Political Debate Forum Grievance Procedure

We strive to make the Political Debate Forum a pleasant place to visit.  In
order to maintain order and promote interesting discussion, we
have certain rules which we must enforce as consistently as we
can.  These are outlined in RULES.TXT.  We realize, of course,
that being human, we sometimes make mistakes.  Below is an
outline of the procedure to follow if you feel you have been
treated unfairly in the forum and/or are unhappy with some of our
policies.

I.  If you feel you have been attacked by another user and the
staff has not (in your opinion) taken adequate action, address
your complaint via E-mail or in the forum to the leader of the
section in which the problem occured.  To know the section
leader's name, check the Staff Roster Announcement.

All sections are monitored by one or more section leader or
assistant sysops.  Sometimes it takes a section leader 24 to 48
hours to deal with a complaint.  Please be patient.  Keep in mind
that section leaders cannot move messages or rename threads. 
Such requests should be made to Sysop.

II. If you have a question or complaint about Forum Policy,
please post such a question or complaint in Marginal Issues. 
Address the question to any one of the Sysops.  We will do our
best to answer you promptly.  The final authority on all policy
issues is Georgia Griffith (Forum Administrator or Wizop.)

Discussions of forum policy are allowed in Marginal Issues, but
trashing of the forum and attacks on forum staff are not allowed
anywhere in the forum.  Please keep your complaints civil and
rational.  We want to be able to help you.  Deliberately
offensive messages are not conducive to good communication and
will be deleted.
  
III. If you have a question or complaint about the policies
behind message moves, title changes and other sysop actions,
please post such questions in Marginal Issues (section 17). 
Please keep in mind that the forum rules (see RULES.TXT) clearly
state:  "The staff reserves the right to move messages from one
section of the forum to another in order to make sure that each
thread is in the appropriate section for its topic and tone."  
However, we are open to suggestions and requests from regular
participants in a given section about thread moves and title
changes.  

IV.  If you are unhappy with the actions of a section leader or
assistant sysop, or if you have a concern with which they cannot
help, address your complaint/concern to Sysop Georgia Griffith
either via mail or in the forum.  Messages addressed to Sysop* in
the forum can be read only by the Forum Administrator, Georgia
Griffith.


 
NOTE: Georgia Griffith, the Forum Administrator, is the final
authority on all that happens in this forum.  She makes every
effort to be fair and open to all positions.  Formal objections
to specific policies and rules will be accepted and will be taken
into consideration whenever we revise the rules.  

However, we cannot allow users (singly or in groups) to demand
that we change the rules or make exceptions in the rules to
satisfy their individual perceptions of what the forum "ought" to
be.  Political Debate Forum is a private service and membership and
participation are entirely voluntary.  If you find that you
cannot accept the rules and policies of a forum, we urge you to
explore the many other services on Compuserve.