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:::I've reinstated the guideline links. However, I think Morser's got a point in saying that if we include "poorly written" as a term that should be avoided (well, it should be avoided, but Morser makes sense), then it's making the etiquette stance go quite to the extreme. Therefore, what has been done is that the guideline has been restored (as it is a guideline); second, I've removed the term "poorly written" till discussions on the relevant page over this are over. As far as I've noticed, nobody's close to 3RR here.[[User:Wifione|'''<span style="color: red;"> Wifione</span>''']] [[User talk:Wifione|'''<sup>Message</sup>''']] 01:27, 7 October 2011 (UTC) |
:::I've reinstated the guideline links. However, I think Morser's got a point in saying that if we include "poorly written" as a term that should be avoided (well, it should be avoided, but Morser makes sense), then it's making the etiquette stance go quite to the extreme. Therefore, what has been done is that the guideline has been restored (as it is a guideline); second, I've removed the term "poorly written" till discussions on the relevant page over this are over. As far as I've noticed, nobody's close to 3RR here.[[User:Wifione|'''<span style="color: red;"> Wifione</span>''']] [[User talk:Wifione|'''<sup>Message</sup>''']] 01:27, 7 October 2011 (UTC) |
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{{outdent}} 3RR is a lousy standard for a policy/guideline page. Let's go 0RR for substantive changes and reach some sort of consensus before making changes. In the case of the particular edit, a <sup>[1]</sup> looks like a reference and it's preferable to link to [[WP:EQ]] rather than quote it. [[User:Gerardw|Gerardw]] ([[User talk:Gerardw|talk]]) 01:40, 7 October 2011 (UTC) |
{{outdent}} 3RR is a lousy standard for a policy/guideline page. Let's go 0RR for substantive changes and reach some sort of consensus before making changes. In the case of the particular edit, a <sup>[1]</sup> looks like a reference and it's preferable to link to [[WP:EQ]] rather than quote it. [[User:Gerardw|Gerardw]] ([[User talk:Gerardw|talk]]) 01:40, 7 October 2011 (UTC) |
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:Maybe the best thing to do here is go straight to an RfC. I don't think Ronz is actually going to communicate his objections (he rarely does), so we might as well just take an educated guess at what he's worried about and open it up to community review. does anyone have any serious objections to the revision I offered? |
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:Wifione: I don't really like the revision you keep suggesting. I think I handled it in a better fashion with the 'characterization' language I was using; what you are offering seems to focused on specific issues. It's one thing to give an example, but it's another to tie the policy to such specific wording that it starts to be limiting. --[[User_talk:Ludwigs2|<span style="color:darkblue;font-weight:bold">Ludwigs</span><span style="color:green;font-weight:bold">2</span>]] 04:03, 7 October 2011 (UTC) |
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Update
This is where we currently stand:
Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream. Note that although pointing out an editor's relevant conflict of interest is not considered a personal attack, speculating on the real life identity of another editor may constitute outing, which is a serious offense.
The problem with this is that as pointed out above "COIs (perceived, or real) have been used in the past as personal attacks, by addressing a person's affiliation rather than the strength of his/her arguments". The stigma of being branded a conflicted editor is one of a number of strong disincentives to disclose and one that is routinely [ab]used in discussions to gain the upper hand. There is zero benefit in pointing out a conflict without identifying how it relates to the current topic and to do so is to comment on the contributor rather than the content. Indeed it is more often than not inflammatory as conflicts of interest are usually associated with unethical behaviour, only it's also currently a blind spot as an editor has little recourse if they are accused (or indeed, attacked) in this fashion. Ultimately the undermining of an editor's argument detracts from their enjoyment of editing, particularly when many consider the associated implication offensive. The following change (from an earlier suggestion) would be a significant improvement in this regard, giving victims of such attacks some limited refuge:
Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream. Note that although pointing out an editor's relevant conflict of interest and it's relevance to the discussion at hand is not considered a personal attack, speculating on the real life identity of another editor may constitute outing, which is a serious offense.
