User talk:Jimbo Wales

Wikipedia servers and Trump threat against NYT

Does the WMF have a fail-over plan to run all Wikipedia file servers outside the U.S.? I have been hearing more troublesome comments to suppress freedom of the press, in "Trump Threatens to Pull Credentials of New York Times" (NBCnews.com). So, I wonder, if the U.S. were overrun by a fascist dictatorship, does the WMF have a viable "Plan B" to run enough Wikipedia file servers from nations other than the U.S.? Historically, nations have turned to fascist controls when job unemployment seemed to reach high levels, or a foreign nation was claimed to have "Weapons of mass destruction" and enough zealots organized to take control of the government, while the broader populace "forgot to vote" to stop the takeover. I don't think WP would be safe, for long, in such circumstances, and should be prepared to re-host servers elsewhere. -Wikid77 (talk) 15:51, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

If the US were ever to be overrun by a fascist dictatorship (not even a remote possibility), then Wikipedia would probably be the least important concern on peoples' minds. A political candidate threatening to kick people out of his private press corps has nothing to do with a fascist dictatorship or anybody's servers. The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 15:58, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

I recall people thinking the Brexit vote "Leave" was "not even a remote possibility". I recall people thinking popular U.S. Vice President Al Gore losing the 2000 election was "not even a remote possibility" or Florida election officials thinking Gore losing the Florida recount (with a 1,000 extra write-in votes) was "not even a remote possibility". When the vote of the people is trumped by the U.S. Supreme Court denying a computerized recount, there is fascism afoot. Don't imagine it's "not even a remote possibility" when it already happened. -Wikid77 (talk) 16:23, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

The odds of a vote or a Supreme Court decision going the wrong way are incredibly different from a hostile dictatorship managing to topple the United States government. That's not even in the same neighborhood as fascism. You're being silly, and this doesn't really belong here. The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 17:12, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

You know what page you're on, right? "You're being silly" and "this doesn't really belong here" are mutually exclusive. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:17, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Eh, fair point. I'm not usually orbiting Jimbo's talkpage, but I guess this is par for the course. The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 17:23, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

(edit conflict)It's called "Make all the content free, as in speech and beer". People all over the world have mirrors, copies, and DB dumps of Wikipedia. If it were to go down in the US for whatever reason, many of those people outside the US have the data and technical skill to get it back up and running again, and have the data (or at least the bulk of it, it might be a few days or weeks old). That being said, Trump can say things like that all day long, but whether he in fact could do them is quite another matter. So I wouldn't worry a great deal about it. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 16:01, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

... and yet the most senior politician in government actually in the UK right now, is Boris Johnson -Roxy the dog™ bark 17:01, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

For some very strange value of "senior". All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 11:56, 18 August 2016 (UTC).

So, you know, I tend to agree with those who are arguing that the American system of checks and balances is strong enough to prevent any serious incursions on freedom of expression anytime soon. As others have pointed out, threatening the NYT with a lack of access is obnoxious and wrong, but it isn't the same as a systematic attempt to undermine the First Amendment in a way that would affect us directly. And the Supreme Court as currently constituted isn't really something like 5-4 in favor of freedom of expression, it's like 9-0. So even if Trump got to name a Supreme Court justice or two (a prospect that does frighten me a great deal) the odds of that turning into a situation where legal suppression of Wikipedia could happen is quite hard to imagine.

Even so, let's contemplate the hypothetical. Wikipedia could be moved to servers in Europe in very very short order. These days, hosting companies are able to spin up servers on demand in very very short order. I don't think a huge amount of contingency planning is necessary. It isn't like we have to physically order servers and install them like in the olden days when I personally did precisely all that. We also own hundreds of domain names so even if .org got compromised somehow, we could very quickly move.

And finally remember that we are powerful. The public loves us. They admire that we are a charitable community just seeking to share knowledge. Any attempt to shut us down would lead to big political repercussions - remember how quickly Congress reversed when we protested against SOPA/PIPA. This would be much bigger. I'll personally lead a march on the White House if necessary. But this is fantasy land - not going to happen.

