Wikipedia:Civility

Civility is a code of conduct for editing on all Wikipedias. Wikipedians define incivility roughly as personally targeted belligerent behavior and rudeness that results in an atmosphere of conflict and stress. Our code of civility states plainly that people must act with civility toward one another.

Our Wikipedia community has by experience developed an informal hierarchy of core principles, the most important being that articles be written from a neutral point of view. After that we request a reasonable degree of civility towards others. "Civility" is a principle that we can apply to online conduct, and it is a reasonable way to distinguish acceptable conduct from unacceptable conduct.

Co-operation and civility

Wikipedia invites editors to improve its text, but often there are differences of opinion on whether a change in text is an "improvement". When editors weigh the pros and cons of whether a change is an improvement, it may be difficult to criticize text without being subjective about the situation. Editors, in trying to be clear, can be unnecessarily harsh. Conversely, editors can also be oversensitive when they see their contribution replaced by something that claims to be "better", despite a possible difference of opinion as to whether the replacement was truly an improvement.

Silent and faceless words on talk pages and edit summaries do not transmit the nuances of verbal conversation, leading to misinterpretations of small comments. One uncivil remark can easily escalate into a heated discussion which may not focus objectively on the problem at hand. During these exchanges community members may become uninterested in improving articles and instead focus on "triumphing" over the "enemy".

Engaging in incivility

See also: Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts; see also Do not disrupt Wikipedia

These behaviours can all contribute to an uncivil environment:

• Rudeness
• Insults and name calling. Comment on the actions and not the editor. See point-of-view editing
• Judgmental tone in edit summaries ("snipped rambling crap") or talk page posts ("that's the stupidest thing I've ever seen").
• Belittling contributors because of their language skills or word choice
• Starting a comment with: "Not to make this personal, but..."
• Lies, such as deliberately asserting false information on a discussion page so as to mislead one or more editors.
• Ill-considered accusations of impropriety, such as calling someone a liar, or accusing him/her of slander or libel. Even if true, such remarks tend to aggravate rather than resolve a dispute.
• Feigned incomprehension, playing dumb

More serious examples include:

• Personal attacks, including but not limited to racial, ethnic, sexual, and religious slurs.
• Taunting, goading or baiting.
• Profanity directed at another contributor.
• Defacing user pages.
• Giving users derogatory names via Pagemove vandalism.
• Indecent suggestions.
• Referring to other editors' good-faith changes as vandalism. See WP:VANDAL for what vandalism really is.

Incivility happens, for example, when you are creating a new page, and another user tells you, "If you're going to write a pointless page, could you spell-check it?" Escalation occurs when you reply, "Get bent!"

This style of interaction between Wikipedians drives away contributors, distracts others from more important matters, and weakens the entire community.

When and why does incivility happen?

See also: Wikipedia:Wikiquette

• During an edit war, when people have different opinions, or when there is a conflict over sharing power.
• When the community grows larger. Each editor does not know all the others and may not perceive the importance of each individual to the project — so they do not worry about maintaining relationships that do not exist. Covering up a bad reputation is easier in a larger community than it is in a smaller community.
• Sometimes, a particularly impolite user joins the project. This can also aggravate other editors into being impolite themselves.

Most of the time, editors use insults in the heat of the moment during a longer conflict. Insults essentially end the discussion. Often the person who made the insult regrets having used such words afterwards. This in itself is a good reason to remove (or refactor) the offending words.

In other cases, the offender is doing it on purpose: either to distract the "opponent(s)" from the issue, or simply to drive them away from working on the article or even from the project, or to push them to commit an even greater breach in civility, which might result in ostracism or banning. In those cases, it is far less likely that the offender will have any regrets and apologize.

Some editors deliberately push others to the point of breaching civility, without seeming to commit such a breach themselves. This may constitute a form of trolling, and is certainly not a civil way to interact.

Other editors are prone to ruminate for many days or months over past slights and injustices and seek resolution and revenge.

It is also reasonable to assume that certain persons may be uncivil because of external variables, such as lack of sleep, which generally lowers one's judgement capability and may make one more prone to speaking their mind in socially unacceptable ways.

Why is incivility inappropriate?

See also Wikipedia:No personal attacks

• Because it makes people unhappy, resulting in discouragement and departure from Wikipedia
• Because it makes people angry, resulting in non-constructive or even uncivil behavior themselves, further escalating the level of incivility
• Because it puts people on the defensive, closing their minds to other ideas and preventing a consensus from forming
• Because people lose good faith, resulting in even less ability to resolve the current conflict — or the next one
• Because in the end, the content to be edited is not improved
• Because Wikipedia is, at heart, an online community, and to maintain the effectiveness of the community, all members must be civil to one another and remember why they have joined the community in the first place.
• Because it creates a hot, unfriendly space and a sense of threat; with civility, there's respect and a sense of safety between people involved, producing room for negotiation.

Outing and harassment

See also: Wikipedia:Harassment

Harassment occurs when a particular editor is "targeted" by another user, and may include any untoward attention such as seeking to communicate inappropriately with that editor, or contacting other persons (either on- or off-wiki) in order to cause harm to that editor. Repeated instances of incivility, if unchecked, can also constitute harassment.

