On 10 Nov 2007 at 12:10:38 +0000, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
So in this case, as with Jonathan Barber (JB196), if it genuinely is Awbrey then long experience shows that the banhammer is the right approach. Revert, block, ignore.
When it comes to essays about preferable Wikipedia behavior in dealing with people who disagree, I like WP:BRD (Bold, revert, discuss) much better than WP:RBI... the ultimate aim of the former is to lead to a discussion, rather than to lead to banning and ostracism and the suppression of discussion. Which of these mindsets is more in keeping with the spirit of a community devoted to the collection and dissemination of information?
While the trolls and vandals do some harm, a lot more harm is done to Wikipedia, in my opinion, by the Judge Dredd types who see themselves as the thin blue line against trolling, vandalism, and anarchy, and have no compunctions against acting as judge, jury, and executioner against anybody they see as an enemy, or as somebody aiding the enemy.
Human history is full of cases where people decided that some enemy (real or imagined, significant or exaggerated) justified a state of war in which normal civilized, genteel considerations no longer applied. The results, which include the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem Witch Trials, and McCarthyism, are often judged harshly by later historians. In the throes of a moral panic, people can enter a state of hysteria where they undermine the values that made their community good in the course of allegedly defending it, like the soldiers who destroyed a village in order to save it. A Twilight Zone episode, "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street", provides a fictional illustration of the tendency of a community to be its own worst enemy.
on 11/10/07 1:26 PM, Daniel R. Tobias at dan@tobias.name wrote:
On 10 Nov 2007 at 12:10:38 +0000, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
So in this case, as with Jonathan Barber (JB196), if it genuinely is Awbrey then long experience shows that the banhammer is the right approach. Revert, block, ignore.
When it comes to essays about preferable Wikipedia behavior in dealing with people who disagree, I like WP:BRD (Bold, revert, discuss) much better than WP:RBI... the ultimate aim of the former is to lead to a discussion, rather than to lead to banning and ostracism and the suppression of discussion. Which of these mindsets is more in keeping with the spirit of a community devoted to the collection and dissemination of information?
While the trolls and vandals do some harm, a lot more harm is done to Wikipedia, in my opinion, by the Judge Dredd types who see themselves as the thin blue line against trolling, vandalism, and anarchy, and have no compunctions against acting as judge, jury, and executioner against anybody they see as an enemy, or as somebody aiding the enemy.
Human history is full of cases where people decided that some enemy (real or imagined, significant or exaggerated) justified a state of war in which normal civilized, genteel considerations no longer applied. The results, which include the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem Witch Trials, and McCarthyism, are often judged harshly by later historians. In the throes of a moral panic, people can enter a state of hysteria where they undermine the values that made their community good in the course of allegedly defending it, like the soldiers who destroyed a village in order to save it.
A Twilight Zone episode, "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street", provides a fictional illustration of the tendency of a community to be its own worst enemy.
That's where this comes from:
"The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosives and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices, to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill, and suspicion can destroy. And a thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own." - Rod Serling
Marc
Quoting "Daniel R. Tobias" dan@tobias.name:
While the trolls and vandals do some harm, a lot more harm is done to Wikipedia, in my opinion, by the Judge Dredd types who see themselves as the thin blue line against trolling, vandalism, and anarchy, and have no compunctions against acting as judge, jury, and executioner against anybody they see as an enemy, or as somebody aiding the enemy.
Human history is full of cases where people decided that some enemy (real or imagined, significant or exaggerated) justified a state of war in which normal civilized, genteel considerations no longer applied. The results, which include the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem Witch Trials, and McCarthyism, are often judged harshly by later historians. In the throes of a moral panic, people can enter a state of hysteria where they undermine the values that made their community good in the course of allegedly defending it, like the soldiers who destroyed a village in order to save it. A Twilight Zone episode, "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street", provides a fictional illustration of the tendency of a community to be its own worst enemy.
There are many problems with the above. First, we are the thin blue line against trolling, vandalism and anarchy. There are masses of people who want nothing more than to use Wikipedia to promote their agends and goals. And we cannot let that occur. There isn't much of an issue here of a moral panic. The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project. There is no acceptable response other than to block them on sight.
Although I disagree with Guy as to how we should treat people who are willing to deal with them, it is posts like the above that make me have some sympathy with Guy's position. Spend too much time on WR and you'll forget what these people have tried to do to Wikipedia and the lives they've ruined in the process. And frankly, to compare good faith attempts to keep this project safe from the people who have explicitly stated they intend to harm to the Inquisition demonstrates a lack of perspective at many different levels starting with the minor detail that we're not killing anyone.
joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu schrieb:
There are many problems with the above. First, we are the thin blue line against trolling, vandalism and anarchy. There are masses of people who want nothing more than to use Wikipedia to promote their agends and goals. And we cannot let that occur.
Instead we promote our agendas and goals, which are good(tm).
There isn't much of an issue here of a moral panic. The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project. There is no acceptable response other than to block them on sight.
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either. Though we've got the power to block. Sounds like a battle to me.