Here's what I think we should worry about: the more subtle problem. There is a longstanding problem with mainstream journalism which is neither fatal nor even super duper serious, but a problem nonetheless. Governments can influence coverage by limiting (or threatening to limit) access. As we recently discussed on this page with respect to the situation in Russia (which isn't just about limiting access, but about more direct control over the press) the best way to vaguely "control" Wikipedia is not to interfere with us directly (that's quite hard to do) but to control reliable sources. My concern is not about Trump trying to shut down Wikipedia - my concern is if the major newspapers and networks cave into his bullying leading to a failure of reliable sources. Even that seems rather far fetched, by the way. The US press is not particularly docile, although often not as feisty as I would like.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 18:15, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining the re-hosting of servers. As for risk, if anyone had said pre-2000, "The votes of Americans will not be counted for President" (because it will "take too long") or predicted the U.S. will spend $2 trillion [1] to invade a nation which had no WMDs and further de-stabilize the Middle East... Like it can't happen here. But imagine what else could be done with $2 trillion. -Wikid77 (talk) 11:00, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

A note that as currently constituted the Supreme Court is at most 8-0 in favour of freedom of expression! Just to add to the mulling over Trump nominations. CMD (talk) 18:23, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Of course you are right, my mistake.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 18:52, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Ben Shahn, Register to Vote, Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) poster, 1946

The proper response to all of this, at least for US Wikipedians, is just to register and vote. I'm against political campaigning (on non-Wikipedia issues) in almost all cases on Wikipedia, but folks should be free to express their general political beliefs on user pages and user talk pages if it doesn't amount to campaigning. Certainly, expressing the idea "Register and Vote" is something I'd like to encourage. Ben Shahn was fairly left-wing and if you read the fine print on the poster it's also a bit left-wing, but I very much like his expression of the main idea. Anybody should feel free to borrow the poster. @Jimbo Wales:, may I put this on your user page? BTW, the WMF should not move to Europe, but to Canada, preferably Vancouver, if things get too hot. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 20:45, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

I agree with you that people should vote. I am with you in terms of being against political campaigning (on non-Wikipedia/Wikimedia issues) in almost all cases on Wikipedia - that's a can of worms that could be very destructive to the community. We have enough political battleground mentality around here as it is. But it's pretty non-partisan to say we depend on strong protections for freedom of expression, and that as individual community members it's a good thing to vote.

In terms of where we should move in a real existential emergency: I hope we never have to actually contemplate that. I actually think that a far more likely scenario would not be attempts to legally censor Wikipedia in the US - that's pretty impossible given the strength of the First Amendment jurisprudence in question - but attempts to force us to get rid of encryption or otherwise give the US a backdoor to spy on what users are reading. For me personally, that would be enough to trigger a massive publicity campaign followed by an exit if necessary. I suspect, although I can't be sure, and it wouldn't be unanimous of course, that the vast majority of our community would agree.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 21:20, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

I'll remove it on Nov. 9. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 22:22, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

I'd love the optimists to be right, but we need only look at what is happening to Gawker - not just the magazine but a whole slew of other publications like Kotaku owned by the same person. The U.S. is not a safe place to cross an oligarch who owns a chunk of the spy-industrial complex. Just ask Barrett Brown while you're at it, who also crossed paths with Palantir. We should be glad for our power, such as it is, and we must not be intimidated, but we should not let ourselves imagine that things will not come to open war ... and sooner rather than later. We will need to actually use those backups. Wnt (talk) 23:27, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

And I would advise editors to keep offline copies of articles they develop, in case a "virus" starts slanting more pages, in unusual ways. It seems some people think all fascists say, "Hello, everyone, I am a fascist dictator here to topple your government" rather than, "There's been a merger, and now we pay volunteers $big at Wikislantia, and so Wikipedia, you're fired". -Wikid77 (talk) 11:28, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

CC-by-SA and the ability to fork the 'pedia protect us here. If Wikipedia was taken over by WikiSlantia, then I'm sure somebody (probably in Canada) would start WikiFreedonia or WikiClassic and most readers would move to to the the truly free version. That's just one of our trump cards. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 13:59, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

That's a good point, and the word would spread quickly to know where most editors had gone. -Wikid77 (talk) 19:48, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Donald Trump won't be able to cause problems for Wikipedia, the only possible realistic threat can come from disasters like this or this. To guard against such threats, we need to save copies, also hard copies of Wikipedia, and also consider the problem of how we can efficiently rebuild our technological infrastructure from scratch. Count Iblis (talk) 16:59, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

It would require repeal or at least massive changes to the First Amendment. That chances of that happening are pretty remote. Guy (Help!) 20:30, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Is "fuck off" the new normal for Wikipedia behaviour?

