Please Read and express your feelings and opinions....

Indeed the forum has become coarse but most often on arguments about science vs empirical evidence (ie-fuses, interconnects) or on certain threads where a dealer hijacks the exchange about a product to damn it with faint praise, talk about his vast experience and submit, as a matter of fact, the "best" product for the OP would not be the one discussed but one which-- after years of careful study and comparison--he thinks is better and just happens to sell. 
It would be nice if the rules here prevented promotional dealer conduct. The exception of course, would be if the thread is about a product and the dealer, as one with experience with the product, can provide an answer to the OP which may incidentally involve praise for the product. Non-promotional conduct by a dealer would be permitted-(e.g. a dealer weighs in on a thread to provide information responsive to the OP that is  not promotional in nature).
  That being said, there is thankfully only one dealer on the forum who wastes our time with the above type of prohibited self promotion. In a way, that is a tribute to the hundreds of other dealers around the country who participate here.

@amg56 so sorry to hear of your cancer and so thankful that you exist.  Music lovers are music to my ears, and you are one.

What makes a forum go downhill is the idea that the person is the issue to attack, not the ideas from a person.

Ideas can be right, or wrong, or neither one (taste, experience, feelings).  We can't attack people for having ideas, only for being clearly unwilling to look at other ideas.

Energy flows downhill and the President is putting out some very cynical and disrespectful and contentious energy for the last 18 months, and that energy has certainly crept in here as well.  So we all have to double down on our humanity right now. 

Audiophiles all need to understand that creating a playback system is your form of creativity, and as such there are no wrong answers.  You all do not write, record or perform music (by and large) you play it back as an expression of who you are.  Some folks are more analytical, some more emotional, neither is wrong.

Good thread.

Respect ..... thats all it needs, for other peoples opinions
Respect !!!

Respect is the word sadly in the age of hiding behind keyboards and not talking directly people tend to show their real side just not their public side. I was "attacked" for spending good $$ on the audioquest Fire for my turntable on a  VPI forum! It really at the end of the day did not bother me other than the superior smarmy tone of the "attacker". I dunno of all the BS i see on these forums it seems cables are the big one. Just mutual respect and and maybe we all police the board together?

Personally, I feel that the worst offenders are folks who own a certain piece of gear and come out swinging even at the slightest hint of criticism regarding their gear of choice. See what happened on the Goldenear Reference thread. The OP was asking for opinions from people who have either heard OR own the speakers. I chimed in and provided my opinion. I was upfront about the fact that I had heard it at dealer showrooms twice, but one of the posters started calling the opinions as 'laughable' and 'crap' and accusing me of doing a great disservice. I quickly bailed out of that discussion, but this is another form of bullying where the owners resort to tough language to drive out dissenting viewpoints. 
The irony is that the same poster is ranting about Tekton fanboys on this thread. Lol!

I don't understand why people get so defensive about what they own. For me, unless I am the manufacturer or at least a major shareholder, I just don't understand how people get so emotional about these things.