Wikipedia talk:No personal attacks

If a person says they are a Nazi, or hate x ethnic/religious group, do we have to just let that pass?

Is there really no line that if crossed allows editors to dismiss etc their views? Doug Weller talk 18:06, 10 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Methinks you want to read Wikipedia:No Nazis; while only an essay, it has noticeable support among editors.--GRuban (talk) 18:30, 10 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@GRuban I came here from there as NPA is being quoted on the talk page with someone saying “ This essay is a violation of Wikipedia:No_personal_attacks, which explicitly states that comparing editors to Nazis or criticizing them on the basis of their political affiliations is unacceptable. Existing conduct policy is sufficient to keep most ideologically motivated editors off the project.” Doug Weller talk 18:43, 10 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
That last sentence is certainly true, thank goodness. 99%+ of editors are not Nazis. However there are thousands of us editors, which means, by simple math, that every so often we find a few that are. Its a useful and widely supported essay and if someone disagrees they may nominate it for deletion and see if that is true. --GRuban (talk) 18:49, 10 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@GRuban Um, I’m not being clear I guess. I’m questioning the wording of NPA. Doug Weller talk 09:17, 11 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Eh. No Nazis says "If you're a Nazi, you're probably going to get blocked". It doesn't say "everyone is allowed to call people they're in arguments with Nazis", which is what NPA forbids, so they aren't really contradictory. Note that NPA does not say "being a Nazi and/or expressing Nazi views is OK".
As to your original question, I would not recommend looking for a reason to dismiss people's views. If X is participating in a discussion with you, either address their views, or go to an administrator and have them blocked, but the middle ground of "We think X's views are despicable, but we can't convince an administrator or the community that they are blockworthy, so we will let them edit but dismiss anything they say forever" is not good for anyone. We don't want to have shunned non-persons that everyone is supposed to ignore editing the Wikipedia. If they are really so despicable that all their views should be dismissed, we should ban them, if not, we should treat them like real people. --GRuban (talk) 14:03, 11 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not trying to do that at all. Doug Weller talk 07:58, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Good to hear. Especially since I think you actually have a mop, right? So, um. I feel like I'm trying to explain fractions to my Math professor - you probably understand all this stuff better than I do, right? So ... um? What's the problem? Because some less than clueful person is making a fuss on the No Nazis talk page? Er - that's not really a reason to change any phrasing on NPA, right? We just nicely explain to them that just because NPA says you shouldn't call people Nazis, doesn't mean that if they are actually behaving like Nazis that's a good thing. We similarly shouldn't randomly call people murderers, but if we see an actual person being murdered, we should darn well do something about it. --GRuban (talk) 15:28, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. Doug Weller talk 18:11, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Doug Weller 2409:408A:2D32:B323:0:0:9E4A:1806 (talk) 00:52, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, as written, it's talking about offensively and without basis comparing someone to Nazis - not about people who themselves show up and say Nazi things. Andre🚐 02:15, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Doug, I presume you are referring to this comment [1]. I can see their point. I'm not sure if I agree or if I think context matters but they aren't all together wrong. The essay, right or wrong, says that you are acting like a Nazi if you do XYZ. If someone says "based on your behavior of XYorZ, NONAZI may apply to you". Well that is in a round about way, comparing the person to a Nazi. But I can also see how saying, "you have traits similar to" is not the same thing as saying "you are". Someone who is Norwegian and presumably Arian has ethnic traits similar to Nazis (at least their ideals) but that comparison alone is far from making them any kind of Nazi. Given the title of the essay I do see how saying the essay applies to an editor would imply they are a Nazi so I see the point. I think this would be especially problematic if say the editor were from part of the world that suffered under Nazi occupation even if the editor themselves had nationalistic attitudes. Consider if we had an editor with Polish nationalist views but who lost family to the Nazi occupation. Yeah, it's a constructed example but in the correct circumstances I can see the concern. That said, I can also see how people might feel that an editor is already over the line if people are suggesting NONAZIs applies to them... assuming it reasonably does. Springee (talk) 15:55, 12 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I really don't have time for this and no interest at the moment. Doug Weller talk 16:19, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Needs a section on calling/assuming somebody to be "a bot"

Today I accidentally assumed a user to be a bot, judging by their swift answer (~100 words + a revert just under 2 minutes). I think the guideline could use a section on that as well. In fact, users with Twinkie or other tools to watch over fresh edits in Wikipedia can give a scare to a keyboard-only editor like myself. Not that I am proud of asking Adakiko if the swift revert was a "some kind of prank?" - I just hope there will be a guideline specially for non-savvy editors surprised by the speed of such reverts. 81.89.66.133 (talk) 10:33, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]


Apparently, I did that assumption more than once

  • In fact, I did a similar thing last year:
Information icon Hello, I'm Loafiewa. 
I wanted to let you know that one or more of  your recent contributions to Talk:Mosin-Nagant have been undone because they did not appear constructive. If you would like to experiment, please use the sandbox. 
If you have any questions, you can ask for assistance at the Teahouse or the Help desk. Thanks. Loafiewa (talk) 09:22, 12 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

My reply was: 

:That was a chat-like quick reply. Suspicious... 81.89.66.133 (talk) 09:28, 12 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Back then, I was not aware there are tools that allow to both revert and leave template-based messages simultaneously. Hope this will help in the future. 81.89.66.133 (talk) 10:38, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]


A comparison list of personal attacks

quote: "Comparing editors to Nazis, communists, terrorists, dictators, or other infamous persons. (See also Godwin's law.)

