Tom Haws wrote
Charles Matthews wrote:
Indeed. Why dice with death and take the moral low ground in revert wars, when there is the more satisfying approach of the uber-troll: get yourself personally-attacked on the Talk page, and get your opponent (if
briefly)
thrown off the wiki?
Charles, as humor this is fine. But the serious sentiment behind it troubles me. Our unambiguous position at Wikipedia is that personal violence against trolls is unacceptable.
Off Wikipedia too, I hope. That was presumably intended as 'personal abuse'.
If editors choose to see this as an unfair advantage for the trolls, that is their choice. If they choose to let it spur them toward greater creativity and diplomacy, that is a better choice.
The underlying point is that editors have to take the long term into account. Reverting and being a loudmouth are a kind of territorial behaviour; what we need are people who see clearly that they have to outlast, rather than simply see off, the detrimentals.
Charles