Wikipedia:Ignore personal attacks
 |
This essay contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. Essays may represent widespread norms or minority viewpoints. Consider these views with discretion. Essays are not Wikipedia policies. |
 |
This page in a nutshell: When personally attacked you should ignore it, rise above it, and continue to comment solely on relevant content. |
It's unpleasant to be personally attacked or treated in a less-than-civil manner, but sometimes it happens – whether because another user is abrasive, or because they're angry. It often makes the person being treated poorly feel angry or trod-on, and often they'll try to pursue some sort of remedy against the mistreatment. It's tempting to respond to personal attacks with more personal attacks, with "telling on" the user on a community noticeboard, or by trying to leave some sort of official "warning" on their talk page. All of these things serve only to escalate the conflict you're experiencing.
An angry, heated conflict will rarely draw compromise, and frequently involves producing enormous quantities of drama, and dumping them on the community's collective metaphorical doorstep. Different people have different concepts of appropriate and civil dialog, and this frequently causes unnecessary escalation of trivial misunderstandings (the conflict cycle). Please, if it's at all possible, ignore and forgive the personal attack, and try to engage the other user in constructive dialog on whatever issue you were discussing (if you can't remember what that was, maybe you should just stop talking).
With that said, it's useful to apply the principle of "defend each other". That is, you should ignore people who attack you, but if you see them attacking somebody else, you can do the other person a favour and drop a quick (preferably private) note noting that their manner could be improved in order to facilitate a comfortable, collegial atmosphere.
