2018 January Open Letter to #RebelYell VISION and Guidelines
Hi everybody,
We're just over 6 years old, gone through different regulars, different ops. All in all, not bad, I think. Now I think we can and will do a bit better. The Vision still reigns: “#RebelYell is a room devoted to the freest expression and exchange of different ideas about all the classic human concerns: politics, religion, culture, philosophy, science, art. And the value of this freedom to speak openly is not so much in the individual's liberty to express his ideas and argue for his own ideals but rather in the need for an open society to hear as many competing ideas as possible in order for that society to make the finest decisions about itself and its future.
The Vision of #RebelYell is this: that people from different backgrounds, with different ideals and competing ideas and arguments can come to speak openly and without fear of punishment or silencing in a public arena. Further, that people with inimical ideals can get beyond the anger at hearing their most cherished values criticized and condemned, speak to the issues and reason together about their differences toward some common goal, at least of mutual understanding if nothing else.  http://pastebin.com/8M9D7ZLx
Now I'd like to focus on the other part to free speech – that is: free hearing. It's not enough to be able to speak freely, it's important that others be allowed to hear – that is – I'm talking about #RY and other forums for public discussion. IRC is fairly immune to violent physical disruption of speech, but there are other ways to disrupt or silence a speaker so that others cannot hear him: abusive adhoms, divertive and disruptive nonsense, constant joking insults that annoy a speaker, bullying and nagging/repetition of questions already answered, flooding the scroll making it difficult for others to keep up/find responses, speaking *for* the other person in egregiously distorted fashion. In effect the speaker is muffled or silenced, actively DIScouraged from continuing his part of the discussion or prevented from focusing on his issues. And the point has been to refuse not his right to speak but the right of others to hear his speech. Others have the right to determine for themselves to whom they wish to listen, what they want to listen to. Let them.
I want to actively ENCOURAGE people to discuss freely to their issues. Remember – people come to hear not just themselves, not just their side, but the other side, other people. LET THEM. Let people hear the other side, not just yours.
So. New Guidelines. Here are the old ones: http://pastebin.com/7NYiqZft
And here are the New Guidelines:
Everything stems from this: avoid discouraging discussion – try to encourage it. If a person you are talking to is asking you to stop x – even if other people don't mind x – remember – IF you want to talk with this person now – complying with his request is not unreasonable, is unlikely to be onerous. You don't have to do anything, to talk with or answer anybody ever, but IF you want to engage with a specific person, then remember his preferences or talk with others. We allow more extreme behavior on irc, in #RebelYell particularly, but there are always limits. These limits are not a destruction of free speech, but rather the necessary platform that allows speech at all.

1. Restrain personal attacks, privilege attacks on the argument. [Li'l PC lingo there :)] Avoid egregious, frivolous, especially MEAN comments. Act as if you want the other person/persons to continue talking to you, to your issue. SO very often you can say the same thing – make the point clearer – just by leaving out the personal tag.
2. Don't threaten violence, don't suggest it by pasting personal information at all ever.
3. Profanity and vulgarity – PLEASE – just keep them down. I'm not going to argue that both are matters of 'free speech' – they aren't. Period. Keep them down do NOT argue with me.
4. Channel Policy Discussion/complaints/etc. Not against the rules, but not so often, unending. Send such things to rebelyell@cox.net. I DO read them, we can talk in pm. Please don't try to charge me with hypocricy and favoritism in the room – you can do that in emails and pm, as well. Don't try to bully me, it won't end well.
5. Which brings me to treatment of ops – and me, the Channel Manager. WE are restrained by the Vision/Guidelines as much or more than chatters. But that's not a license to abuse us. We'll take MORE than ops in other rooms – this is one of the founding points of #RY – much greater freedom in speech and personal style/behavior for the chatters, and greater restraint on the power of ops to punish chatters both for disagreement on issues AND for personal dislike. In fact – ops are NEVER to kick or ban chatters FOR content – for ideology, for reasons that fail to convince the op or for failure to support a position – this is a judgment that is rightly left to individual listeners. Not to the ops. You don't need to be an excellent debater, a great mind, an “educated” person to offer your ideas and reasons. The only 'level' you must reach – as far as ops are concerned – is the personal behavior level that  - in context – doesn't destroy the purpose of the room.
6. All the other standard rules of irc chatrooms still apply to some degree: flooding, caps/colors/scripts are a problem only in that they can disrupt or destroy a discussion. Lecturing – I call it “talking to the world” - and we WANT fuller comments/longer posts in order to explain complicated ideas/reasoning – is not disallowed, if annoying. Try to 'talk' rather than 'lecture'. I know it's hard. Mea culpa.  Sound bites aren't good in TV news or #RY – this is talk – not twitter.
I keep this: The very purpose of #RebelYell is to facilitate and encourage expression of ideas and dialogue of difficult and controversial issues. Please do not discourage either. In general, excess is the key. Heated arguments that are sprinkled with occasional snarls and adhoms are to be expected, but unrestrained attacks and tireless bickering are inimical to the purpose of the room - and - they’re not persuasive of any position.
7. Humor and good manners, sympathy and good faith. Please bring them - you’re going to need them!
8.
The ONLY purpose of the ops is to promote talk, better talk – to issues, to normal human positive interaction. We're here to 'help' people get off each other and back onto discussions that are informative, fun for everybody, interesting for others to listen to. We're not here to hunt for abridgement of every guideline, to PUNISH at the first opportunity, certainly we're not looking to kick/devoice/ban people. If you want THAT kind of opping most other rooms and ops are happy to offer such.
Please, feel free to pm ops/CM with complaints, questions, criticisms. And don't EVER be afraid to cheer and praise!
You have power – we WANT you – we NEED people, different styles and ideas, who want to talk about important things with different people. Who want a room where people can be friendly too, just talk. #RY IS about talking. To some mutual purpose.
It should be fun for everybody. Infuriating fun, but fun :)

goshzilla, your beloved Channel Manager
rebelyell@cox.net