Dear MendoFever Readers,
Our comment section is meant to be a place for sharp insights, local knowledge, and good old-fashioned debate. But lately, some conversations have taken a turn—getting personal, using profanity, and even including racial slurs. That’s not what we’re about.
To keep things civil, I’ve put a filter in place to block comments with expletives or hateful language. If anyone tries to get around it with creative spellings, they’ll lose their commenting privileges. This isn’t about shutting down discussion—it’s about keeping it respectful, readable, and worth everyone’s time.
I know some readers may feel frustrated if their comment gets flagged while other offensive ones remain visible. The filter only applies to new comments moving forward, not retroactively, so older comments may not have been caught. If you come across something particularly offensive that’s still up, let me know. I appreciate the help in keeping the discussion respectful.
Thanks for being part of the conversation. Let’s keep it a good one.
MendoFever’s Comment Guidelines
- Engage, don’t attack. Challenge ideas, not people. Ask before assuming.
- No slurs, no exceptions. Hate speech has no place here.
- Critique with facts, not insults. If you’re calling someone out, back it up.
- Add value. Insight, humor, info—make your comment count.
- No threats or incitement. We’re here for conversation, not chaos.
I’ll update these rules as needed, and if you think a comment was unfairly flagged, reach out: matthewplafever@gmail.com.
Matt LaFever
Founder & Editor, MendoFever
It’s a bummer you even have to address such an issue!
EXCELLENT!!!
Excellent Idea, Matt. Long overdue. Don’t know how to accomplish it, but the use of one’s real name in comments would go a long way to making comments civil.
I don’t disagree with you,but to be fair your articles are highly incendiary, almost as if they are purposefully choosen to inspire division, fear and anger.
The fire that burned those apartments down and no interview with residents, no donation information, no volunteer contacts. Very unprofessional for a local paper.
The Potter Valley Project, The Cubbison Case, The Palace Hotel are your heavy comment hitters and these articles are on repeat for years. I understand we need to be kept updated, but is there nothing else to write about?
As for commentary such as writing LOL on serious stuff, yes its childish. But I think the people are tired of the predictably of old school journalism always resorting to extreme controversy or even death in order to get read.
I actually come to mendofever for the entertainment from the commentary, as I already know what will be written about. I don’t come to Mendofever for deep discussion about real topics, as those articles are never written.
I thank you for these years of lolling me to sleep while I laugh at commentary and crack jokes about Ukiah like I have since I was a teenager. Thank you
Dear Crystal Clear, whoever you are concealed by your pseudonymous name, is his reply for me? For your information I’ve never written about apartment fires, the Palace Hotel or the Cubbison case. Have you confused me with someone else, or are you just confused? Michael Koepf
Your characterization of real journalism is completely off base. Journalism’s role isn’t to soothe or entertain—it’s to inform, investigate, and hold power to account. If a story sparks division, fear, or anger, it’s likely because the subject matter itself is controversial, not because it was purposefully chosen to incite emotions. Reporting on wildfires, infrastructure failures, or criminal cases isn’t “incendiary”; it’s public service.
You claim a fire story lacked resident interviews, donation info, or volunteer contacts, calling that “unprofessional”—without acknowledging that not every story is a feature piece or a charity drive. Sometimes, the priority is simply getting the facts out quickly.
As for repeat coverage of topics like the Potter Valley Project, Cubbison Case, and Palace Hotel—these aren’t reruns; they are ongoing issues with real-world consequences. Major stories don’t just end because you’re bored of them.
You admit to coming to MendoFever for “entertainment” and “laughing at commentary,” yet criticize its coverage for not being serious enough. Which is it? If you want deep discussions about “real topics,” I’d suggest engaging with the content instead of treating it like a sideshow.
So true though, Matt-why does Crystal Clear complain about perceived lack of seriousness if it provides the funnies?
Very well said!
LOL
Thank You Matt for your commitment to informative community articles and this forum for community comments. As someone who does look at comment sections, I understand our community is not served when we see a couple characters trading a series of personal barbs with each other, especially with just handles (not real names). As a person who respects contrasting opinions, and different beliefs, I once took in a lesson from an experienced elder former county supervisor when I was contributing to political dialogue via short lettes to the editor. He suggested the points of my writing or anyone’s can be made clearer by not engaging with, or promoting barbs of character attack (even little joking ones). Those barbs contests are really a distraction from the points we are trying to make. Another Lesson I have taken in: It is so easy to be an Armchair Critic: Here is a Pivot Question: What is the picture of the positive community option you would like to see us pursue together, and how can you and I emphasize that. … My Two Cents.
@crystal clear
That’s because his news is taken from other local news articles or re-hashed like….UDJ and P. Democrat, it’s all accredited to other news articles.
