Continuing to insult others on this message board defeats its higher purpose which is to put forth thoughtful premises and elicit critical responses. It’s not to make others angry, demean them, insult them, and so forth. Undoubtedly, the best posts are ones that eschew epithets and edify others by clever argument, adduction of evidence, and erudi prose employing wit versus truculence.
Most of us are well-educated persons with an affection for the University of Miami. Having the last word is not always having the best word. Not answering is preferable to a fatuous response. As a longtime editorial writer and journal editor, I never published an important piece immediately after drafting it. My rule of thumb was to read my work a day later. The technique saved me many times from making a grievous error and my galley proofs needed many fewer emendations.
In a biblical sense, I definitely cannot be a first stone thrower inasmuch as I have called two of you cunts and threatened to waterboard some of you down by the bayou. Nevertheless, I feel certain that meeting you guys in person would be quite a pleasure, and I’d probably like most of you. I’d like to think a certain amount of wisdom is accrued by age, so I am proposing that we tone things down and pause before throwing stones at each other. By their very nature, humans are bastards to govern (from an old Spanish adage), but peace is preferable to war. Therefore, I propose a Pax Miamiana where we contemplate the religious aphorism of loving one another. We’ll test it to see how well it works.