reindeerblood

Nice profile picture of Vinminen.

Hey,
I was cruising the CE board today and noticed your post in the Nike thread and people's responses to it.
Since you are a fellow Wisconsinite, and also have the good taste of having a kick ass picture of Vainamoinen as your profile pic (the Kalevala is one of my favorite epics, and I adore my Eino Freiberg translation), I thought I'd take some time to answer your confusion on the 'panda' topic.
A former member of the board, Pot_Pete I believe his name was, was a notorious right-wing troll and was known for his profile pic which displayed a panda bear. The guy was known for making gross over generalizations and being condescending/rude to people he was in 'discussion' with.
Pretty much, if someone accuses you of being a 'panda' they are saying that you are not following proper etiquette on the boards.
Now, this IS a bit of a big deal, but not a terrible one either. SG has a tendency of being rather hostile to newbies since I first arrived on the site, back in '03; and, yes, I got a fair share of it myself when I first logged on.
A large of part of this seems to stem from the fact that there is a very strong social code on the site; certain rules exist as to what is proper and polite to comment on. Making things even more confusing, it generally changes from one group to another. What is fine in the "Dating Sucks" group is NOT considered okay in the Current Events Board.
Naturally, none of this written down (well, thats not entirely true; each group and board will usually have a stickied thread of 'the rules'. Although this doesn't usually get into what is socially acceptable or not). The result being, that I've seen a lot of newbies plunge into discussion, get eaten alive after slipping up, and getting burned out by the experience shortly there after.
Luckily, this doesn't happen to everyone (or else, I, and everyone else, wouldn't be here!) You'll get the gist of it after a while, if you stay on the boards and all. My only real suggestion is that, as a newbie, to wade into the discussion boards, rather than jump right in. Also, if someone does comment on something and say that its inappropriate, a simple "I'm sorry, I didn't realize that at the time" will usually go over pretty well.
Anyway; its good to see a fellow Wisconsinite on SG, especially one who knows his mythology and epic poetry! Stick in there, man, and you'll get the feel for the place pretty soon, I think.