Conduct on DDO debates should be based on respect

First things first there is a correction to be made. "Ad Hominem" is often not an insulte: An Ad Hominem is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument. Typically, this fallacy involves two steps. First, an attack against the character of person making the claim, her circumstances, or her actions is made (or the character, circumstances, or actions of the person reporting the claim). Second, this attack is taken to be evidence against the claim or argument the person in question is making (or presenting). (http://www.nizkor.org...) The fallacy rests instead on objective claims against your opponent as reasoning for why they shouldn't be considered valid. For instance "Pro cites Nate Simmons therefore Pro is a lacky of Nate Simmons and anything he has to say on the matter is false.", this ignores the reasoning you propose instead of dealing with the reasoning. It's actually a really common error (more common than BoP errors as far as I've seen) where people will discredit people based on things like previous bias, previous considerations, previous unrelated quotations or current conditions such as one's employment, one's major, one's current theological or philosophical stances, etc. Feel free to click the link granted to see the basic outlay of the error. So with that out of the way it is actually not poor sportsmanship but poor argumentation for Ad Hominem. Moving into insults. Insults are not fallacies. They are uncouth, yes, but they are not fallacies, so relating to conduct it is incredibly difficult to propose that conduct be based on "respect"; looking at the first cited statement by Mr. Simmons it is clear that conduct was intended to run off of maintaining overt behavior however because of the above fallacy and it's conjunction with suggestive insults (which as I said is seeded in many debates) I would recommend instead of respect it should be based on "fluidity". Fluidity ensures that Conduct is maintained in a more professional manner. "Respect" is frivolous as one of the most common things I come across personally when reading debates is a two-faced nature. "Thank you opponent for that round, it was jolly good!" followed by "By the way, you're a moron, here's an accusation, here's another accusation, and my summary is my opponent is a moron. Thank you for time opponent." It's sewn into the fabric and it's relatively hard to see to the untrained eye. A jab may go unnoticed if it's embedded in an argument like "My opponent thinks (<- That's the jab) such and such is so however ... [evidence]" when naturally the opponent never said anything of the sort, it's the opinion (or really the dishonesty) of the contender trying to soil his opponent through a basic statement of declaration (despite it being completely false) and this behavior continues throughout the debate with what I will call "stealth mudslinging". Fluidity solves this. First I suggest that "Thanking" be eliminated. It's stupid. It makes no sense. It doesn't add a gentlemanly quality to the debate if you're going to covertly try to paint each other with wet dirt; I understand that politicians do it in their debates in front of the nation and I've seen it in some, but not many, official debates at colleges and whatnot however in scored debates it's points off; glib is not allowed. It wastes time and energy. The second point of fluidity is presentation; your presentations should be completely linear meaning that your arguments do not contain much, if any, of your personal opinion unless it's build off of it and should not contain tangents (another huge problem here) which lead off into either new claims or new BoP. The third and final point of fluidity is that it makes easier to read. It's far shorter, it has no glib, it has no false accusations, and it has only counter evidences, explanations, or statements that support reasoning in a manner that's relevant and meaningful. "Respect" does not do this. When one looks at the second quotation you've given, regarding passion, and really pushing a person away from Argument of Emotion, isn't respect somewhat based on emotion? "I don't like him. I don't respect him because I don't like him.", well there's bias again. This is one of the major culling features behind voting that really decides whether someone wins or loses: Their popularity. That's not okay. You want to avoid insults, it's rude, it's against the rules, but as a basis for one's voting it's not wise; for one because people's respect falls with bias one may completely falsify their standing. For instance "I don't like this guy and the guy who isn't the guy I don't like said 'are you crazy?' and I totally agree!", this effects the conduct ruling, because if the guy you don't like says "Well you're a buttcheek!" despite the equivalent number of insults you've got bias again acting. The terms of service I'm afraid are not functional as a point of contention particularly because you're not to use insults at all and people do and the first quotation does not align with the third (that conduct should be based on the person who used the least insults or profanities when in fact they are completely illegal) meaning that Simmon's has reasonably considered that we're not all going to be nice all the time (thus the warning against the appeal to emotion). Summary: So there you have it. I don't disagree that personal attacks are bad but I do disagree that respect is a valid basis for a voting system because it's not only highly variable but it is completely subject to bias. I offered an alternative I called fluidity which instead of attempting to "support" gentlemanly falsehoods cuts all of the fluff out of the arguments shortening them, making them more attainable to the reader, and also preventing the mudslinging. It makes it easier to call people on things when tangents are prevented which is also done through streamlining in a fluid fashion.