that is rare.
So on this thread, we have had some really good discussions, on the foundations of conservatism -- Edmund Burke and social change -- on the intellectual weaknesses, or not, of American conservatism -- on the mutation of liberalism in the late 60s -- on the "canon" and multiculturalism -- and of course on Iraq and terrorism abd the nature of Islam. And many other things, especially good books (it being an inherently book-oriented site we are part of). The site has attracted a number of professors, and an equal number of serving military men, and several pastors. (The latter two categories lean to the conservative side and the first one probably has a slight majority of liberals.)
Anyway, maybe if the administrator here announced a new "No Personal Attacks" policy, and became ruthless in pruning people who could not control themselves, the board would start attracting people who are not interested in reading endless playground-level tit-for-tat exchanges of insults.
There are many subjects which are both interesting and vital to discuss: poverty and inequality in the US; the national health care plans that are going to be proposed soon; what to do in Afghanistan; and what to do in Iraq. Plus racial preferences, gay marriage and the state of the family in general; globalization and third-world poverty; crime and punishment.
But it's pointless for anyone to spend a bit of time crafting an interesting post on any of these subjects, if the thread degenerates into a slanging match.
I sweep out the trash on a daily basis... 
