No one can be banned from FlightGear. Free to download. Free to use. Free to develop and even free to send patches, even if one is not allowed to participate in this forum.
( yes splitting hairs to demonstrate the problems of communication and especially communication thru text across languages and education )
Passion:
One is never banned from the forum for passion alone. It is one thing to be passionate. Clearly another to loose ones control of their ability to edit their opinions in such a way as to communicate their passion without making the entire project appear as if it were copied from a stall in a high school men's room lavatory.
Passion does not equate with lowering the bar of polite discourse.
People not allowed to continue to communicate thru the FlightGear Forum often do continue to develop their own FlightGear associated works and communicate through other means quite successfully.
Because FlightGear is a project worthy of intense passion, it is often necessary to maintain the progress of the community by making certain that the forum does not become a place that degenerates into complete dysfunction.
I was saddened to see some members accounts terminated as of late. But I don't blame the forum. I don't blame FlightGear. I don't blame the moderators and the ( for want of a more accurate term ) "core developers."
I don't blame passion.
Passion for my family runs much deeper than for FlightGear. Had I ever used some of the things I've read here in the forum in conversations with family members simply to try to win a point of view against those points brought up by my family members I would certainly have been asked to leave at least the room. And had I done so in a public setting, I would not be surprised had the authorities been asked to engage.
This is a public setting. Public voices apply.
The banning of individuals incapable of communicating their point of view without respect of another's point of view is in my humble opinion something that would be necessary in any project worthy of consideration for any award, large or small.
--Ray
@bomber, Let me be clear: this was inspired by you and not a personal attack against you or your personal opinion of passion or FlightGear
Ray St. Marie