I suspect that the self-defined limits of author's responsibility taken on by Max (and Joe) is to build the forum mechanism as best they can. The responsibility fo evolving a culture here is that of each individual. Each of us builds with what he has. Some build with simpering self-pity and some with scathing flames and derogation of others. Some use four-syllable words and some use four letter words. Each of us is branded by the language we post by; once that Submit button is hit, we've added our piece to the commons and it reflects who we are, or at least who we were, whether we like it or not.

Demanding more intervention is much less interesting than exploring how each voice can raise the general tone and increase the ratio of harmony to dissonance.

Even the Supreme Court believed that redeeming social value was a fair criteria to use in dampening the freedom of speech against what was seen as abuse.

I would suggest that the challenge to you is to see how much redeeming social value you can add in every sentence you write, whether through creative humor, compassion, erudition, literary style or anything else that adds value to others in the community.

I have an opinion that this excludes intentional stupidness, which strikes me as intellectual porno; but that may be just me.

A