Man, you do have a thick skin, I'll give you that. How could I have been snarkier? Yet you breeze right past that to comment something generous and constructive. That's not something I am any good at, but I do respect it greatly.

Okay, I'll try. That is, name-calling and personal attack I can do without, that's obviously more than fair.

I'm just not entirely sure what the "flame war" thing is about, what I do to start or prolong them in your mind. When someone says something I consider incorrect, I refute it. Yeah, I added a lot of extra here I guess, but even without that, long comments with a bunch of quotes and links tend to be my thing. FWIW, they tend to be a LOT longer first draft, if you can believe that. As much snark or passion may have remained in some, it's not that I'm not trying at all. If that (long comments and not letting someone have the last word unless I agree or we're going in circles) is considered "flamewar" I can't help it and must plead guilty and unrepentant and be removed. No hard feelings, either.

But I honestly I don't understand why "too much activity" becomes a problem for you, even on day old threads -- or if it even does, I don't really grok you in that regard. But that's been my impression, as if you think it takes away from discussion of other topics?

During times like these, just like, say, when Appelbaum got cancelled, I do kind of get this thing that Brecht described, where you feel you can't discuss innocent topics while this elephant is in the room. At least not endlessly. Unless it's right in my ball park, something else I deeply care about or know a lot about, I pass, I'm not going to read up and learn on something new and then form a comment based on that, as I otherwise might. Just not in the mood. What I'm trying to say is, if I didn't post these comments (minus the personal attacks, but let's call them activist or political and maybe a bit too long) I would post none, I wouldn't post on other subjects instead.

But I don't post in random threads and try to make them about the chip on my shoulder, either. That's the best I can do, really.

And we don't even have notifications, so when people keep posting in week old threads back and forth, it's because they're both manually checking to see if the other replied. In other words, it's between consenting adults, and as long as it's really just disagreement and splitting hairs and all that, and not abusive, is that really a problem?

Again, other points taken, please don't take this as a long-winded way of say "yes, but" to name-calling and getting personal. It's just your usage of "flamewar" that is hazy to me. To me, flaming someone is name-calling and getting personal, but not a lengthy or "endless" debate as such.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flaming_(Internet)#Flame_war

The tricky things in society, the ones that matter deeply to people or which they literally need to live, just aren't like programming anecdotes and all that, where people can have different experiences and no friction. Of course you're right in that this means one should take extra care to not add friction, and I'll renew my efforts for that. But I don't think friction as such is always bad. Too much of it is, but having zero is also a red flag IMO.