It is a similar concept to requiring the {{COI}} tag be justified with some other policy violation (e.g. WP:V, WP:NPOV, WP:AUTO) and would be another step on the road to elevating WP:COI to policy. It both offers some protection to editors who voluntarily disclose (thus encouraging such disclosures) and makes the possibility of requiring disclosures as policy far more reasonable. Essentially it would require comments like this:
- John may be supporting the removal of the criticism section because he's an Acme employee.
Rather than:
- John [should be ignored because he]'s an Acme employee.
Does anyone have any better suggestions as to how to achieve this aim? -- samj inout 02:51, 5 March 2009 (UTC)
- As there was has been no feedback over the last week or so I've updated it and taken the liberty of adding a link to the "ad hominem" article which I think is pertinent and informative. It now reads:
Using someone's affiliations as an ad hominem means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream. Note that although pointing out an editor's relevant conflict of interest and it's relevance to the discussion at hand is not considered a personal attack, speculating on the real life identity of another editor may constitute outing, which is a serious offense.
- The only other potential improvement would be to drop the leading relevant but it reads reasonably well as is. -- samj inout 12:45, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
some revisions
I've tweedled with the Wikipedia:No_personal_attacks#What_is_considered_to_be_a_personal_attack.3F section, mostly CE and amplification, but also tweaking the focus of it a bit. comments/revisions welcome.
I was debating with myself over one point: I wanted to add in a bit about non-verbal attacks (blanket reverts, tendentious tagging, aggressive discussion closure, etc.), but it's an awfully gray area. I mean, it's clear that these things are sometimes used as personal attacks, but since they are almost invariably done without discussion when they are used as attacks, it's a difficult point to make. Yes, I think we all recognize that in some cases - e.g. when M. Shmoe spends three hours revising an article, and M. Shmue takes all of twelve seconds to revert it in bulk with an obnoxious edit summary like "rv POV-pushing crap" - a personal attack of some sort has occurred. However, the attack seems to go a good bit beyond the unfortunate use of the word 'crap', but it's hard to express precisely why it's more wrong than that wrong (it strikes me as a level of arrogant disrespect for the other editor's efforts, but...). so two questions: (i) do we want to get into that here?, and (ii) do we want to get into that here? --Ludwigs2 08:39, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- Some of the changes look reasonable, although it needs some copy editing (which can wait until after we see how the changes are accepted). One difference I noticed is not helpful: You changed the simple never acceptable: "Threats of legal action" to "Threats of legal action over article content or editorial behavior". The former is correct; the latter offers loopholes. Likewise, changing "Threats to out an editor" to "Threats to out an editor about any aspect of their personal life" is doubtful because whatever the intention, the qualification asserts that some outing (that which does not relate to personal life) is ok. Johnuniq (talk) 09:38, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- I see your points - one of the dangers of trying to make things more concise and clear is that you sometimes miss. If it helps any, my main intention (aside from efforts at copy-editing and clarification) was to draw out the idea that making inductions about editors as people is the slippery slope here: the more one moves from "X did this" to "X is the kind of person who does this" (and the more effort one puts into making that induction stick), the more of an attack it becomes. A personal attack is just personalization, in both the psychological senses of the word: transforming an objective/concrete problem into a social/emotional problem, and portraying individuals in terms of over-simplified dispositional attributes. It's hard to get the idea out of psych-jargon into conventional speech, though. at any rate, yes; let's see what others say. --Ludwigs2 10:05, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- I hesitate to bring up a personal point, but I think that it'd be best to delay this proposal for a few weeks. IIRC, user:Jossi was reprimanded for seeking to change applicable policies while he was in arbitration. Let's wait until Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Arbitration Enforcement sanction handling is closed before deciding on this. We can keep talking about it though. Will Beback talk 11:25, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- Will, do me a favor - if you're going to revert something, do it for a content-related reason, not for some bureaucratic silliness. The revert is fine, but the reasoning "we shouldn't do this because someone got in trouble for doing something vaguely similar elsewhere" is not helpful in the slightest. do you dislike the changes? if so, why? Do you prefer to discard them completely, or are there particular parts you'd like to keep? If you don't have any actual content points of this sort to make, then I'll go ahead and re-revert to the updated version and wait for other people's comments. I'm not worried about what happened to Jossi. --Ludwigs2 17:20, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- I