This isn’t HUGE but it is IMPORTANT.
Most of us come from a long-running Miami Hurricanes community over 20 years in the making. Dallas created this site 4 years ago because m-h.com was overrun with trolls, ignored, and on its last legs.
TheMiamiHurricanes.com has served up good discussion over the years. Dallas took the time and expense to set up great forum software and preserve the community. But the site has its own problems.
Dallas knows this, but he has a lot going on. Real life is taking over any time he once had to contribute to this place. He’s getting lots of messages, lots of requests, lots of complaints, and he has no time to deal with it.
The Solution
Effective immediately, Dallas has passed ownership and admin of the site to me. He’ll still be around to talk football, but from now on he’ll have absolutely nothing to do with running the site.
From now on, if anyone has any questions, concerns, or issues with the forum, talk to me.
How This Affects You
Mostly, it doesn’t. I’m not planning sweeping changes to the forum software, or moderation, or anything like that. The main idea is to keep what works.
That means the main portion of the forum will be reserved for Miami Hurricanes football. The Storm Shelter will continue to exist, and members of all political stripes are welcome to rant.
The Elephant in the Room
It’s clear to everyone except himself that Stormfront has been the majority source of commotion in the forum. He’s had years to improve and change his behavior but has only gotten worse. Lately even his staunchist supporters have encouraged him to chill out. Stormfront has flatly refused.
Essentially, this single poster has been a problem for a long time, he has been given a lot of chances, and he has ignored them all. He refuses to be a part of this community. As a contributor to this forum, he is irredeemable. His presence stifles discussion and harms the reputation of TheMiamiHurricanes.com.
His list of infractions are as follows:
1) Doxing Forum Members
Though many of us know who Fish is, Storm crossed the line by posting personal emails and legal filings.
2) Bringing Politics into the Football Forum
This is such a simple request, and so fundamental to this site. We’re here to talk football and don’t want conspiracy drivel on the main board. Multiple political posts, conspiracy posts, berating posters for objecting to such content, and even a refusal to remove “Obama Treason Trial” references from his signature all break this basic rule.
3) Complaints of Harassment
Stormfront has racked up written complaints of harassment from multiple forum members.
4) Low-Quality Poster
Repetitive image posting (Michelle Obama crotch shots), regular lies (Pope arrest, Trump is president), constant challenging other forum members (stugotz, he is right and everybody else is wrong), inability to type without all caps (TICKEY TOCKEY), duplicate threads about the same thing (5 Epstein posts in the same afternoon), mass mentions (6 people per post, 50+ times per month), etc., all contribute to a low-quality forum environment.
5) Troll
Low quality is one thing, but Storm’s refusal to compromise, abrasive and challenging behavior, and constant name-calling and memes signify a greater intent to troll. This has been made explicitly clear with his declaration of intent to “ruin” the football board.
6) Threats
Stormfront has made indications and threats, implicit and explicit, of looking for forum members in real life. He often threatens legal action stemming from gross misunderstanding of the law.
7) Popular Vote
I am sure many forum members can come up with other ban-worthy infractions, which is exactly the point at hand. Several threads have more or less called for a popular vote to ban Stormfront, and the community has spoken.
Everyone has been asking for a change to be made and that change is here. Effective immediately, Stormfront is permanently and irrevocably banned from TheMiamiHurricanes.com.
Back To Business
Aside from that, I expect it will be business as usual around here. We’ll be very slow in the offseason, and my hope is that we can grow some members and have good discussions as we get into fall. It will be a pleasure to continue the good work that Dallas and Shadow have started.
If anybody is in touch with previous forum members who have left the board (or who haven’t joined us yet), please check in with them, let them know the site is more hospitable, and that future improvements are possible. If anybody has other friends who like to talk football, invite them over.
And finally, if anyone has any thoughts or questions or concerns about any of the above, feel free to reply and make your opinion known. Thanks.