At the time of writing this I am not entirely sober, what I've written may not actually reflect my true views on the topic and some of those views may be misccomunicated, so until I confirm anything while in a sober state of mind take none of this as actual proof of my opinion, just a rough guideline
Okay so I more or less agree with Vulnus, honestly, he's being the voice of absolute reason here.
The Abyss was created by community poll and if it should be ended, then it should be by community poll. Remember that listening to the community is what we're about as moderator staff.
However, I must admit that I very strongly support the idea of The Abyss, maybe my opinion of it is skewed, concerning the gore, I've witnessed things worst than most of whats been posted, so I'm not the slightest bit affected by it, I'm absolutely desensitised and can't truly understand the perspective of having an issue with it, I also have almost the same issue with p0rn and sexual content, it just doesn't affect me.
There's also the fact that I see gore and p0rn as both artistic and personal expressions, which prevents us from removing it from the forum entirely, and that's something I'm somewhat adamant about and honestly I can admit I'm not willing to really back down from because I don't see this forum as a place for artistic/personal expression that we allow because some people aren't comfortable with anything more, I see this forum as a place for absolutely any kind of expression in any forum, with ultimately no limits because people should be free to safely express themselves however they want.
The issue is that not everyone is comfortable with that and we also have the issue of people who are maybe not quite prepared for or too sensetive to what's in The Abyss will not be okay with what's there since that's where we allow people to completely express themselves. Although considering that there is the point of 'just don't look at it and it doesn't affect you, it's entirely optional content really' and you should have read the warning posted in The Abyss before going into any of the threads, which lets you know porn and gore will be there, it sounds maybe harsh but it's your fault for not reading it or ignoring it, not anyone elses, you were informed of what would be tnere and we are more than happy to take any possible measures to prevent people from accidentally stumbling across a GIF of a man burning to death, but if you ignore the warnings then it's not our fault, it's yours.
The best option really, and if I'm honest the only one I'd feel truly happy with and would absolutely 100% support without any complaint is finding ways of preventing people from accidentally stumbling upon the more 'questionable' content which they're warned of anyway, because to be honest you sort of don't have a position to argue from if gore/P0rnn is.not easily accessable, the point of this forum is uncensored expression in any way, and that's probably how I imagine the staff in general will want it.
Now at the end of this, I'm going to clearly state, yet again At the time of writing this I am not entirely sober, what I've written may not actually reflect my true views on the topic and some of those views may be misccomunicated, so until I confirm anything while in a sober state of mind take none of this as actual proof of my opinion, just a rough guideline