For whatever reason, despite being small, this sub tends to get into partisan bickering. A lot of it is from non-attorneys. I don't want to discourage their participation here and just dish out bans to people that could probably participate better if they read a little more.

To get unbanned you'll get a reading and essay assignment. This exercise should lead to better posting from more informed users and you'll help educate the mod team about a topic that might not be in our practice area or wheelhouse.

We don't ban people posting in good faith trying to learn something new. If your entire post history is a bunch of shitposting in political subs and you're here to "tell it like it is" you'll get an essay assignment.

If it's particularly good the mods will post it and sticky it so other people can read your stuff.

[this is an experiment. it is not a rule for all time. just something we're trying out to improve the signal to noise ratio.]

edit - some additional boundaries while we figure out if this is workable: there are a cohort of users we simply don't want here. if someone is throwing around racial slurs, blowing up modmail, engaging in behavior that's banned site-wide, etc. they won't be applicable for an essay. This is only for users the mods think could benefit from knowing a little more about the topic they're passionate about.

And I can't believe I have to say this but you can't just copy and paste Wikipedia or plagiarize an essay. Feel free to take excerpts from a source. (No need to bluebook it but link to wherever you found it) But we're looking to see that you understood what you read.