Not to minimize what you're saying, but this problem
extends beyond non-native English speakers. Before I
joined Wikipedia as anonymous56789, I had a different
username (which I now can't remember. After that, I
quit wikipedia for a year and then rejoined). Anyway,
I didn't know as much about grammar and spelling back
then, and I was rudely told I didn't know English well
enough (or something like that) to contribute to an
encyclopedia like this. This may have happened to more
kids than me, too.
If you find the subtlties of English daunting (not
that you are unintelligent in any way), you could help
with the simple english wikipedia. It attempts to use
only the 1000 most common words in English to create
an encyclopedia. It still uses the UseMod software,
though.
By the way, why haven't all of the wikis been upgraded
yet?
--- Anthere <anthere6(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
--- Stevertigo <stevertigo(a)attbi.com> wrote:
Robert
Pseudo-academic, pseudo-egalitarian nonsense.
That's the
same kind of talk that has damaged the education
of much of
the inner-city youth in America.
Robert, if noone else will say it - I will. Youre
so
full of crap.
Thank you very much for listening.
> Frankly, it is also racist in effect. This kind
of
attitude
has created two generations of poorly educated
Hispanic and
Black youth in American cities. I couldn't
think
of a
better plan for the KKK to promote if they want
to keep
racism alive forever.
God, what horrible garbage.
And frankly, many of our articles are being
damaged by
people with good intentions, but who have poor
English
reading or writing skills (or both.)
Oh, God, what a crapload.
In Stevertigo's bizarre universe, it is
egalitarian to
> encourage this illiteracy, which in the end
would
produce
unreadable articles. In our universe, we are
trying to
ecudate an English speaking audience.
Well, cutting through all of Robert's crap - the
one
VALID point he makes
(underneath all the crap, acrimony, etc...) is
that
a common language
should'nt go willy nilly in different directions.
But it's fucking elitist
as tea-sipping lessons to dictate what is "proper"
in most contexts -
because you personally dont own it - whether it be
a
religion or a language.
Americans and Englishmen are a minority of English
speakers. Toby(I think)
made a valid point that there is already a page
calling attention to pages
in need of a rewrite - the problem is that people
do
what they are
interested in.
(And most pages are in need of a "rewrite" -
whether
its a complete hack
job - or a little comma is missing somewhere.)
If people with little teeny tiny sphincters want
to
take it upon themselves
to focus like a lynch mob on poor, unsuspecting
Bengalis, fine. But dont
bitch when I pull the hoods off your heads. Wanna
correct the bad English? -
DO IT. But dont come here talking about
instituting
ideologies that are
fundamentally elitist.
WikiLove be upon you, Kaiser
- Steven MacGrieves
I would like to add a couple more words to the
subject
The word "english-speaking" is misleading. Wikipedia
is for english-speaking clearly, but here,
english-speaking does mean any person able to
understand english, not native english-speaking
person. In that sense, english wikipedia is for
english people is true, if it encompass any person
able to read english. It should not limit itself to
native english only. You guys should be proud. So
many
of us are using your language now. Even when no
native-english is around, if that is the best for us
to communicate.
I agree wikipedia should be properly written. I just
don't know along which standards, I always failed to
find a grammar book for your language, as French
language has. But in any case, the language escaped
you. English language is not only the language of
native english. It is also ours. Maybe, is it an
international english.
I know quite well I am part of this terminology gap.
I am fully aware of my limitations. Which is why I
never participate in writing meta pages on en (which
I
do a lot on fr), as I know people are very keen in
having those very properly written.
Which is also why I very rarely refactor other
people
prose; I add, I sometimes remove, I create mostly.
This way, I try to avoid people from accusing me of
"damaging" their work and letting an article in
poorer
shape than it was before my input. I basically only
create because I think "not very good" is better
than
"no article" at all.
I also several times asked other people to review my
work, and usually people did so very kindly. I must
say I don't really appreciate that some mention in
the
comment box that "obviously this has been written by
an non-english and needs much work" and then leave
without doing more than correcting a typo.
If someone is willing to go through all my major
contributions to clean up after me, it is all listed
on my page and old contributions page.
I know quite well Robert is including me in these
people who should be elsewhere than here, as he
suggested a couple of times that I should quit
wikipedia if not being able to read and express
myself
properly in english.
That is one of the reasons why, I quit trying to do
anythink on the knowledge article, being aware it
would risk again being considered vandalism as he
said
I was guilty on the gaia articles.
Now, I have some doubts. I see that he is doing the
same with the next contributor he is sharing an
article with. Similarly, while in disagreement with
him,
see
He is using the supposed "inability to understand
and
speak english" to bully people he does not agree
with.
This is so embarassing
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