1. What is this site?

This is a blog where Phil and Dan started writing some of their thoughts about the church, society and the Australian way.  Along the road, we have been joined by a number of people who comment on our site and spend ridiculous amounts of time here.  Say hi to them.

2. The commenters on your blog say all sorts of nasty and untrue things about this person I know/my church/my community.  Why don’t you stop them?

The viewpoints expressed in our comments are not the viewpoints of us nor of Northern Community.  We have a very open comments policy which means that comments are rarely moderated.  Some of what people say here is angry, rude and just plain mean.  We encourage people to weigh in and respond forcefully.  Defend the honour of the downtrodden!!  Most of the commenters here are willing, indeed eager, to enter into conversation with people they disagree with.

Some of our favourite commenters are people that are willing to speak to the other side of the story.  We appreciate that not everyone is willing or able to do this, but it does enrich all of the discussions.  Often our commenters have good reasons for their viewpoints, but some of those viewpoints might be overstated or based on incorrect information.  Please by all means correct them.

We are sorry for any offence which is caused.  The comments policy is a whole grace thing for us.  If you want us to explain our thinking and theology behind this decision, then please email us.  But basically, we believe that there are plenty of church blogs and websites (and for that matter churches and faith community) where people behave nicely and where those who aren’t willing to follow the rules are asked to leave.  We want to have a place where all people are welcome to participate, even those that would not be welcome elsewhere.  That’s kind of our vision of what church should be about. 

It means that people comment here in ways which would not be permitted elsewhere.  These discussions are not permitted elsewhere for good reason (although, to be fair, there has been a fair bit of infighting and criticism expressed publicly in the opinion pages of the newspapers of the world - they just tend not to use bad words).

3. Someone has said something about me that I wish to have removed.  What do I do?

Send us an email with a link to the comment you find objectionable.  We may well agree and may well remove references someone has objected to.  This might include personal contact information, scandalous accusations or things that we consider unacceptable and are not prepared to risk lawsuits over.

We do express our appreciation for those that are willing to allow these sorts of discussions to go on, even if they include criticism, and even if you perceive that criticism as unfounded and ill-informed.  We consider that is in turn a special expression of grace towards us and we thank you.

Often criticism by one commenter, if unjustified is just as likely to be rebutted by other commenters.

4. What do I do if someone has posted incorrect information?

The best way to respond is to dispute the information by making a comment on the post.  Otherwise shoot us an email and we will see what we can do to correct the record. 

5. I have said something that I want to retract, what do I do?

Again, shoot us an email and we will see what we can do.  We can’t promise anything though, so be careful about what you say.

6. I would like to email another commenter.  Will you give me their address?

Out of respect for commenter privacy, we would prefer to pass your information on to them so that they can make the election as to whether they want to respond.  Email us.
7. You haven’t responded to my email/my comment.  Why not?

Well because we have lives basically.  This is a volunteer thing for us.  Be patient and we will get to it as soon as we can.

Comments being Eaten?
Before you start posting comments about how we are censoring your opinion by deleting your comments, please read this.  We handle comments according to our comments policy and so long as you are not an insidious troll or a spammer, we will generally not meddle with your comments.

In order to keep this site functioning, we have installed spam filtering software. This plugin catches literally hundreds of comments per day advertising pharmaceuticals , websites with naughty pictures and all manner of crap. Without this software, our site would cease to function.

 Unfortunately sometimes this blocks some comments from real people who aren’t actually trying to improve our erectile disfunction. If this happens to you, we are very sorry. There are a number of ways that you can minimise the risks of this happening. Posting using a legitimate email address (this is not revealed to the public) or a consistent URL will assist. If you post comments from different IP addresses (eg from home and work) or from behind a proxy server, you are more likely to be blocked.

If you do get captured, attempting to repost the same comment will not help, in fact it will result in you being considered more likely to be a spammer.  Most people who are blocked as spammers have posted a large number of comments in a short period of time when they have little or no history of commenting on the site.  We don’t mind you posting a lot of comments, but it is one of the things that makes our software mad at you.  If you get tagged as a spammer, then all of your recent comments are likely to be deleted.  This may appear as though we are attempting to expunge you from the site, but it is not.  Please email us (phil or dan at the domain of this site) alerting us to your worries and we will rescue your comment and try and help your situation.

In order to comment on this site, you need to be registered and logged in.  However unfortunately this will not eliminate the possibility that your comment will be marked as spam.  You will need to provide a valid email address to receive a password. This is the best way to stop your comment being blocked, and it offers some additional functionality to members of our community in certain circumstances.