Well said, Boomer. All we can do is the best we can, and that means each of us who cares should be careful of how we act, and those who don't care obviously won't. If we offend someone with joking around or whatever, well, straighten it out and apologize if necessary.

This board is not anywhere close to some of the others I've been around on the Net. And the community aspect of FT is stronger than probably any discussion group I've seen.

Yes, there are cliques, but who cares? Most of the people who might be characterized as in a clique are longtime FTers, and if they don't treat an "outsider" with respect, then they don't have any room to complain about the deterioration of FT. That said, I can't think of any longtime FTer who has been intentionally rude to me. But does that mean that other relatively new FT feel the same way? Of course not.

What I think is a bigger problem is how newbies are treated. I'm not talking about those who pop up only on the Coupon Connection asking for upgrades, but rather those who post for advice and happen to ask a question that has been previously discussed. All too often, the answer is "Do a search." Well, that's fine, but newbies may not know about it. We can complain that they should try to familiarize themselves with the board, but my opinion is if someone suggests doing a search that he or she also should attempt to answer the question. Besides, plenty of established FTers, myself included, ask questions that have been previously discusses, and without getting rebuked.

We should all try to be nice to each other, but we should try extra hard to be nice to those who don't know us.