When I was a little girl in the 1950s and 60s we were told to be passive
and pray for what we wanted. Thank heavens self-actualization and womens
liberation came along and we discovered "well-behaved women seldom make
history." (Nicely covered at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurel_Thatcher_Ulrich )
If we want the guys to change we gotta keep busting their chops about
being civil, within the limits of civility of course. On a one on one
basis, day after day after day. And even though no matter how civil we
are, SOME of them still will think it is we who are being uncivil.
It's a dirty job, but it's gotta be done.
And the more guys who help promote civility and are willing to counter
the good-old-boy mentality, the better... :-)
On 7/3/2014 3:18 PM, Sydney Poore wrote:
There was an attempt to address the civility problem
on Wikipedia
English with a top down approach at the very start of Sue Gardner's
time at WMF. Sue, Jimmy Wales, myself, and a group of half dozen other
people talked about it in a closed group. It failed because a top down
approach is not effective on Wikipedia because policies can not be
enforced from the top. Policies need to be made that a large part of
the community agrees at proper and enforceable.
I would be willing to assist a group that wants to take another run at
it. But there are significant challenges with enforcing a civility
policy on a global community where cultural norms differ at great
deal. So, we need to be careful that an attempt to assist one group of
users does not make it harder for other groups of people who are also
under represented on Wikipedia English.