Jay,

>>My whole take on the troll alert things is that I do not need anyone else trying to determine what I should read or not.

Perhaps you could explain how a TROLL ALERT is trying to determine what you read- the thread title cannot be changed and you would presumably read the nasty post before the TROLL ALERT response. If you don't like the warning, perhaps you can follow your own advice and ignore it?

I certainly agree that posters need to be respectful of others' capability and intellect. But in view of the tag-team baiting exhibited by certain others for weeks and months, I'm a little surprised you waited until now to express your views.

I'm also a little surprised that a TROLL ALERT message might disturb you more than the disgraceful hostile message to which it would be a response. It seems you hold me to higher standards of behavior than certain others. That is a compliment, I guess.

If you don't like my suggestion, what suggestions do you have to prevent otherwise good-natured posters being deliberately provoked beyond endurance until they make a terminal post? Bearing in mind that online provocation has been widely researched... we know that ignoring does not work. We know that reasoning with them does not work. The researchers say that TROLL ALERT does work. If you have something better, let us know!

As it happens, there has been nothing needing a TROLL ALERT warning for a few days. Perhaps it is over at last.