The Golden Rule

I had the honor and privilege of seeing Buddy Guy this Sunday at Gathering of the Vibes in Bridgeport. He played the title track from his latest album, "Skin Deep," a beautiful, touching song about all of us being the same, underneath, and to not judge a book by its cover. What's the relevance? I hope a lot of us learned from recently jumping on a Broncos fan that often, sadly, our instincts are to be exclusive instead of inclusive, derogatory instead of encouraging, mocking instead of genuine.

One of the things Ed has told me differentiates this site from a lot of other team-oriented, fan-populated news sites is the level of decorum with which we share our thoughts and ideas. And he's right. So many sites out there are childish, illiterate, asinine, and combative in their user interaction. When we devolve into that sort of written insulting and fighting, we devalue a site that Mr. Valentine has put immeasurable effort into making one of the best.

I'm no saint, and just like all of you, I mistreat people when I'm not being thoughtful. But it's important to remember that as much as we love our team and despise the various "bad guys" of the NFL, it IS "just a game," and it's more important to be good to each other than we might realize in a sports argument.

Our part in helping Ed have the best NYG site on the Web is simple. We should be intelligent, informed, and insightful -- but we also should try to be welcoming to visitors and not take the anonymity of the 'Net or the zeitgeist of sports to excuse treating other people badly.

As far as the handful of constant trolls who incite us, I think it's best to stop replying to posts that intend to inflame or provoke. Perhaps if they don't get what they want, they'll give up.

Here is Buddy Guy performing "Skin Deep" on David Letterman in 2008:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UccVUT8Q988