Mika's Personal Life

[Scut Monkey]

Anyways .. history does play a part , Sunny Monkey set the "rules" on this site , he didnt and doesnt want this discussed along with Deano .... why??? cause we have to be consistent and thats whats its been since day 1!!!

 

Saying that it has to be said that some level of Mikas management were trying to be pleased around that time ... and things have changed and moved on

 

My opinion is that it is free speach, but we have set the rules pretty early via Sunny, and I suppose we should remain consistent .. unless we have a huge swing of opinion .., which we "may" have here

Consistent? Limit freedom of speech for the sake of consistency??? I'm sorry but the concept seems ludicrous to me. The forum should be able to change its rules to improve, not stagnate in unfair practices.

 

It's especially ludicrous considering that "consistency" is a concept that is not being applied with regards to trivial topics other than Mika's sexuality. THAT is where we need consistency, treat them all equally.

 

I'll add that many of the trivial topic sprouted long after Sunny Monkey's "precedent". It's natural that rules change to consider new, previously unforeseen changes.

[Sasje]

I just think that the admin really has to think about what can and what cannot be discussed on this forum..

 

And.. if they don't change their mind over the next 10 years, well.. so be it..

 

I mean.. can't we really live without discussing some things??

[Kavi]

I just think that it will avoid all these discussions, because then the creators of this website just make the rules and the mods only have to see if things are being like they are supposed to be..

 

And if someone just post something what is "against the rules" we don't have to get nasty or angry or whatever, but can point back to those rules..

 

That will also take away the "unknown" rule about talking about Mika's private life..

 

If the admin says it can be discussed, fine, then there will pop up discussion threads about it, and we only have to watch out for fights..

 

If the admin says it can't be discussed, we can close them, based on the rules..

 

I think it will be more easy, also for the new members..

 

yup! those were my thoughts exactly.

so i didn't know why ppl hated on me when i suggested it back then, so i'm glad to see someone else thinking of it...it makes me feel that i'm not crazy after all!

[Kata]

I haven't posted in the discussion for a while, simply because there's now plenty of people saying what I want to say and there's no need to repeat it - I was never really heard when I tried to say it the past year anyway

 

All I want to say now is just that I don't think a poll is the solution, not only because I think the result would be pretty clear, as most people who don't have strong feelings about this would go with the "we don't care" option, but more because the only thing it (in my opinion) would do is to take things back into the sandbox yet again. And it would most certainly take me back into the sandbox, as I would probably then demand a poll to ban all discussion of nasal hair and topless pictures or any other subject that I think could be "private" and that I don't give a hoot about - I'm never gonna be able to accept a ban on just one topic in here, sorry

[Sasje]

yup! those were my thoughts exactly.

so i didn't know why ppl hated on me when i suggested it back then, so i'm glad to see someone else thinking of it...it makes me feel that i'm not crazy after all!

 

Or just as crazy as I am..

 

Well.. I think that is just the most fair, the most easy for the mods (and don't dare to call us lazy..) and the most easy for all of us, because then we finally KNOW what we can or cannot do..

 

Now it is just guessing and discussing and argueing..

[Scut Monkey]

I really need to leave now.

 

But after all of these pages of discussion I summarise it like this: until Mika indicates otherwise, the topic of his sexuality should be treated like any other trivial topic. The ban/limitation should be lifted, then its discussion be moderated like any other discussion. There is no reason for it to be considered differently.

 

Please consider what I've said over here for my reasoning behind this.

[avoca]

Or just as crazy as I am..

 

Well.. I think that is just the most fair, the most easy for the mods (and don't dare to call us lazy..) and the most easy for all of us, because then we finally KNOW what we can or cannot do..

 

Now it is just guessing and discussing and argueing..

 

I have to be honest and not cheesy..

 

aside the closing down of the thread, which i didn't agree with, but I'll survive, I am not referring particularly to mods' decisions in this field: it's more the general tendency on the forum towards this topic, I don't like. and it's a complicated matter, and as kata said, there's been written a lot on it, I won't add my 2 cents.

[FREDDIESDOUBLE]

Consistent? Limit freedom of speech for the sake of consistency??? I'm sorry but the concept seems ludicrous to me. The forum should be able to change its rules to improve, not stagnate in unfair practices.

