MILES to GO || before I sleep

Whatever happened to the good ol' days on MLs when the most basic of rules was "no top-posting"? Why is it so hard for people to delete the messages that came before when they're responding to an email on a mailing list? I mean, if you think people will be confused (because you're making direct reference to a specific statement), go ahead and snip so they can understand from context, but at least put your reply JUST above or JUST below that particular statement-- not above an entire email or digest of the previous emails, and not below it, either. It just clogs up my inbox and makes the new things so much harder to find and read.