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Originally Posted by fredtgreco  As the one who drafted the rule requiring non-anonymity, let me say that anonymous writing on the internet is the source of no end of problems. Those who feel that they can speak with impunity are overwhelmingly more likely to insult, demean and injure others. I have seen it time and time again. The level of discourse here is much better than on other boards precisely because of the name rules.
This has been confirmed by the lack of charity and civility by the few persons here who refused to give their name or lied about their identity. |
I am in complete agreement, Fred. I've been a member on many boards through the years and those that require members to affix their name and affiliation to every message have had the highest level of discourse. Those forums that have been private (i.e. archives not viewable by non members) and only required a first name or less identification have in my experience been the forums most characterized by insulting and at times abusive posts.
There is a great tendency to type things online that we would never say in person (at least not in the same way) and anonymous posting only increases the frequency of this phenomenon.
