(Sorry if this arrives badly formatted, trying out a new MUA here ..)
On Wikipedia, we can't see whether the troublemakers are adults or not, so we give them the benefit of the doubt. But some of them probably are, in fact, children. It wouldn't surprize me a bit to discover that Lir is a very bright 14-year old. Why should we bend over backwards to give such a person presumed rights here that even the most liberal of us wouldn't grant in real life?
You may count me as insulted at the suggestion that I would care for one moment about the person's age.
I have to agree with Toby here. I have known and communicated with many people who have accomplished great things at an early age, such as Aaron Swartz, who joined the W3C's RDF working group at age 15, IIRC, or Tom St. Denis, who has written an encrypted messaging client at a similar age. These people often have social skills that most adults lack.
Social skills are hardly a function of age, and much more a function of upbringing. See http://www.violence.de - children who are raised with affection and love will grow up to become peaceful and socially skilled individuals. Much if not most of the impulsiveness of many juveniles is the result of the way they are treated: bullied in school, abused at home, often prevented from engaging in loving relationships with each other. To repeat the myth that juveniles are naturally socio-emotionally inferior to adults only perpetuates the mistreatment that these people receive, and thus makes their "lack of social skills" a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Of course society draws lines when granting privileges. Even though many young kids may be bright enough to drive a car, it is certainly easiest to work with a fixed age limit. But free speech is not a privilege, it is a fundamental right. That being said, editing Wikipedia *is* a privilege, but Wikipedia should try to endorse openness and condemn prejudice.
As regards the topic at hand, I tend to agree that banning anti-socials from certain editorial functions may be necessary. I am concerned, however, in whose hands we place such powers. I think the more we expand the powers of the Wikipedia admins, the more we need to formulate a democratic process within which these powers are exercised.
It could work like this (note that I haven't really looked at the admin interface yet, so sorry if this already exists in some form): In the top Wikipedia bar, all admins see a "Admin Polls: 3/5", where the "3", in a red font, would indicate the polls which are new, and the 5 the total number of polls that exist.
When an admin bans a user, he gets this interface:
Ban user: [ ] immediately [x] if majority agrees
[x] from edits [ ] completely
Describe reason: ....
If the option "if majority agrees" is chosen, a new admin poll is generated. This poll then allows all admins to participate within the voting period (24 hours or so), and after that period, an automatic decision is made on whether or not to ban the user. Optionally, the poll could have a Talk page linked to it, so that the ban can be discussed during the voting period. It doesn't matter how many people participate in the poll, the automatic decision mechanism simply works with the number of votes it gets.
This way, we can hopefully prevent unfair bans and other abuses of administration power. The poll system could be extended to include other admin decisions later. (Side note: If we create something like this, it would be nice to reuse the poll code to add poll functionality to wiki pages as well.)
Why not make the polls totally open? Generating fake accounts is just too easy, and recognizing forged results would put an additional burden on the administration. However, the permission to vote in polls should be separate from other administrator permissions, so that we can grant this right to virtually every identifiable person who asks for it.
I am proposing this because I have seen how other systems become very user-hostile because of arbitrary editorial decisions. This includes Everything2. Much of the power behind wikis arises from their democratic nature, and we should do everything we can to prevent the rise of an oligarchy.
All best,
Erik