Recent events here have led to a Christian union leader being banned and another suspension for some expressed views in a thread. I did manage to see the OP, but not the deleted posts causing the ban. The whole thread has now gone.I fully support free speech and the right to believe (and I certainly did not have anything to do with the moderation), so I can understand why some of them are extremely angry! (Really annoyed!)

BUT:

The events concern a thread created around the topic of the sinfulness of love between men. I fully support peoples' right to express their love however they want and understand that for some 10% or so of the male population its not some "choice" or partiality, but a perfectly normal way of living in society. I also think that some religious people may feel threatened by the thought of this, perhaps because they themselves have innate unresolved sexual feelings. Its more likely that the pink liberal culture clashes with perceived religious views of sexual abstinence though.

There are some people who concede their sexual desires, but choose to abstain from them with faith. These people still identify themselves with the same sexuality as those that "do it", since they still have the innate urges that they acknowledge they must control because of their chosen religion. But even thinking about not doing something because its a sin is still a sin of desire for some.

Conversely, many Christians themselves accept same-sex relationships in their faiths and clergymen who (as paid to do so by the Church) openly express their Christian views and are even allowed to marry each other. Regardless of what enlightened views I or the "C of E" have, the law in the country this site comes from (and UK where I live) makes it an offence to to use inflammatory or insulting comments about people on the grounds of sexual discrimination.

For a group of Christian people who use this site mainly to try and convert other people to their brand of faith, I'd have thought this insulting technique to be counter-productive. For starters, they're alienating 10% of their intended male converts, plus the majority of friends and supporters like me. Secondly, starting out on an attack is hardly a way to influence people over to a belief. Putting a sexual preference in the same context as "rape" and "murder" seems both inflammatory and distorted. Finally, legal values and site rules should take precedence on perceived religious values. We get our moral outlook from our cultural interactions informing our legal framework, so we should really know when our faith-bound morality conflicts with legal obligations - i.e. when to shut up in public.

What consenting adults get up to in the privacy of their own surroundings should be up to them - not me or anyone else. It's not exactly as if people go waving it about. But religion does tend to get stuffed down our collective throats whether we like it or not, because some Christians feel the need to outline the rules of their faith - in admonishing a select few others for their sexuality.

I joined this site as a rational responder to religious threads here, since I thought some balance was required in religiously influencing impressionable young people on a gaming site. I think there is less religious venom spat here than there used to be (unless there is an interim lull or cease-fire this autumn), so maybe things have been tightened up with the new posting regs. It is still a shame that people get banned, since the decreased amount of Christians willing to debate does obviously impact on the intensity of atheist response here. Ultimately though, it probably is all in the best interests of this site.

I don't know the full extent of the banned user's crimes, since I can't recall debating with them. In some sense I'd have liked the offending thread stay and no permanent moderations made. But I'd also have liked the opportunity to respond to it. However, the way that union works is with invited members only (for purity of thought) and they moderate any views that conflict with their own so would hypothetically deny me my own right of free speech in response. (Check out the Athsiem union for democracy and equality at work!) But as far as freedom of speech is concerned, human legal rights and site rules will certainly take priority over the sustainability of argument, "levels of sin" committed, and sheer offensiveness of some religious doctrine.