Score one for the Freepers and Trolls - temporarily - the
Official Blog site for Rep. John Conyers is now blocking all additional commentary as the result of a negative quality of posts.
On the thread
dated 06-21-05, the following ADMIN note has been posted:
(UPDATE: ADMIN has turned off all comments. This thread has degraded into a number of anti-religious slurs.)The note states that only comments to this one thread will be blocked, but in fact
all comments to all threads are now shutdown.
A further review of the thread in question shows a more detailed explaination by the site ADMIN at post #242:
Commenters: A number of recent posts here have expressed concerns about the tone and content of comments. We have been particularly troubled by profane posts, posts that use racial slurs, posts that are threatening the others posters, posts that are repeated over and over and over and seem to serve no purpose other than to disrupt communication, and posts that slander individuals who have nothing to do with this website. It is of particular concern that the core group of commenters who have been an important part of this blog since the beginning (like the Doc) are growing so discouraged that they visit less frequently.
It must be said that not all commenters who disagree with Mr. Conyers have done these things and there have been many who have stated their opinions in a forceful, but respectful (of this space and of other commenters) way.
So why not just ban the commenters who are doing these things? It is not so simple. You can ban some of these commenters and some have been banned. Others you can report to their ISP because they are violating their user agreement with the ISP. But there are others that do not have a unique IP address (which you need to ban them) and whose ISP is unresponsive to these concerns.
Because of that, we going transition to a blog that requires registration to post comments. Dissenting posts will be welcomed, but posts that fit into the categories described above will result in the poster being banned and action can be taken with any ISP.
Please bear with us as we make this transition. Thanks for your patience.
Before you get alarmed, it seems that the blog will return in a new
registration required form - and in the long term, that's a good thing. It's just a drag for now.
Vyan