User:Krixano
Wikipedians, read this carefully, because I expect that if you actually care about your community, you fix the problems with it rather than ignore them. Your inability to hear criticism as an entire community is what makes you a cult. So, do you want to hear my criticism, or not? Deletion of this page by any admins will confirm to me that you are in fact a cult. But don't worry, I have everything here saved. If this is deleted, I will be going more public with what I've found.
Hello! I am a Theology graduate, and I love studying LGBTQ+ Theology and Jewish Theology. I also minored in Computer Science.
I was not welcomed here very nicely, but rather with condescension, disruptive edits, and people weaponizing unspoken rules and misrepresented guidelines. So I decided to look more into Wikipedia's culture. Here's what I found.
After spending time reading what happened to User talk:Clarawood123 in various places, including here and here, I have decided that Wikipedia is not an Encyclopedia as none of the editors care even remotely about accuracy, and I have decided that admin abuse and toxicity, the stonewalling, and @User:jytdog's carelessness about the WP:3RR guideline, and @User:Bbb23's uncalled for guilty until proven innocent approach to Clarawood's situation during the "sockpuppet" investigation, as well as how much support jytdog received tells me that I do not belong anywhere near this place, and I will be continuing to warn everyone against using Wikipedia and towards using something reputable, like Britannica Encyclopedia, which has better articles in general, and many that are free.
Frankly, Wikipedia's culture based on what I have read is that of a full-blown internet cult. No thanks, I'm out.
P.S. In support of Clarawood123, because what the mods and other editors did to them was completely uncalled for, I'm sharing their original Clarawood page here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Clarawood&oldid=714622457
Examples of Abuse by the Cult Mob and by Admins[edit]
Of course, I didn't stop there, I continued to find information about Wikipedia's toxic culture. I found much information from Quora, which then led me to Wikipediocracy and Wikipediasucks. Of course, I knew right as I seen the Clarawood123 that this place was cultish, but I didn't know to what extent until I uncovered the rest of Jytdog's story.
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User talk:Montanabw&oldid=718559870
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User talk:Irene000&diff=prev&oldid=719813469
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_227#Arbitrary_break
In this Talk page, there is concern about medical videos from a corporation being pushed onto medical articles without much discussion by both Doc James and Jytdog, and yet more abuse from Jytdog calling people names, and abusing his position and power to punish a user for correcting inaccurate information just because it went against Jytdog's edits, and again using his same tricks of saying people who even slightly question him are just out to get him or are liars, etc. This paragraph is of note:
- Very interesting to see the Doc James contributions here. When newbie User:Chrisbospher added the words "for profit" to clarify Osmosis's position as a company, he was reverted and taken to ANI. Doc James claimed "The group doing medical videos at Khan has split off and formed an organization called Osmosis" User:OsmoseIt writes on Commons "We are not a spin-off of Khan Academy. Could you point me to where you saw that we were? If that's written anywhere then that is indeed a mistake and I'll fix it, but to my knowledge we've never claimed to be a KA spin-off." So, we have false and misleading information being corrected and improved by a newbie who is then sent for punishment at ANI. The user is dismissed as "someone with an axe to grind" and "only here for one purpose—to have the extremely useful medical videos deleted" and "The claims of "free advertising/marketing tool" are obviously over-the-top". Well perhaps Jytdog if you could stop worshiping the WP:MED deity for a moment, you might think that perhaps uneditable content owned by a private for-profit corporation on all our medical articles, may well simply be freemium teasers for their subscription material. -- Colin°Talk 18:00, 26 March 2018 (UTC)
Doc James, Jytdog, and their acquantances frequently use COI to fillibuster, go around the 3RR guidelines, abuse new users, just like they did with Clarawood123, and prevent discussions.
Jytdog's pattern has been noted by many people, and many of the admins and other editors have sided with and supported this person, unfortunately. Here's what The Garbage Scow notes:
- I liken it to trying to teach a mule to swim backwards.
- Here's how he wins the MMORPG:
- 1. Draw people into a stale edit war, then report them to 3RR board.
- 2. Tag team with Alexbrn and a couple others who always seem to show up in the nick of time.
- 3. Toady to certain powerful people.
- 4. Use variations of templates (like "comment on content, not on contributors") when they are unwarranted to bludgeon people in discussions.
- 5. Claim everything he dislikes doesn't satisfy MEDRS.
https://www.wikipediasucks.co/forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=177&start=10#p6026
Jytdog misrepresents the guidelines to harass and bludgeon people, and the community lets him get away with it... again.
