I can tell you right now that most of the people that have 90% of the posts haven't grown up.
But in other places and especially lots of the newer older members we/they can hold up a proper argument.
The main problem with people arguing is that they are always stuck on things that don't matter like personal opinions and grammar.

Well, then there are others that are from a different country than U.S. or Canada(eh?)

And then there are those who type uncontrollably fast...

And the people who don't read the rules 100%...

so...

I'm not categorizing the people on the site i'm trying to assist in Cleods decision, so if you could please stop that would be fantastic.
Another reason I would really want a topic like LD is because I was never around for it and I would really like to see how it would work.

>implying it would be unrestricted entry

I'm not implying that, i'm implying that the people that most of the staff consider suited for the topic, are most definitely not.

It's not like non-members wouldn't be allowed to see the section.
It'd just be the same permission settings as Spam, only with a different usergroup..

I know a lot of people here that know how to have a fair debate, the main problem is the people that are normally accepted into the usergroups don't fit under that category.

I agree with G0l3m on this one... There's a lot of people that know how...
But the risk is starting flame wars left and right... So it should be heavily moderated, maybe have all global mods, some admin (Hakker), and maybe the regular mods who know how to moderate a section...

Just a suggestion, that's all

Yes your right about the fact that it will need to be heavily moderated, on the other hand your wrong about everyone moderating it at once. If that were to happen then the rest of the site would fall apart, I would suggest a selected member to be promoted as a special case. This persons only reason in power would be to moderate the new LD but at the same time other moderators could help that person keep it in line.

If alot of people knew how to debate then there wouldn't be a risk of flame wars left and right.

There is -always- a risk of conflict. No two people can get along forever, especially while discussing potentially explosive-although intellectually stimulating-- subjects. That being said, I believe you are all severely underestimating the staff that actually do their jobs- moderating a section for serious business would be -easy-, as any good debate will progress slowly but steadily. It doesn't take a genius to see when things are going sour and take appropriate action, either.

I'm all for this, so long as the members can keep an air of maturity about them or otherwise accept the consequences without throwing a fit.

Well hey, this is actually an interesting idea. I'd be willing to oversee it for a bit with some help. I usually am a pretty reasonable guy. Like Hakker suggested, people can send topics they want to discuss through me and my helpers. The topic is then posted by a mod and opened for debate. Then we could set a time limit to each debate, and perhaps add a poll near the end of the discussion for people to vote on views to add closure.

Whoah, now that's a structure I think would be interesting to see. I could see it being tough to manage though, even with help.

If we did do this, what do you all think of scheduled debates? Basically like DT said, they'd have time limits and the section would basically consist of topics that come and go by the week.

That would be wonderful, actually.
Maybe two debates going on at one time though, only one and it feels a little bit limited for those who wish to participate.