hesitate to bring up a personal point, but I think that it'd be best to delay this proposal for a few weeks. IIRC, user:Jossi was reprimanded for seeking to change applicable policies while he was in arbitration. Let's wait until Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Arbitration Enforcement sanction handling is closed before deciding on this. We can keep talking about it though. Will Beback talk 11:25, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- I see your points - one of the dangers of trying to make things more concise and clear is that you sometimes miss. If it helps any, my main intention (aside from efforts at copy-editing and clarification) was to draw out the idea that making inductions about editors as people is the slippery slope here: the more one moves from "X did this" to "X is the kind of person who does this" (and the more effort one puts into making that induction stick), the more of an attack it becomes. A personal attack is just personalization, in both the psychological senses of the word: transforming an objective/concrete problem into a social/emotional problem, and portraying individuals in terms of over-simplified dispositional attributes. It's hard to get the idea out of psych-jargon into conventional speech, though. at any rate, yes; let's see what others say. --Ludwigs2 10:05, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
- My understanding is that policy is descriptive, rather than prescriptive. If you are arguing that your changes reflect a change of emphasis in the application of this policy, then it would be helpful if it is exampled (with multiples, I suggest, and examples of how the old wording is deprecated if possible). If you are suggesting that certain aspects of policy should receive a different emphasis, and you are going to point to the rewritten page to evidence the "correct" interpretation, then you are going about it wrong. NPA is neither a new or rarely visited policy, it is one that is acted upon and reported against every day, and in how it is used is the only way by which it is defined and therefore can be changed. Even if brilliantly constructed and an improvement on current practice, it still is irrelevant if admins continue to act in accordance to the previous wording. LessHeard vanU (talk) 18:46, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
Not sure where to ask this
who sends the complaints to say it was a personal attack, because a reply i have put has been removed twice from a discussion page, then flagged for an attack on a person when it was nothing of the sort, wikipedia and it's users are really starting to frustrate me now as i cannot even say - see i was right, this data was right so stop deleting it you sod - without being accused of personal attack. It's ridiculous — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.19.57.251 (talk) 15:09, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
- When you stop calling other people idiots like you did in discussion of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, then we stop removing your replies. And it WAS a personal attack. Start talking politely to other people on Wikipedia. The thing that you were right on release date, doesn't allow you to write citing: "Haha f*** you i was right, see it isn't specualation it is very likely AND IT IS RIGHT, YOU ARE SO OBTUSE". Purely rude answer, and I didn't call u names. Sir Lothar (talk) 06:49, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Insulting/disparaging
"Insulting or disparaging an editor is a personal attack regardless of the manner in which it is done." It seems that this sentence is redundant, or is an unnecessary addition to the "What is considered to be a personal attack?" section. Insulting/disparaging is implied to be a personal attack within the bullet outlines. I really can't see why this sentence should necessarily be in there. And God forbid if it should be kept, why would we need "regardless of the manner in which it is done"? I don't know if that is necessary. But I really think this sentence should be revised or edited out for sure. What do you other guys think about this? 67.80.144.146 (talk) 19:51, 15 July 2011 (UTC)
- The NPA policy needs to be clear and not allow any wiggle room. Excellent writing and the removal of all possible redundancy are much lesser concerns. Current text seems fine. Johnuniq (talk) 00:08, 16 July 2011 (UTC)
Insulting/disparaging 2
Since this is more in the nature of where to complain, if there is someplace, in re the "voices" comment here, does that or does that not qualify as an attack? If it does, what action should I take, if any? If any is to be taken, where do I go? TREKphiler any time you're ready, Uhura 16:11, 14 August 2011 (UTC)
- On a quick read, I do think that some of the other editors are crossing the boundaries of WP:CIVIL in what they are saying to you. What you do about it is partly a function of what you want to get from it. One option is to simply let it pass, knowing that they are in the wrong. WP:FLAT has some interesting advice about how to deal with editors who want to push fringe views. You definitely can make a comment on that talk page, pointing those editors to WP:NPA with a blue link, and requesting that they "comment on content, not on the editor". Sometimes, that ends up being enough. A good way to get more editors to pay attention to the page is to post a neutrally worded request at WP:NPOVN. If you want to pursue dispute resolution, the most obvious place to go would be WP:WQA, where you could ask other, impartial editors to warn those users against personal attacks, although it is unlikely that any further action would be taken. To get more action taken, such as user blocks, you would have to go to WP:ANI, but I would advise you against doing that at this stage, unless the other editors are making disruptive edits to the page itself (for example, edit warring). --Tryptofish (talk) 19:25, 14 August 2011 (UTC)
