| For starters, this forum isn't meant to be a public stage for discussion and debate. It is a private stage in the sense that not everyone may participate here. For example, I don't want anyone who can't avoid using foul language to join us.
Yes, there has been a turnover in forum participants, but this is not unusual. All online forums are constantly changing; character, participants, content, all of these things ebb and flow.
That you miss some of those voices is entirely your prerogative, and I don't think anyone has the right to deny you this. On the same note, characterizing their departure as "voices going silent" implies that there was some form of Evil Repression going on.
Given that this site is one I operate as a private person and not some taxpayer-funded public forum, implying that there is repression is both wrong and misleading. Those who were disabled left because I felt they were harming my vision for the community more than helping it. Those who left because they didn't like something that happened left on their own accord.
And it really does come down to it being my vision -- I want the forum to have a particular character, and that means removing elements I don't want present. Part of that character is an openness, so people can discuss policy and decisions outright. I do take these discussion into account.
It might help to always remember that the UF forum is effectively a benevolent dictatorship, and not any sort of democracy. | 
