>Seems like the chatter section should have a little more flexibility...
This is general. There are important issues regarding this. One of the most important one is the fact that many members would believe there is something hidden in the message against other members, or something similar to that, which could justify the change of the language. I am sure this was not the case here but we are trying to have members to respect that in order to avoid unpredictable reactions from other members.