knows nothing about Karl Marx.

but I was told that I could expect no opportunity to make a case for the relevance of my commentary, and that the decision to punish me for my opinion was non-negotiable and without recourse.

the less merit it may carry.

This is the case here IMO.

but if you enjoy this place then try and let it go.  I'm sure you are "principled" in your ways but why let a few people who run the site determine whether you have discussions with the rest of the masses?

To be honest I think your post was pretty political whether you meant it that way or not.  Just my two cents since I read your diary and previous post in detail.

Hey... you might miss the winning streak that is going to start tonight : - )

but what I see there now doesn't seem to warrant a strike.

I assume the "worst" of what you said was deleted, though, so it's hard to say whether or not the strike was warranted.

Politics and economics are inherently a legitimate topic in any conversation about stadium building, though, so it's tough to see how the strike would be warranted.

That said, it's a strike, who cares? It's nearly as meaningless as baseball's steroid policy until the last couple of years.

"there isn't enough nudity" or something like that.

especially in the game thread. Funny how vulgarity is allowed, yet any semblance of political thought is frowned upon. It seems even stranger when the ads on the site occasionally show a political bias.

Sounds a lot like the A's, lately.

were the deleted comments more CGV-worthy than the comments in the link?

how come it's so difficult to get from a comment to the text of the actual diary now?

As I said above, to issue a strike for that comment is ludicrous.  Management ought to reflect long and hard about the message--you can say what you think about baseball economics, but you can't say why you think it.  Absurd.

That said, I wish you wouldn't go.  AN offers a pretty unique dynamic, combining tremendous knowledge of the team and the game with a delightful cornucopia of cleverness.  Most forums devolve to the lowest common denominator; the fact the AN offers much more is plenty enough for me to overlook a few flaws.  Even boneheaded ones like this strike.

If we lose the voices that make this place so cool...of which yours is certainly one...we'll lose it altogether.  Be part of the solution, I always say.  

(and I'm not addressing whether or not the "strike" should have been given as that's for other people to determine and they did):

• The "no bringing politics onto AN" principle does not care whether the politics are left, right, middle, or anything in between. The "political leaning" of the comment doesn't factor into determining whether politics have been brought in.
• The fact that a "strike" was issued automatically means the comment bothered someone in the community enough for them to lodge a complaint (which aren't lodged all that often these days) AND that at least 3 of 4 veteran AN users weighed the comment(s) against the stated CGs and felt aa violation had occurred. I think that is, inherently, a pretty fair process--though surely mistakes will be made.
• Someone (jeepers?) alluded to the lack of public information given surrounding the CGV/complaint process. I just want to say that I used to give reports/updates more often until I received feedback, directly and through inference, that the vast majority of the community didn't want a lot of public discussions and reports, just diligent behind-the-scenes work. So while initially, I think I gave some public report every 4 months, now I do it once/year during a really slow week (late November?).

It's frustrating to be on the receiving end of a perceived injustice, but IMO it doesn't warrant quitting a site entirely over one "mistake" by a group that does the best it can to be objective and fair. So I say go if you want, stay if you want, and go A's.

Believe me, I've been given 2 strikes for stupid reasons (although I probably deserved strikes for other things that got ignored), and decided to stay because most of the people on here are pretty cool. Give it some time, laugh it off, and maybe it won't bother you so much.

AN is better with impassioned A's fans like you.

I'll always remember this HOF AN rant.

I really loathe the no politics rule, because I think it announces a lack of respect for the fully grown human beings that inhabit this place if they can't be trusted to discuss such things without it getting stupid.

That said, one strike and a GBCW diary comes out of it?

Dude, when it happened to me, I took it up with the people in charge and we worked it out.

Making it a public deal as you stomp out of the room is taking the weak option.

And I wish I had a fuicking godamned strike instead of all this "oh laxile's afraid of lolcats" bullshit.  

A privately owned and operated web-based community has decided to exercise its right to control content, so I guess it's only appropriate that we bemoan the fall of freedom of speech and the decay of the Constitution of the United States.

(And this isn't directed at emperor nobody, who, to me, seems to be merely voicing frustration at a rule he doesn't particularly like, but rather at an attitude I saw displayed nearer the top of the thread.)

mainly because the comment that led to this whole thing is absurd.  

The A's success has come from their entrepreneurial approach to baseball management, just as entrepreneurial activity has been the key to the success of modern capitalism.  

Besides, Marx would have been a soccer fan....

Emp, hope you decide to stick around ... but as you can see, any political references inspire the masses to comment on the president, congress, etc. etc.
The point has been made -- I don't give a crap about your political opinion! (to no one in particular) I don't care if you're Republican or Democrat -- although that's never hard to figure out -- this isn't the site for it!
And it's rarely intelligent commentary anyhow, just regurgitated hype from Rosie or Moyer or some other "pundit" who has no idea what he or she is talking about!  Who gives a crap what they cheered about on "Mind of Mencia" -- are you kidding me? "Mind of Mencia?!" ... now there's a brilliant, socially-relevant show ...
Just keep your conservative or liberal, but definitely uninformed opinion, to yourself! Or better yet, simply go to a political blog and spew your nonsense there.

