Wikipedia talk:Ignore all rules

More prominence for "Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy"?

I'm going to guess that 90% of the real uses of IAR are more thoroughly and usefully covered by Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, which is HUGE and hidden and which few editors know about. Here's it's just in a long list with essays etc.. Is there any way to give it more prominence here without polluting the elegance and simplicity of this one sentence policy? North8000 (talk) 12:36, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

More specifically

The sparse elegance of wp:iar is so good that I would want anything ever added to be required to have thorough discussion and input and an overwhelming consensus (like 80%) And that would apply to my idea below.

What do you think of CONSIDERING adding a condensed (e.g. 2 sentence) summary of Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy to wp:iar? This would provide the following benefits:

• elevate "not a bureaucracy" to a position in a policy
• unhide "not a bureaucracy"
• create one specific/accessible but guided way to use wp:iar rather than it just looking like the extreme nuclear option as it now appears

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:49, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Your intentions seem reasonable to me. Do you have a more concrete proposal for consideration?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 20:03, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

RL buried today. I could have one in a day or 2. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 20:18, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

First Try

Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy; it is not governed by statute, and rules are not the purpose of the community. Written rules do not themselves set accepted practice; they document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected.

While Wikipedia's written policies and guidelines should be taken seriously, they can be misused. Do not follow an overly strict interpretation of the letter of policy without consideration for the principles of policies. Disagreements are resolved through consensus-based discussion, rather than through tightly sticking to rules and procedures. Furthermore, policies and guidelines themselves may be changed to reflect evolving consensus. North8000 (talk) 17:08, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

My I suggest a condensed version of what you have above (in the spirit of the current one line entry) -

Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy. Written rules do not proscribe future practice; they document community consesus about what has previously been accepted, and the spirit will always be more important than the letter of any rule or policy.

(But I'd also be sad to see anything added to the entry, as it's current one line is so pleasing.) Chendoll (talk) 05:14, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

I'd change it to "the spirit will almost always be more important than the letter" (italics for emphasis here only), as there are occasions when the letter is just as important as the spirit - principally in the WP:CSD criteria (WP:IAR should never be used to speedy delete anything) and regarding WP:OFFICE. Thryduulf (talk) 10:50, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

I like both of yours better than my draft because they are shorter.

I think that a 2 sentence policy is in line with the elegant simplicity of this. The danger is that expansion would set a precedent. So I think that we must set brevity as an long term standard for the policy, and a high bar for any additions.

I like Chendoll's even better. Thryduulf, as as preface, I think that if the letter of a rule conflicts with the spirit/intent of it, then the letter needs fixing. But I think that what you actually thinking about (?) is covering a situation of one person doing something crazy, which would require going on their personal interpretation of "spirit". Even interpreting "spirit" would end up being based on consensus, which I think would cover that. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 12:19, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

If the letter of a rule conflicts with the spirit or intent of it, then either the letter needs changing or you are misunderstanding the spirit/intent. In neither case should this allow you to go against the letter of policies where there is consensus that the letter is important (CSD and Office are the only examples I can think of). You are of course free to propose changes to the letter of policies at any time (and if you feel that the letter contradicts the spirit you should). As an example there are many people who tag/delete/propose changes to WP:CSD#A7 that show they do not understand (or are not aware of) the spirit of CSD and/or that criterion. Because of this (and the fact that deleting something where there is no consensus to do so is never acceptable) it is not appropriate ignore the letter of the rules in this case. Perhaps more basically, IAR is about improving the encyclopaedia. I'm saying that the spirit of this is that you should ignore a rule where it s uncontroversial that your actions will improve the encyclopaedia, and that there are a few occasions where deviating from the letter of the rule will always be controversial and so saying you should "always" go with the spirit of the rule is incorrect, rather you should "almost always" go with the spirit. Thryduulf (talk) 14:01, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

I like the intentions, but also, like I think all of us, don't like the idea of lengthening of the nice short page we currently have. Maybe something of the same dramatic effect could be achieved by keeping the current sentence, and then using the slightly longer versions being proposed as the whole text of a second section called "Explanation" or something like that?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 12:51, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

If I understand right, you are saying to leave the main statement alone as the primary statement. I thought about that. But "explanation" has it's pitfalls. 1. Invitation to a big expansion. 2. IAR can say alot of things, any explanaiton would cover only a part of them. How bout titling the new section "Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy" and making the above a one sentence section? (by North8000 approx March 9)

Revised draft of proposal

Following discussion, here is a revised and further jelled proposal. Please keep revising it!

