QUOTE(Malleus @ Fri 27th March 2009, 3:38pm)
Tell me Shalom, just to satisfy my curiosity. What's the attraction of vandalism? To me it just seems like mindless destruction.
It's mostly mindless destruction. Sometimes I want to do just that. Let me say up front that I've never vandalized real property (other than my own) and never would do such a thing. Part of the appeal of wiki vandalism is knowing that it can be repaired easily. Putting graffiti on a wall raises serious ethical issues. Putting graffiti on a paper sign posted on a bulletin board for an event that has already occurred, or putting graffiti on the blackboard knowing that someone will erase it, don't raise the same level of ethical issues.
Last Friday in my office I was so upset with things that I started throwing books around. It was a closed room and nobody else was there. By the time the fellow who works in the next room came over to calm me down, I had thoroughly destroyed a notebook I don't use anyway by throwing it against a wall six times. That's vandalism on Wikipedia. Just an act of frustration, needing to destroy something but not knowing what. I've sometimes torn leaves off a tree and torn them up for unleashing angst. Same idea.