Posting Guidelines: the good, the bad, and the ugly

Richard Dorrough called my attention to the submission guidelines on TeamsterPower.org. http://teamsterpower.com/teamster-power-posting-guidelines

TeamsterPower is a good looking site designed by CorD's own Steve Dondley and run by Richard Negri. Its mission is to promote the union and its members, "our national campaigns, our victories, our struggles." It is run by IBT International staff, but is not an official union site.

There are a few such inside/outside sites. For example, the United Federation of Teachers runs Edwize http://edwize.org, an officially unofficial blog for discussing education issues. Invariably such sites run into the "problem" of member participation: what to do when members use the site to talk about the union? If they write to praise the leadership and approve its efforts, no problem. But what if they are critical? What if they question the union's policies or challenge its leaders?

We know the answer: the backward unions try to shut such discussion down. Even the UFT, which allowed a broad range of debate on Edwize, balked when members spoke frankly about the caucuses in the union, particularly the ruling Unity Caucus. The UFT took refuge behind a phony interpretation of the LMRDA, claiming that mention of the union's internal caucuses on Edwize would violate federal law. (See Surrendering to the Internet for more about that.)

How does TeamsterPower handle the problem?

For the most part the guidelines are straightforward:

Do use your real name and Teamster Local number...
Don't use foul language...
Do feel free to offer constructive ideas...

But then comes this:

NO union politics or personal attacks.

Why not?

There are plenty of other forums for that. This site is for building solidarity and unity, not whining, griping, airing dirty laundry and creating division. This site was not built to be a battleground for local bickering and we will not tolerate trolls of any sort.

There are indeed plenty of forums for discussion and union politics in the Teamsters (it would have been nice to provide links to a few -- like http://www.teamster.net/
and http://tdu.org). And it is totally legitimate to focus a discussion by clearly stating the topic and banning off topic posts.

But opposing "union politics" to building solidarity and unity, and equating it with "whining, griping, airing dirty laundry and creating division...bickering...trolling... and personal attacks" is just plain ugly. It reveals a both a distrust of democracy and a fundamental misunderstanding of unionism.

The question is, can a union website, even if it is officially unofficial, gain the confidence of union members and their supporters if the condition of participation is shutting up or saying only what the union leadership wants to hear?