Lately the materialists have been whining more than usual about UD’s moderation policy. They are saying that anyone who disagrees with the UD position gets banned. Fortunately for us, that accusation is demonstrably untrue. No one gets banned from UD unless they repeatedly violate the moderation policy. Civil disagreement is not only allowed; it is encouraged.
Anyone who wants to disagree with us can do so as long as they like, and so long as they avoid trollish behavior, they will never be banned.
Mark Frank is a good example. Mark is one of our most vociferous critics. He posted his first comment nearly nine years ago on February 21, 2006, and he has been politely hammering away at us ever since. No one gets banned from this site merely for disagreeing with us. As Mark has demonstrated, you can pound away at us for nearly a decade and remain in good standing so long as you pound politely.
To our materialist opponents I would say, emulate Mark’s example of good manners, and you never have to worry about being banned from UD.
It is true that a few commenters have been barred from posting. In the nearly 10 years since Bill Dembski started the site, a total of 47,034 persons have posted comments. Of that total, 187 have been banned for trollish behavior. An average of 18.7 bannings per year does not seem especially heavy handed to me.
Finally, it is also true that most of those banned have been of the atheist/materialists type. We admit there is a correlation between disagreeing with the UD position and an increased likelihood of being banned. There is also a correlation between being an atheist/materialist and an increased proclivity towards trollish behavior. Anyone who doubts that can verify it with a quick visit to Panda’s Thumb. If you can control your gag reflex long enough to review the comments even for a short while, you will agree that observation is undoubtedly true.
I will leave it up to the readers to judge for themselves which of the correlated variables is also causative vis-à-vis being banned from this site.