Speaking for myself, if I was allowed to edit on
Wikipedia, I would promise to stay out of trouble, would
avoid any controversial issues, and would edit on articles
which I have expertise on and can improve. I admit that I
made some newbie mistakes when I first started, I
apologise, and I have now read the manual and understand
how things work. Other people did do some things that
upset my experience that they shouldn't have done, but
I've already discussed all of that to death, and dealt
with it as much as they can be, so that's all over and
done with as far as I am concerned. And I am happy to go
through having someone mentor me and with some
restrictions. I get very upset about the poor quality of
some of the articles which I have a great deal of
knowledge of, and I feel like correcting them, to improve
them, so that they are reflected more accurately for
others to see, to use as a reference. I hate teaching
schools and seeing kids get educated badly because they
have used Wikipedia and get false or poor quality
information.
But I am not prepared to give up on my principles, I will
not ever accept that Wikipedia is perfect, nor will I ever
suggest that Wikipedia is not a serious danger. I think
that having inaccurate articles can change our version of
truth, and that this is incredibly dangerous, and the most
dangerous part of what Wikipedia is. I think that WP:OWN
is a very important rule, and that we should be far more
vigilant than we are with it. And I think that WP:NOR is
regularly misused to suggest that someone that is biased
yet has accurate important information has nothing to add.
Of course I am biased about topics that I have a degree
of expertise with. We all are. That doesn't make the
information useless. It is much better to have biased yet
accurate and informative information than to have unbiased
yet inaccurate and useless dribble. And I would rather
see people write about things which they have a degree of
expertise in than to simply fiddle around with things that
they don't really understand.
I don't know about other people who get banned, but I
think that for most cases it is more of a case of a
misunderstanding than anything else. Certainly any case
that goes through the Arbitration Committee or has any
level of discussion is one which can be reversed, provided
that an agreement can be reached. Obviously serial
spammers, hackers, and people who aim to destroy Wikipedia
are beyond reform. But if it is debatable enough that it
needed a discussion, then it is worthy of having an
appeal.
And I don't think that a banned user should be required to
apologise and admit fault in order to have the ban
reversed. If you feel that what you did was the right
thing, then why should you be forced to lie about that in
order to return? We all have our beliefs, and keeping
your integrity is important.