[WikiEN-l] NY Times article on gender gap in Wikipedia contributors

[George Herbert]

On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 11:48 AM, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 31 January 2011 19:42, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at fairpoint.net> wrote:
>
>> Please review
>> https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Civility
>> If, after warning someone repeatedly or taking abuse from someone for
>> years, I file a request for arbitration, I expect the Arbitration
>> Committee to address the question.
>> If you think that is not in your remit, please review:
>> https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Policy#Rules
>
>
> Yes. Civility is *core* policy and that's directly in arbcom's remit.
>
> If the community don't want that, arbcom should suggest they repeal
> the policy in question.
>
>
>> The real issue, however, is to establish customs of courtesy and
>> friendliness among the community at large, not to scapegoat egregious
>> offenders. For that purpose it is not rigorous enforcement of the rules
>> that is called for but leadership.
>
>
> +1
>
> If the admins - who the arbcom do in fact directly supervise - are
> enlightened as to the importance of civility, they *will* enforce it
> in the rest of the community. Because they won't put up with others
> behaving badly when they're not being allowed to.
>
> This is directly in the arbcom's power *and remit* per current policy
> and precedent. Only a lack of will stops the arbcom at this point.


+2 to all of this.

This topic is especially tricky, as civility is not equivalent to the
absence of bad words, and there's a lot of controversy and significant
pushback when people act in ways that indicate that a bad words police
state is emerging on Wikipedia.

It's also tricky as *all of us* (myself included) break down and do
rude things from time to time - in particular when tired, sick, or
stressed from Real World - and we have to balance "Hey, can you knock
that off" with not acting in ways that drive away experienced
contributors and admins for minor or negligent infractions.

That said - Civility, NPA, and the like are policy, we had the
civility policy enforcement poll a year and ... a half? ago, and that
indicated that people both despaired of effective enforcement and
wanted effective and fair enforcement, including more focus on admins
when they transgress.  Arbcom does have this in its remit.  It might
be constructive if some cases regarding this were filed and accepted
for incidents over which desysopping and/or banning are not really
necessary, but for which admonishment or warnings or restrictions
might be - holding a small, foam hammer of someone's head in the test
case is probably a smoother way to move into the problem than holding
the sledgehammer of loving permanent correction.


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