 

It's especially ludicrous considering that "consistency" is a concept that is not being applied with regards to trivial topics other than Mika's sexuality. THAT is where we need consistency, treat them all equally.

 

I'll add that many of the trivial topic sprouted long after Sunny Monkey's "precedent". It's natural that rules change to consider new, previously unforeseen changes.[/quote

 

Scut ... we are not understanding each other .......

 

Where did I say limit speech?? .. I gave two points of view , one being WHY the MFC is the way it is and then the other side that we may and need to move forward and develop ....

[stien]

I haven't posted in the discussion for a while, simply because there's now plenty of people saying what I want to say and there's no need to repeat it - I was never really heard when I tried to say it the past year anyway

 

All I want to say now is just that I don't think a poll is the solution, not only because I think the result would be pretty clear, as most people who don't have strong feelings about this would go with the "we don't care" option, but more because the only thing it (in my opinion) would do is to take things back into the sandbox yet again. And it would most certainly take me back into the sandbox, as I would probably then demand a poll to ban all discussion of nasal hair and topless pictures or any other subject that I think could be "private" and that I don't give a hoot about - I'm never gonna be able to accept a ban on just one topic in here, sorry

 

I get your point, but the thing with a poll is that it could get people thinking and getting an opinion.

It's not the law or something, and I don't thing the result of the poll should be automatically the new vision for the forum.

 

In the end it should be discussed together with the admins etc.

I just like it when people think about these things, and I believe a poll could do that...

 

I think...

 

not entirily sure...

[Sasje]

I have to be honest and not cheesy..

 

aside the closing down of the thread, which i didn't agree with, but I'll survive, I am not referring particularly to mods' decisions in this field: it's more the general tendency on the forum towards this topic, I don't like. and it's a complicated matter, and as kata said, there's been written a lot on it, I won't add my 2 cents.

 

Well... that is exactly what I meant, Avoca..

 

Newbies come over here, don't know anything about the "unwritten law of not to speak about Mika's private life" and get attacked..

 

If there is a possibility of making some "written laws" then they know about it and hopefully won't get attact anymore for something they don't know about..

[FREDDIESDOUBLE]

I get your point, but the thing with a poll is that it could get people thinking and getting an opinion.

It's not the law or something, and I don't thing the result of the poll should be automatically the new vision for the forum.

 

In the end it should be discussed together with the admins etc.

I just like it when people think about these things, and I believe a poll could do that...

 

I think...

 

not entirily sure...

 

I taotally agree with this , Im not saying the MFC want it to go this way .. but we have to consider all views

 

Kata and everyone else ... there will always be topics on every forum that some people dont like , we might as well close every thread!!! alcohol , christmas .. if we wanted to open it up then every thread in some way could offend someone

[JackViolet]

Can we stop eulogizing about free speech as though it were some holy of holies? I am a believer in free spech too, very much so, but IT DOESN'T EXIST on such forums usually anyway, and IT DOESN'T EXIST here, or SHOULD even.

 

Long post on why I am not a Nazi for saying this forthcoming. :-P

 

--Jack

[avoca]

I taotally agree with this , Im not saying the MFC want it to go this way .. but we have to consider all views

 

Kata and everyone else ... there will always be topics on every forum that some people dont like , we might as well close every thread!!! alcohol , christmas .. if we wanted to open it up then every thread in some way could offend someone

 

exactly, fred. then maybe we shouldn't shut down the chance to discuss also mika's sexuality, in polite and tasteful way, like everything else.

[Kata]

I taotally agree with this , Im not saying the MFC want it to go this way .. but we have to consider all views

 

Kata and everyone else ... there will always be topics on every forum that some people dont like , we might as well close every thread!!! alcohol , christmas .. if we wanted to open it up then every thread in some way could offend someone

 

Well my point exactly! Either you have to ban all threads that for some reason can be put into the "Mika's private life" or "possibly offensive" category - which means you might as well close the forum, or you can't use this argument at all. You can't ban one topic for being an invasion on his private life if you don't apply the rules everywhere, so don't ban anything. Close the thread IF it gets offensive or delete offensive posts like you would do with every other "possibly offensive" topic, instead of banning something that is by no means more offensive than speculating whether he waxes his nuts or not

[Christine]

I'm no longer sure if a poll should be our plan of action. I'd rather that the mods discuss this topic with Deano and consider the questions that I've raised in this post then decide what is right not merely what is easiest.

