You remember that old rule from the Code of Conduct (when it was 'just' a Help Center article)?

Be Nice.

That should still be your #1 priority. Whenever you state your opinion, please think twice about formulating it in such a way that it doesn't cause harm to others. If you can't, don't post it.

If you still see somebody posting something that is not nice (which is different from seeing an opinion that is not to your liking), comment on it, explaining that it's not nice and asking the author to reformulate it. Flags are useful, but as a last resort; authors of flagged and deleted comments/posts may get the idea that they're being silenced, which often leads to them posting more non-nice content.

There's another option in the new Code of Conduct which is IMHO used less often than it should:

If a situation makes it hard to be friendly, stop participating and move on

Or, equivalently:

Let's agree to disagree agreeably.

That phrase occasionally serves me well in real life to prevent matters from escalating. Of course, this entire thing is already a (pardon my words) cluster f***-up of epic proportions, but disengaging may still help to put out the small after-fires which are still happening everywhere. When both you and your 'opponent' have made their point, and it's clear neither side will yield, there's no point in insisting to have the final word.

If you see something that is blatantly rude/abusive or trolling, and you get the feeling ♦ moderators aren't around to deal with it, hop over to the Tavern on the Meta chatroom. It's always busy these days and people are (in my experience) quick to help with moderation tasks, especially the blatantly obvious cases.

From your question:

People should be able to answer a question and be done with it. They shouldn't have to fear endless criticism and fight and comments war.

And your answer:

So, if someone is specifically asking to not be talked to anymore then 1) we should respect their wish and 2) we could/should flag every comments that don't respect this wish as "No Longer Needed".

I strongly disagree. You cannot start an argument and then tell people that they can't argue back. That is not what the site is for. Putting forth an answer is in itself the start of your "argument", and it will be treated as such.

What you are essentially asking is "I want to be able to answer questions and spout my opinions, without those contributions ever being open to scrutiny". That is antithetical to SE's purpose. SE thrives off of incremental improvements. If a question is unclear or an answer is incomplete or inaccurate, it can be improved by the community (and by yourself) using proper feedback.

If you are putting a question, answer or comment out there, you should be prepared for possible criticism. It is your responsibility to make your contributions the best they can be.

If you want one-sided communication like that, I heard Twitter is still popular these days.

I'm terrified every time I write a question over here and I make myself ready for a fight every time I write an answer.

I don't dare to look at comments or answers anymore and, if I see a rude/abusive comment, I'm dreadful to report it in chat because I don't want to be shout out for it.

The melodrama does little to further the OP's cause. It is inappropriate for a place that professes itself to be a Q&A site

This site is all about getting answers.
It's not a discussion forum.
There's no chit-chat.

Welcome to Stack Overflow

Since September, @BelovedFool has posted several times with a common narrative. Namely, Stack Exchange is not a safe place for them, that it is, generally speaking, unfriendly to the LGBTQ+ community, that MSE users are basically unwelcoming and systematically flood the OP's inbox with hurtful, cruel, unsolicited messages.

Meta is burning with hatred and heinous speech and SE Inc. is nowhere to be seen.

But this is Meta, where a user posts a question that was also asked in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014… will be hit with 10 downvotes within the first 5 minutes and their question closed as a duplicate. This is Meta, the habitat of users who are programmers, mathematicians, developers, engineers, and academics because Meta is about statistics, rules, standardised policies, feature requests and finding solutions to software problems that are (or used to be) related to the platform. Meta is also the home of complaints and protests about announced changes in SE's policies.

This CoC is going to end up as a stick to beat up people with. We already notice a fair amount of unnecessary flagging, especially in chat. With the threshold for "offensive" now officially reduced to "at least one person found it offensive", expect more drama in the days to come. (July, 2018)

The above was a comment posted on We'd like your feedback on our new Code of Conduct!

It is the tavern where you will hear an irate 1 rep user, blustering against Stack Overflow's policy of anonymous downvoting, to be then instantly knocked-down with a -20 score.

