Yup.
Remember, folks, the rules are ultimately just guidelines. We're all expected to police ourselves individually; the mods are there (in principle) simply to handle things that have gotten out of hand. We'd quite honestly prefer not to have to set rules down in stone and then enforce them to the letter, but the occasional troll does lose track of his bridge and wander in, and then we have to fall back to the rules as written. But if you're basically self-monitoring and asking yourself the honest question of "How would *I* feel if that kind of thing were addressed to me?", you're 1) probably never even going to get an official newspaper to the nose and 2) almost certainly never going to have to face a second one. It usually takes something really egregious, contemptuous, scornful, aggressive or just plain nasty to earn a FIRST "warning" (note the lack of capital W), and since most people realize they've crossed a line when they do that kind of thing, the knowledge that it HAS been noticed is almost always enough to prevent a second occurrence.
In short, everyone makes mistakes. But not everyone keeps deliberately making the same mistakes aimed at others. That's the dividing line, and the vast majority of this forum's population is aware of that and lives by it. It's one of the reasons this forum is SO different from SO many other forums out there; it's actually a pleasant, enjoyable place to be. Hey, sure, some people do enjoy a wide-open, brawling, e-peen-on-the-table, nasty little snarl-fest, but they have plenty of places where they can practice their puffery... just not here. Too many cool folks here to let that sort run rampant.
