Wikipedia:Deletion policy/Personal attacks

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It seems the points made on this page are clear and do not presently need further discussion.

  1. While personal attacks are a Bad Thing, putting up a sanction is unlikely to help, and requires more effort than it's worth.
  2. Repeat offenders should be taken to Wikipedia:Requests for comment.

Rather than discuss a group of articles, this page is for discussing a certain manner of behavior on WikiPedia in general and VfD in particular.

Usually, VfD is an ordered process. Many nominated articles get deleted by unanimous vote because they have no place in Wikipedia. Many others get kept because the nominator was mistaken or uninformed, or because the article was significantly improved after receiving its nomination. However, sometimes, heated arguments ensue, where people who contributed to or associate with an article insist it should be kept, and other people vehemently argue that said article is pointless, or worse.

The problem is that in these heated arguments, some people start attacking the people who disagree with them, rather than simply countering their arguments. Luckily there are few people who behave like that, but their offensive behavior can be destructive. In one of today's VfD discussions, a very simple remedy for this was proposed.

A vote containing a personal insult to someone in the same discussion should be discounted. Just like votes from sock puppets are ignored by the Mods when deciding what to do with a page after its discussion finishes.

Of course, there are subtle remarks that could be treated as an insult, or simply as vehement disagreement (e.g. "John Doe is obviously wrong"). For these, it is important to assume good faith and not treat them as insults. However, any votes containing remarks such as "John Doe is a moron" should be discounted. This seems like an elegant solution, and would serve to convince such people to make civil votes without insulting people.

This is not an official policy proposal of any kind, but it would be nice to discuss this and see if we can get decent guidelines out of it. Do people think this is a good idea? Or a bad idea? Do people have other suggestions? Discussion welcome! Radiant! 10:10, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Statements of general disagreement

  • Though I dislike personal attacks and have no specific love for those who make them, I disagree that they should necessarily render an attached vote null and void. My reasons: Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  1. What constitutes a personal attack is quite subjective, even our ArbComs often have trouble agreeing. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  2. I wouldn't want to put the burden of judgement on the admins who close the VfDs. It would likely make the process of closing VfDs longer and more difficult, as in addition to counting the raw votes, the admin in theory should also be judging each vote regarding whether it constitutes an attack or not. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  3. It is the nature of VfD that some voters have strong feelings on subjects on which they vote. I wouldn't want people to be afraid to voice their strong opinions or arguments for fear of their vote being thrown out. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  4. Relatedly, it is possible that devious VfDers would attempt to goad opinionated voters into making personal attacks so their votes don't count, either to deliberately sway the vote or simply for fun. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  5. Let's think for a moment about what fair voting is. Throughout history, there have been numerous attempts to restrict who may vote in one way or another, such as only allowing (whites, men, landowners, aged 21+, literate people, etc.) to vote. Nearly all such restrictions have been thrown out or modified as generally unfair. To say to someone "your vote doesn't count" is a very strong statement, and should be based on something more substantial than offhandedly calling so-and-so a jerk or whatever. In other words, generally speaking, votes should always count except in the most egregious of circumstances, such as sockpuppeting or other obvious attempts to sway a vote. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  6. Those who are determined to make personal attacks will likely do so anyway, vote or no vote. Simply put, I doubt that this would have any substantial discouragement value. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:54, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)
  7. One more thing... I'm not entirely sure that this is really a particularly big problem. I visit the VfD page every day, and I read just about all of it, and maybe, maybe one-tenth of one percent of votes there are what could even remotely be considered a personal attack. I see plenty of disagreement, of course, but the vast majority of it is mannerly. Compared to other web communities, WP is generally very civil (almost miraculously so, perhaps, considering its size and openness). I think actions like this should only be taken when there is a clear and overwhelming need. At the moment, I'm just not seeing that. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 23:24, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)

