Are they all crazy at German Wikipedia?, Wondering after a specific incident Options

[Law Lord]

(I am posting this here instead of the German forum, since my German is rusty and I prefer an outside view.)

I rarely (never) edit deWiki but a sudden piece of interesting information about the late Hans Diller came to my attention. As far as I could tell, an article on him was only present at deWiki.

I inserted the info (in German). A user reverted. I asked for the reasoning. None was given. It seems said user thought that it is good for the mutual respect that instead of participating in a discussen about an article, you write your admin friends in private and have them threathen anybody you disagree with.

So, asking again made this being entered on my user page:

Please stop your editing without references, which, by the way, looks like „on the wrong side of the enyclopaedic border“. And if you revert that again, I'd have to stop you by efficient means.

The poster was a German administrator, and he has a very anti-French image on his user page.

I posted a request on the bottom of his user page for the removal of said image:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benutzer_Disk...hateful_content

This led to immidiate reaction by 3 different user, none of them adressing the issue but rather "shooting back" at me. The 3rd one write in German calling me a "troll" and stating I have no interest in "encyclopedic coopoeration" and asking for my immidate block.

Certainly, the culture at deWiki is very different from enWiki.



Any thoughts?

Cheers,
Law Lord

[Gandoman]

The German Wikipedia does have certain cultural differences from the English one. For one, it's more authoritarian. While the English Wikipedia at least attempts to keep up the appearance of assuming good faith, the German one has a policy called Sei grausam ("be horrible"), which says that if someone is out of line, it's better to just come down with the banhammer as quickly as possible. Basically, admins are the bosses, and if someone disagrees with any action performed by an admin or contributor with more seniority, they're likely to get booted real quick.

[Law Lord]

Basically, admins are the bosses, and if someone disagrees with any action performed by an admin or contributor with more seniority, they're likely to get booted real quick.

Definitely that is how it works; which is why I stand by my previous conclusion that these people are in need of treatment. They are also bad people because they refuse treatment and continue their sick ways. However, having a sectarian cultural interface is probably difficult to treat?

I understand now, what it is in German spirit that has resulted in some very poor choices over the course of recent history. How sad that this is reflected so clearly by the behaviour of the members of deWiki.

When these people (deWiki people) make so poor choices in simple human interaction (rendering themselves the Herrenvolk and every outsider an inferior) it certainly poses the question: how can anybody trust the validity of anything they write at all?

[Somey]

I understand now, what it is in German spirit that has resulted in some very poor choices over the course of recent history. How sad that this is reflected so clearly by the behaviour of the members of deWiki.

To be fair, I doubt that a cultural emphasis on efficiency, order, and "security" normally results in a mass tendency towards racism, religious persecution, or the devaluation of human life - at least not in most societies. It probably does result in authoritarianism though, along with a rigidly hierarchical power structure and a near-obsession with rules, making it an ideal proving ground for Wikipedianism.

Germans are NOT stupid people; most of them know that the mistakes of the past must (or at least should) never be repeated. Unfortunately, they've yet to realize what a mistake Wikipedia is... Hopefully, time will fix that.

When these people (deWiki people) make so poor choices in simple human interaction ...(snip)... it certainly poses the question: how can anybody trust the validity of anything they write at all?

Well, THAT you could say of almost any culture that produces a Wikimedia project. Each national/ethnic culture has its own idiosyncrasies, and any encyclopedia-like websites produced by those cultures will reflect them. That's just another reason why people should want their encyclopedias to be produced by properly-trained, unbiased academics and publishers, rather than cultures.

[GlassBeadGame]

Germans are NOT stupid people; most of them know that the mistakes of the past must (or at least should) never be repeated. Unfortunately, they've yet to realize what a mistake Wikipedia is... Hopefully, time will fix that.

It has impressed me greatly the generations of Germans since WWII have conducted themselves in a manner that is just about everything you could ask from a people whose nation has a recent past of horrible wrongdoing. As a society they have faced their past without avoiding blame or making excuses, readily acknowledging responsibility.

[Random832]

It has impressed me greatly the generations of Germans since WWII have conducted themselves in a manner that is just about everything you could ask from a people whose nation has a recent past of horrible wrongdoing. As a society they have faced their past without avoiding blame or making excuses, readily acknowledging responsibility.

Though that in turn requires one to take it as read that an individual born after 1945 should take "responsibility" for the events of WWII (which is of course distinct from the responsibility to do their part to prevent such things from happening again)

This post has been edited by Random832: Mon 21st September 2009, 4:43am