False statements at RFA, They "should be banned" Options

[Shalom]

From "Yet another ageism thread": http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...r_ageism_thread

The point of this thread is to attempt to put a stop to opposes based on false information, especially when the person making the false comment refuses to budge. Majorly talk 20:10, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Of course, nobody listened. All anyone wanted to talk about was ageism, not whether it's okay to oppose someone based on a false statement.

Well then, Majorly, don't you think Iridescent's oppose on me was based on false information? Why didn't you protest then? Why did the whole admin community not protest then? Why did everyone smile and nod as Iridescent slandered me -- and continued to do so later by falsely alleging on her talk page that I had engaged in "campaigns of harassment" against "real life" individuals?

[Anonymous editor]

Well then, Majorly, don't you think Iridescent's oppose on me was based on false information? Why didn't you protest then? Why did the whole admin community not protest then? Why did everyone smile and nod as Iridescent slandered me -- and continued to do so later by falsely alleging on her talk page that I had engaged in "campaigns of harassment" against "real life" individuals?

I don't know of a single person who holds grudges as long as you do, and with you they're not even real grudges. They're silly Wikipedia nonsense grudges. How long ago did these things happen? I don't even know what you're talking about and I've followed the RfAs for months.

[Shalom]

Well then, Majorly, don't you think Iridescent's oppose on me was based on false information? Why didn't you protest then? Why did the whole admin community not protest then? Why did everyone smile and nod as Iridescent slandered me -- and continued to do so later by falsely alleging on her talk page that I had engaged in "campaigns of harassment" against "real life" individuals?

I don't know of a single person who holds grudges as long as you do, and with you they're not even real grudges. They're silly Wikipedia nonsense grudges. How long ago did these things happen? I don't even know what you're talking about and I've followed the RfAs for months.

You are yet another person who spends more words shooting me down for complaining about Iridescent's behavior than shooting down Iridescent for her behavior. (Or "behaviour", since she's English. Or "behavior" because she grew up in New York.)

I will always hold this grudge. I tried to walk away several times and forget about it, and I locked out the password to my WR account in December. Then I had a bad day IRL and decided to come back here.

[maggot3]

I will always hold this grudge. I tried to walk away several times and forget about it, and I locked out the password to my WR account in December. Then I had a bad day IRL and decided to come back here.

This is not a good way of gaining sympathy.

Also describing a google bomb to attempt to defame somebody as "harassment" really isn't so far off the mark that it requires holding a grudge for however long.

[Shalom]

Also describing a google bomb to attempt to defame somebody as "harassment" really isn't so far off the mark that it requires holding a grudge for however long.

YES IT IS! I did NOT attempt to defame the university president. I did not announce to the world that he was a ____. It was at first a private joke that I told to nobody (a few family members, but that's all), then it was something I revealed to a few more people for a short period in March 2006, and shortly afterward the Googlebomb was disabled altogether and was gone from existence. All the fuss on Wikipedia, my blog post about it, etc. happened afterward.

Two questions for you:
1) a) Googlebombers linked the names of George W. Bush and Michael Moore to "miserable failure." Was that harassment?
b) Googlebombers linked the name of Tony Blair to "liar". Was that harassment?
c) Googlebombers linked the name of Italy's premier Silvio Berlusconi to "buffone" which means "clown" in their language. Was that harassment?

2) a) Suppose I write on a password protected site, to which only I have the password, that "maggot3 is a nincompoop." I leave it up indefinitely and nobody knows the difference. Is that harassment?
b) I let a few friends in on the joke (say I give them the password). Some of the friends reprimand me, and I go no further. You never find out about it. Is that harassment?

These things used to happen all the time before Google killed Googlebombs. It's not harassment. It's not even close. It's not in the same ballpark. Sorry, I reject your assertion to the ccontrary.

[One]

Also describing a google bomb to attempt to defame somebody as "harassment" really isn't so far off the mark that it requires holding a grudge for however long.

These things used to happen all the time before Google killed Googlebombs. It's not harassment. It's not even close. It's not in the same ballpark. Sorry, I reject your assertion to the ccontrary.

What Iridescent said is exaggeration at best. If you tried to associate a real, non-public-figure name with an attack site on google, that's strikes me as much more heinous that Iridescent's "defamation" of a pseudonym on a web page that few but insiders visit. Especially because it was your grudge that provoked the comment in the first place.

If you were really trying to protect your reputation, you wouldn't repeatedly call Iridescent a liar, especially not on such a weak foundation. For what it's worth, I never read Iridescent's comment before, but my opinion of you is at an all-time low.

Drop the grudge. Move on. Life's too short.

[Noroton]

Drop the grudge. Move on. Life's too short.

Sorry, Shalom, I haven't read through the details of what's passed between you and iridescent. I've got a more general comment that may or may not be useful here.

My take is: it's often very hard to end hard feelings after someone feels he's been wronged, and much harder when the community around you won't enforce its norms in that situation. One of Shalom's complaints was that others didn't do that.

The community around the two parties plays a much bigger role than people may think. We often look away if we think there's plenty of blame to go around when two parties are fighting each other (although sometimes the drama attracts us if it looks entertaining enough or grisly enough). If we want someone to stop complaining about a particular case, or stop feuding about it, it seems to me the surest way to do it is to look into the situation, condemn the other person if that other person really did do something awful, and make the condemnation clear. That cuts down the urge of the complainer for revenge, and may even eliminate the urge.

Obviously, this example is like comparing a mountain to a molehill, but some of the same things apply if you just scale it down: I remember sitting through a well-publicized rape trial, and I had the opportunity to speak with the defendant, his accuser and the family members of each. I also remember being told by a guy -- who happened to be a cop -- that if it had ever happened to his sister or a member of his family, he'd kill the rapist. I remember thinking, "The hell you'd kill him." The experience for an accuser and the accuser's family at a trial has its frustrations, but it can also heal a lot. The accuser's family sat through the trial, experienced the formailty of the community assessing the accusation with care and seriousness, and then, after the first trial resulted in a hung jury, saw the rapist as he was convicted (at which point he bawled), then sentenced. The husband of the rape victim, a huge guy, didn't lift a finger against the rapist, and then, with a completely clean conscience, experienced the satisfaction of seeing the community punish him. If you scale all this down, I'd say that if some third party states that they've looked into a matter and found that someone seems to have been wronged, it helps diffuse the situation.

In societies where the authorities don't tend to dispense justice, traditions develop for families, private groups or the parties themselves to dispense it. The usual conflict-of-interest problems ensue, and the punishments tend to be overly harsh.

From [[Feud]]:

Vendetta is typical of societies with a weak rule of law (or where the state doesn't consider itself responsible for mediating this kind of dispute) [...] The practice has mostly disappeared with more centralized, rationalistic societies where law enforcement and criminal law take responsibility of punishing lawbreakers.

Not everything can be adjudicated. Many things can be condemned. I think that even if both parties are to blame, condemning both may actually be helpful to both, since I suspect most people would be willing to take the criticism if only the other side's wrongs were recognized. This is one reason why we shouldn't hesitate to say something that might irritate the complainer if the complainer is also in the wrong.

I think it seldom works to tell someone who's angry that "life's too short". That may work after the anger dies down, but that's never the time a person is told "forget about it." I think One's reply, overall, was probably helpful by indicating he looked into the matter, and, since he determined that the other person (iridescent) did something wrong, said so.

Maybe the best thing someone in Shalom's situation can do is to state the complaint briefly and provide diffs clearly showing what the complaint is (this is very hard to do, especially when you're mad).