Even after Jytdog harassed and very clearly violated rules, other editors, especially Doc James, came to his rescue, villainizing everyone else in the process:
- WP:You are not irreplaceable and WP:Wikipedia does not need you are not always true, and I've been considering creating a WP:You are irreplaceable counter essay. You do so much for Wikipedia that others don't do. And even if someone else takes up the mantle, there will be some quality aspects missing because every editor is unique in one way or another. I thank you for all of the work you've done for this site, and for often being there for me. I hope to see your return in the future. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 07:31, 4 December 2018 (UTC)
- User:Flyer22 Reborn I have been thinking the same thing. Our core community is irreplaceable. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:07, 4 December 2018 (UTC)
Basically, these people are saying that because you do so much, you are allowed to get others unfairly banned by lying about COI violations that they didn't commit, or that you can wrongfully call someone up without permission and intimidate them with derogatory comments from beginning to end (as expressed very clearly by the victim of the intimidation: Beall4).
My Experience with Wikipedia So Far[edit]
Midsize Jake over at wikipediocracy wrote the following:
- It's the way you're framing the issue. Who are the "many people" - other Wikipedians? People who are already fully inculcated into the system, including many of our own forum members? That's a loss of perspective right there, but it's understandable because Wikipedia zealously discourages attempts by its users to maintain non-internal perspectives; it's practically written into the rules.
- More importantly, "shitty advocacy-driven content" is hardly the only deficient content people try to insert into Wikipedia; it's just one category (or maybe two categories) in a very large bestiary. Maybe you're focusing on it because it happens to bother you more than it bothers others? This is a big part of what makes you a desirable participant from the system's perspective, but I guess the question for you is, how do you convince people that your behavior is entirely (or primarily) based on wanting to "improve the content" as opposed to satisfying some sort of perverse need to engage in online fighting within a pseudo-scholastic context? And are you ever bothered by the notion that the system treats your content-dispute opponents as being just as desirable, participation-wise, as you?
- My point would simply be that Wikipedia, far from helping you convince others that your motives are altruistic, provides no help at all because structurally, its entire existence depends on people having motives that are based on a perverse need to engage in conflict. Who the enemies are isn't the "structural problem" any more than scary wild animals or biting insects are the essential problem of walking through the jungle; as far as the jungle is concerned, they're just part of the environment. You have to ask yourself, if you're walking through the jungle shooting at anything that moves and spraying insecticide everywhere you go, are you good for that environment, and do you really belong in it?
- But since that's an analogy for Wikipedia, it seems jarring and wrong somehow - because when you walked into the jungle you thought you were walking into something else, due to the fact that the sign said something like, "This way to the Museum of Nice Things." But once you realize that's not what it is, you're too addicted to what you're getting from the system to leave.
My experience is perfectly consistent with this. Wikipedia is structured like a cult. It has no real judiciary process to wrestle with disputes in a way that brings the correct outcomes and a sense of justice. Rather disputes are handled as a popularity contest, and much like cults, there are unspoken and often-changing rules that new users are expected to absorb over time, and anyone who dares disagree with an admin will see the whole mob run them over. It takes a guilty-until-proven innocent approach, and new users are condescended and "hazed" as a way of inspiring compliance and reducing individual identity. Most importantly, admins and "prolific" editors are seen as those who can do no wrong and should not be questioned, even after they harm others consistently - this is the most serious attribute that makes a community a cult. This is certainly not a new criticism, as Wikipedia has been described as collectivist before, as mentioned in the Criticism of Wikipedia page. I go farther - Wikipedia is not just collectivist, it's a cult, and it was structured that way deliberately because it keeps people in the ecosystem and working. But like all cults, the community devolves into toxicity and frequently pushes away outsiders.
P.S. This essay on clueocracy is untrue and complete BS.
Final Words[edit]
- It should disturb you even more, to realise how many of those people doing those things, are Administrators or higher, the so called trusted members of the community, the ones who exist to represent their principles and uphold the policies. The problem goes right to the very top, because their system of promotion doesn't select people based on things the real world considers admirable qualities. It seems to go completely over these people's heads that Jytdog never would have passed RfA, even in their screwy system where people happily give tremendous weight to the good things he did.
- It was also remarkable how many people turned out to ONLY express sadness for Jytdog, showing no regard for his victims at all,.much less his impact on Wikipedia as a whole. Even Jytdog recognised he has done both individuals and the community wrong, and needed to face the consequences. His supoorters, not so much. Sick.
- For all these reasons, you should not really expect the loss of Jytdog to markedly change the nature of the community. The are a really fucked up bunch of people. If anything, we might have simply seen in all this, how Jytdog was a far better person than most of them. A better way to condemn Wikipedia, I cannot think of.
Solutions[edit]
Wikipedia's governance is frequently unjust. If they want to fix their problems, they should reinstate every account of the new users that have been abused here and they should punish those who have abused new users.
This involves removing every admin who supported people like Jytdog and Doc James, and enforcing rules against litigious behavior by experienced users. What Bbb23 and Jytdog did to Clarawood, opening an investigation on a bogus COI, should have resulted in what would be called "sanctioning" in real government systems - the inability for editors to bring cases against other editors. Lastly, apologize to all of the victims of this toxic community and actually listen to them.
But they won't do any of that, because they like the toxicity. They are a cult, after all.