Joecuz and Sdale say some good things. The forum's success is the reason for more people, more opinions, and occasional heat. Comes with the territory.
Gotta add in all fairness that there are degrees of cautionary and disciplinary remedies, short of banning or inviting people to leave.
There is a clear policy about racial and lurid topics. There is a slightly fuzzier one about the muzzle thingies but it is known. I would just let the people be the people in the back room if they stay out of those crimes. People who become unpleasant or disagreeable can be warned by PM or just pointed to the policies again. It doesn't always work. Then the bans can be considered.
GTA is at a fork in the internet road, where it is going to be one of the predominant sites for AGs, or it is going to turn into a comfy back porch for a few like-minded friends. Either one is a possibility, and completely up to the excellent and enterprising fellows who started it up.
Consider this for a sec: If we look around our tiny world of air-gunning, the GTA is probably the second most active ag forum in North America, and arguably the one with "momentum". It is a locomotive right now. This is a heck of an opportunity if you choose to look at it that way, but the ownership may not want that.
People come to forums looking for info, and for action. When you see a forum with 2-3 replies on a months old topic, you don't hang there. GTA is a blizzard of action, help, advice, interesting things, and cool pictures. It is fresh almost every day. Until recently, the main topic pages were also free of internal politics and bickering (including other-forum-bashing, how pointless) and all the warnings.
The family feel is an important part of GTA's success. But large, growing families are tumultuous noisy things. You don't normally just kick one of the kids out of the family, even if you have to walk 'em behind the woodshed and administer a whack now and then. And of course you administer some whacks in front of the rest as an example... but it would be nice to see that gently applied, and sterner threats can be taken off line.
Frankly the bickering doesn't bother me if it stays in the back room within the existing rules. New users don't care about back rooms until they have been here for a while and start to recognize handles and personal styles. There are always folks who won't get along on specialized forums. They can shoot it out in the back rooms for all I care, and sometimes it's even amusing. I enjoy the free for all atmosphere (within the rules) but maybe it isn't for everyone. I can not open any gate or thread I choose. No one knows but me.
It was a little disconcerting to see useful contributors and long term members invited to leave, and that's a sign of that fork in the road. Maybe we could all take a deep breath, have a tobacco product on the back porch if so inclined (caution, known to cause cancer in the state of California), and think about what the forum could be, and look like, in years to come. There is a major opportunity but maybe it is unwanted.
I shoulda sent this philosophical drivel in a PM but it also is not for any one person. Some of the overreactions to the overreactions aren't helping either.
