I would presume when your launching Pirates Online Forums that your seeing something similar to below? Please look after the image also to see how to potentially resolve your issue:
POF-TextOnly.jpg
The following picture shows two options which should be selected, but if they look like this picture below you will want to change this by performing the following:
(1) Open your Internet Explorer (providing your using IE)
(2) Click on Tools|Internet Options
(3) Select the Advanced tab
(4) Scroll Down to Multimedia settings
(5) Select the Show Image Download Placeholders checkbox
(6) Select the Show Pictures checkbox
NOTE: The above two selections should be checked off, not like the picture below that maybe how your current settings are is like the picture below...
(7) Click on Apply button
(8) Click on Ok button
I have also seen this before with firewall applications (Symantec Client Firewall) which causes very similar issues...Let me know if that helps you resolve it...
POF-Options.jpg