Hi all,

In the wake of the tragedy in Orlando, tensions are high across social media as people struggle to fit the event into their political narratives. The gun control debate is as heated as it has ever been and xenophobes see the attack as a vindication of their beliefs in dangerous outsiders. This can cause a lot of BadPolitics, but it also causes a lot of wrongness that doesn't belong here.

We have seen quite a few posts in the past few days that have violated Rule 1 and Rule 5 and have thus been removed. We thought it important to give a reminder of these rules and examples of what these rules mean.

• Rule 1: This rule is important in keeping this subreddit an academic environment where we can step back from our ideological biases and examine facts and theories empirically. Holding a certain ideological belief, no matter how ill-informed or disgusting, is not BadPolitics by itself.

• Example: A Xenophobe blaming the terrorist attack on all Muslims and advocating anti-Muslim policies is not BadPolitics. What would make it BadPolitics would be that xenophobe trying to justify his hatred through some kind of misrepresentation of Political science or theory (e.g. "look at this chart, Muslims are in the blue part next to the Commies and America is in the yellow part, therefore the two are incompatible and we should keep them out").

Just being a bigot isn't enough to be BadPolitics, they need to actually be doing political analysis wrong.

• Rule 5: This rule is important for keeping us on topic. Citing wrong facts, even though someone is using those wrong facts to support a political agenda, is not BadPolitics. Those wrong facts need to be relevant to an academic field of Political study. This means Political Science (study of how political actors interact and create policy), Political Theory (study of how ideological identity groups form and how they try to advance their policy preferences), or Political History (study of the history of Political concepts, ideologies, or paradigms).

• Example: An NRA supporter claiming that the Nazis took away their citizens guns by using mass shootings as a scare tactic is definitely bad history, but it is not BadPolitics. What would make it BadPolitics would be that NRA supporter claiming that disarming the population is a key tenet of Fascism and therefore Democrats are Fascists.

Thanks for taking the time to read. If you have any questions, feel free to comment in this thread.