[WikiEN-l] forgiveness of bans

[Toby Bartels]

MyRedDice (Martin) wrote in part:

>I fail to see the benefit of requiring an apology. Such an apology, given under
>duress, has no value. Only a freely given and sincerely meant apology can aid in
>healing the wounds of conflicts past.

I agree that forcing an apology as such (must say "I'm sorry that I ...", etc)
is an invitation to insincerity and the valueless mouthing of words.
But I also think that it's important that, should somebody like Lir return,
this person should state what activities they will not do in future.

For example, suppose that a user (this example is no longer Lir, BTW)
says "Toby should be eliminated" and I interpret this as a death threat.
The user replies that they meant only that I should be kicked off Wikipedia,
but Jimbo bans them anyway for (in part) making a death threat on talk.
Requiring the user to say "I'm sorry that I threatened Toby's life."
is an invitation to gross insincerity when the user denied that they did so.
Rather, the user should say "I won't write personal comments about users
that can be interpreted as physical threats.".

This is, first, less personal (I don't need my own wounded pride healed)
since it doesn't mention me specifically; but also, it allows the user
to save face and continue to deny that they meant it as a threat.
It really doesn't matter at this point whether that's what they meant or not,
once they've gone through the rest of your outlines process.

Disclaimer: This example is drawn somewhat from actual events,
but I'm not suggesting that the user involved there is likely to do this.
That's irrelevant to the point, which is just to borrow a good example.


-- Toby