I hold a counter-opinion. The very fact that this is a community of people not bound by any particular interest in politics or philosophical identity is what makes the opportunity to have these discussions so interesting.  

To those of you who say that this kind of dialog should be best taken to a dedicated political/other forum, I respectfully say that the self-selectiveness of those kind of forums make it more difficult to have the kind of spontaneous discussions that can emerge when people are bound together by something else.

My favorite threads on Primer/BTF (for example) have always been those which explored tangents.  I understand that it is the choice of any particular web site to decide whether to allow tangents which can get so passionate, but I remain disappointed that we are unable to do it here.  

There is something nice about being able to discuss the big issues of life with people who are already known to us in this community through their contributions to the main thrust of this blog, A's baseball.  Indeed it is the very fact that I have read hundreds of posts by someone which allows me to receive what they write with a more nuanced view than if I only knew someone from their writings on abortion, taxes, Bush, etc...

We humans are still very new new to this whole civilization thing, tis a very thin veil.  And we are newer still to figuring out how to communicate and understand this modern world.  It seems very natural to have to have myriad meta discussions about who we are and what we should be doing.  

I, however, do not dispute in any way that the owners of AN/SBnation have the right to choose whomever they please to designate as moderators of any particular forum or blog.  And that those moderators have the right to moderate as they see fit.

I guess I just wish that politics, religion, philosophy, history, and physics were discussed more and more broadly in society, not fragmented off into interest groups which too often perpetuate one's own convictions about the world.    

One is "Was the 'strike' a correct ruling?" The other is, "If a 'strike' should not have been issued, but was, should the victimized user leave the forum in disgust and outrage, or say, 'What a horrible decision--but it's only a lousy 'strike' that will disappear in 4 months anyway, and AN is a cool place"?

I think one could easily say "No" to the first issue and take the second approach on the second issue.

Posting an indignant diary and vowing to leave forever is just one of many, many possible ways to handle this "outrage".

and I agree with the no-politics rule.

More specifically, what I believe should be be discouraged is not a political comment per se, but a comment which invites a political discussion.

EN's post linked in this diary, by discussing the flaws of capitalist society and suggesting the collapse of the American Empire, invites a political discussion.

The strike isn't a "punishment".  It's a warning that says, "You're crossing the line now, so this is the sort of thing you should be careful to avoid in the future."

EN now has a choice. I understand that he disagrees with the rule. That's his right. But his choice now is whether he will abide by it anyway. If he can register his disagreement with the rule and then go on respecting it nevertheless, he'll continue to be welcome here. If the rule bugs him too much and he can't be happy with the restriction, then leaving AN is the right choice.

It's not at all true that EN is being punished for his opinion. I actually agree with much of his political opinion, and on other forums I'd probably pursue the discussion. I don't want to pursue the discussion on AN. There are thousands of other forums where I can discuss politics. And while I certainly agree with Jakarta's observation that 90+% of them are too self-selected to be any fun, there's still dozens of good and balanced political forums -- enough so that I value AN far more as a reasonably politics-free forum to discuss the A's than I would yet another non-echo-chamber political forum.

Perhaps a revision to the rules which might improve things for everyone.

Could we perhaps designate a code that means "politics allowed"?  In any diary that has that code in the subject line, the no-politics rule is suspended. That way, if EN or Oz or anyone else wishes to raise an issue like what the stadium debate says about capitalist society, he can start a new diary and even link to it from the main discussion. Those who want to discuss politics can pursue the discussion on the new thread and those of us who don't can easily avoid it.

I would further suggest that such diaries should never be on the front page, and the subject line itself should be non-inflammatory.

The no-politics rule would still apply on the rest of the site, and the other community guidelines would still apply in the politics-allowed diary.

As one who does not want political discussion in AN, I'd still be perfectly happy with this arrangement, and I'd be glad to have AN better accommodate those who do want to discuss politics.

This is an A's fan site -- we can only afford a role-player chamber.

pretty typical response from you i say. someone complains about your preaching and you take your bat and ball and go home. nice. but not before making a big deal out of it. come down off your cross and enjoy some baseball.

i'm pretty sure i disagree with every political fiber of "holly oz's" being and we've been told shut our mouths in a very public way on AN. fair enough....we (I) had it coming. but just because "it amounts to that I no longer feel quite so comfortable being my gay ol' lefty self here" is actually your problem ol' Josh. i don't care, nor do i need to know, that you are left/right/center. but if you're an a's fan, we're brothers.

finally, this CGV, the rules/guidelines, and the term "community" often makes me giggle. this is a blog folks! an a's baseball specific blog that is actually own by one person (and/or his company). tyler can set down any friggin' ground rule he desires. he can tell us when we are invited on his blog and when we aren't. blogging on AN is NOT a right, it's a privilege.

anyway, historically, with diaries like this one the dude types up a nice "good bye" only to be found posting in the game thread the same night.