Daniel, you know what "schmuck" means in Yiddish, right?

The reason I like the level of language in this essay is that if you're a person who is genuinely being a schmuck, if you prefer, polite warnings to be civil and avoid personal attacks are not speaking your language. When I talk to my schmuck-ish lizard brain, I don't say "please Nepenthe, comment on content" and when trying to communicate with someone else's lizard brain (in the case of mentees/adoptees, I'm much more politic with editors I don't know) I don't say that either.

I can see the argument for professionalism, but I think that it ignores the reality of Wikipedia: we are a group of mostly young, mostly anonymous/pseudonymous internet denizens for whom the Greater Internet F*wad Theory, has some effect. (Call it the "Online disinhibition effect" if you prefer the professional cant.) There are ways that woman friendly websites that I frequent have dealt with this effect: stricter moderation comes immediately to mind, requiring registration comes to mind. Pretending the community is something other than what it is does not come to mind. Policing the use of naughty language also does not come to mind.

I guess I'm not particularly invested in this essay, but it just seems so trivial in comparison to what might actually work rather than what might placate the easily offended who somehow stumble upon this essay. (From what I can tell from "what links here", the it's linked to fewer than 1000 times on en.wikipedia and fewer than 100 times on meta.)

Nepenthe

On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 3:37 PM, Daniel and Elizabeth Case <dancase@frontiernet.net> wrote:

> I've actually been citing this one in presentations for some time, because
> I very much like the sentiment of the essay, but always felt a little
> uncomfortable with "dick" and would've preferred "jerk."

Having sometimes linked to this page in block messages (until I read a
little further down to where it specifically says not to do that sort of
thing), I often wondered if it had been translated into Yiddish, where it
had a better title waiting for it that can be used at least in the English
Wikipedia:

"Don't be a schmuck"

Daniel Case



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