Shut Discussionist down!...

[Ms. Toad]

337. The rape threats were hidden by unanimous vote of four different juries.

And the poster was banned - the exact same thing that would have happened on DU. (And I would not have been surprised, had the same thing occurred on DU, to have had a few dissenting votes.)

No one "allowed" that poster to make rape threats any more than anyone "allows" the death threat guy to make them here. And when he does, no one suggests that DU be shut down because all DU did was hide his posts and ban him. Repeatedly. As many as dozens of times a day.

Rape culture is an issue on both sites - and, again, no one is suggesting that DU be shut down because way too large a percentage of posters on DU either don't acknowledge it exists or are active participants in it (albeit usually more subtly than on discussionist).

As far as whether people objecting to rape threats want (or don't want) differing viewpoints - that is an entirely separate issue. But, FWIW, some have made it very clear they don't. Just skim any anti-discussionist thread and look for people making comments about how they hear enough right wing garbage in real life and you'll find a healthy overlap with the people in these threads complaining about rape threats. There's nothing wrong with not wanting to spend time online with people with differing views - but just because you (or they) don't want to isn't reason to agitate to shut down another site designed to accommodate differing views that responded exactly as DU would have to rape threats.

There are very few places with robust discussion software which are dedicated to broad ranging discourse, with a significant population base. That is a significant opportunity which should not be thrown away merely because it isn't perfect fewer than 4 months after it opened its doors. DU has been around considerably longer than that - and it is still far from perfect.