First, Steve in South Africa, you don't have a clue about cat sailing in America.
You just hung spins on your already successful Mosquito class and called yourself F16s.
That is not an option here.
My comments refer to the conditions, marketplace and demographics here, IN AMERICA.
I also want to reiterate that I believe that Jim Boyer has designed and built excellent boats.

"Seems like someone"
I, and many others, have been discovering and exposing wouters lies for several years now. I wouldn't trust him to tell me the correct time.
EX: On 3/21/02 wouter posted: "I'm building Taipan hulls right now" . Then on 4/16/02 he posted: "I have the plans and they are real. I'm hoping to finish my boat this summer" One month he is building hulls and the next month he gets plans.
I have saved many examples of his proving himself a liar.
"FOOL ME ONCE, SHAME ON YOU, FOOL ME TWICE, SHAME ON ME"
I also know that Kirt Simmons changes boats whenever the wind shifts.
I was not at all surprised to see that he has abandoned the class that he talked so much about a short time ago.
The AMERICAN Class organization is in disarray.
Maybe the two new people will stick with it and make something happen.

"Is it that someone can buy or even home-build a 16ft boat that is "almost as fast as an F18" that upsets you?"
Earth to Steve, there are plenty of factory or home-built boats that are faster than an F18 IN AMERICA.

"Or is it that if your crew doesn`t pitch up, you CAN`T take the jib off & go sailing on an equal or similar footing to your mates?"
There are less than TWENTY f16 scattered across America.
They can't get half of them to their own National Championships.
There is no place IN AMERICA, and won't be in the near future, where an f16 can show up and have their choice of a single or double-handed class to race in.
IN AMERICA, 99% of the time a Taipan or f16 sailor will be alone, racing in the open fleet.

"Whatever your reasons, there`s no real need to keep on putting another class down"
If reality, IN AMERICA, is a putdown then too bad, change the reality.

"Everyone thinks their own boat is the greatest, that`s why they chose it in the first place."
BULL! Most of the time it is what ever boat they can find in their price range.
Whenever a person asks for advice about which boat to buy, the standard advice is to decide what type of racing they want to do and to look around their area and see what boats are being raced.
If there is any Class racing available, you don't recommend a boat that is going to always put them in the open fleet.

"Why call F16 a "overweight wanna-be A Class" ? Why even compare the two?"
DUH, because that is exactly what Class that wouter targeted.
He has said so many times.
Look at his website.
Look at the "David and Goliath Cup page.
He refers to the A Class as a "prey class".

"Must a Tornado sailor also have two boats - no, he must just live with the fact that he can`t race single-handed,"
Wrong again. He can take off his jib and/or spin and race in the open class with the one f16.

"If your friend said he was looking for a boat that had a chute, could be sailed with crew, and occasionally without, and didn`t weigh 300 lbs, would you still tell him that F16 is a bad choice."
YES I WOULD! I would tell him all the things I am trying to tell you. Racing in a standard Class is always better than open fleet.
The reason that a person would ask for advice is that theoretically you know things they don't know.
Remember, the AMERICAN f16 class has already had two people quit and sell their boats.

I know of a specific example which in the end caused the person to quit cat sailing altogether.
This guy(C) had an old friend he worked with and a new friend he was trying to impress at the yacht club he just joined.
The new friend had a Nacra 5.2 that he was trying to sell because he didn't race it anymore.
All the cat sailors at the yacht club had switched to something else.
C talked the old friend into buying the the 5.2 with a lot of flowery promises about regattas.
Of course the 5.2 being a dead boat was always racing in the open fleet against miscellaneous whatever.
New friend became very disappointed in the regatta experience.
He specifically told me how upset he was at C, that he had been talked into buying a boat that had no one to race against.
He quit racing after two years and sold the boat.

So most emphatically, I know of no place or probable set of conditions, IN AMERICA, that would cause me to reccommend an f16 to a friend.
At least not one I wanted to keep.