Coupeville Sports

OK, enough is enough.

It is time (probably past time) for me to act like an adult and shut down the verbal slap-fest that has been raging over on my story about Hayley Newman quitting the South Whidbey High School girls’ basketball team.

What began as a very South Whidbey-style discussion, with eloquent, civil comments on both sides, degenerated into name-calling, smears, wild allegations and a few comments so ripe even I didn’t let them go through.

I’m not saying it wasn’t entertaining from the outside, because it was, but the truth is real people are being smeared on both sides, and it’s not fair for people to anonymously post wild allegations without having to back it up.

Also, I have a real job, and can’t spend 24/7 on here, parsing every comment to decide if it pushes the line, bends that line or completely obliterates it.

So, all 32 comments are gone and the the comments are locked on that story.

If you have proof of your allegations, I am very easy to contact, as South Whidbey High School officials will attest.

In fact, I will be in the stands in Langley again tonight, when the Coupeville boys’ squad faces off with the Falcons in a district playoff game. Since many of you have looked at the “Who’s responsible for this stuff?” section on here, you have a pretty good idea of what I look like.

I stand 100% behind the original story and fully believe I did the right thing running it. You can like me for that, you can hate me for that. Your call.

But for now you can’t call each other hookers and whores and criminals and scum in the comment section (well, for that story at least…).

Do that in person — it has more of an impact.