Goodbye

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Brad

Goodbye

Post by Brad »

I used to feel like I belonged in a community and had people I could relate to about fashion preferences that are usually not discussed openly in our closed-minded society. However, it seems the moderators of this community are closed-minded as well with their heavy-handed and tyrannical censorship. What if I want to consider myself a cross-dresser? What if I don't prefer to wear kilts? What if I want to wear high-heels and like my feminine gait? What if I want to have feminine tendencies and traits?

This community is so afraid of public image, how others will perceive us, that we not be regarded as out-of-the-mainstream wackos or perverts, or mentally ill wing nuts. I feel like I can't be myself or think what I want without running afoul of some ill-conceived and oppressive rule being subjectively applied by a parental moderator. I know there have to be some ground rules or anarchy and chaos will take over, but enough is enough.

I was so thrilled when I discovered Tom's Cafe. I felt like I belonged. I loved it even more on Kris' Atrium where I felt that I really belonged. I enjoyed attending the Million Skirted Men gathering in NYC in Feb. 2004. But times have changed- Tom passed away and Kris has moved on.

Goodbye folks- it's been real. Bob, please take me off the site. You won't miss me anyway. I'll lurk occasionally to see what's going on and I'll continue wearing what I want when I can.
Bob
Barista Emeritus
Posts: 587
Joined: Tue Oct 21, 2003 9:31 pm
Location: New England

Re: Goodbye

Post by Bob »

As a moderator, I have had to make the call on what to do with this post. We received the following opinion from one of our members:
There's nothing actually wrong with this post except that it is a waste of electrons and perpetuates the impression of discord. Frankly "I'm off" posts usually are and... my inclination would be to remove them. They are nothing more than electronic litter left in our playground.
It's quite possible that our reader is correct, that this is a waste of electrons. I am leaving the post up because I want SkirtCafe to be the kind of place in which we can respectfully voice our opinions, even (or especially) when they are critical. Others on this forum have expressed sentiments similar to Brad. He may not be in the majority, but he is also not the only one; I'm sorry he has not chosen to stick around to add his voice to the conversation. I believe these are important issues for us, as a community, to keep in the back of our mind.
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AMM
Member Extraordinaire
Posts: 841
Joined: Tue Feb 28, 2006 4:01 pm
Location: Thanks for all the fish!

Re: Goodbye

Post by AMM »

Brad wrote:I used to feel like I belonged in a community and had people I could relate to about fashion preferences that are usually not discussed openly in our closed-minded society. However, it seems the moderators of this community are closed-minded as well with their heavy-handed and tyrannical censorship. What if I want to consider myself a cross-dresser? What if I don't prefer to wear kilts? What if I want to wear high-heels and like my feminine gait? What if I want to have feminine tendencies and traits?
First of all, I suspect that what you experienced is what everyone experiences when they join a new group. At the beginning, you don't really know anybody, so, if you want to think it's the group you've been looking for, you imagine that they are the kind of people you hoped would be in the group. As time goes on, you start to find out how people really are, and you get disappointed. The better they were in your imagination, the bigger the let-down when you are confronted with their reality. People like to talk of the Golden Age when Tom walked the earth, but the tensions that developed into the braveheart vs. freestyler schism were there from the beginning.

Second, I think you are scapegoating the moderators. The moderators here lock very, very few threads, and don't even step in very often. My own feeling is that the biggest problem with how they locked the Jeans thread was that their initial explanations didn't emphasize the real problem: the flat-out bad and dubious behavior of some posters on the thread.

People do post about considering themselves cross-dressers, or wearing high-heels, or about feminine tendencies and traits. Those threads have never gotten even threatened with being locked. But they did gather quite a few responses from people (non-moderators, mostly) who didn't agree with them.

If you're looking for a site where everyone will agree with you and will have the same tastes in fashion (and whose tastes will change in the same ways that yours change), this is not the site for you. I don't think anybody here gets that from SkirtCafe. Actually, the only way you're going to find that is to create your own website. (Ask Ziggy about how he did his. Or Skip (= since1982). You can even start a thread on it -- in Off Topic, maybe, or in "In the News".)

BTW, please don't use the word "Censorship" about what the moderators do. It's an insult to all the people who live in countries where they -- and their ISPs -- risk a visit from the police, and then jail time, if they post what they think on any site at all. Here in the USA, at least, if you don't like SkirtCafe's acceptable use policies, you can go to another website, or start your own, post what you want, wearing whatever you want, and nobody here can stop you. Or will even try.
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