When we find ourselves using expressions like "those with a liberal bent" or "the GOP way" in disputes with other Mudcatters that should perhaps be a signal to us to hold off posting until we have cooled down. We write our posts as individuals, not as part of a collective.

When we write something that is interpreted as racist, and it wasn't meant as racist, that should be a signal to us to have a good look at what we have written. Maybe it's been misinterpreted, and we need to explain ourselves better. Maybe there was actually something racist in it, and we need to think again.

Or maybe, of course, the person responding has unfairly twisted what we said into something that we didn't mean, and which doesn't match with what we actually said.

But we shouldn't assume that that last one is the right one until we've looked at the first two.