 

I totally agree with that. That's all I was trying to say in my post this morning. It wasn't an attack on the mods at all. In fact I'm going to have to trust the admin's judgement in the end even if I disagree with the decision. I'm just happy that we've all been heard on the matter and this thread hasn't been closed.

 

Well, then you need to make up your mind. You say you want free

speech like this is a democracy, then you tell us we shouldn't put

things to a vote, as a democracy would.

 

Freedom of speech and democracy are not synonymous.

 

Democracies have leaders to make tough calls instead of holding every issue to a referendum. If the US government operated on a policy of only making decisions based on popular consensus then you would have no separation of church and state, no abortion, maybe even institutionalized racism.

 

Leaders are supposed to make decisions based on what is fair and just, not simply what is popular. That's why they are called leaders and not poll-takers.

 

Yes, and you called it lazy, but I call it being PROactive instead of

REactive.

 

I did not call you lazy. In fact I qualified a comment yesterday by specifically saying that I'm not accusing the mods of being lazy because we should all be putting in the effort required to keep these threads under control and not relying on the mods to come in and close it down when it gets ugly.

 

When I saw Freddie's reaction to my post, my heart sank because I thought I'd been overly harsh when I didn't mean to be. But I went back and re-read it and I don't think I was harsh or taking shots at the mods at all. Except for my error in lumping Sunny and Deano (who I'm assuming are the final arbiters here) in as "mods", I don't understand why what I said was taken as an attack or an accusation of laziness.

 

You and Freddie are two of my favourite people here and I have no issues with any of the mods. I don't want us to go down this road every time I speak up about something that involves the moderators on this board.

 

Yopp called me a "super carebear" in JackViolet's thread, and I know

she meant it as a kind of a dig -- as if being nice and trying to

keep the peace are bad things. But

seriously, don't we all have enough negativity in our real lives? Do we

really want to bathe in it here as well?

 

Some of us don't feel that every disagreement is a negative thing and I think maybe that's where the Carebear talk comes from (at least generally, I don't know about you in particular, that's for Yop to say). I think that as long as people aren't calling each other names, engaging in arguments in not only acceptable but stimulating.

 

Jack and I are friends precisely because we were debating in a thread one day. We (and some other people) enjoy it and don't think that we all have to agree 100% of the time in order to avoid negativity.

[Scut Monkey]

Consistent? Limit freedom of speech for the sake of consistency??? I'm sorry but the concept seems ludicrous to me. The forum should be able to change its rules to improve, not stagnate in unfair practices.

 

It's especially ludicrous considering that "consistency" is a concept that is not being applied with regards to trivial topics other than Mika's sexuality. THAT is where we need consistency, treat them all equally.

 

I'll add that many of the trivial topic sprouted long after Sunny Monkey's "precedent". It's natural that rules change to consider new, previously unforeseen changes.

 

Scut ... we are not understanding each other .......

 

Where did I say limit speech?? .. I gave two points of view , one being WHY the MFC is the way it is and then the other side that we may and need to move forward and develop ....

I must have missed the latter view then.

 

Can we stop eulogizing about free speech as though it were some holy of holies? I am a believer in free spech too, very much so, but IT DOESN'T EXIST on such forums usually anyway, and IT DOESN'T EXIST here, or SHOULD even.

 

Long post on why I am not a Nazi for saying this forthcoming. :-P

 

--Jack

Maybe not a holy of holies but far more important than the things that it's been sacrificed for here.

 

Why shouldn't it exist? I can't imagine why not. I think it deserves its priority especially considering that some of the reasons given for limiting it are weak if not invalid IMO.

 

 

 

... and now bye for real. Until tomorrow.

