Ok, I will stop advocating for a group hug as it is apparent to me that there would be too many daggers present and the opposite of the desired effect would result.

As to the question of who moderates the moderators when their disucssions veer from constructive moderation discussions into frustration venting to name calling to slander, I do think that the best answer is sunlight. If I have done something that causes the mods to have an honest discussion about my behavior, seeing (without being able to comment on) that discussion would be informative and would even provide guidance for me to self-regulate my perceived transgression. It would also assure that the mod discussion stayed in the bounds of constrcutive discussion.

But, lacking same, as I have noted before, I think the best ombudsman has and will always be Randy himself. I DID see at least one attempt by him in the selective mod posts that were revealed here that he had warned mods about getting too personal. Yes, he is my favorite benevolent dictator (a true term of endearment) and this is his sandbox.

But I do expect mods to live up to similar standards as they enforce on the rest of the community. I KNOW that is a difficult standard to achieve. I freely admit that were I a mod I could not do it.

Whether you are a mod or not, take a look at the threads surrounding this whole topic with a Mod hat on. How many TOS violations do you see here (including personal mentions and derogatory comments). How many have YOU (and by you I mean EVERYONE personally) made? How many posts are meant to denegrate and how many are meant to be constructive?

There seems to be some intractable (and I do not use this term lightly) hatred among the community. Those hatreds appear to color ever facet of participation.

It is just sad that such a powerful tool for brining out the best in folks and brining folks together has become a conduit for dividing people and bringing out the worst in them.

Is it too late to set hatreds aside and accept all individuals for whatever it is they have to give, whether you would choose to break bread with them or not?