To the downvoter: at least have the courage to make clear who you are and why you downvoted it. Or offer a better alternative. Have you missed the new Code of Conduct? source

Meta means murder, a newcomer needs to grow thick skin if they want to post something that goes against the grain and culture of Stack Overflow. They need a certain mettle to handle criticism; just look at the level of animosity that CTOs, CM leaders, Directors (mmm…) have had to endure in recent weeks, mostly in stoic silence. But with the exception of Monica Cellio, whose case is unique, I have never witnessed a Stack Exchange executive or its management be disrespectful or hurtful towards any user, while Community Managers (also paid employees) and mods (volunteers) have always sought, to the best of my knowledge, to be considerate, unbiased and helpful to any contributor who asked–politely–for assistance and guidance.

Meta is not a haven of compassion that was never its role to begin with.

I have accepted it for what it is. Neither one of us can change the nature of the beast. It is what it is.

There are; however, numerous other SE sites which would be more congenial to the OP's gentle spirit and inclination. Sites which are run by equally hardworking contributors and mods, people whose mindsets are more flexible and forgiving than, say, those of Stack Overflow.

First and foremost, Interpersonal Skills, followed closely by English Language for Learners that successfully puts into practice a culture of tolerance, acceptance, kindness and evenhandedness, which should lead as an example. Followed by The Great Outdoors and, I would also recommend Writing. These are far friendlier sites with far less drama that currently resides in MSE. In a comment the OP admitted

Reading not nice stuff here makes my anxiety and depression worse. It hasn't done it yet but it could send me in a panic attack

There's a saying,

If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen

The Phrase Finder defines the expression as

Don't persist with a task if the pressure of it is too much for you. The implication being that, if you can't cope, you should leave the work to someone who can.

Listen to constructive criticism, try to see the other person's point of view, reflect before posting an outburst, revise your first and second and third draft before pressing that submit button. Be prepared to displease some people but listen to tips and advice from those who have been around longer than you. Stick to your guns, without being pig-headed, if you know you are right and have evidence to support your argument.

I don't dare to look at comments or answers anymore and, if I see a rude/abusive comment, I'm dreadful to report it in chat because I don't want to be treated like a witch that needs to be burned.

_{(emphasis mine)}

Why would you report it in chat and make yourself a target?

Flagging exists to keep you shielded from retribution if that's what you're afraid of.

People should be able to answer a question and be done with it. They shouldn't have to fear endless criticism and fight and comments war.

I don't agree with this, at all.

We've always been able to challenge and critique ideas and I don't believe that should change. What has certainly changed in this emotionally charged environment is that we no longer assume good faith (and in some instances, I can see why) in the challenges/critique being made. Just because someone levels criticism at a post, doesn't mean they dislike the person that wrote it or are "after" them.

And I, strongly believe that every voice is valuable. That driving away people that are afraid of conflicts, people with low self-esteem, people with anxiety issues, that driving away all those people and even more is a terrible thing.

Realistically, there will be disagreements and conflict - we're on the Internet after all - but it doesn't have to be unpleasant, it can be handled respectfully. I'm not sure how we'd be able to retain people who can't handle respectful disagreements (and I don't say this insensitively).

So, what can we do, as a community, to help make this place a safer one?

Be respectful.

Note that I'm also not talking about what SE Inc. or mods can do. The responsibility of all this isn't and shouldn't be on their own shoulders.

We, as a community, are the ones screaming and making this place unfriendly. We are the ones that are at each other throat. We are the ones that are fighting in comments, about comments, around comments.

Not SE Inc, not the mods, us, the community.

You've been a member for 1 year and 2 months, though the rifts between the company and the community have widened drastically within that period, the issues go back a lot further. It isn't possible to solve this in a vacuum. All parties need to be held responsible for whatever part they've played in this breakdown.

_{(I touched upon why this will be even harder to achieve now that the "community" has fragmented further into subgroups in this answer of mine)}

So, what can we do, as a community, to help make this place friendlier and safer again?

What can we do to make sure that, even if the mods aren't available, even if there are no diamonds around to erase all the bad things that are said, what can we do to make sure (as much as we can) that this place keep being safe and friendly?

In so far as what the "standard" users (i.e. non mod users) can do, we're rather limited to the tools that are at our disposal, so, do your normal flagging and down-voting.

I, personally, wouldn't recommend engaging with an individual who is being belligerent because it might escalate the situation further (as has been my experience previously), but it's your call.