[Tia]

I haven't posted in the discussion for a while, simply because there's now plenty of people saying what I want to say and there's no need to repeat it - I was never really heard when I tried to say it the past year anyway

 

All I want to say now is just that I don't think a poll is the solution, not only because I think the result would be pretty clear, as most people who don't have strong feelings about this would go with the "we don't care" option, but more because the only thing it (in my opinion) would do is to take things back into the sandbox yet again. And it would most certainly take me back into the sandbox, as I would probably then demand a poll to ban all discussion of nasal hair and topless pictures or any other subject that I think could be "private" and that I don't give a hoot about - I'm never gonna be able to accept a ban on just one topic in here, sorry

 

im with kata. i am a grown up woman with views. i have never once in this forum forced these views up-on anyone, i have never once in this forum being mean or nasty or said anything disrepeactful about mika, his family or another MFC member.

i will never except a ban on any topic and i do care and i wouldn actually come onto this forum day after day if i didnt!!!

[JackViolet]

Can I just say that I wish everyone would cut out the dramatics about our precious free speech being infringed upon, and how sad this poll is? Free speech may be a political right in many of our respective countries, but it is not something that applies here. Privately-owned and moderated boards never have free speech, because they belong to a specific person or group, and that person or group has the right to decide what is or is not an allowed topic or mode of conversation. If we all owned equal shares in MFC and paid for it, we might have some grounds for complaint, but as we do not, the owners have full rights to limit our speech however they’d like. If deano decided that he never wanted to read another word about the color “red” again, he could ban all mention of that color and it would be his right. It would then be our right to leave the forum, of course.

 

We already do not have free speech here. Swear words are censored, and one of the rules is that racist, violent, or otherwise hateful speech is not allowed. If someone were to start an obscene or racist thread, the moderators would shut it down immediately, and no one would complain “but what about free speech, I have a right to post explicit pictures or to mock and insult Jews!”

 

I don’t think anyone so clamoring for free speech on this thread would wish such speech to be allowed: it is banned precisely because there is a general consensus that it is not desirable here. So there is plenty of precedent for limiting speech.

 

Moreover, we all seem to agree that private photos of Mika’s family and friends are off-limits. If someone found photos of Allegra’s last birthday party or Fortune’s hospital records, for instance, and posted them here, I think everyone would be in support of a moderator deleting those items. Again, this is a limitation imposed on our free speech due to a general consensus that we do not wish to distribute such material on this forum.

 

The question of “distribution” is the one pertinent to me, here. Certainly, I do not like censorship. I am also rather against enforcing any limits in terms of applying them by force. But I wish people would realize that this is a PUBLIC and highly-frequented messageboard, and that some self-censorship—like with private photos, etc—may be appropriate. Do I want to “ban” discussion of Mika’s sexuality? Well, no. At least I definitely do not want to ban mention of it. I think it should be perfectly all right for someone to say “I think Mika is gay,” or “I think Mika is straight,” or whatever. Right now I believe some people feel constrained if they would want to say something like that, and this I do want to change.

 

However, I also wish people would keep in mind how public this forum is—and how anyone can come across it. Mika’s friends and family read it sometimes. Mika reads it sometimes. Journalists and casual listeners and who-knows-else may read it. There are some things I wish we would try to keep off by our own volition.

 

For me, yes, this includes in-depth discussions of Mika’s sexuality where we try to dissect his behavior to the smallest detail. Since he did say he’d rather keep that subject off the table, I think this is unnecessarily prying and yes, disrespectful. Even if what we try to analyze is public behavior—I feel the same way about, I don’t know, capping footage of him when his pants ride down frame-by-frame to see if he waxes or whatever. Sure, it may have happened in public, but sometimes scrutiny and curiosity goes too far. I’ve been out in public and had my shirt ride up or my top get caught on something too—doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be pretty upset if someone videotaped it and then screen-capped and blew up my briefly-exposed regions for all to see.

 

I want to stress again that to me this all hinges on public vs. private. I think a lot of topics and discussions that are fine for private consumption become a lot less fine when they go public on a forum like this one. For instance, maybe GhostintheRadio and Hollis want to discuss Mika’s, er, measurements, and they giggle about it on AIM. (I’m just using names randomly here guys, sorry.) That’s fine. Maybe pinkunicorn has a sex dream about Mika and she decided to share it in steamy detail with, I don’t know, HollyD, because it’s so hot—that’s fine too. Maybe DaMango stumbles across some private pics of Mika’s vacation on flickr and is so excited she has to show them to PhotoJennic—again, that’s not really a problem. Free speech, etc, they have a right, yes? But when any of this is posted on a public, high-traffic forum, one must realize that it changes how such information is consumed, and act accordingly.