Is "fuck off" the new normal for Wikipedia civility? Are we going down the Roger Ailes route where we tolerate it because everyone does it. No one deserves to be treated like that. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 21:26, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

It's very simple: If you don't like being told to fuck off, then adjust your behaviour accordingly. What's this; no luck at ANI, so thought you'd try another dramah board? Still, I'm sure some of the mongers around here will massage your ego and tell you what you want to hear. Cassianto^Talk 21:44, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Like with Donald Trump, it is best to just let you express yourself, and people can decide for themselves. I bring it here because behaviour tolerated at Wikipedia reflects on the founder. By my incomplete count your told 8 people to fuck off or some similar incivil phrase, so, I don't feel special. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 22:11, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

More delusional bullshite from you, I see. I take responsibility for my own actions and if I want to tell troublemakers and trolls to "fuck off" from my talk page, then I will. In the past 24 hours you have hounded, edit warred, dramah mongered, and then templated me. Why then, when you harass me at my talk page, should I not be able to tell you to fuck off? Answer it, as you will, but I want nothing further to do with you and will not engage with you further. Cassianto^Talk 22:21, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

@RAN: "reflects on the founder"...lol. So John Yoo's Torture Memos reflect on Jefferson and Washington? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 22:24, 16 August 2016 (UTC)

Stephen, if you tell people to "fuck off" you should be blocked for it immediately, and banned if you continue. Stop it now, it's not right. I am making no comment on whatever sequence of events led up to the incident, as there is no justification for it. A single time, in a moment of passion, and quickly apologized for? No big deal. Establishing it as a somehow proper way to deal with a problem - no way. We need to continue to be a better community than that. If you want to curse at people to try to modify their behavior, you should know that it seldom works -and you should know that there are thousands of message boards who tolerate it, and you'd be more than welcome there.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 00:13, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I guess the "monger" spoke. Thank you. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 00:46, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I think you missed that it is Cassianto who has the dirty mouth. Stephan is a gentleman.

And no, "fuck off" isn't the new normal for Wikipedia behaviour; it's the entrenched norm, sadly. I've brought up the subject of civility numerous times on your talk page and elsewhere and finally gave up, seeing my ideas on civility are considered hopelessly priggish by most Wikipedians. YoPienso (talk) 00:32, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't know how gentlemanly my comment above was, but indeed, I have not in recent times, or indeed as far as my memory goes back, told anyone to "fuck off". Or called them Jimbu ;-). I have, however, tried to redact a PA, but to no avail. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:18, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

For my own part, someone who closes with a sarcastic "cheers" is far more irritating than somebody giving me an honest "fuck off". But I respect others who disagree -- and really, we shouldn't tolerate either one. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:53, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

(Wow--I've often signed off with a sincere Regards or Best regards or Best wishes or Cheers, never sarcastically. I hope I haven't unintentionally given offense. Don't think so. YoPienso (talk) 03:06, 17 August 2016 (UTC))

Sorry if there was a misunderstanding, User:Cassianto was the uncivil one, you can see his previous 8 "fuck off" comments on my user page where I was collating them before the ANI was closed as boys-will-be-boys. I stopped collecting when the ANI was closed. The rationale for the closing was "if an admin really thought saying 'fuck off' was bad enough, somebody would have been blocked for it." A good example of circular reasoning. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 01:00, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Jimbo Wales if you think that it's bad form to tell editors to Fuck off then you should set the standard by handling it. If people are allowed to simply get away with it then they will continue to do it. In the less than a month I have been editing I have seen it numerous times including from an admin a couple editors and in at least three edit summaries. I can provide some links if you want. Upon closer inspection it seems that a couple if the individuals use the term regularly when addressing others. So IMO stating the behavior isn't acceptable is less helpful than actually doing something about it.GustavoRomeo68 (talk) 02:27, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

On January 25, 2016, right here on this page, Jimbo dismissed the legitimate concerns expressed by Doc James as "utter fucking bullshit" in the wake of that editor's ouster from the WMF Board. When I asked Jimbo to withdraw those harsh words, he doubled down and dug in his feet. It turned out that most of what Doc James said was correct. The situation spiraled out of control, many valuable WMF staffers resigned and moved on to better tech jobs, a new member of the WMF Board resigned under a cloud, and eventually, the WMF Executive Director resigned without a tear being shed by anyone. Words have consequences and Jimbo is in no position to take a righteous stance against dropping "f-bombs". Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 03:48, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