Matt doesn’t hardly ever do his own news…. or his own photos.
Let’s see if this gets posted ;·)
Your criticisms are wrong on all fronts. Content recycling happens across the media landscape, making your point irrelevant. I’m not one to brag, but readers who have followed MendoFever know we’ve broken and provided serial coverage of many stories other outlets didn’t. Also, if you actually looked at the photos, you’d see most are either authentic images of the subjects covered or stock photos I personally took.
Matt LaFever has broken numerous stories of his own, especially in regard to regional cold cases, while few others have. If you seek rehashed and stolen stories, visit the Anderson Valley Advertiser, a journalistic flypaper for anything previously printed. Also, good doses of anti-Semitism are also available there.
Well I’ve been kicked off this re-gurgetated need platform lol.
Haven’t gotten any updated re-gurgetated news since. If this comes through…..I want y’all to know that I have not been able to read any news because Mr Lafever had banned me it seems. So I have paid UDJ my money to get my hometown news FRESH
@Who? I saw your message so I guess you are not totally banned lol
Take a look at kymkemp.com’s comment section….it is disgusting. I told Kym and Matt a long time ago that they should remove the comment section. Many low IQ residents live for the drama in the comment areas. Why don’t they remove the comment section? Not because it provides positivity or insight into the written article but a lot of people click on the article just to read the comment section. Toxic comment section equals more readers.
Good policy.
Thank you
Thanks for the filter Ann your explanation of how it works.
I wholeheartedly approve!
No doubt there will be I’ll-tempered claims that this violates the First Amendment.. It doesn’t. No matter how angry one may be all of us are able to express ourselves without violating MendoFever’s rather broad standards. Comments such as those banned here can have the effect of discouraging other members of the community from commenting — who wants to get flamed viciously or to have to read what amounts to empty shouting.?
mendofever encouraged all the dirty comments until he got bought out by SF Gate. Clicks equal growth for a website and it used to be by any means necessary for this place. It has to be sanitized niw or mendofever faces the ire of his SF overlords. Cool I guess.
You’re completely off base. The toxic commenters have been a persistent issue for over a year, and while I hesitated to step in due to concerns about censorship and predictable backlash, the flood of blatantly racist comments in the past week made inaction impossible. The tone of the conversation reflects my platform’s values, and if that needs to change, it’s on me to change it.
This has nothing to do with SFGATE—trying to connect the two is just grasping at straws.
If true, so what? Civility is a universal value.
In some online papers clickbait articles are a problem. But if a MendoFever article attracts a reader in the first place I don’t see how a comment section below it adds much to the commercial motivation you criticize.
As for media overlords sanitizing their outlets, focus on Jeff Bezos’s sanitizing the Washington Post’s opinion pages so that no political or foreign affairs pieces are published.
If you think this is a clickbait policy, go elsewhere. I’m sure you’ll be impressed by the coverage in the Ukiah Daily Journal, which is owned by a right wing press baron who has bought over 1,000 local papers including the UDJ, the Fort Bragg Advocate-News and its Mendocino sister publication. None of them have any news or editorial presence on the coat. That’s why many of us support MendoFever.
Honestly, I love satire. And mendofever is borderline satirical. I come for the satire and if I happen to get some information while I entertain myself with the idiot comments, so be it.
Mendovoice isn’t borderline satire, even with their cheesy wholesome farming articles and local music. ….and I ask us all for arts sake, why does Mendo Fever tread that borderline of political satire? Doesn’t anyone else fi d that interesting? I mainain that the articles themselves are very good at pinpointing divide. There’s nothing banal about any of the articles in mendofever, in fact they go right to the heart of the age old battle between novelty and habit, progress and preservation, and as a 7th generation Ukiah resident who sees pattern, I find mendo fever comforting.
But make no mistake, censorship will only drive the creation of deceptive language.
Although there are occasionally some thoughtful and helpful comments, most comments here are just ad hom attacks, smears, childish name-calling and generally toxic nonsense. Unless you have time to actively moderate the comments, I would just ban the comments section altogether.
good for you, Matt. Hope you can continue it.
Its a news platform. Matt dosen’t have to explain himself. It’s informative & it gets people talking on their own steam. But there has been people really saying awful comments about others comments. Instead of about the article. I am so glad Mendo Fever exist. We lost a lot when our local paper stopped almost all news reporting & became community events & no real time reporting I assume because don’t work on it 24/7. Thanks Matt
Great idea. Good luck!!
Thank you for taking this step.
Long overdue. The comments section have been a dumpster fire for sometime now. Bravo!
GLAD TO HEAR SOMEONE PUTTING A STOP TO PROFANITY!
