At the risk of being one of those "high alert" lunatics, Um, John, maybe it's you who are taking this too seriously
This is a bonsai forum. People are talking bonsai. It is a highly concentrated atmosphere of people interested in one thing--which makes it a very weird, unpredictable, sometimes bombastic, place. This is true for ANY specialized club, society, etc. Believe me, my mom showed dogs professionally when I was a kid and I grew up as kennel help. I went to plenty of those meetings. If you think bonsai is bad, you oughtta get a load of a local (or regional, or national)kennel club meeting.
Good Lord, what a bunch of loony toons
If you're looking for a "teacher" here, you may have noticed that's pretty catch as catch can. The Internet is a great leveler of organizational and intellectual heirarchy. Looking for a leader on the Internet is a little illogical when everyone's raw opinion is of equal face value and you have no real way of knowing who's who or what they're up to.
This place has no real bearing on reality. It's cyberspace and different rules apply. People feel free to say all kinds of things all over the web they wouldn't say in person--good or bad, like it or not.
What may come off as "intense," "unbalanced," or idiotic, could be someone just noodling around with his/her thoughts, or it could be some psychotic with a twisted agenda
. You will never know. The best approach I think to all of this is with a grain of salt and large scoop of humor.
That doesn't mean it can't be informative. It can. Take what you will. Leave what you don't want. Glean the diamonds from the quartz.
For what it's worth, I have a life outside here. A great one. I enjoy bonsai as a hobby, an outlet, but hardly the center of the universe. This is an amusing passtime for me between deadlines, nothing more. I like the give and take and the stuff you can pick up occasionally. I also like to argue with the occasional lunatic or 'pretender." It's fun and sometimes informative. It's never dead serious for me.
For what it's worth, I have met several of the folks I've talked to on line. They are nothing like they sounded, or they are exactly like they sounded. You can't tell and it will drive you mad trying to tell which ones are which.