Bee, in a forum as large as this, there are bound to be a few rotten eggs. In my 2 1-2 years here, I have developed a close comraderie with the good people, and learned to ignore the bad. As Lime said, for every 300 good folks, there are bound to be some bad ones. I would say that the amount of troublemakers or jerks I've encountered is maybe 1 or perhaps 2 percent of the forum, if that many.
One way to weed out the jerks if you choose not to see the fighting, is to place whoever you find offensive on ignore. Go into your private messages box, click it on, even if you have no current messages, then click the edit ignore list button, and write the name of whomever you find offensive in those boxes provided. This way, the offenders can never leave you a private message, and you dont have to see their posts. When you click on a thread, whoever you have on your ignore list, it will just say, this person is on your ignore list, and you wont be able to read their posts. This can help you from not having to see offensive posters or such.
I hope this doesnt sound too negative, Iam just trying to help. Let me again stress, as Lime pointed out, that for every 300 good members, you are bound to have one of a couple of bad ones. For the most part, I can say that I have many friends, and like most of the members here. As for the small percentage of offenders, the ignore list works well for that problem.
Mitch