[Wikipedia-l] Helga banned

[Jaap van Ganswijk]

Some clarifications...

I got two personal reactions and I read all the comments.

At 2002-09-09 22:19 +0200, Jaap van Ganswijk wrote:
>At 2002-09-09 10:19 -0700, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>>After much deliberation, and after due consideration for all of the
>>arguments and discussions here, and taking into account what appears
>>to me to be a general consensus, I have chosen to ban Helga for a
>>period of 3 months.
>
>Banned from what? This list? The English Wikipedia. All Wikipedia?

Jimmy Wales explained to me that she was banned from all
Wikipedia and therefore not from this list.

>What I object most to, it that the subject itself may have
>been disallowed to right to rebuttle.

Perhaps I overreacted a bit, but I was thinking about
cases where people were removed from mailing lists in
days when the mailing list was the medium and the meta
medium or a case of a political debating mailing list
where people objected to a mailing list becoming linked
to a public and archieved newsgroup and someone changing
that after only a very short period in which the people
who were against it didn't have enough time to discuss
it and after the list was made public they didn't want
to/couldn't discuss it in public anymore. There was even
a vote, but it turned out to be handled very badly.

>>After that time, she can reapply to me personally for re-instatement.
>
>Sure, and some sex on the side.

Of course I didn't mean sex literally her, as at least
one other person understood. Most of you Americans are
so tight-assed about sex.

>>I know that not everyone will be happy with this decision, although
>>the vast majority will be.
>
>Not me.

By the way, I'm not against banning Helga if she
causes the trouble that she seems to do. I just
object to aspects of Jimmy's email about it and I
have doubts about the procedure and about the
period of banning. Personally I saw that fact that
Helga joined this mailing list as a very good sign.
And over time I'm sure she will learn how to quote
correctly... ;-)

And she responded very reasonably to various remarks
by others.

I have also looked at some of here articles among one
in German and didn't find much bias in it.

She seems indeed to be in denial of the holocaust
as most Germans and German media were during several
decades after the war (and perhaps still), at least
they didn't report about what actually happened
during the war. We can receive German television here
in the Netherlands and it's amazing how 'closed' the
German media still are in some regards.

By the way, the first time I encountered 'revisionism'
around 1996, I was also puzzled for a while. Was it really
a big lie that our elders had tought us about the war?
As a scientifically trained professional I didn't
immediately believe the new 'evidence' of course,
but what struck me most was that I had never seen
foto's or film's about actual gas chambers. After
focussing on this some more I did find foto's etc.
the fact that there is relatively little material
available is probably due to the fact that most
of the extermination camps were located to the east
of Germany and they were liberated by the Soviets
who didn't have much camera's and film to spare at
that time.

As regards an international jewish organization
declaring war on Germany: The first time I heard
about this was from revisionist sites. I never
heard about this from all the stories told by
older family members, but of course it may have
been true and for the time being I assume it's
true, but it doesn't allow a government to take
the measures against jews as the German government
took.

Of course a government has to be careful. The USA
put all Japanese inhabitants in camps in world war 2
and rightfully so. You don't want to be backstabbed
when trying to win a war. After the terror attack
of september 11'th last year a lot of muslims were
arrested in the USA without proper legal reasons,
but these things are justified by the unclear situation
I think.

>>Such is the nature of consensus.
>
>The nature of consensus is that you achieve it first.

The problem with consensus which isn't properly
measured is that the person 'measuring' the consensus
may have a bias and may interpret what people say
in his own subjective way.

I propose that some sort of voting mechanism is
installed. Just give all people on this list an
opportunity to vote.

One should write a message saying: I propose to
ban person X because .... Person X can then explain
him/herself and votes will be counted durign a week
or so.

>>I can't wait for unanimity, or we will wait forever.
>
>Is there some voting mechanism or did you just ask your
>friends?

This is the hand-on way I tried to express the above
notion of 'subjective'.

>>Even here, on the mailing list, where I invited
>>her to discuss these issues, she prefers to ignore discussions about
>>her posting style
>
>Huh, you expect someone obviously new to the mailing
>list fenomenon to immediately reflect on her own behaviour?

I noticed that Helga didn't quote 'very efficiently'
and that is often a sign that one is new to mailing
lists.

I manage several mailing lists and have also followed
the personal progress of people new to mailing and
noticed that most of them catch-on very quickly, just
by copying what they see others do.

>>In order to contribute to a restoration of the peace, I will be mostly
>>avoiding further public comment, although everyone who likes is more
>>than invited to write to me privately to support or decry this
>>decision.
>
>And since this was done in public, I do this in public.

The problem with taking discussions like these to the
personal level (and I have years of experience) is that
one forgets what one has said in private and what in
public. The same goes for crossposting to several
mailing lists by the way.

>>Helga, in particular, is welcome to write to me to discuss this,
>
>Sure and in exchange for sex perhaps?

Again, I meant that I dislike the notion that she
would have to discuss these things with you personally.
You shouldn't take this as that I suggest that you
were trying to extort sexual favors from Helga.

And no, I don't imagine Helga to be a blonde teutonic
goddess as someone suggested. ;-) If I remember
correctly Helga is already quite old.

Greetings,
Jaap

PS. Would it be possible that people use their real name
on this mailing list and in personal email? Please use
something like I do in my 'from address'. I don't think
it's civil to presend oneself as a movie with Philip Glass
music in it, however good the music is. I have the CD...