[BubRoss]

There is a difference between attacking someone and being blunt. If you want to ban people and scold them for being blunt then you might as well say that, but to say this is attacking someone is not reasonable. It would be different if there was some sort of uniformity to this, but it seems more like a self righteous crusade to get people to apologize to you personally for not sugar coating what they say.

[dredmorbius]

I've occasionally bit my tongue really hard in not calling someone an idiot outright.

Semi-recent example (shared previously w/ dang):

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22133112

The person I'd replied to ... thanked me.

Your reply reads better without the attacks.

[dang]

I don't need you or anyone to apologize to me personally. The only issue is whether you'll abide by the site guidelines in the future.

Interpretation is part of applying the rules, but I don't think there's so much variance in how we interpret them. Something like that gets pretty regular and tedious after you've done it a hundred thousand times.