It's one thing for partners in a committed relationship to idly check out others and make comments about them to each other - quite another for someone to do it in a new, young relationship with no real commitment. The problem here is that for the LW, the people her boyfriend is checking out count as competition. He's not with her in any permanent sense; he may call her tomorrow and say he's moving on. It bodes ill for the relationship that he's willing to make her uncomfortable.

My husband and I freely check out other people (although not in such a way that the other people notice - that's just rude.) I know where his allegiance lies, and he knows the same about me. He jokes that a certain handsome waiter is my "boyfriend," and I've been known to point out attractive women to him. I don't think it would be healthy to live in a dream world where I believed my husband had gone blind to the sexual attractiveness of every other woman alive when he married me.

I know I sound like brightstar, but there's another frequently-neglected group of anorexics: men. One of my internet friends is a 17-year-old boy who has been in and out of the hospital for treatment of anorexia.

To the person who said anorexics who kill themselves are a statistical blip: As many as 20% of anorexics die, often from heart problems. And an estimated 5% of young girls are anorexic. That's not a blip.

I got mine from the British health service website. Where are you getting YOUR statistic? I think you are lying.

Did y'all miss that the LW's mother will be dead by the time he reaches her? It's a little late, and more than a little cruel, to tell him to go see her before she dies.

I'm so sorry. You are not the worst son in the world; this happens. My makeup artist is Korean, and one day she seemed depressed and I asked her what was wrong and her mother was dying swiftly and painfully of pancreatic cancer, far away in North Korea, and there was no legal way for her to visit even if she had wanted to. I called my own mom (which I hadn't done in a while) and burst into tears on the phone. Think that at least maybe your letter will make someone here call home before it's too late.

...would be to join the people standing up.

I don't blame you for not saying anything. Someone who has already demonstrated a lack of manners isn't likely to take well to public correction by a stranger.

I have several comments on this.

First, the most virulent trolls are usually not the anonymous ones. There are several posters, and you know who they are, who consistently make posts with no other content than attacks on other posters. There is one - and it appears to be just one - anonymous troll - who hangs out on broadsheet, smelling up the place. Likewise there's one troll who likes to hang out at Greenwald's. But for that one troll there are many useful, kindly people posting anonymously.

Second: Broadsheet is a disgrace to your site. If you won't moderate it, close it. As matters stand, it's a little like a schoolroom run by the bullies. In real life I don't go to places full of guys who like to hang out and abuse women; I'm not going to do it online, either.

Third: I approve of the suggestion made by another poster to prevent "sock puppeting". If someone posts anonymously, assign them a number for that thread so people can follow them. In addition, I would like to see the ability to block the posts of other users. Or at least for fuck's sake put the poster's name at the TOP OF THE POST instead of the bottom so that I can choose to skip letters by people who are consistently evil. Assigning a consistent identity to anonymous posters in a thread would facilitate the ability to identify and ignore trolls.

Fourth: I'd hate to lose the ability to post anonymously. I do it when I want to discuss children's issues using situations from my family.

Salon has some hard-core trolls, and I think they should be required to play by the rules - no personal attacks, period. If an otherwise well-written letter contains a personal attack, delete it; let the poster rewrite it in a civilized fashion. That's what other sites consider a bare minimum of civility, that the people who visit them can post without being personally attacked. In addition, most other sites have rules against hate speech. It's not difficult for a moderator to figure out the difference between a reasoned argument that perhaps feminism hasn't been a boon to all women and a statement like, "Bitches just want money."

One other thing - and perhaps I should just let this go, but I can't - I have to take issue with the statement that Salon's readers are something to be proud of, because this is, hands-down, the most close-minded crowd I've ever encountered, anywhere, period. I wouldn't want to post under my own name if I happened to disagree with the party line either. Evangelical Christian? Unashamed meat-eater? Believe in spanking? Believe life begins at conception? Think now is not a good time to pull out of Iraq? Don't expect to be treated with civility here, no matter how graciously your post is phrased, because the majority of the readership thinks it's impossible to hold these opinions unless you crawled out from under a rock. This is not a friendly place for people who don't toe the line. Any enforcement will need to be even-handed, based on clear standards of conduct, not along ideological lines.