On Tue, 23 May 2006 21:05:56 +0530, you wrote:
You have neglected the second part of my message- the one that deals with indefinite blocks placed without benefit of Arbitration. Do you have any comments to make about the latter?
I'm not really entering this debate, I got this by accident as I was going through the messages of condolence for the death of my sister, but I want to respond to this point.
As a member of the community, a white supremacist exhausts my patience at about the first edit. Ditto an extremist Zionist, an Islamist or even a militant atheist - if they can't bring themselves to respect other editors and contribute according to the rules, good riddance to them, and it's not like we haven't heard it before. Kids who add crap learn and grow up, bigots do not, they just get a greater feeling of entitlement to their bigotry.
Wikipedia is a collaborative project. People who prove themselves unable to collaborate, whether over a long or a short period, are destructive of the project. Absolutely no good can come of having bigots insert crap. None whatsoever. It's not just that these are not valuable contributors, they are actively harmful because they cause dissent and strife among other editors who are actively trying to cover subjects neutrally. WP:NPOV is non-negotiable, and someone who shows that they cannot and will not abide by it is best shown the door soonest. Experience indicates that it will happen sooner or later anyway, in the meantime we have better things to do than police them.
The amount of good, useful editing a user needs to do in order to be seen as worthy of trying to save is very small. These POV-pushers who do nothing but try to slant articles to support their lunacy are simply not worth saving, and the sooner we ban them the quicker. Why wait for Arbcom? Arbcom are just folks, like admins are just folks. They may be a bit more experienced, but they are not gods. Blocks can be challenged, discussed, debated, meanwhile the vast majority of editors - the ones who do not feel the need to spew bile wherever they go - can get on with it. Let the blocked POV pushers come here, or go to Wikitruth or wherever. Just as long as they are not adding antisemitic / anti-Islam / anti-Christian / racist / whatever poison into the project.
Guy (JzG)