True. But there's kind of a hierarchy to it. Some things are more low-brow than others. And there's a problem with social media sites catering to the lowest common denominator. I think this is also part of the reason the discussion between the left and right has broken down as much as it has.

It's clear your heart is in the right place. The irksome part of it is how do you turn that into rules that won't be interpreted radically different by different moderators. I think when writing site rules that dictate the type of environment you want to create a good thing to consider is the supreme court case Brandenburg vs. Ohio. This is the US case law that draws a clear line between speech protected by the 1st Amendment and illegal threats.

In a nutshell, violent or hateful statements that are generic and lack credible immediacy are legal speech.

Ex. "Someone should kill people I don't like."

Ex. "We should round up and kill all the X."

Ex. "Someone should shoot X corrupt politician/celebrity."

Things that have enough specificity to be a credible or immediate threat aren't legal.

Ex. "Hey, angry mob, string up that guy standing in the back of the room with the yellow shirt."

Ex. "We're killing people we don't like on Tuesday in Made Up City, KS. Meet at the KFC on 5th street at noon."

The line of "protected speech" here will obviously be drawn differently than the legal line due to the goals including desired level of discourse and civility. Many overly hostile and violent statements are legally protected speech but are not something likely to lead to productive or entertaining discussion.

I brought up all of this because I think the very clear way the court defines what's acceptable versus what isn't has a bunch of value. It's something completely lacking in most forum rules - which are intentionally left vague and at the whim of the people that enforce them.

If you can find the right spot you can still have edgy humor and decent discourse, but with a clear "line" people know they shouldn't step over. Hit the wrong spot and you lose the "banter" due overly broad restrictions. Objectively quantifying "intent and tone" are almost impossible on the internet so the more cut and dried things are, the better.

If rule enforcement is a public thing (logs) this sets a clear "precedent" for the enforcement of site-wide rules, and also exposes when you have power-mad moderators that need to be removed.

Having said all that, I've been involved in communities that have attempted to go down this path and still become right wing echo chambers because all other parties either disengaged from the conversation or slowly became right wing themselves.

Those of us that enjoy arguing opposing viewpoints on the internet are an endangered species. People these days tend to just avoid places that may challenge their opinions and surround themselves with people that agree.

The upvote/downvote system inherit in modern social media further encourages this, because opinions that run contrary to the prevailing one tend to be buried under a sea of "You're stupid and I don't like you" downvotes. I think the fact that this site lacks downvotes is a very interesting step in the right direction.