Red State Citizen is a news outlet. Our priority is focused on presenting stories to the people of Texas and neighboring states. Our readership is a broad slice of these populations, so please write with them in mind. We aim for smart, concise, connected writing that encourages wider conversations.

Submission Guidelines: How to submit to Red State Citizen

Do you have something to say? Want your voice to be heard by thousands of readers? Send RSC your letter to the editor or guest opinion piece. All submissions will be considered for publication by our editorial staff. If your letter or editorial is accepted, it will run on redstatecitizen.com, and we'll promote it through our social media channels. Just follow our simple submission guidelines and make your voice heard:

• Submissions should be between 250 and 500 words.
• Submissions must be sent to editor@redstatecitizen.com as a .doc, .docx, or .txt file.
• The subject line of the email containing your submission should read "Letter to the editor."
• Attach your name to both the email and the document file (we don't run anonymous letters).
• If you have a photo or image you'd like us to use and it's in .JPG format, at least 1100 X 600 pixels large, and your intellectual property (you own the copyright), feel free to attach it as well and we may use it, though we reserve the right to choose a different image.
• If you are on Facebook and would like a shout-out when your piece or letter is published, include that in your correspondence and we'll give you a mention at the time of publication.

Editing

All submissions are subject to editing for length, expression, and content. There are no exceptions to this rule. Feel free to contact us and discuss this further, but RSC retains the final say at all times over what appears on the site. We also retain the right to schedule articles as we see best. If an article is time-sensitive, you must give us a minimum of 24 hours notice to fit it into our publishing schedule. We cannot guarantee when an article will appear.

Legal responsibility

Defamation law is evolving quickly in the digital sphere. Please remember that if you make a defamatory statement that's published, we will not bear a legal responsibility simply because we are the "means of publication".

Defamation is where a statement communicated to a third party causes injury to the reputation of the person about whom it's made. Any comment that injures someone's reputation can be defamatory if it brings a person into contempt, disrepute, or ridicule. To be defamatory, comments must be "heard" by a third party.

Avoiding defamation: The most important rule is to state the facts, not the conclusion. Let readers draw their conclusions from facts. Be sure that you have documents to back up the statements that you make. Sometimes understatement — saying less than everything you believe to be true — is more effective than wide claims. If you are writing something that might be defamatory, seek a second opinion.

Anything before the courts may be sub judice, so check before you report.

Moderation policy

As per the site's terms of use, RSC will not publish content that:

• infringes intellectual property rights or copyright
• is defamatory
• violates laws regarding harassment, discrimination, privacy, or contempt
• is abusive or offensive, including obscenity, blasphemy, and racial vilification
• is condescending
• promotes hatred of any kind
• is inflammatory or blatantly off-topic
• is intentionally false or misleading
• doesn't make sense or is of nuisance value
• is inappropriate or vexatious
• could place the writer at risk

We reserve the right to reject submissions on topics that have already been widely canvassed on the site. We also reserve the right to reject submissions from participants who seek to dominate the discussion.

We will also not publish material that:

• compromises the privacy of our readers, contributors, or staff
• contains inappropriate personal information or content
• seeks to endorse commercial products or activities or to solicit business (except sponsored content, which is published by arrangement and marked as paid material (see more details below)
• deliberately provokes other readers

Submitters patronage

Wherever a submitter has a current or prior relationship with the subject of an RSC article or receives any form of patronage from them; this must be disclosed either in the content or after the article.

Sponsored feature articles

RSC partners can sponsor articles from our submissions as part of their partnership package. If the content is to be published as news, the sponsor cannot determine the content of the article and it must meet journalistic standards for news content.

Sponsor provided content

RSC partners can sometimes supply sponsored content articles as part of their partnership package. All sponsor-provided content must be submitted under their organization's name and will be disclosed as sponsored content at the beginning of the article.

RSC actively seeks strong, Texas-connected articles. If this sounds like your kind of writing, please contact us to discuss submitting to our site.