So kindly remove this thread. And stop trying to pretend it's not here, by saying bury it. They aren't the same thing. So my request is for it to be removed.
All of what I'm about to say here has already been covered, but not in an organized fashion, so let me address it in full.
There are basically three levels of administration here at the WWGHA forums:
1) Local moderators (folks who moderate some forums but not all of them)
2) Global moderators (folks who moderate all forums and who will override a local moderator when they feel it is proper to do so)
3) Administrators (above global moderators; highest level of responsibility, will override local and global mods at their discretion)
I am a local moderator, the moderator for the Mailbag (as well as several other forums here). As such, your request first comes to my attention. Here is my response:
I handled your email in the same way that I handled any email that comes in. I reviewed it to determine whether it was suitable for posting. After deciding that it was, I created a thread for it in the Mailbag, removing all identifying information from the post. I then sent you, the letter writer, the standard form letter that goes to all letter writers whose letters are published, giving you links both to the thread and to the registration page, along with an explanation of what I had done. This is the same procedure that I have followed with dozens if not hundreds of other letters, and it is, in fact, by instruction of the administrators that I follow this procedure.
Posts on the WWGHA fora are very rarely deleted, and only under exceptional circumstances. The circumstances with this thread are not exceptional -- they are, indeed, very ordinary. That being the case, I see no validity in your complaint and will not delete the thread.
At this point, if you are unsatisfied with my decision, you may choose to speak to a global moderator, and if the global refuses to override my decision, you can speak to an admin. In this case, though, at least one global and one admin have already spoken up and have said they won't be deleting the thread. I won't presume to speak definitively for anyone else, but if I were a wagering man, I'd bet that any other mod or admin you speak to about this will express similar sentiments. (And if I turn out to be wrong -- if I do get overridden, and this thread gets deleted... well, more power to you. But don't hold your breath.)
I suggest you resign yourself to this thread staying put. And I would add, again, that you're getting off light. Other people, including me, have had far more embarrassing communications made public, and not anonymously, either. Consider yourself fortunate, chalk this up to experience, and in the future, before you compose an email and click the "Send" button, you might want to think twice. Next time, you might not dodge the bullet, as it were.