I propose to remove the word communists for the following reasons:

  1. Communism in an economic concept where means of production are commonly owned, it is an opposing side of capitalism in contrast to capitalism where means of production are owned by certain invididuals; since communism is an economic concept, to be non-biased, the whole sentence should look like "Comparing editors to Nazis, communists, capitalists, terrorists, [...]"
  2. Godwin's law does not mention communists. Nazism as a whole was condemned by the international community, including both communist and capitalist countries, The Nuremberg Trials, involved an international military tribunal composed of representatives from the Allied powers, including the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and France; whereas communism is not condemned, or, if condemned, by capitalists or their sympathesizers and vice versa. Due to the controversy of the issue, I propose to remove it. Alternatively, we may add "capitalists" to the list to have it balanced.

--Maxim Masiutin (talk) 15:04, 6 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Recurring attacks

Is there a reason, possibly some archived discussion, concerning including or excluding
See also: Wikipedia:Harassment
--- under the section title?
The Wikipedia community definition of "recurring (repeated) attacks" is a pattern of repeated offensive behavior that appears to a reasonable observer to intentionally target a specific person or persons, so it would seem uncontroversial. -- Otr500 (talk) 17:20, 10 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Do we differentiate between direct and indirect personal attacks?

On the Talk:Donald Trump page, an IP user said this: My God, California could fall into the sea tomorrow and you people would oppose adding "submerged" to the opening sentence because "recency" and "undue weight" and "California's more notable for other things than being underwater" and "Wikipedia isn't a newspaper". It's obnoxious. Stop it. You're embarrassing yourselves. In my mind, this is simply a thinly-veiled personal attack, disguised as an indictment on a larger group. But I'm not sure.

  1. Would the same exact phrase, referring to one person instead of a wider group, be considered a personal attack, or even a borderline personal attack?
  2. In general, does referring to a group as a method to personally attack an individual constitute a personal attack?
  3. Is this codified in policy somewhere that I am unaware of?

Thanks. Cessaune [talk] 01:59, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Who cares if it's documented somewhere? When it comes down it, we have to rely on some commonsense and the comment above is not a personal attack. If commentary like that was frequent without compensating positive contributions, the author might be sanctioned. But a couple of statements like that are just part of a robust exchange. Either ignore or briefly explain whatever the issue is. Johnuniq (talk) 02:15, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
My question was just a general question about policy, more than an actual want to sanction the IP. Let's assume for the sake of argument that the user makes comments like these frequently.
Why don't you consider this a personal attack? Also, I don't get what positive contributions have to do with it; can you explain? Cessaune [talk] 02:19, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Adding "language" to the list of protected characteristics

@Remsense I have attempted to add "language" to the list of protected characteristics, which you have reverted. Could you please elaborate on your reasoning? NicolausPrime (talk) 07:04, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

NicolausPrime, if I say to another editor: "Your English language skills are too weak to edit the English Wikipedia, and I recommend that you edit the Wikipedia in the language you speak best", is that a personal attack? Cullen328 (talk) 07:11, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If there was evidence that this has been resulting in unintentional disruptive editing, then my understanding would be that your example would be governed by WP:DISRUPTIVE and not by this policy. And I don't think this example would constitute Abusive, defamatory, or derogatory phrases by the cultural standards present on Wikipedia.
Now, one may claim that neither of these arguments is very strong. But I don't think this policy is interpreted with this level of literalness either. For example, if someone was detected inserting content whitewashing Holocaust or increasing visibility of neo-Nazi activists, then citing the WP:NONAZIS essay to call for a rightful ban could run afoul of a literal and scrupulous reading of the following prohibitions: Using someone's political affiliations as an ad hominem means of dismissing or discrediting their views, such as accusing them of being left-wing or right-wing and Comparing editors to Nazis. NicolausPrime (talk) 08:20, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
No, I can't beyond that it seems unnecessary. Your justification was "completeness", which is not sufficient in my mind. To me, you would need to articulate an actual concrete reason for the addition. Remsense ‥ 论 07:11, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
To be clear, the list is explicitly non-exhaustive (etc.), so there really has to be a positive argument for explicit mention of any given item. To be blunt, this seems potentially like a preoccupation that is wholly hypothetical on your part. Does this happen? Moreover, if there is a linguistic discrimination problem in the discourse on here, surely it should be profiled and discussed first? Remsense ‥ 论 07:28, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]