On 9 Nov 2007 at 10:39:57 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 09/11/2007, zetawoof zetawoof@gmail.com wrote:
[[Scientology]]? Less imaginary than you might expect.
Obsessive POV pushers in general, who don't get or don't care about NPOV.
If you act in a manner perceived by others as being jerklike, they are likely to perceive you as being jerklike.
...which still doesn't justify being a jerk back to them. Two wrongs don't make a right.
On 09/11/2007, Daniel R. Tobias dan@tobias.name wrote:
On 9 Nov 2007 at 10:39:57 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
If you act in a manner perceived by others as being jerklike, they are likely to perceive you as being jerklike.
...which still doesn't justify being a jerk back to them. Two wrongs don't make a right.
Oh, definitely.
The counterpart to "Don't be a dick" is "Try not to come across as a dick to others." This is a pair like "be liberal in what you accept, be conservative in what you send."
Most people understand "don't be a dick." However, "Try not to come across as a dick to others" is a lot more work. I suspect it's the essence of "civility" in a social environment.
- d.
d. wrote:
The counterpart to "Don't be a dick" is "Try not to come across as a dick to others." This is a pair like "be liberal in what you accept, be conservative in what you send."
Hmm. I would have thought the counterpart on that score was AGF. (That is, don't be a dick, and don't assume dickness in others.)
Most people understand "don't be a dick."
Well, most non-dicks, anyway. But the single greatest failure of WP:DICK was that not one dick in a thousand ever truly grasped the implications of that wholly remarkable sentence, "If a significant number of reasonable people suggest, whether bluntly or politely, that you are being a dick, the odds are good that you are not entirely in the right." (In fact, I suspect this is one of the underlying reasons that WP:DICK was banished to Meta.)
On Friday 09 November 2007 06:03, Daniel R. Tobias wrote:
On 9 Nov 2007 at 10:39:57 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com
wrote:
On 09/11/2007, zetawoof zetawoof@gmail.com wrote:
[[Scientology]]? Less imaginary than you might expect.
Obsessive POV pushers in general, who don't get or don't care about NPOV.
If you act in a manner perceived by others as being jerklike, they are likely to perceive you as being jerklike.
...which still doesn't justify being a jerk back to them.
And also doesn't mean that you actually *are* being a jerk.
Some people are just totally irrational and like to overreact to the slightest thing.
It's impossible to predict what such people will throw a shitfit about, so you're best off not even worrying about it.
On Nov 9, 2007 12:03 PM, Daniel R. Tobias dan@tobias.name wrote:
On 9 Nov 2007 at 10:39:57 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
If you act in a manner perceived by others as being jerklike, they are likely to perceive you as being jerklike.
...which still doesn't justify being a jerk back to them. Two wrongs don't make a right.
Reflecting on this debate, we all know there are some users who are just about causing drama and not here to build an encyclopaedia. There are also some users who are just about propounding their own views and not here to build an encyclopaedia. Then there are some users who, while they have an abrasive approach, want to make a better encyclopaedia. The missing consideration is that sometimes, users in this latter group move into either of the first two based on their experiences.
And, that includes their experiences with admins.
All admins should consider the actual effect of admin actions and of talk page messages on the user who receives them. An admonition to 'please behave better and think of others' allows the recipient the choice of complying or not. A comment that 'you are a disruptive troll and are on your way to an indefinite block' does not.
I find that the best way of making obsessive editors more constructive is to give them things to do. In other words, "you can have claim X in the article if you can prove to me it's significant - bring me some mainstream sources for it". Every hour this editor spends looking for the source is an hour spent in possible improvement of the encyclopaedia, and an hour not spent disrupting things.