The problem is that this question,

What can we do, as a community, to help make MSE a friendlier place again?

is predicated upon a false premise. Meta Stack Exchange (MSE) never really was a friendly place. It's not intended to be a chat room, forum, or blog; it's a place for people to come with suggestions and questions about the Stack Exchange (SE) network. That requires a degree of professional decorum and that's really about it.

It's a very flawed premise to assume that when someone is acting in a professional manner that they are being friendly or that being friendly is even required for them to do so. Kind of like the old trope about how your bartender actually hates you, are acting friendly because their job is predicated upon emotional labor. MSE is built upon the same structure of professional relationships: while people shouldn't walk around being intentionally belligerent, things are quite structured and transactional. You ask a question to the group at large, and they provide zero or more answers back, perhaps with some comments to clarify. I suspect the overwhelming majority of users are comfortable with this approach, which is why they might be out of the loop when it comes to social issues. Effectively, there's a lot of things that don't really come up at most workplaces and a lot of the SE sites are seen as extension of the workplace.

Effectively, this means that one of the ways to make MSE a "friendlier" place again is for people to lower their expectations. This doesn't mean that people are allowed to be jerks - jerks get fired in the workplace! - but it does mean that I have no real expectation for my colleagues to ask me about my personal life or anything. It's a system that works because we all have the same vision as to why we are somewhere. I might find some comments to be quite blunt at times, but it's also not really personal. Likewise, in the workplace if I need to tell a subordinate to go back and do something again, it's not personal, the work just needs to be brought up to standards.

Note that I'm not really addressing chat here. Chat is a completely different situation all together and one that I personally avoid.

When used for open-ended discussion, SE comment threads have an marked tendency to degenerate into shouting matches, in no small measure due to limitations of the comment format itself. To have better odds against that, it is a good idea to take some care when commenting so that the opportunities for escalation are minimised. Some things that are helpful:

• Consider not posting a comment if the point it would raise was already made in the discussion. That is specially important if the point has just been raised by several people replying directly to a specific person.

• Steer clear from personal attacks, and avoid superfluous charged language. In the heat of the moment, it is easy to get carried away and make an otherwise constructive point in an inflammatory way.

• Be wary of engaging in unproductive discussions, and disengage as soon as you feel the discussion won't lead anywhere.

What I see here is lots of people talking past each other, looking for ways to attack "the other side", and generally assuming bad faith in what "the other side" is saying. This will never lead to a solution. Best case, it leads to people leaving until "one side" is all that's left.

The solution starts with everyone. Everyone should:

LISTEN

Read what other people say with an open mind. Read with the view that these are other human beings with opinions and feelings. Read with the idea not of responding but with the idea of understanding what they are saying.

PAUSE AND THINK

Don't immediately respond. Let things percolate. Consider. Don't just look at ways to find the perfect debate response. Try to read through the lens of disinterest to see what the other person is actually saying, and actually means from their perspective.

PAUSE SOME MORE

If your blood is up, stop. Go get some coffee, play some video games, watch some TV, read a book. If you post with emotion, you are contributing to the problem, not the solution.

RESPOND WITH FAIRNESS

Look for responses that open up lines of communication. Spend as many words on points of agreement as points of disagreement. Look for ways to compliment the other party. Admit mistakes. (We all make mistakes, every one of us.)

The mantra of good will and inclusiveness is this: "I screwed up, we succeeded". Compliment others, approach yourself with self-deprecation, admit mistakes, look for compromise, not victory.

THIS MEANS YOU

Above all, don't assume this advice is for someone else, whether you are an individual user, a moderator or an SE employee. We're all human beings, and being in a position of power makes you no less susceptible to emotion. It only makes your emotionally driven actions more damaging.

Additional to the core Be Nice I would suggest some restraint.
Duplode's answer already touches on this.

• If someone comments on an answer, then a 3rd person comments on the first commenter, do you think commenting on person number 3 still adds useful stuff?
  This is different from If a situation makes it hard to be friendly, stop participating and move on. It is asking yourself if your opinion is really so important that you have to write it down.³
  In the current atmosphere, I suggest the answer is remarkably often No - it is better to let the thread die down.
  And as Mary-Lou nicely phrases in the last paragraph of her answer: "Listen to constructive criticism, try to see the other person's point of view, reflect before posting an outburst, revise your first and second and third draft before pressing that submit button"
  You don't have to react.

