are a person's best friends on here if they aren't looking to get into any frivolous back-and-forths.

Let's face it, there are some folks who are just itching for drama and use DU as a place to unload their baggage.

Don't know if it's ever kicked in yet

Two birds. Stone.

I agree with you about avoiding the temptation to engage in threads where there is really no hope of convincing anyone about your point of view, and I try to avoid posting in such threads. Though I'll admit that sometimes (possibly too often) I am weak and post a response anyway. I almost always regret it. I do agree it's best to just move on. Or write a response just to get your viewpoint down in writing and off your chest, and then delete it before clicking the post button. I can't tell you the number of times I do that.

But is it a good idea in general to hide threads you disagree with? Isn't that like putting your fingers in your ears or your head in the sand? Isn't it better to know what people here are thinking? Do we all want to create our own insular paradises, in which we only have to see or hear what we want to see or hear?

I real life, it's kind of possible to do that. I am not going to invite someone to dinner whose ideas I disagree with thoroughly, or who I know will make me mad. We choose friends who are generally in sync with our own beliefs. Or we avoid topics on which there might be disagreement. And when we do disagree in a conversation, it's done in an agreeable way.

But I don't think it's always a good idea to cut yourself off from all the unpleasant things in life. You can, for instance, never step foot in the impoverished neighborhoods in your city, pretending that everything is lovely, but you will be missing something really important or just fooling yourself.

I wish there were a way to have disagreements on a subject here in a rational, respectful way. I wish there were a way to disagree vehemently with someone but not hate that person. Everyone here is just an anonymous cipher, on whom you can project all kinds of bad motives (I think you did that in your OP, just as you think others have done to you). I wish there were a way to picture that person across the dinner table from yourself, having the same disagreement. But I guess I'm just dreaming.

I use it to hide threads in which I know that those with whom I disagree will behave in predictably disagreeable and antisocial ways.

There are some topics that cannot be discussed without being baited and accused of all manner of corrupt, depraved and sick motivations. Those who do the baiting and accusing are occasionally and infrequently censured... but when they are, a candlelight vigil is held on their behalf.

Will someone be so kind as to check back in and let us know when we can remove "woody", "farrow", and the like from our trash thread list? I'm afraid I'll miss some breaking Woody Harrelson news. (you serious, Clark?)

Like a car wreck you have to slow down to just look at the carnage.

At some point it becomes a rerun, then it becomes retro-kitsch, then it becomes ancient history.