Pat: There was a post by that guy "Jonny" this morning claiming that you were banning his posts. I thought it was a stupid post and then I saw the post was gone. So I am now thinking a little more seriously about it. Is this forum now censored? If so, which specific posters have been censored or banned? Just curious.

AP,

Yes, as I suggested last week on this forum, this discusion group now requires those who post to register and provide a valid email address.

For the entire past year I never once deleted a post or banned a single poster. But two or three posters have consistantly abused this openness.

Posters like "Jonny" made a hobby out of posting vicious remarks and paranoid attacks, without ever providing a constructive reply to the many posters who come to our group to find answers to their questions.

Anonymous posters with hidden agendas, who wreak havoc for the sake of destruction, will no longer be allowed to run amok.

A discussion group is like a garden. It needs to be cultivated and nurtured and protected from pests and weeds in order to remain healthy.

As the moderator, I was a negligent gardner who let too many weeds run wild – viciously attacking excellent surgeons like Dr. Limmer and Dr. Parsley, making racist and foul mouthed remarks, while spreading misinformation and rumors.

Surgeons like Dr. Parsley, Dr. Limmer and others came to this discussion group to help patients get informed answers to their posted questions, not to be the brunt of angry and unmerited vicious attacks.

These vicious personal attacks by "Jonny" and others drove away several excellent surgeons who had been helping numerous individuals with intelligent replies to their questions.

I still welcome all posts – the good and the bad – if they are sincere. This discussion group is intended to provide people with a forum for learning about hair loss solutions and hair transplant surgeons, while debating their merits.

It is not a platform to be used like a weapon for vicious foul-mouthed attacks motivated by a hidden agenda. Like the discussion groups at Hair loss Help and Hair Loss Talk, I too will now be actively moderating my discussion group.

As always, I welcome open criticism and debate. But I will no longer give individuals like "Jonny" free reign to spew lies, vicious rumors, and make mean spirited personal attacks.

I have removed the posting privileges for Jonny, GNX, Thor, and Questioner.

Pat Hennessey – Publisher of the Hair Transplant Network.com

I agree we really need to get things under control when posters use profanity or start ranting like nuts, but we the posters make up the site and we the posters should get to choose. I don't agree with your list in total (there were one or two people I would have included that you didn't and one or two I would have excluded)--but that's the point, isn't it?

I think we should, by a poll, vote on individual posters after they have been warned (maybe the prospect of a ban will tone things down). Hey, it's our forum as much as it is yours or the doctors'. We really should be the ones who tell people they're adding nothing but hate to the site, since the site is for our benefit.

In any event, I'm at least glad GNX is gone.

Thanks.

Amen! I agree 100%. Frankly I knew it had to happen; wondered why not sooner...we certainly do need any Osma "Bald" Ladens' terrorizing us here...

I mean: "we certainly do NOT need any.."