In order to provide you with the most accurate assistance, I'll need a bit more information about the issue you're experiencing.
Unpublishing a category by itself in Joomla should not prevent the site from loading. However, it might cause problems if there are articles or menu items linked to that category.
Could you provide more details about your setup? Such as:
1. The version of Joomla you're using.
2. The exact error message you're receiving, if any.
3. A description of how you've set up and linked your categories.
The more information you provide, the better we can help you troubleshoot the issue.
I am using Joomla 4, updated to latest release. I have not used the misc category, there is nothing published to it. I have simply created and used my own categories. So I just wanted to get rid of that category but when I unpublish it, my site wont load, If I leave it published, everything works fine.
Using Firefox browser this is the error it displays;
The page isn’t redirecting properly,
An error occurred during a connection to mysite.com
This problem can sometimes be caused by disabling or refusing to accept cookies.
Using Chrome shows this message;
This page isn’t working
mysite.com redirected you too many times.
Try clearing your cookies.
ERR_TOO_MANY_REDIRECTS
Edit: I am not disabling/refusing cookies, and I have cleared cookies/cache, error persists.
I have solved this issue.
I had my Home menu set as category blog and using the miscellaneous category so no articles would show in other categories on home page. But then I built my home page with modules and particles. So changing the Home menu to Gantry 5 custom page allows everything to work properly and I can get rid of the now unused miscellaneous category.