This is an age where all manner of freedoms are being vigorously fought for. Freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom to bear and to not bear arms, freedom to love who you want and, more topically, freedom to marry who you want.

Resolution on the issue of same-sex marriage in Bermuda, and in several other parts of the world, lest we forget, is still a ways off. But in the meantime, those on either side of the debate deserve to be allowed to argue their points without being subjected to the worst excesses of vitriol, laced with Bible-bashing and homophobia.

The ability to offer comment, whether it be via letters to the editor or on news websites since the explosion of the internet age in the mid-Nineties, is one of the greatest gifts. It is a privilege to be cherished. It is also one that has been subjected to serial abuse.

News agencies have wrangled for years with the trying issue of commenting, especially in the cases of people using pen names or pseudonyms to harass or go wantonly off-topic — in Bermuda, the modus operandi is to turn even the most sterile story into an electioneering battleground between the One Bermuda Alliance and the Progressive Labour Party.

Allowing commenting represents a vital community service. It opens discourse to everyone and gives Joe Public a voice; in essence, validation of a right. However, if voices are drowned out by online bullies, commonly referred to as trolls, or if those voices are used to malign or to play footloose and fancy free with “facts”, it is an abuse of a bestowed freedom.

To do so while using your own name is not nice; to do so using a fictitious one, some might say is cowardly.

Disqus, the blog commenting hosting service that The Royal Gazette employs for its website, conducted a survey last year that looked into why people use pseudonyms.

The responses from the 2,000 Disqus and general internet users contacted were varied, but two figures stuck out and give us great pause before considering whether to do away with pen names in both our print and digital platforms.

Sixty-three per cent of Disqus users adopt a pseudonym, with 40 per cent of general internet users doing likewise — a significant number, too significant, perhaps, to alienate the masses so that the few who abuse the system might be locked away in a form of “cyberprison” or shooed elsewhere to cause their particular brand of disruption.

A female respondent said this about why she used a pen name: “For me, at first it was paranoia and trolls, but now it’s just convenience. Today, I choose when I want to comment honestly. I have chosen blogs and websites that have good feedback from people. When I mean good feedback, I mean people who can debate a subject with knowledge, not personal agendas; truth-seeking people, not put-downers, not trolls, not close-minded ones with limited vocabulary that always swear in their comments.

“The internet today is truly informational and not a novelty like in the 1990s, but the only problem is most people have not changed and use it as an outlet to hurt, condemn, stalk, misinform or just rip people off. I believe there are more good people online than bad, but the internet is a business and it’s used as marketing of people because it’s people who bring in the profits. Choose wisely which forums and blogs you choose, choose wisely who you befriend. I use my real name and my abbreviated name because I am but only one of millions online, but I am one mum with seven children with family and friends offline.”

Another has had a change of heart and now prefers to use his real name. He said: “I know that a lot of people use a nickname or handle on the internet. At one time, I did as well, but a few years ago I stopped and started using my real name. I did this when I realised that the [United States] Government and the internet corporations knew who you were, no matter what name you used. There are no secrets or security on the net. It just doesn’t matter what name you use; they know who you are and where you live.

“By using my real name, it makes my comments a little more from the heart than they would be if I was using a nickname. By using your real name, it makes you stop and look at what you’re saying and, maybe, say it a different way. If everyone used their real names, then it would clean up a lot of the garbage and crap comments that we find on the net today.”

The job of the moderator is to sort through the dialogue and the vomitus. It is not an easy exercise, all-encompassing actually, and the difficulties with it have led some agencies to stop commenting altogether.

Alongside shouting, swearing and incivility, comments sections can also attract racism and sexism. That is an obvious downside, but the positives still outweigh the negatives as connections are sought with audiences in the hope that issues that might have previously been a one-way street can turn into multifaceted conversation.

The Daily Dot, the self-styled home-town newspaper of the world wide web, launched in August 2011 and stopped comments a mere three years later. “To have comments, you have to be very active, and if you’re not incredibly active, what ends up happening is a mob can shout down all the other people on your site,” said Nicholas White, the editor and chief executive officer, while in conversation three months ago with Anne-Marie Tomchak on BBC Trending radio.

“In an environment that isn’t heavily curated, it becomes about silencing voices and not about opening up voices. I can’t point to any particular comment and say it’s the straw that broke the camel’s back. It was more that we weren’t seeing the conversation happen on our site.”

Fellow guest Mary Lyn Bernard, aka “Riese”, the co-founder and editor-in-chief of Autostraddle.com, the online magazine for women who are lesbian, bisexual or “otherwise inclined”, empathised with The Daily Dot, but would not dare do away with comments.

“Comments have been a big part of our community from the very beginning,” Riese said. “For our community, a lot of what they go online for is to connect with other people like them. I completely understand why The Daily Dot wouldn’t want to have comments — or in fact why most websites wouldn’t want to have comments. I think 75 per cent of the time, they’re more trouble than they’re worth, and for us it’s still a lot of work to keep up on.”

More trouble than they’re worth.

A scroll through the comments on The Royal Gazette’s website often results in the same impression being left, especially when the specific subject matter is not that which should warrant the attention of two or more unnamed persons engaging in a slanging match that lasts for hours, sometimes days, giving the article a false sense of popularity.

That is not the purpose of allowing commenting on the website and we are in no position to have it adequately policed — that is a round-the-clock job.

Many of the abusive commenters actually do come across as possessing above-average intelligence, some exceptionally higher. But that gives no one the right to be a bully, intellectually or otherwise, or to be vulgar. There are ways to get one’s point across by playing it straight — no pun intended — even if you are intent on being critical.

So the best option we have, other than shutting down comments altogether or banning pseudonyms — both of which are non-starters — is to be more forceful with offenders.

The first step has already been taken this week by restricting the commenting lifespan of each story to three days (subject to alteration). This should give the worst offenders less time to troll the website. Persistent offending, and there are some whose number is already close to being up, will result in summary blacklisting. We hope it doesn’t come to that.

As far as the physical paper is concerned, starting with letters submitted on Monday, November 9, 2015 — in the interest of giving sufficient warning — pen names will no longer be accepted for letters to the editor if they are deemed to contain attacks/criticisms of a personal, business or political nature.

With Parliament set to reconvene from its summer break and the OBA well into the second half of its maiden term in office, the political temperature undoubtedly will be ratcheted up, and that affects the populace.

Venomous political discourse, which is barely acceptable at the best of times, has to be carefully monitored and letter writers are now tasked with having the courage of their convictions to have their names stand alongside their published criticisms.

We may very well lose some letter writers — those who refuse to shed the cloak of secrecy so that they may be seen in the light of day. But, notwithstanding that the majority of our loyal letter writers have no need for a pseudonym, what we will gain is a more respectful, more equitable and more respected product.