Quoting Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at:
There isn't much of an issue here of a moral panic. The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project. There is no acceptable response other than to block them on sight.
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either. Though we've got the power to block. Sounds like a battle to me.
If you wish to use that framework, you are welcome to. If it is a battle, it is a battle between those who wish to provide free, neutral information to humanity and those who would see that goal either thwarted or perverted.
joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu schrieb:
Quoting Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at:
There isn't much of an issue here of a moral panic. The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project. There is no acceptable response other than to block them on sight.
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either. Though we've got the power to block. Sounds like a battle to me.
If you wish to use that framework, you are welcome to. If it is a battle, it is a battle between those who wish to provide free, neutral information to humanity and those who would see that goal either thwarted or perverted.
So we are back to: "Either you are with us ("good") or you are with the thwarted or perverted ("evil")." IMHO this is both wrong and way too simple.
On 11/11/2007, Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at wrote:
joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu schrieb:
Quoting Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at:
There isn't much of an issue here of a moral panic. The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project. There is no acceptable response other than to block them on sight.
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either. Though we've got the power to block. Sounds like a battle to me.
If you wish to use that framework, you are welcome to. If it is a battle, it is a battle between those who wish to provide free, neutral information to humanity and those who would see that goal either thwarted or perverted.
So we are back to: "Either you are with us ("good") or you are with the thwarted or perverted ("evil")." IMHO this is both wrong and way too simple.
No, it was phrased that way by those opposing the block on querulous long-banned users, by claiming such blocks were an example of this. It appears you have not read the whole thread.
- d.
Quoting Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at:
joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu schrieb:
Quoting Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at:
There isn't much of an issue here of a moral panic. The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project. There is no acceptable response other than to block them on sight.
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either. Though we've got the power to block. Sounds like a battle to me.
If you wish to use that framework, you are welcome to. If it is a battle, it is a battle between those who wish to provide free, neutral information to humanity and those who would see that goal either thwarted or perverted.
So we are back to: "Either you are with us ("good") or you are with the thwarted or perverted ("evil")." IMHO this is both wrong and way too simple.
Kindly don't put words in my mouth. First, I didn't use the battle language use did. As I said above "If you wish to use that framework, you are welcome to. If it is a battle..." Second, I did not assert that there was simple dichotomy in action here. If I thought there was any such issue, I'd have indef blocked an T and a few others a long time ago. None of that changes that Barber, Bagley and Brandt are people who care only about destroying Wikipedia or perverting it to their purposes and we must be ever vigilant against their attempts to undermine the project.
On Sun, 11 Nov 2007 18:41:33 +0100, Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at wrote:
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either.
Which is a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia. And that's bad because?....
Guy (JzG)
Guy Chapman aka JzG schrieb:
On Sun, 11 Nov 2007 18:41:33 +0100, Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at wrote:
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either.
Which is a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia. And that's bad because?....
Well it shows, that you and your opponents share the determination. It would be bad, if determination turns to fanaticism and leads to collateral damage (editors who get blocked, just because they have a different view on what a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia should look like).
On Sun, 11 Nov 2007 22:11:11 +0100, Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at wrote:
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either.
Which is a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia. And that's bad because?....
Well it shows, that you and your opponents share the determination. It would be bad, if determination turns to fanaticism and leads to collateral damage (editors who get blocked, just because they have a different view on what a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia should look like).
Have you ever actually looked at Wikipedia Review? Just curious.
Guy (JzG)
Quoting Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at:
Guy Chapman aka JzG schrieb:
On Sun, 11 Nov 2007 18:41:33 +0100, Raphael Wegmann raphael@psi.co.at wrote:
We won't stop before we get precisely what we want either.
Which is a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia. And that's bad because?....
Well it shows, that you and your opponents share the determination. It would be bad, if determination turns to fanaticism and leads to collateral damage (editors who get blocked, just because they have a different view on what a verifiably neutral encyclopaedia should look like).
But that's isn't what we're talking about. We're not talking about editors who we have disagreements with about whether a given phrasing is neutral, or whether a given source is sufficiently reliable for inclusion. We are talking about people like Bagley who won't be happy as long as Wikipedia contains any criticism of Overstock, and people like Awbrey who wants Wikipedia to be his own personal ground for original research. These people have a different view of what a verifiable neutral encyclopedia would be like. They don't want a verifiable neutral encyclopedia. We should not lose sight of that.
On 11/10/07, joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu wrote:
The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project.
There is no reason to believe they'd stop when they "get precisely what they want". Wikipedia was foolish enough to try that approach with Brandt, and it worked out great (but only for Brandt).
—C.W.
Quoting Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com:
On 11/10/07, joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu joshua.zelinsky@yale.edu wrote:
The people we are dealing with, such as Brandt, Bagley and Barber will stop at nothing until they get precisely what they want out of Wikipedia or destroy the project.
There is no reason to believe they'd stop when they "get precisely what they want". Wikipedia was foolish enough to try that approach with Brandt, and it worked out great (but only for Brandt).
Well, that makes my point all the stronger.