- Thx for the quick answer. It appears, in this case, it's just a troll with nothing constructive to say on the subject looking for a victim. I'm not sure if it's an attempt to push a fringe view (he denies it, but I have doubts). I'll have to think about where to go with it. Could be just ignoring will solve it. TREKphiler any time you're ready, Uhura 03:25, 15 August 2011 (UTC)
"some types of comments are never acceptable: [...] Using someone's affiliations as an ad hominem means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream."
This sentence is poorly written and appears contradicted by the subsequent ones. A Wikipedian who is also an author of a BookSurge-published book declared that discussing his reputation as a historian is a personal attack. I'm sure such absurd interpretations of this policy were not intended, because WP:NPOV would be impossible to reach if every Wikipedian who adds his own books to articles cannot have his reputation as a suitable source for articles questioned. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 18:23, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Even the article on ad hominem makes more sense than the statement I quoted, in no small part because it relies on reliable sources instead of the opinion of the few Wikipedians who have edited this page and who seem to need a refresher in informal logic. "The ad hominem is normally described as a logical fallacy, but it is not always fallacious; in some instances, questions of personal conduct, character, motives, etc., are legitimate and relevant to the issue". Have mörser, will travel (talk) 19:12, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
And for a more trivial case, WP:CSD#G5. Someone belonging to the banned user group seems a license to dismiss their edits of any kind. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 18:51, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
- You really need to cite the specific example. What to you might be an impersonal questioning of the book, might to another reader be a mean spirited and deeply personal attack. We need to remember that we're all human here, and taking things personally sometimes comes with that; let's try to be nice. A link to the specific dispute, please? --GRuban (talk) 14:19, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
- I'm not sure how a specific dispute is germane here, (is there a standing policy for questioning the wording of Wikipedia polices?), but [1] referring to [2] is what made read this policy and comment on its absurdities. Please read the diffs very carefully if you're going to comment on that dispute because several editors who have rushed to comment have made significant misrepresentations. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 19:56, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
- Take the issue to COIN. This may not be the right place. The policy seems perfect. Calling a person a sockpuppet may be considered a personal attack. But taking the issue to the SPI noticeboard is not. In the same way, questioning a person's background may be considered a personal attack. Taking it to COIN with valid supporting edits, not so. Wifione Message 16:07, 1 October 2011 (UTC)
- You say "The policy seems perfect." But a formulation like "never do X. But there are exceptions! Here is a list of them." is a pretty confusing way of formulating perfection. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 21:17, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
- It seems you are already having discussions at COIN. And administrator Atama's comments are more than perfect, I should say. Do continue your discussions there. In case you wish a change in policy, you can discuss the proposed changed wordings here and request comments from editors. Thanks. Wifione Message 16:20, 1 October 2011 (UTC)
- Yes, I very much thought that I had written in that incident was "fair comment"—as administrator Atama later characterized my words. I would not have gratuitously questioned someones affiliation & qualifications. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 21:26, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
- I think that "ad hominem" discussions are normally allowed with respect to sources' authors. Perhaps this perfect policy should state that; something along the lines of "Discussion about the affiliation, qualifications, and reputation of the author of a source [proposed to be] used in a Wikipedia article are permitted within the bounds of argumentation relevant to identifying reliable sources." Have mörser, will travel (talk) 21:26, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
- I understand the "someone" to be a fellow editor, not the author of a source. How about
- Using an editor's affiliations as an ad hominem means of dismissing or discrediting their views; e.g. "you're a train spotter so what would you know about fashion?" Note that although pointing out an editor's relevant conflict of interest and its relevance to the discussion at hand is not considered a personal attack, speculating on the real-life identity of another editor may constitute outing, which is a serious offense.
