User:NE Ent/Civility

There is no absolute standard for civility, no C such that x < C is perfectly hunky-dory and x ≥ C is Evil Reptilian Kitten Eater who should be banned for life. Rather, there is a continuum of Civility. Frequently, a review of Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts cases shows an injudicious remark following by a slightly more uncivil response followed by a more uncivil response and so on.

"Civility" and more specifically, WP:CIVIL is all too often used as a weapon against other users rather than a way to avoid conflict. The vast majority of cases brought to community or admin attention via Wikiquette alerts, admin noticeboards and the like are not cases of one editor being harassed by another. Rather, most of the cases tend to consist of two editors having a minor disagreement, and BOTH escalating rather than de-escalating the situation. Often this consists of editors A and B engaging in a minor content dispute. Both A and B resort to edit warring, sometimes with one or even both attempting to discuss the issue, but neither waiting for the discussion to play out before reverting or altering the other's changes. The edit war escalates, as they tend to do, with increasingly terse comments made in edit summaries and on talk pages. Finally, usually after being baited by editor A with "revert vandalism" or some such, editor B makes an uncivil comment to editor A. Instead of both parties stepping back and examining their own behavior, editor A immediately runs to WP:Wikiquette alerts and/or WP:ANI and starts screaming about being treated with a lack of civility. In this manner, civility guidelines are used as a weapon to "get back at" someone with whom editor A had a minor disagreement. The underlying problem is not editor B's incivility, but rather the tendency of BOTH editors to edit war, even if discussing the issue at the same time, rather than working together toward a solution.

Civility is also often used as a weapon when editors have a history of dispute. This commonly consists of editors C and D having opposing views which they have argued about in the past. Things have cooled down recently after one or both being warned by the community about their behavior. After a little time has passed, and editor D thinks he can get away with it, he posts some comment or reverts some edit C has made with the purpose of provoking editor C. Editor C, already weary of D and overly sensitive to anything D may say or do, reacts with incivility or an attack. This is immediatley followed by editor D running to any forum he can find and complaining about being treated so horribly by editor C. This of course is a blatant violation of policy yet editors and admins often look at the attack or incivility by C and reprimand or block that editor, without taking the provocation into account. This, understandably, angers editor C who is more likely in the future to use confrontation due to perceived persecution by the community while his adversary, editor D, is not even warned. In this way, not only does editor D get away with provoking editor C and disrupting the community, but editor C is driven away from the project, and anyone who sees the bigger picture is struck by the lack of fairness in the process as well.

The purpose of examining how WP:CIVIL is abused is to better determine how to apply it correctly, both for those involved in disputes and for those who are uninvolved but try to help out. The most important part of Wikipedia's code of conduct for dealing with other editors is not civility per se, but assuming good faith. Most disputes would never become uncivil if editors, when feeling slighted, would assume the slight was unintended and look for clarification rather than assuming offense was intended and escalating the situation. Likewise, if editors would discuss content disputes rather than edit warring, even if they are not violating the letter of the law, many disputes would be avoided. What is hurt, for example, if someone puts their version of a disputed point in an article, if you are able to discuss it? Why does it have to be changed right that day? Why are so few editors willing to allow the edit they disagree with stand during debate? These are simply a few ways to minimize the situations an editor may become stressed and feel slighted by another editor.

If you find someone being uncivil towards you, consider the following steps:

• Just ignore it if you can. Assume good faith. This is especially true if it's moderate or a first time thing. Ignoring little stuff comes across as a sign of strength and confidence.
• Review your own actions. Is there something you said that could have been phrased more clinically? e.g. Please post comments on the article talk page. reads better than Stay off my talk page! Consider striking through something you said per editing your own talk page guidelines.

If the above isn't successful, follow the dispute resolution procedures

• Be sure to follow the guidelines, e.g. Posting neutrallly worded notification at the other editor's talk page.
• The best cases are succinctly stated and include very specific diffs of the behavior in question.
• Present your case but avoid demanding specific remedies. Ban this user for life! makes you look intemperate.
• Your posting will frequently be followed by a rebuttal by the other party. Unless there is a specific factual error that you are correcting, preferably with diffs, avoid the tendency to immediately respond.
• Give the process time. It may take a day or two for third party editors to have a chance to look into the issue.
• Stay focused on the issue at hand. Something from three months ago probably isn't going to be helpful.

Try to meet the other party two-thirds of the way. If you try to meet them half-way, you'll probably end up arguing about where the half-way point is. Your goal isn't to win, it's to make Wikipedia better.