Also, please understand that any topics posted with the following three themes, even if they adhere to the other guidelines for posts in this forum, will be closely monitored and are subject to deletion without notice at the discretion of our moderators and administrators. So, if you post one of these themes, you know your risk. No need to be upset about an axed post if you know the risk ahead of time, no? <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

1) Politics
2) Religion

Highly controversial topics that usually become highly emotional amongst the debaters. Not all, but many, people are quite passionate about those topics and believe strongly in the end of the spectrum where they fall. There is no resolution to such a debate, but it can often be a learning experience for all involved.

However, the purpose of UtterAccess is technical support. Highly charged threads like political and religious debates must be tirelessly monitored. Sometimes they go well, and sometimes they become a huge, chaotic mess of negative emotional tirades and downright insults. Messes like that can have two undesirable effects. First, the moderators, who monitor and help here for free, are forced to devote time they could use answering technical questions to monitoring political/religious debates. And second, users who may otherwise find this site beneficial for technical support develop negative relationships with others that, without the debates, wouldn't have been there.

The chat forum is good for building community, blowing off steam and having a laugh, and getting to know one another a bit more personally, but controversial debates seldom contribute to those ends, either, in a community as large as ours.

So...in short, and objectively, those types of threads require an awful lot of investment and risk, while adding nothing to the primary purpose of this site. They are not innately bad, and they do have their place; it just doesn't happen to be here.

3) Sexual themes

One of the prime benefits many users find in UtterAccess is its acceptance by their workplaces as a corporate-approved support site (à la this). Many users need to be able to access our site from work. Obviously, discussions about sex, regardless of where they fall on the risqué meter, could eventually undermine this and result in UA being banned from some workplaces or picked up by NetNanny or other filtering systems.

Thanks to all for your understanding and cooperation. If you want to post something and are not sure whether it's appropriate, feel free to find a site administrator or moderator and ask. We don't seek to discourage free expression here, but we are obligated to keep our chat posts as searchable and as appropriate as the posts in our other forums.

All in all, the chat forum is just a sidebar to our true purpose at UtterAccess (Access and other technical support! Of course!), so enjoy it, but please don't abuse it. If moderators have to spend too much time wading through controversial posts and putting out fires, that's less time spent doing meaningful, productive things like helping folks with Access questions. We love our chat forum, and we'd like to keep it around by keeping it "lovable." If you come across a post here that seems to be outside the guidelines, please click the "Notify Moderator" link to report it. Please do NOT add fuel to the fire by responding to any offensive posts. Don't be pulled in by flame bait!

Thanks, and enjoy! <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />