Sad news: Ed Brayton, blogger at Dispatches from the Culture Wars and the creator of Freethought Blogs, is leaving the network. He’ll now be blogging at the Patheos Atheism channel. He’s turned over control of the Freethought Blogs network to the FTB executive committee.

So why am I leaving? Also omnipresent since the start of FTB, as I’m sure you well know, has been controversy. The bloggers here have often gone on crusades and launched battles, most of them necessary and justified. But along with that has come a great deal of drama and stress. I’ve endured several threats of lawsuits against me as the owner of the network over the words and actions of others. I’ve had continual demands that I do something about this or that blogger, that I throw them off the network or censor them. I’ve been caught in the crossfire of a great many fights, continually taking shrapnel in battles that I wasn’t even involved in.

I believe it has to some degree impeded my ability to engage in important activist projects by making some people reluctant to work with me because of all that controversy. That frequent stress has also begun to affect my health. I have two autoimmune disorders that are triggered by stress and I have come to the conclusion that it would be better for my health, both physical and mental, to get out of the crucible and be responsible only for myself and my own words and actions.

Here is his full announcement, explaining his decision in more detail.

I will miss him hugely, but I 100% support his decision to take care of his health and well-being, and wish him all the best. As many people have heard me say, sometimes holding up a four-foot-long banner with the words in big block letters: Self-care is not selfish. I’ll be following him at his Patheos blog, and hope to have many years of happy and fruitful work with him in other arenas.