I'm going to quit Wikipedia!
editI felt misunderstood and attacked by other editors. I was becoming grumpy and thinking of throwing up my hands in disgust and quitting Wikipedia. Fortunately, I recognized that these feelings and thoughts were probably a sign that something had gone awry with me. I therefore went on a reading spree, consulting Wikipedia essays and other articles that I thought might help me work through this grump-fest. They helped!
Helpful Essays
editHere are the essays that I found helpful, with a sentence or two from each article that epitomizes a point that helped me develop a more mature perspective.
No angry mastodons - Keep the discussion focused. Concentrate on a small set of related matters and resolve them to the satisfaction of all parties. Afterward open unrelated issues as a separate discussion. ... Focus on the subject rather than on the personalities of the editors.
Advice for hotheads - Don't post in the heat of the moment: If you're a "ranty-pants" type, go ahead and write your spur-of-the-moment, bombastic reaction in a debate, to get it out of your system, but don't post it yet.
Go have a snack or watch funny pet videos for 15 minutes, come back, and re-edit it to follow the above advice before posting it.
Assume the assumption of good faith - What "Bad Faith" Is: A bad faith edit, or a bad faith comment, is an edit or comment made deliberately to disrupt the project. The best example of genuine bad faith is vandalism. While bad faith is not strictly limited to vandalism, the key component of bad faith is the deliberate attempt to be unconstructive.
Assume the presence of a belly-button - To assume the presence of a belly-button is to allow for the possibility that anyone — you, your friends, your enemies, the people you voted for or against, the cited source with impressive credentials, or the anonymous editor who just made a mess of your carefully written page — might make an innocent mistake, without intending to do anything wrong, without even realizing it after the fact.
On assuming good faith - each person editing Wikipedia is either trying to make it better, or trying to make it worse. If they're trying to make it better, that's a good faith edit; if they're trying to make it worse, that's vandalism.
No personal attacks - Comment on content, not on the contributor.
Old-fashioned Wikipedian values - Some long-term editors have noticed that they've become increasingly grumpy and bad-tempered on Wikipedia. This could be for any number of reasons, but the impact is that they are less happy contributors and the effects become a downward spiral, drawing in more and more grumpy contributors.
By pledging to return to these old-fashioned Wikipedian values, perhaps your example will spread, making the whole environment more pleasant. But even if it does not, you can feel happy about yourself and the contributions you're making.
After all, the high ground is a great place to be. But beware the high horse; it can be painful to fall off this animal.
Beyond civility - Make sure you're addressing the original question, not the argument about the question, or an argument about the argument. ... Once you get more than one level of abstraction away from the original question, it is very unlikely that anything you say is going to help resolve that original question.
Beware of the tigers - Wikipedia's articles are no place for strong views.
Or rather, we feel about them the way that a natural history museum feels about tigers. We admire them and want our visitors to see how fierce and clever they are, so we stuff them and mount them for close inspection, with all sorts of carefully worded signs to get people to appreciate them as much as we do. But however much we adore tigers, a live tiger loose in the museum is seen as an urgent problem.
Etiquette - Keep in mind that raw text may be ambiguous and often seems ruder than the same words coming from a person standing in front of you. Irony is not always obvious when written. Remember that text comes without facial expressions, vocal inflection, or body language.
Be careful choosing the words you write: what you mean might not be what others understand. Likewise, be careful how you interpret what you read: what you understand might not be what others mean.
Staying cool when the editing gets hot - Take it slow. There is no time limit for a discussion. If you are angry, take a break from posting or editing. Come back in a day or a week. You might find that someone else has made the change or comment you wanted while you were away.
Raw text is ambiguous and is often more difficult to interpret than speech. Text comes without facial expressions, vocal inflection, or body language. It is easy to misjudge other editors' moods and intentions, especially when disagreements or discussions are heated. Make your proposals and responses clear; listen carefully to opposing arguments and/or criticism, and be prepared to prove that you are listening actively.
Saying things like "You seem to be saying [paraphrase of opposite opinion or suggestion]", or "As I understand you...", acknowledges that you are paying attention and not just waiting to interject with points of your own. Even if you are sure you have not misunderstood what someone is trying to say to you, listening carefully and communicating effectively will help keep you from missing something important.