Private forum topics

I am wondering if it would a handy thing to have private forum topics? By private, I mean that only users, invited by the creator of the topic, would have access to it and I guess they wouldn't be moderated either, since neither the mods nor I would have an access to them, that is, if we're not invited.

What do you think?

I'd rather have group private chats. If it's a conversation I'm not allowed in, I'd rather not see it at all. It's their business and doesn't concern me. If there were private topics in the forums, to everyone who's excluded it's basically just a sign that says "this is our club, you're not invited".

The private topics would be hidden from those not invited, you wouldn't even know that they exist.  Regarding the group private chats, I will definitely implement them :)

It wasn't specified in the OP and I didn't want to make assumptions. If they're invisible to the uninvited I see no problem. Might be neat.

Yeah, my apologies, I should have mentioned it. 

Sounds interesting. Maybe could be used for mafia I suppose.

It would be bice for Christians to get together and talk without being harassed by the godless pagans, gnostic heretics, and wing nuts.

Awesome, those sound like good reasons.

Also considering the popularity of the religion forum, we may consider to change the name of the website to DebateGod.com haha

Pagans are not godless.

They already exist - its just that you've never been invited to one.

I find theist-to-theist discussions interesting but don't get to read them very often because atheists come in the thread and turn it into a theist/atheist battle. It would be a bummer if there were private topics that were free of that problem but I still didn't get to read them. 🙁

But it's not a big deal, and I really understand why theists would want such a thread to exclude atheists like myself. Sometimes you just want the other side to fuck off. More than "sometimes" in the case of our religion forum, I'm guessing.

I wouldn't isolate myself from the non Christians, that defeats the point of me being here.

See, bible studies are impossible on the religion forum because it will inevitably turn into a topic about the validity of the bible.

The point would be so that Christians can get their theology in order, maybe help eachother be more effective in the common forum.

Instead of you know, it all being drowned out by those with strife on their agenda.

Make sense?

No one is truly godless.

1. Would the forum creator be able to boot out someone previously invited?

2. If someone exhibited really bad behavior in a private forum, would that be reportable to a mod?

Well, to be honest, I haven't given it a lot of thought since it was just a random idea but I'd imagine those being self moderated, so if somebody misbehaves, it's the creator's responsibility to kick him out. 

Yes, as it's pretty much what I said.

And I wasn't suggesting that you would isolate yourself from non-Christians.

I am not sure how to go about it, I'd need to think about it, as I mentioned that's just a random idea. I am open to suggestions though :)

Can just imagine the likes of goldtop making a private community to whine and abuse me realising can't read it and crying that they can't bully and get away with it even then.

I think that would be pretty cool. But I guess it could potentially stir up drama and clique wars.

It's a good idea. Look into it and let us know what you find.

Yeah. If there are private topics, there's gonna be people in them talking about uninvited members. It's inevitable.

This is a really good idea. I think it also might be a good idea to let all people see the thread title and maybe a short description by the moderator, but not the content, so that they know that a discussion exists and can ask to join it if they're interested. It would give people a chance to escape from the stifling moderation atmosphere that's currently settled over the site, and allow each user to self-sort into their own level of comfort. It will also let normal members get some moderation experience, and allow some criticism of moderation. For example, I recently wanted to discuss a controversial deleted thread, and linked an archived page of that thread so that another member could see what was actually deleted, and that post was itself deleted. It's kind of Orwellian that we can't even talk about content that was deleted without our posts being censored, and I can definitely see a private thread being devoted to documenting oversteps and trying to hold moderation accountable.

This would be really helpful for mafia purposes! It would also be good for mod business as well.