User:Hank Stamper

I'm an engineer, who has worked in the mining industry in Australia for about 35 years, mainly in maintenance. Living in the outback, fixin' broke stuff, raising a family.

I know a little bit about a lot of things, so I don't contribute much beyond the occasional comment & suggestion.

And, to me, the Wiki concept is about the most enthralling thing the 'net has delivered - it's like watching your kids grow up, or something you built work and develop.

But....it also worries me. I see the need for the growing cult of "editorialism" that is evident in the editing process. But it is a cult, and it is increasingly dominated by whatever is the current fashion in academic or pseudo-academic censoriousness. I appreciate that the background battle that goes on in "controversial" pages is a necessary part of tuning that content and getting it right. But it's increasingly becoming dominated by a vision that stifles debate and information when it doesn't conform to current pieties. And by those who are here for the fight, and nothing else, and never change views or take a step back - making bloody-minded ideological rigidity the governing force.

And that's dangerous.