zlacker

Yes, although the issue isn't only incivility, but also other forms of repetition. The intention is to avoid discussions that are predictable and otherwise low-information, to the extent possible.

You're quite right that energetic conversations can be really good, though, which means we have to review the list of threads that have gotten penalized by the flamewar detector and turn the penalty off for the ones that don't deserve it. We do that several times a day. It's not a perfect solution though, because sometimes a thread languishes for hours before we notice that that's happened.