>>>>>>Okay, a passive moderator, who gets active when someone has a complaint. A moderator who stimulates social behavior and suppresses anti-social behavior. Why not?!
>>>>>
>>>>>How would this moderator suppress anti-social behavior? Or stimulate social behavior for that matter?
>>>>
>>>>For one (and this may be the most difficult skill), notice dirty tactics in debates and send a warning when noticed. An example of a dirty trick is calling someone a whiner. This is an argumentum ad hominem. Even if it's your personal feeling about the other, it is not appropriate behavior to use it in the debate. Another one is the usage of dysphemistic wordings, e.g. calling someones argumentation 'utter nonsense'. It shows disrespect for the opponent.
>>>
>>>>
>>>>I'm not referring to all types of fallacies here. There are many fallacies that are made simply because there's still a certain lack of skills in debating techniques. Rather I'm referring to dirty tactics.
>>>>
>>>>Showing such disrespect for the opponent in the debate causes stress in the community. It is therefore an anti-social act.
>>>
>>>Suffering fools gladly demeans the intellectual level of the community and is therefore an anti-social act. More importantly, having to do so causes stress.
>>
>>Charles, can you rephrase? I do not fully understand the first part of the first sentence.
>
>In this context it means believing what someone is saying is foolish or "utter nonsense" but having to pretend their argument is worth debating.

Charles, believe me, I've really tried hard to understand this sentence. But I can't. I hardly dare to ask you to rephrase again.

>And do understand, in all these discussions, you seem to me to be a very nice, well-meaning considerate person and anything I am saying here refers only to the quality of your argument and my contention that your style of debate may in itself be the cause of the behavior in others that is causing you stress.

I don't like to be called a whiner, or when my arguments are called utter nonsense. But I too have my tactics to cope with that and if a stress-meter would be attached, hardly any, or no stress at all would be registered, that is, if it was said here on the UT. Is that proof that 'dirty tactics' never cause stress? In another situation, e.g. at work expressed by a powerful manager, it would cause a stress-registration, for sure. It are the other details that matter.

My style of debate is..., well, my style of debate, I guess. It is grosso modo highly appreciated in at least some other (Dutch) forums. I haven't been around here in debates since I opted out because of the twit/moderator issue. That opt-out is still valid. This thread was the exception because it is about the twit filter, which is fundamentally wrong, so is my strong POV. All things that I think that should be mentioned have been mentioned by me, so it's time to shut down the debates.

And yes, I'm actually indeed a very nice, well-meaning person, and I know that you are too. :-)