People wanting to instantly block users who resort to expletives should spend more time dealing with the many tendentious WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT contributors who waste enormous amounts of community time and energy. Sure, people should not resort to expletives. However, people should not waste community time by pushing and pushing and pushing their favorite thing. It would be great if a mechanism could be devised to instantly block both sides, but pronouncements that an expletive requires a block are particularly unhelpful because they ignore the actual problem and reward the editor who is really at fault. The comment by Jimbo mentioned above is diff. Johnuniq (talk) 04:07, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

We should prosecute women that are raped, because they should not dress that way, they are just pushing and pushing. We call that victim blaming. Qatar Convicts Dutch Woman Who Reported Rape but Will Let Her Return Home. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 12:56, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Given that you are now comparing wikipedia editors to rape-apologists, do you not perhaps wonder why no one has sympathy when you bring one of your 'Everyone else is wrong' spurious complaints to AN/ANI? Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:02, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Someone telling someone else to "fuck off" after they've been baited may not be blockable, but I strongly suspect that equating other editors to rape-apologists might well be. You're well out of bounds there. I'd quite forcefully suggest that you strike that, RAN. Black Kite (talk) 13:05, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

You must see the irony in your continual blame the victim strategy. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 16:00, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Please don't over-react like that; nobody suggested we "instantly block users who resort to expletives." We're talking about a standard of civility, not an escalation in vengefulness. There would be a process of warning before a temporary block. If the user didn't improve his vocabulary, eventually there could be an indefinite block. Imo, administrators should more quickly be sent to the corner for a time-out since, along with using the mop, they should be (again, imo) modeling appropriate behavior. YoPienso (talk) 04:39, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply, but why not make a suggestion for how to handle the tendentious editor who pushes and pushes and pushes, but does not say BADWORD? I have never seen an editor who routinely uses expletives remain unblocked. The issue is how to handle good editors who occasionally resort to undesirable terminology when dealing with undesirable contributors. Johnuniq (talk) 05:27, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

• You wrote: "I have never seen an editor who routinely uses expletives remain unblocked." Apparently you have not followed the ANI I have linked to. Please read the subject of the ANI's comments below: "As for the future? Well, I shall continue to tell those coming to prod me to fuck off; this joke of a thread will have no bearing on my future conduct."

Sure, here's my suggestion: remain calm; don't take the bait; let normal editing procedures work. Railing back at a tendentious editor is counterproductive. We had one at the Charles Darwin talk page. You just have to back off and ignore his rants. The article hasn't suffered. We're all responsible for our own actions and it's our business to be civil even with difficult colleagues. YoPienso (talk) 07:28, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

There is a quite a big difference between dealing with an annoying editor at an article talk page, and dealing with one who shows up at your talk page to template you and who raises spurious complaints at AN/ANI to drag you there. One can generally safely ignore the former, the latter requires an active response. Only in death does duty end (talk) 07:32, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Indeed. They usually get boomeranged or otherwise go down in flames. ANI checks your history, and if it shows good editing and collegial attitude the problem gets cleared up. I was falsely and rudely accused of being a sockpuppet once and threatened by an admin with banning. It was annoying and unnerving, but ended well. They ran a checkuser on me that showed I was thousands of miles away on another continent from my alleged alter ego. Problem solved. It just took a little patience and some help from friendly editors. Real life presents similar difficulties. Nothing to get upset about. YoPienso (talk) 07:52, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