• Are you assuming? If you count the number of assumptions in posts over last few weeks, it is enormous¹.
  People assume X and then write their opinions about X.
  This is basic human behavior, we do this all the time². But knowing that, is it really worth posting your assumptions? At the least, say that/what you're assuming.

¹ I'm not going to point to examples, thus naming names, and maybe make people going to defend themselves ("I did not!") That is exactly the kind of noise we need less of. I'm inviting everyone to see this as an exercise for the reader.
² Reading material 1, 2, 3 etc.
³ Don't forget those I agree comments with an additional argument/opinion.

Talking about "exercises for the reader":
I challenge you to think twice before commenting ;-)

@Glorfindel has a good answer regarding the old "Be Nice" policy, which IMO is everything the community can do.

The Problem

... is that the community's trust in SE has been damaged. The new FAQ, though IMO far from perfect, is a massive improvement over the old one - mostly because compelled speech got booted out.

Another problem that harmed the trust is how they de-modded Monica, and their subsequent awful handling of the community response. I'm not entirely sure how they would have to go around fixing this, but a public apology specifically to Monica in person, along with public revocation of unsubstantiated accusations, would go a long way.

So... what can we, the community, do?

Not much. We can assume good intent from SE, but that's not something that's going to rebuild trust. In my opinion, what we should do is keep calm, explain our trust issues in a calm manner, try to stay constructive, and keep calm.

The only way forward, whether we like it or not, is SE and the community together.

When people have differences they can negotiate or they can fight. If fighting breaks out there are two options: one side surrenders or they decide to negotiate.

Why does one side surrender? Because the fighting and/or the consequences harm them. In order to drive one side to surrender the other side must be willing to inflict some sort of harm. What's more, the vast majority of people suffer harm when they harm someone else.

That's pretty messed up, and it's why people choose negotiation and compromise instead. Negotiation means that people understand each other and figure out a way for everyone to get something they want. That is usually impossible unless everyone is willing to give up something they want.

How do we make MSE a friendlier place? Negotiate. Yield. Compromise. There is no other way. Winning a conflict is pointless for anyone who cannot do that. They will only attempt to solve future disagreements with conflict. They will never be happy - not when they lose, and not even when they win.

That's the answer: Negotiate, compromise, yield.

I honestly feel that the only way to resolve this drama and to make meta nicer is for everyone to slow down and show some empathy. If people are able to understand where the other side is coming from and accept those fears then I feel we could finally push past all of the political bull**** and come to a mutual understanding. Anyways, that’s just my thoughts.

Flag comments for deletion

I don't dare to look at comments or answers anymore and, if I see a rude/abusive comment, I'm dreadful to report it in chat because I don't want to be shout out for it.

Then IMO you are not using the tools at hand that can help with this.

People should be able to ask a question on MSE without fearing to be schooled for it. They should be able to suggest new, unusual, ideas to be screamed at because people disagree with the premise of their question.

People should be able to answer a question and be done with it. They shouldn't have to fear endless criticism and fight and comments war.

There's a tool here that can help. Flagging comments.

Once you have answered a question, and taken into account any comments that are constructive (i.e. they help you improve the answer) you flag all comments under your answer for deletion.

And then: move on and don't look back. Don't let the venom spitters get you down.

This isn't a forum; take the approach that you will not treat it as one. (That took me a while to grok as I encountered SE-ness a few years back)

This takes effort. Often, things worth doing take effort.

There is no easy button.

Because, if people are afraid to ask good faith questions, if they are afraid to suggest anything, if they are afraid to answer questions, then they will stop doing it.

I think that Jeff Atwood might suggest that this is the stack working as designed, but I guess we've moved out of the Atwood era.

I believe that you need to ask that as a separate question, because Questions and Answers have different values on Stacks, in general. So I'll recommend something to you:

• Make this a question in two parts, because I think it's too broad.

• Question 1 has to do with your concern about getting flamed for answers.

• QUestion 2 has to do with being attacked for simply asking a question.

• These seem to me to be two related but separate problems.

Thanks for raising this issue.