Because of privacy concerns, which apply to the Internet in general, editors (Users) are encouraged not to supply superfluous identifying information about themselves, such as home address or telephone number. This minimizes the likelihood of spamming or harassment by outside parties. If personal information becomes available in such a way as to constitute a risk of harm to a User (editor), the information can be deleted or Oversighted if necessary. An editor (User) who makes use of such personal information available concerning another user to harass that user, or who enables the harassment of a user, may be blocked for doing so.

Where information about an editor is available, perhaps because the editor refers to such information or provides it on their own blog, or on another site, such information should only be referred to if it is reasonable to do so to assist in working on the encyclopedia, and if it is reasonable not to doubt the accuracy of the information. This may occur in the case where a particular editor is an acknowledged expert on a subject, perhaps the author of reliable published information about the subject, or the editor may in fact be the subject of an article. See also: Wikipedia:Conflict of interest.

If an editor for the purposes of working on an article or otherwise collaborating does volunteer some personal details, such as where they work, what their job is, their school or academic institution, such details may be referred to if it is of assistance in working on the encyclopedia. (Remember, such information may not always be completely accurate, or may become out-of-date, and should be used with discretion.)

Arbitration

See also: Dispute resolution

In a case of ongoing incivility, consider discussing it on that user's talk page, not to escalate the situation, but to explain your objection. You may also wish to include a diff of the specific uncivil statement. If the incivility is unresolved, a user conduct Request for Comment is for discussing specific users who have violated Wikipedia policies and guidelines. An RfC may bring close scrutiny on all involved editors.

The Arbitration committee has given this advice to editors: pursue disputes in a civil manner designed to contribute to resolution and to cause minimal disruption.

Considerations concerning civility

See also:Wikipedia:Etiquette

Preventing incivility within Wikipedia

• Prevent edit wars and conflict between individuals (the project sets editing constraints — essentially a community answer)
• Force delays between answers to give time to editors to calm down, and to avoid further escalation of a conflict (protecting pages)
• Use positive feedback (praising those who do not respond to incivility with incivility)
• Apply peer pressure (voicing displeasure each time rudeness or incivility happens)
• Solve the root of the conflict between the offender and the other editor(s) or the community — or find a compromise.
• Use negative feedback (suggesting that an editor involved in conflict should leave a conflict or even temporarily avoid all controversial areas in Wikipedia). It may be worthwhile making such suggestions to both sides of the conflict.
• Have certain users refrain from editing specific pages that often trigger incivility.
• Filter emails by the offender, or filter mail based on certain keywords and reject emails to the Wikipedia mailing list with those words
• Accept that incivility and rudeness can't be entirely avoided in such a project, and do not respond in kind.

Reducing the impact

• Balance each uncivil comment by providing a soothing or constructive comment.
• Do not answer offensive comments. Forget about them. Forgive the editor. Do not escalate the conflict. (an individual approach which allows a user to remain uninvolved)
• Alternatively, respond to perceived incivility with greater civility and respect. Many editors will then moderate their tone to match yours.
• Ignore incivility. Operate as if the offender does not exist. Set up a "wall" between the offender and the community.
• Walk away. Wikipedia is a very big place. Just go edit somewhere else for a while and return when tempers have cooled.
• Please. Thank you. I'm sorry. You're welcome. You're a good person and I know we'll work this out. Treat your fellow editor as a respected and admired colleague, who is working in collaboration with you on an important project.
• You do not have to like an editor as a person, to appreciate that they are also working for the good of the project. If you do not like a fellow editor, try not to hold that fact against them.

Removing uncivil comments

See also: Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines

Only in the most serious of circumstances should an editor replace or edit a comment made by another editor. Only in the event of something that can cause actual damage in the real world should this be the first step (i.e., disclosing the name, address or phone number of an opponent). In the event of rudeness or incivility on the part of an editor, it is appropriate to discuss the wording with that editor, and to request that editor to change them, but it is not appropriate to make another editor appear to be more courteous than he truly is.

• Remove offensive comments on talk pages (since they remain in the page history, anyone can find them again or refer to them later on). This is appropriate if the words appear to be vandalism.
• Delete (entirely and permanently) an edit made by the offender (requires technical help).
• Permanently delete an offensive comment made on the mailing lists (requires technical help).
• Replace a comment made in an edit summary by another less offensive comment (requires technical help).

Suggest apologizing

See also: Wikipedia:Etiquette

Mediation regularly involves disputes in which one party feels injured by the other. The apology is a form of ritual exchange between both parties, where words are said that allow reconciliation.

For some people, it may be crucial to receive an apology from those who have offended them. For this reason, a sincere apology is often the key to the resolution of a conflict: an apology is a symbol of forgiveness. An apology is very much recommended when one person's perceived incivility has offended another.

See also

• Wikipedia:No angry mastodons
• Wikipedia:Harmonious editing club
• Wikipedia:Kindness Campaign
• Ethic of reciprocity
• Wikipedia:Honesty
• Wikipedia:An uncivil environment is a poor environment, an essay on why civility is so important.