This is another example of the fallacy of circular reasoning. We justify bad behaviour because of templating a talk page. Yet, templating is demanded by the ANI process. Accusers "get boomeranged" is again an example of blaming the victim. Make a valid accusation and the surrogates and enablers will comb through your edit history looking for a gotcha moment to punish the accuser. You can see an example of it in the ANI I started. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 15:24, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Yopienso you say: "nobody suggested we 'instantly block users who resort to expletives.' " -- er, I think Jimbo did above by saying: "Stephen, if you tell people to "fuck off" you should be blocked for it immediately, and banned...". But then I've never really taken anything Jimbo has said seriously, illustrated by Cullen's exposé, just above. As for the future? Well, I shall continue to tell those coming to prod me to fuck off; this joke of a thread will have no bearing on my future conduct. But I thank Richard Arthur Norton, anyway, for some added pleasure time in allowing me to read this to much hilarity. Cassianto^Talk 06:38, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Ah, but Jimbo said that to you, specifically, because of your track record. (To be precise, he said it to Stephan, who he thought was you, and mistakenly called him "Stephen.") He added, "A single time, in a moment of passion, and quickly apologized for? No big deal. Establishing it as a somehow proper way to deal with a problem - no way. He didn't say the moment anybody says a bad word they should be summarily blocked. YoPienso (talk) 07:20, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Whenever anybody comes out with an outburst or personal attack I really think you have to look at the context and if the editor was provoked or not. Wikipedia does tend to attract particularly irritating people at times who will cross the line in harrassment territory and target an editor/editors for weeks even months sometimes. It can really be exasperating to deal with at times, especially if you've worked hard at an article and people are nitpicking or trying to force an infobox. Sometimes outbursts are understandable given how intense editing can be at times, but obviously ideally we would all be civil 100% of the time. Me, I try to be pleasant generally, but if I see an editor bullying others or just behaving annoyingly I won't hold back on saying what I think. It's just the way the site is, it's impossible to really be pleasant to people at all times. Sometimes certain people need to be spoken to harshly for unreasonable behaviour, though "f bombs" are sometimes a little harsh, and some are more understandable than others. Everybody has had heated moments on here, even Jimbo. I've been here 10 years now and I think it's impossible to not spend significant time on here without a heated dispute. I do think more people on here need to take a step back at times and look beyond certain disputes. Most of us are here for the same reason and share a similar passion for building this encyclopedia, and a lot of us tend to forget that. One thing though which I think tends to make situations worse is where one editor tries to draw out a dispute and try to get another editor blocked and take it to various talk pages as in this case. This is not the way to resolve a dispute and will only increase hostility in the long term rather than diminish it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 08:58, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

You are using the language of domestic violence to justify bad behaviour. They "pushed my buttons", they "prodded me", they "goaded me", "it got heated". If there are no consequences for bad behaviour it continues and escalates. If you want to troll people with incivility, use the comments sections of every news story online. I think they exist just for that purpose. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 15:10, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I'm not justifying anything. But I do think that you're milking this for all it's worth and you come out of it worse than if you simply had a heated argument with Cassianto and then yawned and moved on. I don't see what there is to gain by coming here complaining to Jimbo, knowing very well what the answer would be. If you really have a problem with its useage, the best thing would be to try to get arb to pass something which penalises an editor for saying it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 15:38, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

For years that was how Fox News operated. We should not have to accept it as part of Wikipedia culture and just move on. WP:Civility reads: In cases of repeated harassment or egregious personal attacks, then the offender may be blocked. Even a single act of severe incivility could result in a block, such as a single episode of extreme verbal abuse or profanity directed at another contributor, or a threat against another person. Why don't we just delete the page if it is never enforced. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- )

I agree, but then we should also not have to accept people who contribute nothing to articles coming along and trying to enforce infoboxes upon articles where the people who have promoted them to GA/FA. It causes disruption with the disputes that follow and is really offputting to editors who promote content and opt not to have one. That to me is one of the most unacceptable parts of Wikipedia culture, but what can I do about it?♦ Dr. Blofeld 16:12, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

You shouldn't have worn that dress = You should expect this if you participate if RFCs and oppose my opinion. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 16:16, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Are you calling me a cross dresser? ;-)♦ Dr. Blofeld 16:18, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Some of us edit using machines behind corporate filters. Use of "f-bombs" results in the whole page being blocked. The same can happen for the word "bastard". So the simple message is: keep it civil, respect cultural differences or risk being unreadable to some readers. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 09:02, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Yes indeed, Martin. Some of us even edit in Lincolnshire (allegedly), where "bastard" is often used as a term of affection. Martin in Scunthorpe (talk) 22:17, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

About 6 months ago I had an email blocked from a garden centre. It was advertising bird feeders and claiming that it attracted several types of tit including great tits! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 22:45, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Oi, mate. Who are you calling a great tit!? Martinevans123 (talk) 07:48, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

Sometimes I see people express a desire to be consistent about censorship. The problem is, there is no consistency possible if you censor. Every comment is different, and every judge is moved more by his own personal biases and ulterior motives than by a hypothetical assessment of which term is worse than another (or which analogy is too provocative to make). Given an unfair and systematic bias, the solution is not to heap up more penalties on the weak end, because that will only lead to worse abuses by those alleging consistency while crushing somebody they don't like. Instead it is best always to focus on removing existing censorship, which is neither fair nor ever accomplishes what it claims to be seeking to do. Long ago I called civility enforcement "Wikipedia's War on Drugs", and I haven't seen anything to change my mind since; it is an enforcement that feeds into creating the problem it claims to solve.

