More time has passed, discussions have been halted, so I’d like to talk about another incident. I gotta get a bit less vague this time, so please be chill.
Someone started an Incident report because Andrew Tate was in the Did You Know box on Wikipedia and it had a quote where he self-described himself as a misogynist. This person thinks, seemingly, anyone/everyone involved in the Did You Know side of wikipedia is an idiot (Are the idiots who run DYK under the mistaken impression that WP:BLP doesn't apply there? was what they named this Incident before someone else edited it to be less inflammatory), but especially anyone who allowed the following Did You Know text to be approved:
... that social media influencer Andrew Tate described himself as "absolutely a misogynist"?
Keep in mind, this specific part of Wikipedia that this user took this to is about interpersonal or behavioral issues, not "I don't like what this page says" issues. There are seemingly a billion places on Wikipedia to discuss the ins and outs of what should or shouldn't be on an article or in infoboxes or what have you, and this specific place is to talk about behavioral issues of users.
Which brings me to another point: This was discussed at length in the relevant places for the Did You Know box! In fact, since early April or early March, depending on when you're counting, this has been brought up and discussed. The person who brought this to the Incidents seemingly had no clue that all this discussion happened, and once it's brought to their attention it's brushed aside, as a group of people defending this user are basically advocating for the entire Did You Know aspect to be removed entirely from Wikipedia.
For all of this incivility, the proposal is to block the person for 24 hours. This person already has an open Incident about themselves as they decided to have this little outburst, and I've seen them be a massive asshole like this in the past, so it feels like 24 hours is too low, but I don't edit Wikipedia so I don't get a say. Additionally, this person has repeatedly been told to be civil, and even had to cut the R-Word from their on-site vocab, so like... something needs to be done! Another thing I've not seen brought up at all is that this user's need to be mean and rude and blow up at people had them coming to this page, Incidents, to yell and be shitty without even a partial understanding of what was going on about the thing they were mad about. If they get so red, nude, and mad online that they can't even bring up their issues in the proper places, let alone be remotely civil about things, something needs to be done!
The split on the proposal has been mostly "Support, this guy needs to cool off and needs to know actions have consequences" or "Oppose, c'monnnn he's learned his lesson [citation needed].". One weird one is someone going off about "The question here is literally whether civility trumps our biography policy", which is simply not the case? This isn't the place for that question to begin with (again, this page is specifically about reporting and dealing with behavior issues of users!!), but on top of that there was already discussion on if that line about being a self-described misogynist really did go against policy and the discussion didn't go the way you wanted! This is, by all accounts, not actually about a biography policy but instead about a dude so fucking mad he saw "described himself as "absolutely a misogynist"" in the Did You Know box that he wanted to run to the "Please Deal With These Problem Users" page and call everyone involved in putting that line in the box idiots "trivialising" abuses.
Which kinda gets to a larger point that I keep seeing when I read this page. A lot of times it seems like people don't want to talk about what is actually the problem, but instead want to be fussy about anything else. In another Incident that went up around the same time, someone put in their user page an infobox that described themselves as anti-LGBT+ with the image of the pride flag with an X over it. Obviously, in order to talk about what was happening, they had to either link to the flag/infobox or describe it. So many people were up in arms about the description of what the flag was that there was, at one point, more comments about how to describe the anti-LGBT+ thing than what to do about the anti-LGBT+ thing.
But the best response, by the time the discussion got locked, was this:
Neutral – but I do look forward to seeing everyone making the "he's learned his lesson!" argument back here next time :)
Speaking of the discussion being locked… the discussion got locked! Seemingly by a friend of the problem user in question! Even though discussion was ongoing, with people split between “this dude needs to face some sort of consequences” and “c’mon he’s just a little birthday boy”, with responses and talking about the issue at hand, this friend of the problem user instead stopped the discussion (locking the whole thread) and directed them to a discussion about the Did You Know policies and practices. So now that discussion in this other part of the site is being sidetracked because people are pointing out how weird it is to close the discussion as people are still working out how to handle the problem user. To be clear, the problem user is still making digs at people so clearly he hasn’t learned his lesson, proving everyone who said he needed to face consequences right.
Additionally, another small thing came up. The problem user and alleged friend of problem user frequent some anti-Wikipedia forum. As far as I can tell, this website exists solely as some Wikipedia-specific kiwifarms, attempting to doxx editors under the guise of speaking truth to power and generally point and laugh and make fun of other editors not part of their shitty circle. Someone brought up how weird it was that the person who locked down discussion, the alleged friend of the problem user, talked extensively about the Incident in said forum before locking it, and now the alleged friend is trying to act like people are putting the kiwifarms-but-for-wikipedia-editors site on trial.
Reading through that thread on the kiwifarms-but-for-wikipedia-editors site... yikes. The person who locked the thread about the problem user is backpatting, others are justifying doxxing editors, other people are making fun of someone for talking about the connection between the alleged friend, the problem user, and this kiwifarms-but-for-wikipedia-editors site.
Looking at everything as a whole, here's what I see happened:
An editor with an axe to grind against the concept of the Did You Know box on the front page of Wikipedia got so red, nude, and mad about the line ... that social media influencer Andrew Tate described himself as "absolutely a misogynist"? that he went to the Please Help Me Deal With This Problem User(s) page to call everyone an idiot. Despite that this seems like a completely unhinged and procedurally incorrect response to this, no one brings that up in how his obvious want to be mean and shitty and uncivil he went to the wrong place to yell at randoms and also had no awareness that this line had already been litigated. Despite being active in his hatred for the Did You Know box on-site at Wikipedia and also off-site on a kiwifarms-but-for-wikipedia-editors site, he had no idea these discussions happened. When they're not relitigating if the Did You Know line was against policy or not, the opinions of editors on if this guy should face a 24-hour block are split into "this guy is always uncivil, and usually gets away with it for being right, he needs to find out that actions have consequences" and "he's learned his lesson, he's just a little birthday boy, you all yelled at him and that's enough". Before consensus could be reached on what to do about this guy, a kiwifarms-but-for-wikipedia-editors site fellow traveler swoops in and locks discussion of any consequences being faced. When people point out how weird it is for this fellow traveler to do this, they go back to the kiwifarms-but-for-wikipedia-editors site to yuck it up.
Truly this saga has it all, including a sequel hook, as I know this guy will not stop. Again, never had less of an interest in editing Wikipedia lmao