Gerardw (talk) 22:41, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
Note
I have restored the version of Sept 29 [3] before the rapid series of recent changes. I have already laid out my objection to a specific point and proposed a remedy above. The others should do the same for their proposed changes. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 16:04, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
proposed revision
I made this change to the Avoiding Personal Attacks section - basically a broad revision fixing a number of confused statements and refocusing the issue on the general problem. it was reverted by Ronz with the suggestion that it had lost something from the original version. I don't see what's missing; can someone clue me in? --Ludwigs2 16:47, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
- Links to the relevant policies/guidlines, for a start, then de-emphasizing them to the point of coming close to contradicting them.
- Why the rewrite? --Ronz (talk) 18:03, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
- the rewrite was mostly motivated by generality; the current version is awfully point-specific and hard to abstract to actual instances. plus I thought it would be useful to focus on the act of 'improper characterization' as the problematic case: This distinguishes nicely between personal commentary that is useful to articles and personal commentary that's inflammatory (e.g., it's useful sometimes to say that someone made a bad edit, but it's never useful to suggest that someone is a person who makes bad edits); that seems to be a bone of contention in the current debates.
- The policy links can be reintegrated easily enough, though I thought they were a little redundant, personally. I'm not sure I see what you mean when you say they were 'de-emphasized'. That wasn't my intention and I don't see where it happened. if you can explain that more clearly, maybe something can be done about it. --Ludwigs2 18:20, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
- I've reinstated the guideline links. However, I think Morser's got a point in saying that if we include "poorly written" as a term that should be avoided (well, it should be avoided, but Morser makes sense), then it's making the etiquette stance go quite to the extreme. Therefore, what has been done is that the guideline has been restored (as it is a guideline); second, I've removed the term "poorly written" till discussions on the relevant page over this are over. As far as I've noticed, nobody's close to 3RR here. Wifione Message 01:27, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
3RR is a lousy standard for a policy/guideline page. Let's go 0RR for substantive changes and reach some sort of consensus before making changes. In the case of the particular edit, a [1] looks like a reference and it's preferable to link to WP:EQ rather than quote it. Gerardw (talk) 01:40, 7 October 2011 (UTC)
- Maybe the best thing to do here is go straight to an RfC. I don't think Ronz is actually going to communicate his objections (he rarely does), so we might as well just take an educated guess at what he's worried about and open it up to community review. does anyone have any serious objections to the revision I offered?
- Wifione: I don't really like the revision you keep suggesting. I think I handled it in a better fashion with the 'characterization' language I was using; what you are offering seems to focused on specific issues. It's one thing to give an example, but it's another to tie the policy to such specific wording that it starts to be limiting. --Ludwigs2 04:03, 7 October 2011 (UTC)