DU used to be a good Progressive message board. Not any more. The rules of civility (and the SOP) are being broken with impunity and juries vote to leave because of who did the offense.

Now, we have various swarms trying to take over and control DU with their own pet outrage.
We have those that see trolls in most anyone with low post counts - and brag about it.
Those that see Republican talking points in any posts by some posters they disagree with. Never mind that the offending post may be actually true.
Those that see misogyny in most anything that relates to women in general, unless they are members of the correct clique, of course.
The just plain bullies, that take joy in what they do, staying just inside the lines.
We have had out breaks of multiple threads, that are not much more in reality, than thinly veiled misandry. They take serous problems, pile on and use them as weapons, intimidating anyone with a differing opinion, disrupting DU for days at a time.
The in your face arrogance for those that have the audacity to not agree fully with the framing of latest outrage.

And it keeps getting worse.
If this is allowed to go on, DU's days as a progressive/Liberal web site are numbered, as the good decent members will leave in even greater numbers. Which may be the goal. Even as the Tea-Party took over control of the Republican Party.

That's where the problem lies. That is why DU is having such a hard time deciding. Some people do not believe in context, others think context is important.
Some words have multiple meanings, either through past usage or different language roots. Where is the line in the sand and who draws it? How wide should that line be drawn? How sharp or fuzzy should that line be? Should it be hard and straight, or should it be allowed to meander?
Even who is saying something enters into whether it is racist, homophobic, gender slurs, sexist, whatever.
I see shades of grey and even rainbows of color, where others see only stark black and white. Most things are not either/or. We do not live in a binary world. There is usually more than one workable solution. Who should decide? Who views should prevail?

I think we should come down on the side of tolerance. Take problem posts on a case by case basis. Is it actually an affront to some group or another, or was it just a word that is on someone's personal no-no list? What is the poster really trying to say?
Try to see the grey. Blanket condemnation seldom works. Work-a-rounds abound. Pay attention to politics for lessons on how work-a-rounds work.

Except that I am usually not all that much clueless when I post.

To function properly DU needs to reflect the real world. That is why it was founded in the first place. George may be gone, but not the problems he brought with him.
DU used to much better place until the Alert/Jury system was implemented, giving the authoritarians a self assumed license to censer and control what they don't like, regardless of any objections and push back.

We need the openness and tolerance of a Democratic site, a site that reflects the real world. Censorship of the real world, by what is, in reality, other members with the exact same privileges here everyone else, no more, no less, that are trying to control the rest of DU, regardless of the wishes of the other members.

The only people that can do that are the Admin, as this is their site. Any cliques, swarms, Safe Havens, groups, or 'friends of' do not have the authority to be remaking DU into what they want, at the expense of the rest of us. Only the Admin have that privilege.

The attacks and infighting cause by the few here, are counter productive, in that they turn actual and potential friends into more problems to overcome in the very real fight for equality for all, regardless of gender, orientation, skin color, or anything else we are born with, that are used to divide us.

Sometimes I think the continued division is the prime objective of the usual suspects, even though they would deny it when asked. They'd rather have the fight, than an equable solution.

Nobody can see the long term. Just the next bottom line. Why?

Letting the bu$h tax cuts expire will ruin this Christmas for so many. But what about the next Christmas and the Christmas after that, when the economy picks up? Jobs, even Living-Wage-Jobs will be more plentiful? We can't worry about what is down the road, we need to worry only about right now. We can worry about later, later. We have to put out this fire right now. We can't be worrying about how to prevent those fires in the first place. No time! That cuts into the the time needed to fix this problem.

We must continue to diddle with the symptoms, least we accidentally deal with the root cause of something and actually fix a problem.
What will we ever do if we actually start to fix too many problems? What if we run out of problems to fix? How will we function then?
Oh, so much to worry about now, we can't worry about the future. Time is of the essence. Time is running out. There won't be a future if we don't fix this RIGHT NOW!!!!1!1 Forget the future and deal with this NOW!

When you cut the flow of money on main street, everything slows down. Nobody is getting rich off the Social Programs in the first place. But those programs do allow more people to spend on Main Street. Every little but helps. Take it away and in this fragile economy, it will hurt.

The Fix?

1. Read the United States Constitution with comprehension. Paying particular attention to the Preamble and Section 8. The parts about the general welfare of "We the people...".
2. Raise taxes on everyone grossing $100,000 or more, in stepped increments. When the average income is only around 40 to 50 thousand dollars, that makes more sense than starting at $250,000 and up.
3. We need to stop the wasteful wars and look hard at rebuilding this country.
4. WE need to get our heavy industry back into this country. How can we continue to be a Super Power, if we continue to outsource our manufacturing jobs overseas?
5. Single Payer, Universal Health Care. Include Dentistry and eye care in this Universal Health Care. And don't for get help for the hard of hearing.
6. Criminal trials, with harsh sentences for those found guilty for our own war criminals.
7. Investigate Wall Street with the same vigor as we do our war criminals.
8. Make White Collar crime illegal.
9. Stop the For Profit wars on terror and drugs. Apply some common sense for a change.
10. Stop voting for people that have been selected for us. Remove the corrupting money from our elections.
11. Corporations are not people. Regulate them as the predatory entities they are.

that one or more of the group have decided for the rest of us, for any number of reasons, that they don't want used on DU.
The problem is though that most of these words are used everyday in the real world, on TV, the radio, blogs, message boards, printed/online newspapers, you and I in everyday conversations. Often in context unrelated to the reasons give for their banning.
There is this silly idea that banning whatever word will correct the problem they have associated the word with, regardless of context.
English is a conglomeration of languages, resulting in a very high number of synonyms - and homonyms. Banning words is a losing proposition.
What is the difference between using a given word or one of its synonyms? (Homonyms muddy the waters even more.) If the substitute word comes into common usage, it too will eventually be put on someone's no-no list, to start the bickering all over again. Why? Because the root cause of any slights, slurs, insults, sexism. bigotry, racism, whatever are not being dealt with, because the word itself is the point of contention, not the underlying problem.

but there are a bunch here with all the characteristics of Republicans. They are making DU suck with their wanting everyone else to lockstep with them.

Yeah, that's the ticket. Makes as much sense as someone coming to DU because it is a Liberal/Democratic leaning site and trying to straight jacket DU into their own blinder enabled image of the world.

Hmmm, yeah, that is what is happening.

I wish the usual suspects would stop trying to make the rest of DU into their own version of what they made their Safe Haven to be.
The open forums need to reflect the reality of the rest of the world, not the world view of some Word Police type that looks for and sees only words that can be used as slights, slurs, bigotry, homophobia and sexism, real or imagined, in almost every post by anyone not of their clique. Context and meaning being tossed out in their furor to be offended for mere use of a word.
Word policing is in itself, a form of bullying. But some here thinks that's OK because they are the ones doing it.
Eh, no it ain't. And like in the real world of the elections just past, people are tired of being told by fringe groups what to think and do and are pushing back.