Add a new section titled "Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy", contents as follows:

Written rules do not proscribe future practice; they document community consensus about what has previously been accepted, and the spirit is more important than the letter of any rule or policy.

3/17/11 Revised draft of the proposal (even shorter)

Add this as a second sentence of the policy: Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy

I think that this accomplishes most of the initial objectives while being very brief, and not creating a lot of new text. It gives the concept greater stature (compared to just being in the "see also" section) , as well as some specificity for common situations. Specificity = usability vs. just a general nuclear-appearing option. The separate guideline is given greater weight, but, since it is just linked, it is not specifically incorporated by reference into the policy. And we aren't adding any new material except a time tested/accepted phrase/title. What to y'all think? Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 19:58, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Proposal: invalidates WP:IAR for controversial topics

As an editor of articles on controversial political subjects, my only weapon against biased editors is WP policies. The last thing I need is for an editor to evoke WP:IAR while violating WP:NPOV. I propose that WP:IAR should be invalidated for all articles on the Wikipedia:List of controversial issues and/or under the WP:1RR rule. Emmanuelm (talk) 19:45, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Oppose because this would mean that the Doctrine of absurdity would not override all in other problem areas of articles in that list. PPdd (talk) 19:51, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Emmanuelm I've also done some work on controversial topics here and there and I wish it were easier to invoke IAR. It is a great thing that Wikipedia has this policy and the biggest problems I see on Wikipedia are from people using absurd interpretations of policy pages in order to try to avoid consensus building and get their own way. Really obvious vandalism or trolling can be dealt with much more easily than this.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 20:01, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

IMHO People who blatantly violate the letter and intent of policies are the easiest ones to reign in, are usually short term problems, and I've not seen them invoke IAR. People who use wiki-lawyering to violate the intent and spirit of WP policies, are the tougher ones to reign in and are the more persistent problems. We need IAR for them. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 20:24, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

No. This is a perennial proposal that is always shot down because it is based on a misunderstanding of IAR. This policy expressly does not give vandals and trolls license to do whatever they feel like. It only gives license to ignore rules when it is necessary to improve the encyclopedia. --64.172.173.138 (talk) 23:40, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Much harder to stop wikilawyering on controversial pages then to stop people using IAR which is itself just ignored in most cases.AerobicFox (talk) 05:56, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Vandalism or trolling never improves an article, so, of course IAR would not apply. AerobicFox makes an excellent point, in that IAR itself is largely ignored. It seems to me that IAR has outlived its usefulness. It was probably a great idea when it was instituted, and it no doubt played a huge role in allowing Wikipedia to grow into the astonishingly vast and nuanced work that it's become. I think that there is just too much going on here now for "ignore all rules" to even be plausible, let alone a pillar of the encyclopedia. I would love to see, "If a rule prevents you from improving an article, ignore it" replaced with a simple, "Use common sense". The comments about trolling and vandalism notwithstanding, "ignore all rules" tells an editor that they can do anything they see fit when making a good faith edit that they honestly feel improves the article. And in reality, they can't. They can't ignore 3RR, no matter how passionately they feel that their edits improve the article. They can't ignore verifiability, even if they are certain that adding certain information would improve the article; in fact even if that information is true. And the list goes on. "Ignore all rules" probably worked well early on because it seems that there really weren't many rules back then. The policies and guidelines that have been implemented over the years were implemented gradually, and they seem, for the most part, to work. And while it's true that any of these policies or guidelines can always be changed, it's not necessarily true that they can be ignored. As I wrote last week in a talk page comment, everything in Wikipedia sholud be tempered with reason. "Ignore all rules" seems to have become archaic. Joefromrandb (talk) 13:51, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

I disagree on most of those points. They are so broad and wide-ranging that I think that addressing them fully (including the reason why wp:IAR is necessary, important and influential, even when it isn't invoked) would take a book rather than a post.  :-) Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:33, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

You're certainly right about the "broad and far-ranging part". I'ts almost amazing how complex one simple sentence can be. I've only been here for a few months, and my comments about this rule in times past are speculation, based upon what I've read, rather than the observations of someone who was here during the early days. I didn't expect to be in the majority. In any case, thank you for commenting. Joefromrandb (talk) 18:15, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

