There seems to be a signal of intent there; some people are accidentally senseless jerks (including yours truly), and a simple reprimand is enough to tone it back. By contrast, the sort this seems to be aimed at would likely scoff it off. I guess like "Hey man, don't be a jerk" followed by either "Oh sorry, didn't mean any offense" or "Hey! I'm not a jerk!"

Like many moderation policies, I guess we can just hope the moderators are, well, moderate.