QUOTE(MZMcBride @ Tue 30th June 2009, 11:11pm)
You didn't answer the question.
Personally, I'd say he
did answer the question, but he didn't want to come right out and accuse you of binary thinking. By the same token, if you weren't thinking in that fashion, you probably should have assumed that he would have made exceptions for people threatening acts of violence in the Real World, or other overtly harmful crimes.
All of this hinges on what society (as opposed to the WP community) would consider a "crime" with respect to anti-Wikipedia activity. I don't believe society has really decided that question, though I would imagine the justice system would not look kindly on someone firebombing or blowing up one of Wikimedia's server farms, for example.
However, I'd prefer to think that he was writing that somewhat metaphorically. Obviously he
did use the terms "blown up" and "utterly destroy" though, which was perhaps unfortunate, because apparently a number of alarmists among the WP'ers took this to mean that he planned some sort of physically destructive act. Instead, what he really proposed, IMO, was in effect to bring on the inevitable Attrition Phase a few years sooner than it will actually occur.
As to his suggestion that most Wikipedians should be institutionalized, well, that proposal has been going around for years...
This whole episode strikes me as a bit silly, which sort of makes me wish I had thought of it first. (Though I suppose I did, in a way - it's just that at the time I didn't have Mr. Damian's standing as a "productive editor," so nobody really took it seriously.) The WP'ers who are indulging themselves in all this cult-apocalyptic hoo-hah over "plans to destroy Wikipedia" have, I'm afraid, also been brainwashed somewhat by all the talk on WP of how "some people on WR seem perfectly reasonable, but others just want to destroy Wikipedia altogether," as though wanting to destroy Wikipedia is somehow
unreasonable. In fact, this is simply indicative of a desire to return to the state of general-reference publishing that existed a mere ten years ago.
Ironically, I myself am usually considered one of the more "reasonable" people here. I can assure you that this is just an act - I'd probably destroy the entire Web 2.0 edifice if I could, if I thought I could get away with it and do it without anyone being physically injured. This despite the fact that my livelihood practically depends on the internet.