I have seen good political discussions in online communities (on Crooked Timber, for example), but usually these are communities where the members have fairly homogeneous political views. When the participants in the discussion see one another as members of the same tribe, I think mind-killing is less likely.
Except when a member of another political tribe wanders in. Then it's "Kill the heretic!", usually under the pretence that the outsider has introduced politics into the matter.
Hello fellow LWs,
As I have read repeatedly on LW (http://lesswrong.com/lw/gw/politics_is_the_mindkiller/) you don't like discussing politics because it produces biased thinking/arguing which I agree is true for the general populace. What I find curious is that you don't seem to even try it here where people would be very likely to keep their identities small (www.paulgraham.com/identity.html). It should be the perfect (or close enough) environment to talk politics because you can have reasonable discussions here.
I do understand that you don't like to bring politics into discussions about rationality, but I don't understand why there shouldn't be dedicated political threads here. (Maybe you could flag them?)
all the best
Viper