I left a message on Jimbo's talk page about this, and he was kind enough to give me some feedback. He too, disagrees with me, and he made some very good points. I still, for the most part, stand by these comments, but there's certainly a lot to ponder here. Joefromrandb (talk) 22:27, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

The point about IAR is that Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy (WP:BURO). Sure, in pretty well all cases, ignoring 3RR is going to result in a block—however the reason IAR does not apply there is that consensus supports 3RR (even if the edit is "right"). If some rule says an article has to be like so, then IAR can (rarely) be invoked to arrange the article differently if consensus supports the change as an improvement. That's different from law courts where the pettiness of the legal system is not an issue: if the law says something, then that's the way it is—IAR and BURO indicate that Wikipedia is organized differently. Johnuniq (talk) 01:13, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Another is that the rules are written imperfectly, making them open to misuse by wiki-lawyering. North8000 (talk) 11:31, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Good points, all of them. Guess I need to rethink my oposition to this rule, in the context of the explanations I've been given. Joefromrandb (talk) 01:43, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

I find your process and responses here to be very impressive. North8000 (talk) 02:12, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you. I think a lot of the nastiness I've seen on Wikipedia could be avoided if everyone kept an open mind, and discussed things respectfully, as we've done here. Joefromrandb (talk) 05:08, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually, a perfect set of rule with no exceptions works much better than a perfect set of rules will exceptions, as exceptions are when the worst things happen. However, no one can think of a perfect set of rules, and all flawed rule have loop holes which allow even more persistent abusers, so exceptions to rules are still needed, although they must be treated with extreme caution. 173.183.79.81 (talk) 02:29, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Proposal distilled from March 1st-17th discussions

Proposal

So the proposal is to add the following as a second sentence of the policy: Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy.

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:09, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Discussion

I believe that it serves these objectives:

• unhide "not a bureaucracy", which is very germane and central to the reason for this policy. Being one of many "see also"'s is not enough to do this.
• somewhat elevate "not a bureaucracy" to a position in a policy, although not categorically so, because it is still merely linked, with no statement that the specific wording of that section is policy. Again, being one of many "see also"'s is not enough to do this.
• create one specific/accessible but guided way to use wp:iar rather than it just looking like the extreme nuclear option as it now appears.

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:09, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Are there any objections to this proposal? If not, I'm ready to "be bold" and put it in. If so, further discussion is needed. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 22:31, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

I object. That Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy is an important element of this policy, but it isn't its sole basis (as such a revision would falsely imply). Therefore, the current link is appropriate and sufficient. —David Levy 22:48, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

I too object. If this needs a second sentence it should be to stress that all actions taken under IAR should uncontroversially improve the encyclopaedia. Thryduulf (talk) 00:53, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

So, no "be bold" edit for me. I think that David Level makes good points. Ditto for Thryduulf's questioning of adding a second sentence at all. I would certainly oppose Thryduulf's idea for an addition, as that particular addition would essentially erase wp:iar overall. (render it inoperative)

So, it's time for discussion instead. I think that ANY change from the longstanding single sentence wp:iar should require either zero objections (per my "be bold" float) or a very strong consensus. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 12:04, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Ignore

Is ignore really the best word here? Breach or infringe might work better, because ignore implies acting as if the rule is completely not there. 173.183.79.81 (talk) 02:34, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it shouldn't be "ignore", it shouldn't be "all" and it shouldn't be "rules". But this is one of those things that people have got so used to that they'll never agree to change it.--Kotniski (talk) 09:08, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Catchy phrase to illustrate a point is catchy and effective. --Karek^words?! 06:24, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree. An accurate statement of the intended effect of this rule in the complex balance of how Wikipedia works would be immensely complex. North8000 (talk) 10:55, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

This is an epic policy!

I love this policy (Alicianpig (talk) 12:47, 21 June 2011 (UTC))

Opinion and Improving Wikipedia

Could this page be improved by specifying an objective definition for "improving"? As it stands, I could think an article on politics would be "improved" by me deleting all references to parties I do not support.

Opinion and Improving Wikipedia

Could this page be improved by specifying an objective definition for "improving"? As it stands, I could think an article on politics would be "improved" by me deleting all references to parties I do not support.211.30.171.128 (talk) 02:38, 25 June 2011 (UTC)