User Registration

In order to comment on WORLDmag.com's Community site, you must complete the online registration process.

This site is unique in the blogosphere in that we have created a place where people from all worldviews can come to hash out the issues of the day without fear of 1) being attacked personally; 2) having their comments deleted by any ideological Gestapo; and 3) having to be subjected to profane, graphic, or racist comments.

We require a valid email address for three reasons:

• To provide a way to resolve technical issues for individual users.
• To enable site managers to follow up on rules violations and keep peace on the comment threads.
• To ensure no one else posts comments under your Username.

We will not share your email address with other users of our website, companies, publications, or agencies of any kind.

To register, click here.

Comment Policy

The free speech goals of WORLDmag.com's Community site parallel the view enunciated by Puritan poet John Milton three and a half centuries ago: "Though all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play upon the earth, so truth be in the field, we do injuriously by licensing and prohibiting to misdoubt her strength. Let her and falsehood grapple; who ever knew truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter?"

Based on that faith, we hope for a forum within which truth will emerge—but WORLDmag.com does not endorse the truth or accuracy of any comment posted on this site. The posting of any comment or other statement is not an endorsement or acceptance of the statement by WORLDmag.com nor by any individual, agent or employee on behalf of WORLDmag.com. We yearn for a forum in which participants will be tough-minded in their analysis but respectful toward each other (see Rules of Engagement below).

Debate is a contact sport, so we don't discourage intellectual blocking and tackling within free and open encounters. But obscene, profane, or racist rhetoric—to cite only some obvious examples—shuts down debate. WORLDmag.com reserves the right to delete or edit any comment as its editors determine. That WORLDmag.com reserves this right does not mean that it will exercise such editorial control over the content of this site: Our desire is to let truth and falsehood grapple. Failure of WORLDmag.com to delete or edit any material does not mean that we are accepting the content of any comment; our staff is small.

Our lawyer puts it this way: "Any individual making a posting to this site agrees (by submitting the posting) to indemnify and hold WORLDmag.com harmless from any and all liability or injury that WORLDmag.com may incur by reason of any posting." What that means is that no one need worry about defending or attacking an idea, but if (for example) you post a personal attack on another commenter and he sues for libel, you're the one who would be responsible for the legal fees, not us. So, as your mother might say, be polite.

Our lawyer also reminds us that the posting of third-party copyright-protected content without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of that content is forbidden. In other words, do not copy and paste articles from other sites in your comments. Post links to those articles instead. Remember to Honor the 8th.

The Rules of Engagement

Though we here at WORLDmag.com's Community site may grow fond of you, as much as it pains us, we will ban you if you break the rules, as many diehard rule-breakers have learned. Here are the rules in participating in the comment threads on this site:

1. Do not engage in personal attacks.
2. If someone attacks you personally (rather than attacking your ideas), do not return evil for evil. If in the process of attacking you, a person violates the rules against profanity, racism, or vulgarity, or you think their attack is serious enough to merit our attention, please send an email to webmanagingeditor@worldmag.com.
3. If we perceive that a person is emailing us to point out every insignificant jot and tittle in order to get another person thrown off the site, we will count it against the persistent emailer, so be sure a person has really attacked you.
4. Do not email us to say that someone attacked someone else. Let each person speak up for him- or herself if he or she perceives an attack.
5. In terms of banning/not banning, we will take into account that person's history of being naughty/nice.
6. Recognize that on the WORLDmag.com Community site, many of us have intrinsically irreconcilable ideological differences. This does not make us haters, bigots, homofascists, boy-lovers, Nazis, blind, ignorant, etc., etc. It means we subscribe to a different worldview. We are all thinking people, uniquely created by and for God. Most of us arrived at our worldviews through thought and study—MANY from the other side of the spiritual/political fence.
7. Members of the WORLDmag.com staff would most likely have coffee with any one of our liberal regulars in a second and disagree with every word that came out their mouths, but still enjoy having coffee with them. Someone suggested that we post comments as if we are having an in-person chat. That's probably a good guideline, though we would add that the imaginary chat be in a very public place. That might mitigate some of our tendencies to be nasty.
8. We expect each of you to post comments with humility and respect.

Together, we have created something unique across the blogosphere—a place where people of different faiths and worldviews can come to discuss the issues of the day civilly, without profanity, and with most of us remaining friends at the end of the day.

Links to third-party Web sites that are not a part of God's World Publications (publishers of WORLDmag.com) are offered as a service to readers. WORLDmag.com is not responsible for the content contained on these sites.

WORLDmag.com Copyright Statement

All of the content on WORLDmag.com and the WORLDmag.com Community site are protected by U.S. and international copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published, or broadcast in any manner without the prior written permission of WORLDmag.com, or in the case of third-party materials reproduced on these sites, the copyright owner of that content. You may not alter or remove any copyright notice from copies of the content.

You may, however, download content from WORLDmag.com and the WORLDmag.com Community site for your personal, noncommercial use. This use is limited to one machine-readable copy and one print copy per page.

And always remember to Honor the 8th.

Associated Press Copyright Statement

The following provision applies to all visitors (which shall include persons and representatives of legal entities, whether such representatives are persons or digital engines of a kind that crawls, indexes, scrapes, copies, stores or transmits digital content). By accessing this Web site or digital service, you specifically acknowledge and agree that: (i) Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium; (ii) No Associated Press materials nor any portion thereof may be stored in a computer except for personal and noncommercial use; (iii) The Associated Press will not be held liable for any delays, inaccuracies, errors or omissions therefrom or in the transmission or delivery of all or any part thereof or for any damages arising from any of the foregoing; (iv) The Associated Press is an intended third party beneficiary of these terms and conditions and it may exercise all rights and remedies available to it; and (v) The Associated Press reserves the right to audit possible unauthorized commercial use of AP materials or any portion thereof at any time.

God's World Publications' Privacy Policy Notice

To read God's World Publications' Privacy Policy Notice, click here.