For the love of the eternal darkness, let's keep steemit chat crude, free-speech friendly, and absolutely raw.

Don't let Steemit become some corporate HR nightmare for those of us who enjoy freedom.

I strongly believe in free speech, to the point where one could say I am anti-censorship. This means that when a lot of people say "Well, even free speech has limits", I'm the weirdo saying "Actually, I don't think free speech should have limits."

And this includes the Steemit chat.

Now of course, kindness and courtesy is more attractive than insults and slander, so I can't help but feel that the natural path of the chat is to reach towards kindness. Especially when we're here to make money and get popular. Everyone should be aware of how silly it'd be to scare off your audience by insulting them.

At the same time, maybe that's your thing. Maybe your point of view gains strength when it's presented cruelly, and without mercy. Metal music might not be your thing, but it most certainly does have an audience, as an example.

If you don't like it, there should be ways to block individual members in the chat, so that those with sensitive eyes or ears don't have to suffer the unrelenting wrath of a troll. At the same time, I'm not interested in hanging out in a chat, listening to worthless platitudes inspired by a ban-happy mod. I want real conversation. I want the human experience.

The general chat should be for everyone, and that includes people who happen to be crude. A chat that's for more delicate people can also be created, and that chat might have more strict rules on etiquette and manners. There's nothing stopping a person from creating their own chat channel and making sure the people there behave nicely.

So I think that the solution is to allow people to talk in the general chat however they want, no holds barred. People should be able to say what they want, but feeling like they're being watched by mods who might censor them will cause this entire community to suddenly feel like we're being watched by an authority who might punish us for what we say.

I demand freedom, and you should too!