[WikiEN-l] Featured editors?

[Raphael Wegmann]

On Tue, Nov 13, 2007 at 12:39:40PM +0000, Guy Chapman aka JzG wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 23:53:08 +0530, "Relata Refero"
> <refero.relata at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> >"Even if admins were blocking a specific POV- so what?" Well, here's why
> >that thinking might be dangerous: most banned editors are banned for
> >disruptively arguing their POV, nor their POV. If we ban accounts on the
> >basis of POVs like already banned editors, that would be a severe error, and
> >compromise our neutrality, our effectiveness, and our ability to criticize
> >ourselves.
> 
> There's some truth in this, but I don't see much evidence that
> people are being actively banned just for holding a POV, only for
> disruptively asserting it.  I guess our tolerance for pedophilia
> activism and holocaust denial is pretty low, but the average
> holocaust denier engages in unambiguously banworthy editing (they
> are usually not too subtle in their biases).
> 

Apart from invoking Godwin's law, I don't think your Reductio ad Nazium
argument helps the discussion. No matter how outrageous the POV is,
nobody should be banned for merely holding it.

> We could all do with a bit more AGF here. Some people give a very
> good impression of assuming that any removal of any link is
> motivated by a desire to censor legitimate criticism.  Some admins
> think that this makes the people who stir up such drama *evil*.  I
> don't think either of these views is productive.  But neither do I
> think we should tolerate arguments based on points of non-existent
> principle (e.g. free speech) when an explanation has been made in
> pragmatic and specific terms (e.g. offsite harassment, banned users
> advocating content changes in offsite forums).  Wikipedia is not a
> free speech zone and not anarchy either.

I remember an issue, where the main argument, which was solely based
on this non-existent principle (free speech), trumped all explanations,
which had been made in pragmatic and specific terms (e.g. onsite
bigotry, vote stacking in offsite forums).

br
-- 
Raphael