Rethinking Comments I: Not Censoring Comments … Maybe

For quite some time I have had a strict policy of not authorising crude, anonymous and inflammatory comments. But, whilst on holidays, walking along the beach at sunset, I found myself wondering if I had made the right choice.

I restarted this blog in October 2004 (having previously blogged in 2001 and 2003) and since that time I’ve had a steady trickle of comments and a deeper stream of email correspondence covering the various posts. There’s been a small, but regular amount of what could best be described as “hate-comments,” typically clustered around posts about India, Australia and to a lesser extent, the emerging church. Most often these comments are anonymous, vulgar and misrepresentative of what I, or others, have said. Rarelt, they raise very valid concerns, but their anonymity makes it impossible to verify their content.

Those comments get deleted – but, now I’m starting to miss them. Sometimes the best repudiation of a position or ideology actually comes from the mouths of those who try to defend it. Maybe, instead of working so hard to defend the “respectability” and “legitimacy” of this blog, I should have been more permissive and let the world see what people who claim to be defending the good of their country or church are willing to say to another human being who is simply trying to find some truth and honesty in this world?

Maybe I got it wrong? Maybe it’s time for a rethink?