Whether PeterT was right to calling somebody an idiot or not is debatable. Personally, I prefer to try to avoid name calling and in that instance in may have been better to have referred to the comments as being idiotic.

Having said that, we all have subjects that we feel strongly about and are entitled to our own opinions and if PeterT feels that the poster is an idiot, I see no harm in him expressing that.

I do feel that people are over reacting to a few posts and that overall, Mudcat is a very friendly place (compare it to some newsgroups). We are only human and a number of us will react harshly on occasions but I think that this place would become very sterile if we all had to ensure that every post we made could not conceivably offend anyone.

In an ideal world, there would be no dissagreements but we live in the real world where these things happen and what is more important to me is that these arguments blow over quickly and that there are no grudges held.

I have seen anonymous posters mentioned in this thread and mention of harshly worded posts but there are other matters that I have seen in Mudcat that I consider to be far worse. I have seen the deliberate goading and repeated personal attacks on a poster and recently saw a post that I suspect was a troll.

Jon