Wikipedia talk:Wikilawyering

Offensiveness, again

As an openly-admitted lawyer (see my user page), and in part to Laurent's assertion that real lawyers might not feel offended, I have to at least weigh in and say that I do, in fact, find the term offensive. The arguments made, above, for why lawyers shouldn't feel offended by it are themselves contrived and, frankly, Wiki(substitute N-word)rigged.

Would you have been offended by that term, had I spelled it out? Why? It just refers to the practice of shoddily constructing something. Everyone knows what it really means, it's not really a reference to African-Americans, and African-Americans shouldn't therefore be offended by its use. I could go on with references to Wiki(I-word)giving and Wiki(J-word)ing and Wiki(B-word)ery, but I won't because my intent is not to disrupt WP to make my point.

Appeals to bush lawyer, barrack lawyer, and ruleslawyer are of no benefit, they're just as offensive as wikilawyer. Frankly, the foregoing comments of DVdm as much prove my point as not, and he's not the first editor who I've encountered who has expressed or implied the idea that if lawyers cannot set aside their lawyerly habits that they simply shouldn't be editing WP at all. Indeed, the first subparagraph of the Wikipedia:Wikilawyering#Advocacy in Wikipedia section comes very close, indeed, to saying just that in a damning-by-faint-praise manner. (And it's interesting to note that when that subparagraph was added in 2006 that the Association of Member's Advocates was still in its heyday and was in fact playing a disruptive, er..., active role at ArbCom and other fora. Now the Association is gone (and it went away a few months before I began editing here), that subparagraph can even more strongly be read to say that lawyers need not participate.)

I must, however, say that Wikifinagling is not an adequate substitute, nor is Wikipettifoggery nor a prior attempt at WikiCaviling. Rather than come up with a substitute term, I would advocate for eliminating its use altogether. Perhaps others can come up with examples of where it was properly used in its exact meaning to describe what someone was actually doing, but I strongly suspect that it is rarely, if ever, used other than as an unfounded accusation and, as such, is just a form of name-calling. Let's give it up. Shorthand terms are convenient, but when they're offensive we can take the time to say what we mean — emphasizing the letter of policy over its intent — rather than offending. Though I grew up in a time, place, and culture where the use of racial epithets for African-Americans and Latinos were part of everyday parlance, I don't use them. Not out of political correctness or fear of getting in trouble but simply because they might offend. Why should we prohibit the use of "racial, sexist, homophobic, ageist, religious, political, ethnic, sexual or other epithets" (and to those who would say that the ones which are prohibited are the ones that one cannot choose, such as race, age, or sex, I would point out the inclusion of "religious" and "political" in that list), but yet allow this one? If we're going to foster a culture of collegiality and consensus, why should we encourage the use of terms that can offend?

Full disclosure: I have, and do, on occasion use the term, but I ordinarily do so in a jocular way to refer to my own positions and arguments, not to refer to the activities of others. Since coming to Wikipedia in 2007 I've been trying, probably not always successfully, to use my skills as an attorney to benefit the encyclopedia and to change the term wikilawyer from a negative one to a positive one, so I've not avoided its use.

Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 18:57, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

The term "wikilawyer" refers to misguided attempts to look for loopholes in procedures, in order to excuse unhelpful behavior at Wikipedia. There is no reason for a lawyer to find the term offensive since the "lawyer" part of the term is not used in any disparaging manner. As a website, Wikipedia is fundamentally different from Real Life, and wikilawyers are editors who mistakenly imagine that RL approaches to rules are useful here. Johnuniq (talk) 05:07, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

The essay says, "It may refer to certain quasi-legal practices ... In other words a 'wikilawyer' is an image drawn from a lawyer" (it said "poor lawyer" until this IP edit in February, but I've not reverted it because, frankly I'm not sure which one is more offensive), so that's the most WikiPolish (i.e. stupid) argument I've recently encountered. Oh, that usage shouldn't be offensive to Polish people since I'm only really referring to the Poles who are actually stupid, not all of them, just as Wikilawyer only refers to the lawyers who misguidedly practice law in an irresponsible manner. And by tacking "Wiki" on the front I'm clearly limiting its use to here at WP and not making any reference to Real Life. The fact is both those terms refer to an implied and false stereotype and are patently offensive. (And I apologize to my Polish family, friends, and relatives for using the term even for purposes of illustration.) There is certainly a reason for lawyers to be offended by the term and, indeed, I am offended. I must admit, moreover, that I may have been wrong in one of the things that I said above, in particular, the observation that the behavior currently described by the term wikilawyering may not really occur often enough here to justify any term to describe it. Your argument could not be a clearer example of "4. [R]elying on technicalities to justify inappropriate actions." — TransporterMan (TALK) 15:53, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

"Lawyer" is a chosen profession, not an unchangeable accident of birth. What about WP:POLICE? Offensive to cops? Needs to be changed? What if somehow there was an essay WP:PUMPINGAS? I can just hear the cries of "that's offensive to gas station attendants!" Not the same thing as using slurs against someone's ethnicity or race. Not even close. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:52, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Religion and political affiliation, both of which are personal choices, are protected by WP:NPA#WHATIS. I'm not suggesting, however, that professions ought to be added to that list, but only that this essay ought to be revised not to use the term "wikilawyering" and to state that the use of the term is discouraged; in other words, I'm not saying that the use of the term ought to be banned, but only that the encouragement of the use of the term ought to be discontinued. As such, the use of wikilawyer would become much like the use of profanity on WP: tolerated but not favored. It should be noted that in addition to the categories banned by WP:NPA#WHATIS, and notwithstanding WP:PROFANE, WP is not insensitive to mere offensiveness: we block usernames for offensiveness as mild as "poo" (block log, 13:46, 25 July 2011) and "bastard" (block log, 14:40, 1 August 2011). Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 15:32, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

It's true that username policy enforcement has become absurdly prudish. That doesn't seem particularly relevant to the naming of this essay. I also don't see any personal attack, so NPA is not really relevant either. This is dead horse, I suggest you let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:01, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

And, indeed, I have dropped the stick insofar as I never intended to do anything more than, first, register my objections here and, second, to hope, without much real hope of success, that the community would listen. I do reserve the right, however, to continue to respond to comments made here (or elsewhere, if a discussion about the appropriateness of the term should come up), but I haven't gone around, and don't intend to go around, being a disruption and objecting or raising the issue every time I come onto the term being used outside this discussion and, indeed, wouldn't have said anything more here had you not commented. (And that's not intended to be criticism: I welcome your, or anyone else's civil, good faith remarks on the subject and, though I disagree with what you've said, would like to thank you for making your comments.) Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 21:15, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

commonsensical? really?

Wikipedia policies and procedures should be interpreted in a commonsensical way "

A small point, but is "commonsensical" a real word? I've certainly never seen the term "common sense" turned into a compound word before but maybe I'm just behindthetimesensical. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:36, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

I went ahead and changed it [1]. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:22, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

This article has an unusual structure, and lack of coverage of main points in the body of the article

While the lead usually summarizes the article, in this case the lead is the only coverage of the main points of the article and the body of it just contains specialized sidebar notes. I IMHO long term more in-depth coverage of the main concepts introduced in the lead would be good. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 03:11, 5 February 2012 (UTC)