[WikiEN-l] NOR contradicts NPOV

[Ken Arromdee]

On Sun, 28 Dec 2008, Carcharoth wrote:
> > So basically, we have a phrase that mandates the violation of NPOV on
> > a host of articles, that was inserted without discussion, and that has
> > been controversial in every subsequent discussion. But we keep it,
> > because it's "consensus."
> Have you tried suggesting this change on the talk page and advertising
> the discussion at various relevant noticeboards and other project talk
> pages?

I'd imagine there'd be a huge argument, with no resolution, and since there's
no resolution we have to keep it at status quo, which means to leave the
phrase in.

This is one of the classic ways to make a change on a controversial policy
about which there is no consensus: Make the change anyway but do something to
ensure it stays in for a while--either sneak it in and hope it stays
unnoticed, or use delaying tactics.  Once it's been in long enough, you've
won; it's now status quo and while the change is still controversial,
the controversy now means you can't change it back.

Yeah, I'm still bitter about spoiler warnings, but perhaps they should be a
lesson.  Wikipedia is a game of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomic .