For heaven's sake, folks, you are taking up memory by starting and posting to yet another thread discussing how to deal with flamers and non-musical threads. It's been said at least a hundred times before ... same subject, same words. Cease and desist and get on with reading and posting to those threads which you find interesting and leave the other threads, which you do not find interesting, to others. Surely, you can find other subjects to debate, e.g., what is folk music? ... that dead horse hasn't been beaten in at least 2-3 months. Or do something really constructive like reading music-related threads ... you might be surprised at how much you can actually learn from those threads and may even have something relevant to add. By now, it should be apparent that ignoring flamers diffuses them. I'm beginning to think that it is this type of thread which is causing people to leave the mudcat, not the flamer threads. And if you are curious as those who have made themselves scarce, check out the Big Mick Birthday thread. Several former mudcatters posted best wishes to Big Mick, however, you won't see them posting to any other threads. This is a sad state of affairs ... moonchild