 

Again, I, personally, self-censor a fair lot. I have my own opinion on what Mika’s orientation is, as do we all, and I might even think I have some “proof” of it. I could possibly make a thread arguing my viewpoint—I wouldn’t be able to convince everyone who disagrees, of course, since as I tried to show, we don’t really have any decisive information on the subject that couldn’t be equally well spun another way, but I might be able to get several people over to “my” side. However, I prefer to self-censor and not do that, since I’d rather take Mika’s guide and not say anything definite. (Dcdeb mentioned how some people took my last post on Mika's sexuality as "fact" rather than satire, but I think you'll note than any way you take it--even if you take it entirely seriously--I did not actually say anything one way or the other.) Even if I felt I knew for sure—if, say, I happened to meet someone who was a distant cousin of Mika’s, and while at his house I saw some family photos of Mika and his significant other—I would still not post about it here, even if my “right to free speech” should allow me to. I don't say that everyone ought to follow my example exactly--I did say that I think people should be free to express their opinions on what Mika's sexuality might be if they want to--but still, we ought to think about it beyond just "what we have a technical right to say."

 

That’s what any of these proposed limitations should be about, as far as I’m concerned—not “banning” topics or discussions, but making decisions on the kind of information we want to distribute through this board.

 

--Jack

[mariposa]

Well... that is exactly what I meant, Avoca..

 

Newbies come over here, don't know anything about the "unwritten law of not to speak about Mika's private life" and get attacked..

 

If there is a possibility of making some "written laws" then they know about it and hopefully won't get attact anymore for something they don't know about..

 

I agree with you on that!For newbies it's pretty difficult to know what "rules" (whatever these may be...) this forum has if it's written nowhere...

And I also always feel sorry for someone opening a thread about an issue which fits in such a category and is therefore attacked...How come could they know? I have to admit that sometimes I don't even know if there are any unspoken rules and what they are...and if so if they have to be applied on certain threads only (-> discussion about Mika's sexuality..) or if these rules should rather be applied to a wider range of threads talking about private things...

 

Well my point exactly! Either you have to ban all threads that for some reason can be put into the "Mika's private life" or "possibly offensive" category - which means you might as well close the forum, or you can't use this argument at all. You can't ban one topic for being an invasion on his private life if you don't apply the rules everywhere, so don't ban anything. Close the thread IF it gets offensive or delete offensive posts like you would do with every other "possibly offensive" topic, instead of banning something that is by no means more offensive than speculating whether he waxes his nuts or not

 

That's exactly what I think...thank you, Kata!

Why should this subject be treated differently than all the other threads about his private life which are sometimes (for many people on the forum) "shocking" and "too much"?

[FREDDIESDOUBLE]

Wow Jack

[avoca]

Can I just say that I wish everyone would cut out the dramatics about our precious free speech being infringed upon, and how sad this poll is? Free speech may be a political right in many of our respective countries, but it is not something that applies here. Privately-owned and moderated boards never have free speech, because they belong to a specific person or group, and that person or group has the right to decide what is or is not an allowed topic or mode of conversation. If we all owned equal shares in MFC and paid for it, we might have some grounds for complaint, but as we do not, the owners have full rights to limit our speech however they’d like. If deano decided that he never wanted to read another word about the color “red” again, he could ban all mention of that color and it would be his right. It would then be our right to leave the forum, of course.

 

We already do not have free speech here. Swear words are censored, and one of the rules is that racist, violent, or otherwise hateful speech is not allowed. If someone were to start an obscene or racist thread, the moderators would shut it down immediately, and no one would complain “but what about free speech, I have a right to post explicit pictures or to mock and insult Jews!”

 

I don’t think anyone so clamoring for free speech on this thread would wish such speech to be allowed: it is banned precisely because there is a general consensus that it is not desirable here. So there is plenty of precedent for limiting speech.

