Ok, Im going to say something that will likely be very unpopular here in the forums for some.  I will also leave the ability to downvote this post into oblivion, but honestly, I dont give a rip about that, so have at it.

I have been a member here since 2011, but anymore, I rarely comment, but I am here, literally, every single day for my Buckeye fix.  

Eleven Warriors is without a doubt the best overall Buckeye site on the internet...and on top of all of that...it is free!  I publicly thank Jason Priestas for the fine vision and extreme effort in producing such a place as this.

However...increasingly over the last several years, I stay away completely from the live game threads (although I do sometimes view without comment). 

And that is  my point of contention here.  My frustration is NOT with the site itself, and not so much with the mods, who seem to do everything possible to mitigate the issue I am about to bring up.

My frustration is with a number of my fellow fans.  It isnt just the horrific language from some, but it is more the extreme degrading of players and coaches when the chips are down.  

I guarantee you that major sports sites come here to gauge what Ohio State fans are saying and feeling, and even though it's unfair to do so, they report the worst of our fandom from the takes of a few drunks and morons.

Look, I know its easy to let loose a few obscenely crazed comments in the heat of the moment, but it seems like twelve to fifteen members do it incessantly, and even though they represent a vast minority of fans, it's what outsiders and haters gobble up. 

The point of this post is simply to make a plea to those members who are guilty of this...to temper frustration a little bit by dialing back on the personal attacks on the players themselves.  Coaches are big boys enough to ignore those things, but come on.  When young kids get attacked for substandard performance by our reckoning, real damage can be done.  

I will not tell you who it is, but an Ohio State football player I personally know has been extremely discouraged and even seems depressed to me...because he came here and saw what he interpreted as "fan hate" toward him.  I tried to convince him it was such a tiny number of people that it was insignificant, but it didnt seem to help a lot. 

My PLEA to my fellow fans is simply to think before hitting "SAVE" on that hot take.  I know people should learn to develop thick skins for these types of things, but every single one of you know that's not the case in today's public social profiling where just a few raw comments take push a kid over the edge.  

Like I said, this post may be unpopular, but I have the skin to shrug off the downvotes and nasty retorts to this post.  I ask those more level headed commenters to deal with the few idiots who inevitably show up just to deliver those poor representations of our fan base. 

Respectfully,

Southernstatesbuckeye

aka Time Traveler 

(Mod Edit: moved to Site Stuff forum)