That said, it is also helpful to examine positive duties that Wikipedians have, such as explaining themselves and discussing rather than just edit warring. Wnt (talk) 14:58, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

You are very wrong about all this, and I think it is because you are looking at it through the wrong filter. Thinking of this as 'censorship' is absolutely silly. Imagine if you have a little dinner party at your home. One of the guests is rude and abrasive to others. When people disagree with him on a some minor issue, rather than addressing the issue itself, he tells them to "fuck off". What do you do about? There are several options, but none of them really have anything at all to do with "censorship". My advice is this: don't tolerate behavior like that. Be forgiving of emotional outbursts, they do happen, and that's ok. Except to see apologies afterwards. Do not under any circumstances, though, suggest that such behavior is right. We are here to build an encyclopedia - nasty behavior to others is damaging to that effort. It's really that simple.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:44, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I completely agree with Jimbo here, FWIW. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:40, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Jimbo, let's explore that imagining a little. Let's assume this dinner party has a person who, using polite language, declares an opposition to same sex marriage. Another guest asks why he should not be able to marry his partner just because he is gay, and gets the reply that gays aren't normal and don't get to redefine marriage, still expressed in polite terms. The second guest tells the first to "fuck off". I would see the second's comment as unfortunately worded (though I would not call it wrong), but the first as being the one whose behaviour was by far the more objectionable. True 'civility' is not determined by what words are used, and a reflexive objection to words without evaluation of the broader circumstances is unhelpful and can be unfair. EdChem (talk) 19:31, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Pending Jimbo's reply, I'll explore that with you. The point I think is that the "fuck off" response accomplishes absolutely nada except to inflame the situation, making any effective communication virtually impossible. Tell me to fuck off in such a situation and my pre-human attack reflex kicks in, my adrenaline spikes, and I go into self-defense mode and dig in my heels. At that point I'm deaf to any other words you have to say to me. People who use such tactics either (1) do not understand this involuntary reaction, or (2) do not seek effective communication. No mainstream (consensus) psychologist would support that kind of response, if you have any respect for the admittedly soft science of psychology.
Given that the practice is both counterproductive and offensive to many, I think "fuck off" proponents should be willing to refrain, and I don't buy the "I can't help it" argument. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:42, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I think RAN and others are on the right track. He errs in believing that anything will be accomplished in discussions like this, however. Real change in this area will be achieved by (1) community evolution, debatably, or (2) WMF intervention. With the exception of occasional comments like these, I've long ago given up on this issue for the sake of my own mental well-being. My motto: In the end, it's only Wikipedia. (BTW, I have a mini-essay on the topic at User:Mandruss#Culture of disrespect.) ―Mandruss ☎ 18:30, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I agree with Jimbo on " We are here to build an encyclopedia - nasty behavior to others is damaging to that effort.", but nasty behaviour goes beyond uttering expletives, some of the worst offenders I can think of on here are the ones who typically don't resort to direct personal attacks, but go about the site harrassing people and bringing a vendetta to multiple articles, psychological bullying on here really. That can be the most damaging I think. And they get away with it because they're "civil" in terms of abiding by NPA. Personally I'd rather somebody swear at me than spend weeks/months pursuing some issue and wearing me down by obsessively going on about it, or infobox warring!♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:26, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

The logic is that we shouldn't seek to address a problem while there are worse problems going unaddressed. But it's likely that some nuts are harder to crack than others; why not crack the easier ones first? (Assuming that either nut is crackable; see above.) ―Mandruss ☎ 21:48, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Has our civility compass really become so broken that we are even considering this. It should never be acceptable to tell another editor to "fuck off" (unless this is clearly done light-heartedly and is stated as such). I thought I read somewhere that editors should behave toward each other as if they were at real life work...I would not ever think of telling a colleague to fuck off. DrChrissy ^(talk) 21:55, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Considering this? Relative civility is community consensus, at least as per the voices of the editors who are prepared to speak up. We assume they are representative of the whole because we have no other choice. It doesn't take too much open-minded reflection to figure out that they are probably not representative, but there it is. And you've spent enough time at ANI to know this. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:03, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be better if we treated inappropriate use of expletives as cries for help and all sent Wikilove messages to the editors in question, assuring them that they are loved and appreciated. --Boson (talk) 22:12, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

