It kind of makes no sense when the actions of one or two people who could have been warned would have been better rather than closing the thread on the vast majority of well behaved users

I am referring to the recently closed thread in the lounge. And sometimes things get really really inconsistent with the mods. I experienced this inconsistency first hand several months ago when bizarrely the Islamaphobia thread was never closed despite deep insults flying on and on and on.... almost forever, but approximately the same time @frob quickly shut down a thread I started, after some mild queries, adding a bizarre note with the closure. I went into a fury of PMs with frob and Josh, but i'm not here to dig up that pandora box again ....

... but only to suggest that in cases like the recently closed thread in the lounge where only one or two people were using insulting words - wouldn't it have been better to warn or eject those involved since the majority of contributors in the thread were well behaved?

In this case, I think the thread closure was okay to do and a sufficient explanation was provided. At 22 pages, that's a lot of thread, and since the election scenario has changed since it was originally created perhaps a new thread is even more justified?

Certainly no issues over the topic as long as it stays civil. In fact, I think we should encourage civil debate and hope to see a new thread soon.

My personal opinion (ie not official moderation policy) is that political threads are allowed to remain active completely at the discretion and pleasure of the moderators, and that no one has any right to complain when they're closed down. That said -

wouldn't it have been better to warn or eject those involved since the majority of contributors in the thread were well behaved?

I don't know what thread YOU were reading, but the thread I was reading was garbage. "Well behaved"? I prefer "not technically against the rules". Besides, even if the discussion was still active, nobody in there has said anything vaguely intelligent in some time, it's just been childish sniping back and forth.

I don't know what thread YOU were reading, but the thread I was reading was garbage. "Well behaved"? I prefer "not technically against the rules". Besides, even if the discussion was still active, nobody in there has said anything vaguely intelligent in some time, it's just been childish sniping back and forth.

I will have to concede to you here because i read probably only about 50%-60% of the posts in the thread

My personal opinion (ie not official moderation policy) is that political threads are allowed to remain active completely at the discretion and pleasure of the moderators, and that no one has any right to complain when they're closed down. That said -

I agree, since a complain culture would tend to undermine the authority of moderators, but my original post is more of a suggestion rather than a complain

I'm impressed that it survived as long as it did. These topics tend to derail fast :).

A thing just popped into my head now, how about allowing up/down votes in the lounge? I think this will restore sanity to lounge discussions and discourage flamewars

Or try for a few months, if it works retain, if it doesn't scrap