 

Moreover, we all seem to agree that private photos of Mika’s family and friends are off-limits. If someone found photos of Allegra’s last birthday party or Fortune’s hospital records, for instance, and posted them here, I think everyone would be in support of a moderator deleting such items. Again, this is a limitation imposed on our free speech due to a general consensus that we do not wish to distribute such material here.

 

The question of “distribution” is the one pertinent to me, here. Certainly, I do not like censorship. I am also rather against enforcing any limits in terms of applying them by force. But I wish people would realize that this is a PUBLIC and highly-frequented messageboard, and that some self-censorship—like with private photos, etc—may be appropriate. Do I want to “ban” discussion of Mika’s sexuality? Well, no. At least I definitely do not want to ban mention of it. I think it should be perfectly all right for someone to say “I think Mika is gay,” or “I think Mika is straight,” or whatever. Right now I believe some people feel constrained if they would want to say something like that, and this I do want to change.

 

However, I also wish people would keep in mind how public this forum is—and how anyone can come across it. Mika’s friends and family read it sometimes. Mika reads it sometimes. Journalists and casual listeners and who-knows-else may read it. There are some things I wish we would try to keep off by our own volition.

 

For me, yes, this includes in-depth discussions of Mika’s sexuality where we try to dissect his behavior to the smallest detail. Since he did say he’d rather keep that subject off the table, I think this is unnecessarily prying and yes, disrespectful. Even if what we try to analyze is public behavior—I feel the same way about, I don’t know, capping footage of him when his pants ride down frame-by-frame to see if he waxes or whatever. Sure, it may have happened in public, but sometimes scrutiny and curiosity goes too far. I’ve been out in public and had my shirt ride up or my top get caught on something too—doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be pretty upset if someone videotaped it and then screencapped and blew up my briefly-exposed regions for all to see.

 

I want to stress again that to me this all hinges on public vs. private. I think a lot of topics and discussions that are fine for private consumption become a lot less fine when they go public on a forum like this one. For instance, maybe GhostintheRadio and Hollis want to discuss Mika’s, er, measurements, and they giggle about it on AIM. (I’m just using names randomly here guys, sorry.) That’s fine. Maybe pinkunicorn has a sex dream about Mika and she decided to share it in steamy detail with, I don’t know, HollyD, because it’s so hot—that’s fine too. Maybe DaMango stumbles across some private pics of Mika’s vacation on flickr and is so excited she has to show them to PhotoJennic—again, that’s not really a problem. Free speech, etc, they have a right, yes? But when any of this is posted on a public, high-traffic forum, one must realize that it changes how such information is consumed, and act accordingly.

 

Again, I, personally, self-censor a fair lot. I have my own opinion on what Mika’s orientation is, as do we all, and I might even think I have some “proof” of it. I could possibly make a thread arguing my viewpoint—I wouldn’t be able to convince everyone who disagrees, of course, since as I tried to show, we don’t really have any decisive information on the subject that couldn’t be equally well spun another way, but I might be able to get several people over to “my” side. However, I prefer to self-censor and not do that, since I’d rather take Mika’s guide and not say anything definite. (Dcdeb mentioned how some people took my last post on Mika's sexuality as "fact" rather than satire, but I think you'll note than any way you take it--even if you take it entirely seriously--I did not actually say anything one way or the other.) Even if I felt I knew for sure—if, say, I happened to meet someone who was a distant cousin of Mika’s, and while at his house I saw some family photos of Mika and his significant other—I would still not post about it here, even if my “right to free speech” should allow me to. I don't say that everyone ought to follow my example exactly--I did say that I think people should be free to express their opinions on what Mika's sexuality might be if they want to--but still, we ought to think about it beyond just "what we have a technical right to say."

 

That’s what any of these proposed limitations should be about, as far as I’m concerned—not “banning” topics or discussions, but making decisions on the kind of information we want to distribute through this board.

 

--Jack

 

no one wants to post the TRUTH about mikas private life. no danger of that. if there's, it's rightly in need to be moderated. the fact some topics are ok and some not to be just DISCUSSED, if this is conducted respecting decency and taste, is not correct imo.

