Thanks for the response. I will agree with what you are saying. I did not consider that it ever got to the point where it was "just" a shit slinging contest. I will also concede that I have a higher tolerance of shit stained walls than most, and my judgement may have been skewed by memories of what BG was in the past rather than what it became.
Who knows? If you ever read about the human memory and how extraordinarily inaccurate it is you will know that I can not judge what Bellgab was actually like at any point in it's existence... I do seem to recall that I enjoyed it (and my proof is that I was there regular for years reading, posting and interacting.)
By that standard- I must enjoy it here (and I do...) 
I found BellGab right after Art left Coast after Ghost to Ghost 2010. I was looking for news about what happened and found BG. I was hooked. Lurked from late 2010 on regularly. There were a lot of really smart people on there, a lot of really funny people on there. Some shitheads too, but there are shitheads everywhere. I really enjoyed BG for years. I felt like part of the gang even though I didn't join.
I noticed an influx of new posters after Art left MitD that kind of got the ball of ugliness rolling. Then some of the longtime posters started to leave and even more new ones came on that just wanted to troll. I like a good troll, it can be funny, but some of it was pretty nasty. I got bored with the constant trolling, just got old, and the racist/homophobic stuff was way over the top. But BG before that was a good place, lot of talented people with interesting things to say. I think the big increase in shit slinging toward the end left a bad taste in a lot of peoples' mouths and that's why they (me included) see EllGab as respite from that.
I enjoy reading your posts here, and I think there's a danger in over-generalization of BG to include all posters there as being shit slingers. Yes, it got bad toward the end, but for the most part it was an interesting, entertaining place before it got overrun with trolls. BG was a staple of my daily routine. I was actually disappointed to see how it deteriorated.
Apologies to you if it seemed like I was lumping you and others at BG in with the late-arriving shit slinging crowd, that was not my intention. I'm due for a flogging anyway
