Michael, I meant no insult and hope none was taken. As I said, my reaction was one of surprise, not anger. You've explained your point well, and I now understand it.
I DO believe that feeding the troll just makes things worse. But, the difficulty arises when differentiating between feeding the troll by lowering yourself to his level, and reasonable rebuttal.
Being specific, it was one posters implication that the original poster could NOT get an objective opinion from anyone on this forum, and must go elsewhere to get a reasonable answer to his question that set things off. Being one who believes there is NO SUCH THING as an objective opinion, I agreed with the the first part of his implication. The thing that bothered me was the general implication that an objective opinion could be found elsewhere, and specific implication that any opinion would only be objective if it agreed with his own.
What if the original poster BELIEVES that? It's not so much that I feel the necessity to defend the forum's honor, although that is, admittedly, a factor. But, rather it's the desire, and commitment to provide the original poster with accurate information. I feel it's important to answer that kind of misinformation, for the forum's sake, for Axiom's sake, and for the original poster's sake.
When he resorts to name calling, I feel no need to respond in kind, because that kind of behavior speaks for itself. I do feel the need to point out that that kind of behavior is unacceptable. The trick is to do so on a higher road than the troll, so as not to feed him.
