Welcome to BullCityBlue! This site exists to bring Durham Democrats together to engage in the discussion and promotion of Democratic issues and positions, and of politics in general, while maintaining a focus on issues specific to the City of Durham and Durham County.

You do not need to be a Democrat or a Durhamite to participate, but BullCityBlue is a Democratic, and thus, a partisan blog. We welcome the expression of all political views within its threads, but with the understanding that most of us are Democrats.

Rules for Participation

1. Membership is required to post. Why? First, registration is free and requires only an email account. BullCityBlue won’t share your email address with anyone without your permission. We require registration as a way to encourage certain community standards:
   * All posts and comments are connected to a user ID, which gives everyone a chance to get to know a user over time and develop a sense context for the user’s content.
   * Trolls are more easily identified and neutralized
   * Registration is a hurdle that most spammers don’t take the time to cross.
   * If you’re brand new here, you have to think about your comment at least long enough to go get the registration link from your email, which is probably a good thing.
2. No commercial advertisements or other posts deemed to be “spam” by the moderators are allowed in the community, as our members can certainly find materials online if they wish to do so. Commercial advertisements and “spam” will be deleted. Once again, if you think what you are posting may be considered “spam,” it probably is. Please be proactive.
3. Keep the reprinting of entire articles to a minimum. While the sharing of articles and external commentaries is encouraged, use links (i.e. http://xxxxxxxx.com/myarticle) whenever possible along with excerpts that best summarize a piece.
4. No personal attacks or trolls will be allowed on anyone in this community. Everyone here deserves courtesy, not just members. There is a difference between a civilized discussion of differences of opinion and the eruption of name-calling and other hostilities. Trolls can come from any point in the political spectrum, and they will not be tolerated. Personal attacks include, but are not limited to, name-calling and insults of intelligence, morality, or character. The term “troll”, when directed at another participant in the community, may be considered a “personal attack.” If someone is called a troll, this will not necessarily result in a warning, unless the victim takes offense and brings it to the attention of the moderator, in which case a warning will be issued. Long story short, if you suspect trolling, contact the moderator. Call other participants “trolls” at your own risk!

Enforcement of Rules

We will work hard to ensure BullCityBlue remains a cordial, engaging and fun place to participate in political discussion. In order to do so, however, the above rules are necessary, and fair and consistant enforcement of them must be applied.

The above rules, when broken, will result in an “official warning” immediately. Only two “official warnings” will be issued to anyone. Upon a third violation, of any sort, further action will be taken, including banning. This consistancy is applied so that everyone knows where they stand and everyone is treated the same. Additionally, it should be noted that “official warnings” are not necessarily permanent. Timing of violations will be taken into consideration when action is necessary.

Thanks for understanding and, even more so, for playing nice!