[WikiEN-l] Disgusting behavior on AN:I

[George Herbert]

On 7/12/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Thu, 12 Jul 2007 09:04:28 -0400, Marc Riddell
> <michaeldavid86 at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> >Keep in mind, Mark, WE teach people how to treat us. And, when shouting is
> >met with silence, all that's left is the echo.
>
> I wish.  What is left is the endless repetition of "see, he had no
> answer to this! I was right!" posted to every single place the
> disgruntled troll can find.

No.  It's not that simple.

With all due respect to MONGO, and I respect him a lot, there's a
reason that he's attracted ten times more flak than the next most
controversial good guy.

His interactions with the trolls, and the snipes he takes at them, are
part of a vicious circle.  He's antagonized by them, he antagonizes
them.

Unfortunately, his objective in editing Wikipedia is not to frustrate
them.  Their objective is to frustrate him, because he blows up so
spectacularly when provoked.  They think it's fun.

The only ways that this ends are either with him leaving the project,
complaining that we didn't defend him enough, or he learns how to not
engage the trolls.  As long as he's an attractive and reactive target,
he will never get away from it.

Lacking the apparent power or authority to effectively permanently ban
(identify, and ban) every person who seeks to troll him or poke at him
somehow, we can't solve the problem for him.

There's a difference between blaming the victim, and observing that
the victim and victimizers are trapped in a behavioral loop.
Defending him doesn't mean that we should never take a step back, look
at the situation, and observe such behavioral interactions.  In fact,
defending him effectively demands it.

He has become his own worst enemy; the attackers aren't able to
actually cause him harm, but they cause him to blow up in arguments on
ANI and so forth which do serious damage, over and over again.

I want him to stay, and be a productive editor, and eventually maybe
he'll want admin bit back.  I think success in those endeavors
ultimately depends on having a few more of "us" try and talk him out
of the response behaviors that keep him in the EDers crosshairs.  I'm
proving spectacularly ineffective at pointing it out to him, probably
because of our history.  It would help if more of you joined in.


-- 
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com