On Wed, Sep 10, 2014 at 8:46 AM, Carol Moore dc <carolmoor...@verizon.net>
wrote:

>  On 9/9/2014 7:51 PM, LB wrote:
>
> I'm going to keep at it, for now. Honestly, I'm tired of it being a mostly
> internally discussed problem... Perhaps I'll change my mind at some point,
> but that's my thinking on it at this time.
>
>  Lightbreather
>
> You are braver than I!  On the other hand this is what
> [[User:Jayen466|Andreas]]  wrote when I complained the woman editor was
> being harassed off line:
>
>
>
> *        Criticising the quality of an editor's work, whether here or
> elsewhere, is not harassment. This is not a private project, but a public
> one, with a significant impact on public life. Any such public project
> should be prepared to be criticised. If someone writes nonsense in a
> science article read and relied on by a million people a year, that is a
> matter of public interest, just like stories like
> [http://twkozlowski.net/the-pot-and-the-kettle-the-wikimedia-way/
> <http://twkozlowski.net/the-pot-and-the-kettle-the-wikimedia-way/> this],
> [http://twkozlowski.net/paid-editing-thrives-in-the-heart-of-wikipedia/
> <http://twkozlowski.net/paid-editing-thrives-in-the-heart-of-wikipedia/>
> this],
> [http://www.salon.com/2013/05/17/revenge_ego_and_the_corruption_of_wikipedia/
> <http://www.salon.com/2013/05/17/revenge_ego_and_the_corruption_of_wikipedia/>
> this],
> [http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/is-the-pr-industry-buying-influence-over-wikipedia
> <http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/is-the-pr-industry-buying-influence-over-wikipedia>
> this] or
> [http://www.dailydot.com/politics/croatian-wikipedia-fascist-takeover-controversy-right-wing/
> <http://www.dailydot.com/politics/croatian-wikipedia-fascist-takeover-controversy-right-wing/>
> this]. If you would like to curtail editors' freedom to speak out about
> Wikipedia's failings in public, this in itself will be a media story, and
> rightly so. Such ideas belong to places like Azerbaijan and North Korea. *Thus
> one would think quoting nasty sexist things, especially when an editor's
> name not mentioned should be ok. This really was a test case, wasn't it?
> (Or not in a community that still applies double standards to male vs.
> female actions.)
>
> Here's the link to the ANI in question:
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive835#Harassment
>
>
>
Where were the sexist comments? The user complaining of harassment and the
user accused of harassment were both women, and I see no comments about
gender in either the AN/I or the extensive editor review. The harassment
complained of was the persistence of an editor in following another editor
around and pointing out errors in many of her articles, and the
argumentative and derisive attitude of the first towards the latter.
Andreas' point is that criticism, by itself, is not harassment. Many agreed
with the criticism but advised the critic that she needed an attitude
adjustment. At that point she disengaged.

So it's a problem when we conflate circumstances which do not implicate
gender or sexism with those that do. Calling this an example of sexism
muddies the waters, particularly when there are many examples that are
perfectly clear cut.  It *is* an example of the hassle and angry debate
involved in contributing to Wikipedia, though, and I can certainly see how
that would drive all sorts of people away from the project.
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