I am quite glad that Andrew has stated everything I could have said, and better. Would it be nice if we didn't have so many personal attacks on VfD? Yes. Is the stick of "you'll get your vote taken away if we deem what you say a personal attack" the way to go about it? It's a solution quite potentially worse than the problem. -- Antaeus Feldspar 21:46, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I'm in general agreement with most of what Starblind wrote above. Furthermore, having spent the past few days working through the backlog in /Old, it looks like just about all of the personal attacks were from newbies who probably won't stick around after their article is deleted, or from repeat offenders, for which there's already a more effective solution. —Korath (Talk) 08:19, Mar 2, 2005 (UTC)

I also agree generally with Starblind's comments above. I close many of the articles on /Old, and it can be a tedious job. Adding another layer of complication by having closers decide if a snide remark is a personal attack just makes the job more difficult. It also becomes more contentious, as we dance in the grey area areas where an offhand comment can go either way. I have no problem discounting the votes of probable sockpuppets, but to ignore a vote of an established user because of their comments really rubs me the wrong way. I also specifically agree with Starblind's last statement: I'm also not sure it's that big a problem. I sometimes roll my eyes at some things said, but most of the discussion is civil. This seems like a solution in search of a problem. Joyous 00:57, Mar 3, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Statements of general fence-sitting

  • I am torn. Certainly, we have all seen several cases on VfD of late that would lead one to wish for such a structured approach to discouraging such behavior. Unfortunately (at least for the process of making clear distinctions) the most egregious cases have not been clear-cut abuse, but have instead been cases in which an individual with a very firm opinion resorted to language that was not an obvious imprecation, but was instead along the lines of "John Doe is obviously incorrect." The behavior that made it egregious was the fact that said user did the same thing to everyone who disagreed with him/her, even when s/he was the only person voting against the common opinion.
Of course, it would be nice to say that if a user described another user with a word generally accepted as a pejorative in a reasonably clear pejorative fashion, that the vote would then be discounted. I think that this is a nice, clear-cut criterion. Such a clear definition would also reassure those voting in good faith that innocuous statements would not be misrepresented to deprive them of a vote (all you have to do is avoid words generally recognized as pejorative). But this is, I think, what all reasonable people expect from other Wikipedians. Isn't the tossing of pejoratives a grounds for banning or temporary blocking? And this does not take into account Andrew's points #5 and #6.
Unfortunately, I cannot think of any elegant solutions to prevent the sort of abusive, bullying behavior that the last couple of days have revealed in VfD. Therefore, it is tempting to propose and support some kind of punitive action on those who engage in that behavior. But I'm not sure enough to vote either way.
In any case, I think that largely the administrators recognize abusive comments when they see them, and discount their effect on the concensus process (ie, only count them as one vote). And, while it can be upsetting to the Wikipedian attacked in the short term, I believe most of us, in the long run, recognize that the individual who has attacked us in such a way has his/her own problems, and their comments don't really say anything about us, but instead say something about the attacker. Ditto how such comments effect the opinions of others regarding the person attacked. So I don't know if the abusive users really have any long-term impact on WP or the VfD process. Except for being extremely annoying, of course. HyperZonktalk 17:32, Mar 1, 2005 (UTC)


  • If all comments are read by a moderator before a decision is rendered, then I'd like to assume they have enough experience and sense to decide whether a vote should count on a case by case basis. If it's a sockpuppet, we already know it doesn't count, and if the voter makes a personal attack, the mod can decide whether or not the vote should count based upon the situation. However someone who makes repeated personal attacks should receive a warning and, if necessary, suspension, but I assume such policies are already in place. 23skidoo 01:06, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)
  • Yes, I believe there are policies to warn and/or suspend people who repeatedly make personal attacks. However, I do not believe these are actually enforced. At least, I have not noticed any Mod, Medi or Arb responding to the repeat offenders. To make it worse, one of those offenders is an Arb. Radiant! 09:08, Mar 2, 2005 (UTC)
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