Of Eorl: The line thought broken

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Urwen

Maybe, but I created this thread. Last time I checked, many sites have adopted a 'my thread, my rules' policy.

Please don't let's fight, people. The Downs is so small these days, a little bad blood will wind up affecting everyone.

I've always felt that if you give implicit or explicit rules in a thread (eg by asking a question like 'what would be the effects of this?'), I'm expected to abide by those; I can post other things, particularly in response to other comments, but I shouldn't try to shut down conversation on the original topic.

But if you post something just as a theory, like this thread or... ah... most of mine, to be honest, then the rule becomes simply 'discuss' - which can be 'disagree with details'. A flat 'nope that's wrong' would be pretty rude, but a 'here's why [I think] that's wrong' is a different matter.

Urwen, I think you've stayed out of the Balfrog threads (actually I think they mostly stopped posting them before you became active again), but I know I spent a lot of time disagreeing with them over there, and others did too. If they tried to shut down disagreement with their theories that, say, The Hobbit is largely plagiarised from an obscure Elizabethan play, I think we'd all be very disgruntled.

hS

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

But if you post something just as a theory, like this thread or... ah... most of mine, to be honest, then the rule becomes simply 'discuss' - which can be 'disagree with details'. A flat 'nope that's wrong' would be pretty rude, but a 'here's why [I think] that's wrong' is a different matter.

It seems to me that proposing a theory based on canonical (or even HOME) information from the published books is perfectly fine; putting forth an idea with no such support because it isn't impossible and can't be disproved is another matter.

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Inziladun

It seems to me that proposing a theory based on canonical (or even HOME) information from the published books is perfectly fine; putting forth an idea with no such support because it isn't impossible and can't be disproved is another matter.

I agree that it's a different matter, and think it's is definitely more suited for N&N than Books.

hS