[Wikipedia-l] Helga again

[Tom Parmenter]

Ed, take a look at [[Eisenhower and German POWs]] and its talk page
for a fair sample of dealing with Helga.  She got her article into the
Wikipedia, but many people had to fight like hell to keep it from
being pure anti-semitism from one single, dubious source, and after
all that it still consists mainly of unproven asservations.  Or follow
some [[Copernicus]] links and look at the associated talk pages.  On
all those talk pages you will see people bending over backwards to be
polite, following up her suggested references, suggesting wording to
get controversial points of view past NPOV, and generally giving her
every chance to make a positive contribution while she grinds her axe,
but all she wants to do is grind her axe.

She is dogged, impervious to suggestion, and absolutely clueless as to
what makes an encyclopedia article or a worthwhile historical proof.
She wants back those German lands that were "stolen" (by the Germans
losing wars that they started), she want Copernicus to be a German,
and, one suspects, she has other minority German enthusiasms as well.
As I said before, "She's had her chance, but she's more trouble than
she's worth."  

As far as I know, her most positive contribution was getting Senator
Capehart into the Wikipedia, where he now receives credit as the
marketing genius behind the 20th century popularity of the jukebox.
She put him in originally because he once made an obscure speech that
Helga thought proved some point of hers, which some of us turned into
an article about the Senator himself.  

Tom Parmenter
Ortolan88

|From: Stephen Gilbert <canuck_in_korea2002 at yahoo.com>
|Date: Fri, 30 Aug 2002 17:57:59 -0700 (PDT)
|
|
|--- "Poor, Edmund W" <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
|> Mav and others have told me that Helga's been a
|> thorn in the project's side for a year. But I think
|> the way you've responded has been inflammatory. No
|> offense meant.
|> 
|> Instead of hitting her over the head verbally with
|> phrases like "she's at it again" and "removed NPOV
|> text" -- why not take a more low-key approach? It's
|> working for me in the Arab-Israeli conflict
|> articles:
|
|Ed, people have spent many, many hours trying your
|"low key" approach. It hasn't worked. Some Wikipedians
|have spent most of their Wikipedia time following
|Helga around, trying to work with her, fix up her
|contributions and explain why in non-confrontational
|ways. People have left the project in frustration
|because of her.
|
|It's a little frustrating to hear people implying that
|everyone has treated Helga harshly and unfairly.
|
|> *sigh* if only Larry were still
|> here.
|
|Larry's not a magic bullet. I respect Larry, and I
|think he deserves a lot of the credit for getting this
|project off the ground. He has, however, been less
|than diplomatic in certain past situations.
|
|Come now, Ed. There's no need to wish for a knight in
|shining armour whenever we have a problem. ;-)
|
|Stephen G.
|