Wow, looks like I have missed a lot since I last logged on on 2-17.......
Everyone makes some good points and here is my 2 cents worth.
ANY topic that has the ability to polarize the populace has a very good chance of leading to hurt feelings and a degredation of the quality of the conversation. In my opinion - religion, politics, Nascar, Football, Basketball etc are such topics.
While many people in a campground may spend time on Saturday watching a NASCAR race that doesn't neccessarily make it a good topic for a thread. Opinions on drivers, quaterbacks, teams, etc all run strong and the conversations don't stay civil for long.
It is tough to know where to draw the line. You want people to know more about each other but not provide a forum for arguing viewpoints on things really not TM related. We have enough heated discussions concerning Tow Ratings and use of Weight Distributing Hitches without discussing who is going to stomp who in the BCS bowl.
The trick is allowing people to be individuals without letting things go to far. For the record, I have nothing against MGoBlue's moniker or picture. Okay, I know he is a Michigan Football supporter. Great. No problem there in my book, but I would object to a thread bashing Ohio State or Michigan State before an upcoming Game (even if he were going to watch it in his TM!)
Horseshoes, monkey toss, geocaching, kayaking, fishing, biking, RC aircraft, traveling in your TM to a dog show or karate tournament are all okay to mention in my book. GPS to help get to a campground, fine too. I definately sought opinions of what I considered knowledgable people before I laid out the kind of money some of these systems asked for.
Thank God TMs are so light weight that we don't have to deal with discussions on this thread over which 3/4 ton pickup is the best and why. It can be done but it takes careful moderation to keep the tone and focus helpful and not competetive.
Chris has the ultimate control on the content in this forum and he relys on the moderators to help. Moderators are people too and sometimes they are not always at their best when they log on to catch up on the forum. Any questionable topics could always be checked with Chris privately and then acted upon. 99 times out of 100 our moderators here are spot on. They shouldn't be looked upon too harshly for the 1% of the time something gets misunderstood or they make a bad call. A 99 still qualifies as an "A" where I went to school.
JMHO.
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