As I said just now, attack the view, not the commenter. We’re all for lively, spirited debate here, just don’t want the entire comments system to be dominated by a handful of individuals arguing amongst themselves and having personal spats.

Our comments system will remain 99% unmoderated as it has always been.

Regarding the deletion of my post, it was a mistake – there was a spam comment posted in reply to my original comment that we intended to delete, but accidentally removed my post along with the reply to it. We’re still getting used to Disqus, it is a bit confusing on the admin side.

That said, my post was not insulting toward you – nor did I mean to single you out, as I said in the post – something to the effect of “and this isn’t to single out George, there are many far worse,” – I directed the comment to you not to single you out, but because we have communicated on a (friendly) level before, and I figured you’d might help me bring the tone down a notch here, rather than replying to someone I have never communicated with before.

I am actually looking for an “un-delete” option on Disqus but can’t seem to find one, in order to bring back my original post, but it appears disqus doesnt not have this option.

The point is, and this goes for EVERYONE, we want our comments to be a place that anyone can express their views – right, left, inbetween – without fear that they will be personally attacked or called names for their views. Attack the view, not the person. Otherwise it makes ICR seem like quite an uninviting place, especially for new visitors, to comment.

So to be clear – the post was not directed at George specifically for any other reason than we have spoken over email previously. In fact, it was George that suggested the move to the new Disqus commenting system, another reason I directed this at you – as from a moderation standpoint (filtering the f*ck word, etc) Disqus has proved more difficult than our previous system.

George, I also did not receive any emails from you regarding this. Not sure where you sent them.

At any rate, I want you to continue to be part of the discussion here. What I was looking for – as frequent commenter – was simply your assistance – even if that included letting us know about others abusing the comment system – as we don’t have the resources to necessarily monitor what is happening in the comments all the time. I apologize if it was taken the wrong way or if you felt I was singling you out for some reason, wasn’t the intention.

Have a great weekend.