RHC Forum Rules & Guidelines

We at RHC feel that we offer a great deal of freedom here, but if that freedom is abused, we'll take it away, individually. We are not your average message board, we are a club, and as such, we should try and treat each other a little bit better. RHC's forums were established in 2002 to create a friendly environment for RHC enthusiasts to interact in a laid back, respectful environment. In order to foster this friendly interaction and create an environment where ALL RHC enthusiasts feel comfortable posting and hanging out, we have created a set of rules and guidelines which all members are required to follow. These rules are general in nature, as it is impossible to spell out every possible offense that may result in a thread being locked, deleted, or edited. The rules are as follows:

1. Expletives
We currently only have one word that is banned, but that may change. If you try hard enough, you'll figure it out, but using it in any form is not allowed, and for good reason. Many people are deeply offended by vulgar language. If you feel you must swear to get your point across, fucking great, but please try not to be overly offensive. Replacing one or two letters in a banned expletive by using ASCII characters (! for I, etc) is not an acceptable solution.

2. Flames or Derogatory Insults
Flames or derogatory insults are strictly against the rules. If you disagree with another member's point of view, do so in a mature and civil manner. If someone posts to discuss their personal problems or seek help from other forum members, please do not respond unless you have something positive or helpful to add. If you find yourself being flamed or insulted by another member, please do not dignify that person with a response. Notify a moderator and let us handle it. If you feel you must respond to a flame or insult directly, please do NOT do so on the board. Use private messages or e-mail.

Suggestion: If you are particularly irritated by another member's posting habits and are constantly fighting the urge to flame them, you can click on that person's profile, and select "Add to ignore list." This will make that person's posts invisible to you.

3. Threats, Racism, or Sexism
Threads or replies promoting or expressing extreme intolerant views towards minorities (race, religion, sexual preference, etc.) will not be tolerated. Jokes are one thing, but when said in a serious or threatening context, it will be dealt with accordingly.

4. Porn
Porn is not welcome here. Pictures showing nudity may be allowed if an appropriate "Not Work Friendly" warning is posted in the subject line, and the picture is at worst, "R-rated." The posting of "X-rated" pictures is and will remain strictly against the rules.

5. Free Posts
"Free posts", or posting solely for the purpose of boosting your post count is frowned upon. Many people judge member's credibility based on post count, so we ask that you obtain your post count legitimately. Furthermore, free posts waste server space and ISP bandwidth unnecessarily. Posting a sentence one word at a time, over several posts, for example, is not allowed. Frequent free post abusers will have 50 posts deducted on their first transgression warning and 100 posts on each subsequent transgression of the rule.

6. Posting in Appropriate Forums
Please post your topics in the most appropriate forum (i.e., tech threads only in tech forums). If you post a thread that would be more appropriate in another forum, a moderator will move it for you. However, please do not make the moderators do this for you. Use your judgment to determine which forum(s) best suits your topic. If you are dealing with a TECHNICAL topic and it could appropriately fit in more than one forum, you may post it in multiple forums.

7. Controversial Topics
Controversial topics, such as religion, abortion, retardation, racism, etc., will be monitored closely. Although these topics usually start out civilly enough, experience has shown that these sort of topics often disintegrate into all out flame wars and heated arguments. At the first sign of this, the thread will be locked.

8. Trolling
"Trolling", or makings posts with the sole intention of creating problems on the forums is obviously against the forum guidelines. This includes registering an alternate ID for the sole purpose of creating problems on the forums. "Troll ID's" will be locked immediately and permanently, and can be locked without notification to the offender.

9. Attacking Forum Moderators
Posting a thread or reply to question or criticize moderator or administrator actions is not appropriate in a public forum. Please utilize the board's Private Message function, or e-mail, if you wish to discuss these issues. As long as you bring up your concerns maturely and civilly to the moderator or administrator in question, we will do our best to address your concerns fairly and promptly.

Here are the "Do's" and "Don'ts" of addressing your concerns to moderators or administrators:

"Do" be civil and polite. Bring up your concerns in a mature and respectful manner. If you are contacting us because you violated forum guidelines, be adult enough to admit your mistake. If your ID has been locked for some reason, talking politely to us about it in private, via e-mail or private message, can get your ID reinstated in many cases.

"Do not" be derogatory or insulting towards us. You will not get what you want by name calling or bashing us.

All we ask is that you treat us the way you would want us to treat you. If you treat us with respect, we will do the same for you.

10. RHC site Communications
Using the RHC PM process to solicit business, lure members away to go to another website, send threats of violence, racial attacks, or sexually harassing messages is prohibited. You will be warned once and the 2nd offense is 7 days restriction from the board. Any additional offense of this nature will result in a permanent ban from the site.

Anyone that feels they are a victim of this problem should immediately contact a moderator or a site Administrator for assistance. DO NOT DELETE THE MESSAGE(S) Please keep the offending message(s) on hand so that you can forward them to the Administrator, as evidence, for action against the perpetrator.

General Dos and Don'ts

If you violate forum guidelines, in most cases, you can expect the following action from the moderators/administrators:

1. First offense- warning via private message, e-mail, and/or moderator reply in the offending thread

2. Second offense- 3-day lock of your ID

3. Subsequent offense- longer ID locks, possibly permanent

Please realize that the nature of the offense will determine the action to be taken. If the violation is extreme enough, or has been repeated enough times in the past, a member can have his/her ID locked without a warning.

Threads or replies that do not comply with our guidelines may be locked, edited, or deleted, depending on the nature of the offense. We will make every effort to state why such action was taken via private message, e-mail, and/or moderator reply in the offending thread. For this reason, we ask that you check your private messages often. You can find out whether or not you have received any private messages by logging into your user CP. You can set your options so that the board notifies you when you have received a private message, if you so desire.

The above rules and guidelines are necessary to make RHC's forums comfortable and enjoyable for ALL RHC and automotive enthusiasts. If you feel you can not comply with the rules above, please refrain from using RHC's forums.

Thank you,

RHC's Administrators