Alex, I completely agree with you that the positives of the thread far outweigh the negatives. It would be nice if everyone we interact with shared the same sensibilities about all matters including flexibility with “rules”; especially when dealing with a topic (the thread) with the many positives that you nicely laid out. Also, after years of interaction with others on a subject such as music which has so many personal overtones (pun) it is, as Mary_jo points out, only natural that discussions should veer off into subjects of a more personal nature. However, not everyone shares the same sensibilities nor level of flexibility with rules and, importantly, that includes those with the power to regulate and control the thread (Audiogon).
On a personal level, I don’t much care about the political (and other) rants and would not object but for two reasons: they often created ill will between the participants while interrupting discussions of the music and, as perhaps is being demonstrated now, they created the possibility for thread censorship given the clearly stated “rules”. THAT was the reason for my suggestions that we stick to the subject of the thread.
Where I disagree with you is in the idea that these deviations from the thread’s subject matter were “rare” and “not really offensive to anyone”. They occurred fairly regularly and the rancor that sometimes was expressed over some of these rants tells a different story.
Perhaps Audiogon staff is monitoring this thread as well and I would respectfully ask that they reconsider their decision for the reasons that you state. I would also encourage all those non-participants who followed the thread to petition Audiogon staff to reconsider as well. I have a strong suspicion (hope) that all this would serve as “lesson learned”. As Cleeds points out “This is a private group and the First Amendment doesn’t apply”. As unfortunate as the ramifications of this may seem, the way I see it, if the main concern and love of the participants truly is the music this restriction shouldn’t matter that much. I doubt the censors would object to an occasional comment about the beauty of Croatian women.
Edit:
I just received a response from Agon staff to my question re the reason for the thread’s removal:
**** If I am not mistaken, it was closed because the discussion got way off topic and even got political.
Tammy ****
