Rules Of Engagement

People who want to post comments on Health.am are going to have to follow our rules. We know that not all blogs/forums are like that, but this one is.

There's legal language nearby. Here's the plain English: no libel, slander, no lying, no fabricating, no swearing at all, no words that teenagers use a lot that some people think aren't swearing but we do, no insulting groups or individuals, no ethnic slurs and/or epithets, no religious bigotry, no threats of any kind, no bathroom humor, no comparing anyone to Hitler, Stalin or J. Bush. We expect heated, robust debate, but comments should be polite and civil. We consider this to be public space so behave and write accordingly.

Yes, what is not allowable is subjective. Health.am absolutely reserve the right to remove posts we think break any of the rules or the spirit of the rules and we reserve the right to ban individuals from commenting. We will use language filtering programs to block certain words and we will use human editing too.

Comments should be limited to the topic of the original posting. This is not the place for private conversations, no matter how innocent.

We require everyone who comments to register and provide a real e-mail address. No exceptions. And posting comments is not the same thing as complaining to CBS News or notifying CBS News of a problem - legally, there's a big difference.

Very important: if you see a comment that you feel is inappropriate, let us know by clicking on the "contact us" or "report this complaint" button.

There are 10 guidelines we would like you to be aware of, and which we expect all participants in the community areas of ArmMed Media to abide by:

1. We welcome hearty debate and dissent, but the key to maintaining ArmMed Media as an inviting space is focusing on intelligent, insightful and passionate discussion of issues - to use a footballing phrase, we expect users to "play the ball, not the man".

2. Please respect other people's views and beliefs and consider their impact when making your contribution. We understand that people often feel strongly about things, but we will consider removing any content that other users might find extremely offensive or threatening. We actively discourage obscenity and mindless abuse. Personal attacks on other users or authors have no place in an intelligent discussion.

3. We will not tolerate racism, sexism, homophobia or other forms of hate-speech, or content that could be interpreted as such. We recognise the difference between criticising a particular government, organisation, community or belief and attacking people on the basis of their race, religion, gender or sexual orientation.

4. We appreciate that we have an international audience, but since we publish content in English, the language of conversation on the site should also be English. As such, contributions that cannot be understood by the majority of participants may be removed.