Spoiler:
The decision to add these rules was not without much thought, consideration, and debate. The reason for it is because of the divisive nature of politics, which began to show itself in the several political threads that have since been locked. As said in the amendment above, politics is by nature a very personal subject; because of it, people tend to make their criticisms and defenses of their views personal.
Many times in those threads, posts hinted at what their main points. Some effectively said that each candidate was totally and irredeemablly evil, making it easy to imagine what that person thought of the candidate's supporters. Others posts were more direct in mocking or criticizing supporters. In either case, criticizing members for their political beliefs is not something that we find acceptable.
Although I bring up those posts, I must also commend other users who did not engage in that behavior, and maintained a classy attitude throughout. Despite those better efforts, we still feel that it is better to not allow political discussion at all, both due to the failures of some members to be considerate, and frankly because FootballIdiot is a forum that was created to discuss American football and video games about that sport. At this late stage of the community (nine years since Madden was last released on PC), political discussion is the last thing we need to maintain unity.
