Could you elaborate on

>Usually if it takes work to distinguish it's not worth it within a work environment.

"That's why professional environments are effective and make a pleasant place to work for all."

If there's a missing "if" before the "it's" in his first sentence, I can only assume he means it takes effort to restrain oneself from being unfiltered, but there's an uncanny taste of an insult I can't pinpoint.

I think for clarity I'd add a comma:

> Usually, if it takes work to distinguish, it's not worth it within a work environment.

Such that it's read as:

> Usually, if it takes work to distinguish [whether it's worth it,] it's not worth it within a work environment.

The idea is that in a professional environment, part of "being professional" is avoiding those situations where your comments might be read as unwelcome. With a viable rule of thumb being to just err on the side of assuming they'd be unwelcome in any case where you have to think about it.

I see now looking through that lense it makes sense. After re-reading my comment he was replying to I think I understand exactly what the OP was trying to convey.

"If you have to consciously figure out if comments are malevolent or not, you should find a new workplace."

And that "that's why professional environments are effective and make a pleasant place to work for all," implies more real work is done when you're not playing office politics, and everyone comes out happier because of it.

In retrospect, it seems like a silly thing to try and figure out.