We still don't know what happened, mods haven't explained yet.
Iβd assume it was the trolls, they decided to go crazy.
Did you block Dio? Always a good first step. Occasionally, threads can be returned with some comments removed. I doubt it will happen in this case: too much to go through.
If the trolls "went crazy", they certainly should have been blocked immediately. The mods see it as irresponsible to allow a high level of, sort of, uncouth comments. I must admit that loads of childish comments by trolls are tedious and they ruin threads, so they should be blocked. The other thing is that there probably was a conspiracy among the obvious suspects to shut the thread down.
They always get sarcastic and very defensive when such things are mentioned. They pretend there's no troll cabal and represent every such suspicion as delusion. I don't know whether they imagine they'll be believed when they protest their innocence or if they just deny it to keep up appearances. Depends on how intelligent they aren't. They might be so dim they don't know they're doing it; but I doubt that.


Well the other reason I didn't block them, was because in addition to my free speech stance, blocking prevents people from posting in any thread started by the OP. I feel it is unfair if they couldn't post any chess content in my chess topics (main reason I hate being blocked as well so didn't want to be a hypocrite).
Blocking someone should only block them in the thread you blocked them in. Also, if they turn your thread into a dumpster fire, I think itβs safe to block them.