 

it's true that IF there are some things some of us have seen or know or heard or anything, we may NOT want to post here. but that's meant generally. I'd not post my family pics here or anywhere on the net.

so this is valid for many other topics as well on forum, and I mean it generally, so please do not pm to know details over mika's sexuality.

[lollipop_monkey]

Summary, as I see it:

 

• Some people are concerned that if the topic isn't limited, it will take over the forum
   
  
• Some people have made the valid point that we talk about all sorts of trivial aspects of Mika that don't receive nearly the scrutinzation that chatter about his sexuality does
   
  
• Some people genuinely don't care - they either aren't interested at all, or they don't feel it's an appropriate thing to speculate about
   
  
• Some people are outraged at the thought of a particular topic being banned for no clear reason
   
  
• Regardless, new members will be curious and will have questions
  

 

My thoughts:

 

We resurrect Yop's efforts at creating an FAQ section. We sticky it and put it in the "Introductions" thread. We put in a question "is Mika gay?" We then link to one thread created for the purpose of discussing this.

 

The first post in that thread should be a factual and informative overview of the topic. It should outline how there has been speculation over Mika's orientation ever since he began to be noticed, but that he's never announced anything concrete regarding his sexuality.

 

I envision it starting with a direct quote from Mika - maybe where he said "I never talk about anything to do with my sexuality. I just don't think I need to. People ask me all the time. But I just don't see the point."

 

It should then invite people to ask questions, share thoughts, etc. It should state that we don't intend to have a "Eureka!" moment where suddenly it all becomes clear. In addition, I think it should state outright that there's no tolerance for attacks or homophobia.

 

------

 

Franky, people want to discuss this. If you read the first 36 hours this thread was open, people came from all over to add their opinions on the "free speech" topic; but then people started tossing in their opinions on the sexuality issue. As long as it's done in a mature, respectful manner, I think people could learn from it. Not learn as in, learn suddenly whether Mika prefers birds or bees, but learn about sexuality as a concept.

 

Those that genuinely don't care have many, many other threads to contribute to. Those that do want to talk about this then have a safe but monitored space to do it in.

 

Thoughts?

[Romis]

Well my point exactly! Either you have to ban all threads that for some reason can be put into the "Mika's private life" or "possibly offensive" category - which means you might as well close the forum, or you can't use this argument at all. You can't ban one topic for being an invasion on his private life if you don't apply the rules everywhere, so don't ban anything. Close the thread IF it gets offensive or delete offensive posts like you would do with every other "possibly offensive" topic, instead of banning something that is by no means more offensive than speculating whether he waxes his nuts or not

 

If you get that philosophy, the Mikagasmic thread should have been closed long time ago...and it's one of the most visited and good threads here!!

I don't want the Mikagasmic close, of course...but for some reason, the Mikagasmic is immune to the critics, and this thread not. Even though that thread deals with 'sexual things' as well...I remember the day there was a discussion about mika's private parts ... Don't worry, they censored themselves...

 

 

Oh and Jack...you were out the tangent...can you post something without exaggerating please?? We all understood the privacy thing, we didn't broke that law and we won't for sure...al least people I know here

 

 

 

Franky, people want to discuss this. If you read the first 36 hours this thread was open, people came from all over to add their opinions on the "free speech" topic; but then people started tossing in their opinions on the sexuality issue. As long as it's done in a mature, respectful manner, I think people could learn from it. Not learn as in, learn suddenly whether Mika prefers birds or bees, but learn about sexuality as a concept.

 

 

Mana, good point...I see you're very sensible...

[FREDDIESDOUBLE]

If you get that philosophy, the Mikagasmic thread should have been closed long time ago...and it's one of the most visited and good threads here!!

I don't want the Mikagasmic close, of course...but for some reason, the Mikagasmic is immune to the critics, and this thread not. Even though that thread deals with 'sexual things' as well...I remember the day there was a discussion about mika's private parts ... Don't worry, they censored themselves...

 

<Jumps to Mikagasmic thread>

[Sasje]

I think this discussion really needs to go about all that kind of threads and not only about the "is mika gay or not" threads..

 

Just be careful about all what is posted on the whole forum..