I like to read the threads in the "Forum Announcements" folder because I like knowing what goes on behind the scenes of things. (Anything, really, not just the forum.) I do see a lot of threads in which people talk about favoritism, about certain people being able to get away with being rude while others are chastised by the mods for what they see as minor comments.
To be honest, I don't really track posters well enough to pick out patterns involving specific people (i.e., whoever would be classified as "favorites"). I tend to just read the comments without looking to see who wrote them, unless I really agree or disagree with them.

I
have noticed a few inconsistencies lately; for example, there was a recent thread that I felt was getting into personal insults, where I was kind of like

when I read some of the responses. I was discussing it in PM with some people and I know at least one person reported the thread to the mods. Yet, the thread never got locked, nor did a mod post to chastise anyone. (Obviously, if any posters were PM'd by mods to chastise them, I wouldn't know about that.) In contrast, I've seen a few locked threads recently where I could not divine why it had gotten locked, as none of the responses I read were rude, and the threads were short and had not really "run their course" yet.
But, are these inconsistencies the result of--as PPs said--a handful of mods and hundreds of threads, coupled with the subjective nature of "rude" comments? Or are they due to favoritism and mods locking threads that they personally dislike, especially those critical of some aspect of the forum? I honestly can't say; I'm not good at detecting that kind of thing. But, I find it worrisome that so many people--at least, people who post publicly--think that it's the latter. It does tend to make me a bit paranoid about posting sometimes.
I am going to post this, then go back and read the rest of the thread; because I have a feeling this thread is headed for lockdown...