For someone who posts things like "Not only are you surprisingly easily manipulated, apparently, don't you have better things to hack on?", it takes a lot of temerity to act offended at personal attacks.

There's a difference between giving advice from a position of authority and exploring the subject from a variety of angles. It feels to me as though you're accusing folks doing the latter of engaging in the former. Playing around with an idea and throwing out possibilities--some of them foolish or ill-advised, certainly--is at the core of the hacker culture, and I'd like to discourage you from criticizing people for doing so, while still maintaining your healthy skepticism.