Should we shut down the Political thread?

I’m not prepared to vote yet. With all due consideration at this point I recall creating the thread myself because political issues continued to be posted primarily by one poster who ardently wanted to express his political views in the form of cutting and pasting articles to educate us on topics he was personally invested in either intellectually or emotionally.

I’m a big believer in freedom of speech, and believe that if you don’t care for what you are reading or hearing, then you should walk away. I don’t mind engaging in any topic despite my rather independent and often moderate views.

That said, the forum was originated as a place to discuss baseball. It’s for fans of the New York Yankees. The format of the place we are posting in will allow anyone to create their own political forum, or join an existing political forum. We could choose to visit those forums if we want to. I won’t be going there, but those who want to speak from a bully pulpit may wish to go.

I am leaning toward believing in closure of the thread. Instead of sharing ideas in a way that we may become more tolerant of each other and understand the other man’s plight it seems missiles are being launched into various emotional targets. Collateral damage has been done...

Chuck.

I'm sorry to hear that Chuck left. We have few enough posters as it is. Since I have very intentionally never looked at the political thread, I guess I don't deserve a vote here. On the one hand, there are millions of sites out there where we can express our political views and let everyone know how much we hate them. It's nice to have a refuge where we can focus on something we have in common.

On the other hand, if for some people every single human endeavor is essentially a political issue, then I guess it's better to have a designated spot where this takes place rather than have it bleed into game threads.

Often after the heat of an argument, people do reconsider.  Without having any idea of what his politics are, I always enjoyed his comments.  Plus the Miles Davis avatar was cool.

This is very considerate of you, Dome. For what it's worth, you are not at all the reason that we lost chuck. Chuck is the reason we lost chuck. Apparently his emotions got out of control. Perhaps as pipps said, after the heat of the moment, he'll be back...

All of that said, I've always enjoyed chuck as a poster, and he will be missed. We lost Utah a few months ago, and that was over a political issue. One the other hand, we had people leave the old Pinstripes Plus forum over baseball related issues, so there is no assurance that people won't leave for reasons other than political...

Sadly, when we don't allow ourselves to hear the voice of others, we lose an opportunity to understand them...

Good points by those who are quoting James Madison, but no one is denying anyone a right to start a political forum or right to speak. The decision is to prevent collateral damage by having a thread on this forum. I sadly will now choose to vote to shut down the political thread. I actually felt that I learned a few things there, and made progress as a human being...

I emailed him and asked him to reconsider. He seemed set in his ways at the moment but maybe he can change his mind later.