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As the orientation labels are part of the registration process, the perspective that is used to assess changes are slightly different. We're a community that primarily aims to serve people at the initial stages of their identity development, thus requiring us to structure our registration process accordingly. As somebody who has worked in the LGBT+ support community for 8 years, with 3 of them being done professionally, even I am still running in to labels that I do not know the meaning of. If I added a label each time somebody suggested it be added, our registration page would be a very convoluted process which could overwhelm those who are only just beginning their own identity journey. Therefore, it's why I work on the premise that less is more, as we use pre-determined identities which we know are widely used within everyday, mainstream language, whilst allowing people the option to specify something outside that list. There's no hierarchy to it, and keeping it short and sweet helps ensure that those who can't even grasp whether they have same-sex attractions aren't completely confused by a whole range of synonyms which aspire to embrace varying degrees of romantic attraction. That, however, isn't to say that the list is frozen and will never be changed ever again, but I am very careful about being dragged into discussions which encourage a wide-range of identities to be included in the list. At the end of the day, there's a whole range of labels that people use, and each of those individuals wouldn't be against seeing it added to the pre-determined list on the registration page. However, by and large, our target audience won't be at the stage where they're even confidently applying any label to themselves, never mind specific labels which fall outside the mainstream scope of everyday society. My primary focus is less about having an all-encompassing list of labels, and more about ensuring that the registration process is as straightforward as it can be for our primary target audience. The balance between pre-determined and inputting your own, in my mind, has done a good job of helping to cater for all people, at differing stages of identity development. If others disagree, I'm certainly interested in hearing views on it, as I'm not married to a particular viewpoint. My main priority is ensuring we keep the registration process as straightforward as it can be, and I'm confident that that principle wouldn't be lost if the views of others were taken into account, so I'm all ears.

The proposal for a young people's board isn't really something I can offer much feedback on, as these are based more on membership demand. If there's a necessity for the community to structure itself based on age-criterion, it is something that we'll of course consider. After all, the Later in Life section was introduced following consultation related to this specific necessity, and it has been a tremendous success. So... that's something for the membership base to evidence a need for. My initial impression would be that EC, by and large, is one big young people's forum. However, that might depend on what it is specifically that you define as young, as my own definition would include those in early adulthood, whereas you might be thinking more 13-16?

Regarding people below 13, YuriCore is correct. Those below the age of 13 can join with parent permission, but that's an obvious barrier because of the nature of the support that we provide. Unfortunately, it's not a restriction that we happily enforce, but is instead a statutory requirement under the Child Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998. Basically, an organisation cannot obtain information of somebody under the age of 13, without first obtaining parental permission. I don't like the law, but I'm also not a US national so it's not really my place to start criticising international statutes.