Because of the more and more dichotomous stances being taken, it seems almost any subject can become a pissing contest anymore.

I suspect that is not a sign of poor character among the posters, but an extension of the more and more polarized politics showing up all over the world, which in turn cause folks to develop and exhibit opposite and rigid views on nearly every subject sometimes, just as a habit formed from dealing with their polarized daily world.

Anyway, maybe we could decrease the seeping of those attitudes into what are supposed to be informational forums by creating a forum espcially for such irritants?

How about a forum such as "Irritating Non-political Subjects or Views" as a forum where anything a poster feels is simply not right (aside from politics) could be criticized and argued about by those so inclined?

The political garbage could stay where it is. And anythng else a moderator found becoming nastily contentuous could be moved to the new forum.

Something needs to be done. The nastiness becoming endemic to this board makes me not even want to read much of what is written anymore because of the increasing name-calling and general lack of courtesy in evidence.