A couple things. First, other people breaking the rules doesn't make it ok for you to do so, and you were by far the worst instigator in this thread. It's not helpful to point fingers at others in such a case. We need you to follow the rules regardless of what other people do.
Second, people certainly shouldn't be posting personal attacks—I tell HN users not to do that all the time: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que.... If there were personal attacks in this thread that I didn't respond to, that's most likely because I didn't see them. It's certainly nothing personal or specific to you in any way. You've been a great HN user for years! (except for the flamewar comments)