Quite right. Tone matters.

When the Tea Partier down the street implies that the country would be better off if liberals were dead, and one of your fellow commenters on Pharyngula suggests that it’d be better if “Bill” (the creationist that’s been trolling for a week) were to be set on fire and burn alive, you don’t get a free pass to laugh at the Pharyngula comment and get upset at the Tea Partier just because the Pharyngula commenter is right about evolution and the Tea Partier is wrong about public policy. Truth is important, but it’s far from an excuse to whitewash hate and call it something different. Also, just because a person (we don’t know, let’s say her name is Sheril, and she’s a women’s rights advocate) gets upset when you wax poetic about seeing her sexually violated with a knife, that doesn’t mean that what you said becomes funny, or that you can say whatever the hell you want because, somewhere deep down inside, you don’t think you’d ever actually follow through on whatever you’ve said. You have the right to be a hateful asshole if you want, but at least have the intellectual balls to call it what it is: hate. Don’t try to give it Happy New Labels like “humor” or “satire” or “truth” instead.

From one of many excellent posts this anonymous blogger has been making in recent days. Kudos.