A Quick Note on Being Respectful

Here we are again. In the midst of another Poem-A-Day challenge. Stepping on each other's toes again. Sigh.

I'm sorry I dropped the ball on this one, because everyone seemed to be playing nicely. But appearances aren't always what they seem. There has apparently been some hateful speech directed at certain groups of people imbedded in the poems by certain poets this month.

In fact, the hate speech was dramatic enough that our current Poetic Asides poet laureate felt the need to abandon the site for a while. That's beyond ridiculous.

Now listen: I'm a Cub Scout den leader, and I don't tolerate hate speech from my 8-year-olds. Don't think that I will tolerate it from grown-ups either.

If you write something that attacks a certain group of people, that's fine, but don't post it here. There are plenty of other message boards where hate speech is accepted and maybe even welcomed, but this is not one of them. The Poetic Asides community has ALWAYS been about the poeming first and foremost. As the founder of the Poetic Asides community, I have ALWAYS been about freedom of expression but also being nice.

For the offenders, I'm going to assume you offended unintentionally. However, this is your last warning. If you're in doubt about whether your poem is hate speech, then it probably is.

For the offended, I want to make sure it's as easy as possible for you to alert me to offenses. Instead of just responding directly in the comments (which is fine to do in addition), please send me a direct e-mail at robert.brewer@fwmedia.com with the subject line: Bad Stuff on Poetic Asides. Identify which post, day of post, who is making the offending comments, and why. This will make it easy for me to investigate and resolve.

I apologize for anyone negatively affected by the hate speech this month, and I hope that this new approach of e-mailing me directly will help eliminate the problem.

*****

Follow me on Twitter @robertleebrewer

And check out my other blog: My Name Is Not Bob.

And if you want to learn how to be nicer, click here to read this post in particular.