On Sat, Feb 19, 2005 at 12:51:46PM +0100, Anthere wrote:
Non making any comment on whether the person should be unsysoped or not unsysoped, I think that as soon as editors question the action of a sysop or not, it is worth listening and considering.
I think TBSDY's actions here were entirely justified. As soon as an editor makes threats against another editors, the threatener needs to be taken off the project. The alternative is to let the situation fester, ruining articles and eventually leading to us seeing an article on Wikinews entitled, "Encyclopedia editor killed by online stalker".
Nonetheless ...
There is an easy way to do this : have it a requirement that listing the person on the admin/deadmin list be made by a sysop himself.
There is a model wherein privileges are conferred upon persons in recognition of innate virtues, and it is presumed that whatever these persons care to do with those privileges, they will do so in ways conformant to those innate virtues. The commoners are not deemed competent to judge the privileged: only a peer can judge a peer. This is called aristocracy.
There is another model where responsibilities and the powers to carry them out are conferred upon persons deemed likely to do so correctly, but wherein those persons' actions are always subject to review. The people are (collectively) deemed competent to judge those thus empowered, and to remove them from office by due process of recall or simply by not re-electing them. This is called republicanism.