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Wikipedia:Shunning

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We all know not to feed the trolls. Even a person who is not a "troll" may be difficult to work with for many reasons. Certainly we should make reasonable efforts to collaborate with others, but if someone seems more interested in fighting than collaborating, it may well be time to simply shake the dust from our feet and move on.

The advantages of simply shunning such an editor are real. Shunning can be done individually. If you ignore someone, they are no longer able to bother you — you do not have to wait for community consensus for a ban, for example. When enough editors do this, the shunned editor is removed from the community without sound and fury.

Publicly announcing that you're shunning someone may actually cause more drama. Furthermore, responding to comments related to the shun announcement may dilute the effect of the shunning. If you decide not to engage with someone, then you need to both stop talking to that person, and also stop talking about that person as much as possible.

This is more a form of "dispute avoidance" than it is a form of dispute resolution. Like nearly any technique, it's not always applicable — actively disruptive behavior may not always be ignorable, but noticeboard discussions are then often effective.

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