as i figured...
remove_filter( 'the_content', 'wpautop', 10 );<br />
remove_filter( 'the_excerpt', 'wpautop', 10 );<br />
remove_filter( 'bbp_get_reply_content', 'wpautop', 40 );<br />
remove_filter( 'bbp_get_topic_content', 'wpautop', 40 );
is not removing the wautop nonsense that causes an html comment in something like loop-replies.php to get P tags around it because of double line breaks... but it's also not
breaking the wanted functionality where a double line break
in the forum reply editor gives us a new paragraph...