I don't think anybody is arguing that it is acceptable. However, there's a huge amount of territory in between "there is nothing wrong with this" and "you have been indefinitely blocked", and where any particular instance falls in that continuum is a matter of context. Incivility is still a major problem, but clear-cut civility blocks that don't take mitigating circumstances into account went out of fashion here 7 or 8 years ago. I remember dozens (hundreds?) of AN, ANI and Arbcom cases over a handful of extremely prolific content creators who constantly got in trouble for being rude to others. After a time the community got tired of the cycle of block influential editor > another admin unblocks > ANI thread > (loop for months) > RFC/U > Arbcom. There's never going to be any uniform concrete rule on it, because context is everything. The Wordsmith^{Talk to me} 22:17, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

Many will argue that it is forgivable if one is sufficiently "provoked". Forgivable not once, but again, and again, and again with the same editor, without end. There are always ways to avoid the situation where one is provoked in the first place—we call them dispute resolution—but using them requires a bit of adult-like self-control. It's so much easier to just continue arguing until one is provoked and then tell them to go fuck themselves. (I believe Wikipedia is also a regular anger release valve for many editors, and using DR does not serve that need.) Keep turning up the flame until they (1) back down, or (2) take you to ANI, where you know from past experience you will be forgiven, once again, thereby reinforcing your behavior.
If this is not the same as "acceptable", that is a distinction without a difference.
The way to short-circuit your perpetual cycle is to stop the another admin unblocks step. As I've said previously, that would require WMF intervention and, since I don't see that happening in my remaining lifetime, I'm not optimistic. Essentially, this is merely a stimulating academic discussion for me, and I should probably stop wasting server resources here. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:39, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

• The only inconsistency to WP:CIVIL comes from who is doing the incivility and how many friends they have. This isn't a comment on Cassianto or RAN - this is a comment on the rest of you who quibble over this. At this point, I'm tired of this argument. Let's just drop the facade and accept that everyone, on all sides, protects their friends and they're not ashamed of it.--v/r - TP 01:59, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

I agree and as I commented above if no one is going to enforce the policy and say or do something to these offenders then that policy isn't not worth the paper it's written on. I having the support of friends doesn't allow people to vandalize articles then they shouldn't be able to defend and justify their friends behavior in this way either. Jimbo is an admin and should do something about this behavior. GustavoRomeo68 (talk) 03:07, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

• Playing devil's advocate here, but is "fuck off" any different in meaning than "bugger off" or "piss off"? They all essentially mean "go away", but if any of the variants (or the actual meaning) were used, I don't think this thread would exist. So, is the personal attack in the intended meaning, the obscene word, or the manner which it was used? Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 13:27, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

I would say they are all about the same. When feeling that way it would be better to say: "Look, I feel as if our interaction isn't helping the encyclopedia. I'm going to back away from this issue now, and I would appreciate if you would do the same. Let's avoid each other for now, as clearly this isn't a good situation."--Jimbo Wales (talk) 13:35, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

Outstanding questions

Jimbo, did you ever decide whether in your view, my restrictions on talking about economics and using the COIN process should be appealed? I don't think the topic bans have resulted in substantial improvements, and the fact that I have been censored in part because of my trying to persuade you that the problems exist in the first place doesn't seem right to me (frankly, the topic bans were both unjust in most all respects, but since nobody showed up in my defense, I decided to try to abide by them for a while before appealing them.) Now I am sure I will try to appeal them, but I want to know your opinion first because even if you think so, it's not exactly my top priority.

I am also interested in your opinion of whether we should ask the copyright office to share royalties collected for orphan works with editors in proportion to the popularity of the work they've done. Could doing so entrench a culture of celebrity, so we should wait until there are valid importance models to use instead of pageviews as a coefficient for bytes appearing in articles due to specific editors? EllenCT (talk) 14:19, 17 August 2016 (UTC)