I noticed.  Although meticulous evidence-gathering was more important (as was a lack of finnicky reasons to not include you), it is a part of why I included you on v1.0 of my refreshed trust list:  I place more trust in people whom I expect will not kowtow to smear campaigns, mudslinging, emotional manipulation, etc.  The same criterion was a point in favour of Lauda, TMAN, actmyname, The Pharmacist, and several key staff members and/or Bitcoin Core devs who have demonstrated track records of standing their ground against extreme personal attacks.

The ability to resist pressure is necessary but insufficient to exercise trustworthy judgment.  The weak-willed are ipso facto untrustworthy, for in the end, they don’t really exercise their own judgment at all; bad people can simply browbeat them into submission.

I think it’s important to mention this.  With the newly democratized DT, I fear that DT will slowly devolve into a popularity contest for who can best pander, flatter, and curry favour—i.e., politicians who not only bend to ill-motivated sticks, but also dangle carrots to actively exploit the underlying human frailties to their advantage.  To be worthy of DT, you need to be at least a little bit of what many people would consider “a jerk”—not for the hell of it, not for trollish purposes, but just because you need to be ruthless and tough as nails against bad people who will try to sway you any way they can, by hook or by crook.

---

A reasonable question.