Agreed we are all adults here. Yet at times it is very important to allow honest and open Communications. Look at the Cubbison case they lied and denied all the way through it. They said none of these things happened and in the end they really did. Sometimes it takes a long time and a lot of conversation and pushing for the truth to come out doesn’t mean you have to come and say horrible things about people but the truth does hurt those contrary to it.
As the usual suspects panic that they wont be able to spew their hateful rhetoric anymore.
I don’t spew hateful comments or rhetoric,but I must say that seeing the hateful comments with my own eyes taught me something. You see, in my naivete, I forgot that (insert expletive referencing wild donkey combined with holes) actually are floating around all empowered. If you censor this we’ll forget. We’ll think progress is being made.
What really needs to happen is when these imbecelic i dividuals write terrible things is that the rest of us ignore them. Don’t like or unlike it, don’t try and convince them with facts or nasty words. Just let it pass like a fart in the wind.
Nah. I may know some bad actors but I’d rather not have to put up with them.
For the most part, I like your idea. The only problem is that people should not be allowed to attack others with racial slurs, bigotry etc. Those people should be silenced as no one should be subjected to that. That’s how I raised my children, and Matt is apparently having to do that job here unfortunately.
Exactly. We all know the usuals.
Is MendoFever using a Christianity filter too?
Do you want him to?
@KINDALAME, Are you for or against Christianity?
The 10 Commandments were/are a good thing. If we were still honoring just those simple TEN commandments and teaching them to our children, then Matt wouldn’t have to show up here with a can of ( pardon my language,please) whoop booty.
Google The Ten Commandments if you DON’T know what I’m talking about.
Commandments 1, 2, and 3 aren’t neccessary outside of a religious context. Commandments 5-10 are more or less already part of the morals of general usa society (maybe 4 if you broaden it to the concept of a weekend or regular days off from work in a secular sense). I’m not sure I understand why you think we need to teach this to usamerican students when many of them are not Christian, and nevertheless get taught morals from society which encompass many of the commandments already.
The website said my reply was posted, but I can’t see it. I’ll keep this brief. Commandments 1-3 are clearly religious; I don’t see why they would need to be taught to everyone in a country with freedom of religion where many religions abound. Commandments 5-10, and in a broader sense 4, are already integrated into the morals of usamerican society, just as general societal morals instead of something religious or christian. Hence, there is no need to teach the ten commandments to usamericans separately from the secular and religious morals they already get from their parents and society.
Great move and thank you. Civil and intelligent commentary are in alignment with professionalism, and adds to the legitimacy of a credible news source/publication with less unnecessary distractions and more thoughtful engagement on the issues… yes to that.
Fully agree Matt. I don’t always agree with your slant but you provide an excellent, well written source of information that we’d all be much less without. And it almost makes me physically ill to see some of the nasty, uninformed, ad hominem vitriol that passes for what should be healthy debate. I don’t mind being told I’m an idiot for something I say but it goes down a lot easier with a little humor and some information to back it up, rather than just mud slinging at some imagined stereotype. Maybe I’m naive but I keep hoping that we can get back to airing the kind of disagreements that a healthy society needs to survive.
It’s about time. I’ve been saying for more than 2 or 3 years now that this comment section is the worst representation of Mendocino County. You can imagine. And I will admit I have been guilty in participating. For the most part lately I stopped commenting at all unless it’s about Lake Pillsbury and the water diversion situation. Which I commented a lot about. I apologize for my foul demeanor at times, and my participation in the rudeness, but this is a long time coming. I have suggested this before after reading some of the cowardice filth in the comments section. I regret the part I played in it. But I never came close to taking it to the level that some people did. I have submitted several photos and videos that got published which I greatly appreciate. I support Mendofever and I think this is a good decision Matt. People need to bring back civility and just being respectful. All God’s children.
Thank You Matt,
Respect and common sense, imagine that…
I have not noticed any problem. Maybe some of you all need to grow a thicker skin. And I’ll tell you also, the leftist-socialists who assume their opinions need to be regarded as fact are wrong. Most all censorship is political, meaning politically agenda driven censorship, and that is not in keeping with ethical journalism.
There are socialists here (on this website)?
Yeah goy fly that red flag of Communism and limit people’s speech ?
Bravo to you! I am new to this newsletter and haven’t seen much if any bad comments yet, but it’s a constant problem on some social media sites as well. People can be so childish. It’s a shame you have the need to do this, but I’m sure necessary.
If you’re not a folk singer then we’ll have a humdinger
Comments really hv nothing to do with the article writer unless they are involved directly in conversation or conversation about them. I personally feel your oing too much work with this. Pop are literally ofnd by everything these days and need to get thicker skin. Ignore….these guys pray for actions. They are got one thistime….a whole website changed their format. ITs a small area… I also like to know what my local grocer, bank teller, neighbor, or the little old lady in a rocking chair really has going on in their heads. Threats libel call the cops