User:Riana/The encyclopedia matters
 | This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: While all contributors should be treated with basic courtesy, respect must be earned rather than expected. Upholding our goal as a first-rate source of information should be foremost in our minds, rather than tiptoeing around our etiquette guidelines. |
Wikipedia has a vast, diverse community, complex in its structure and its heterogeneity. As Wikipedia grows, so does its community, and thus this variety and intricacy.
While this massive userbase is Wikipedia's lifeblood, it is often its greatest undoing. Wikipedia's enormous popularity, its great success, and its open, welcoming community, is the very thing that encourages many to take advantage of it. Self-promotion, conflicts of interest, original research, nationalism, advertising in articles - basically, using Wikipedia as a sounding board for your very own gripe/obsession/new theory - can and will ruin the encyclopedia if its dedicated contributors do not do their uttermost to keep the scourge at bay.
Yet many will persist in telling you that second chances must be given; that we must bathe all in the warm glow of WikiLove; that all new editors are confused lambs to be caressed and set on the right path with only the gentlest nudge of the shepherd's crook. This is quixotic naïvete at best, and blind stupidity at worst. Many a user will reform, this is true; I will not be so cynical as to suggest that the guy who replaced a few articles with 'poop' cannot be ameliorated. But the new user who argues persistently that the article about his small firm should be kept; the POV-pusher who is never blocked due to never actually breaking past his three reverts; the section in the historical figure's article describing a fascinating hypothesis about his origins, which cites sources which just maybe don't quite check out - these are Wikipedia's enemies, to be quashed, and fast. Low-level, persistent disruption can be more harmful than the obvious, in-your-face type, which people are more willing to deal with rapidly.
When something does not feel right, do not hesitate to call someone out, or alert someone with the ability to help. Do not let people tell you that you are biting a newbie; that Wikipedia is only as strong as, or even dependent upon, its community; that you too were new once; that all can be reformed. You should respond that you are not so much biting a newbie as teaching him exactly what Wikipedia is about; that Wikipedia is not a sociological experiment in how groups function, or how a group and its aim are co-dependent; and that some people simply cannot, or will not, understand the rules. When you reach this realisation, stop, and ask yourself whether dealing with this person decisively will be a loss to the community, or whether it will lead to a better Wikipedia, and how these two weigh against each other.
Wikipedia's primary focus is not its community. Wikipedia's primary aim is noble, and that is promoting a free, first-rate source of information to its readers. A large proportion of its community do nothing to further this aim, and one must bear this in mind at all times when editing. When push comes to shove, assuming good faith is foolish, and civility for civility's sake is always hypocritical. If you have to act, act for the sake of making a better Wikipedia, and never hold back because you're scared of violating some twee etiquette guideline.