User:Orthogonal/Calvinball

Calvinball is a fictional game described in the comic strop Calvin and Hobbes. It is:a game played almost exclusively by Calvin and Hobbes as a rebellion against organized team sports (like baseball), although the babysitter Rosalyn plays on at least one occasion. On other occasions participants of Calvinball must wear raccoon-like masks. When asked why, Calvin replies that "no one is allowed to question the masks". The rules of the game, besides the soccer ball and wickets almost always used, are made up as they go along, but the one consistent rule is that the rules can never be the same twice. Either player may change any rule at any time, so the only way to break the rules is by using one rule twice. Scoring is also entirely arbitrary, as the point of the game is to have fun playing it: Hobbes has reported scores of "Q to 12" and "oogy to boogy".

While Calvinball makes a fun game, it isn't a good model for governance, as constantly "moving the goalposts" leads to arbitrary standards capriciously enforced.

On the other hand, so long as there is a clear goal in mind - to have fun, for instance - Calvinball can be an extremely liberating model, in that it allows adaptation to any situation, and allows a minimum of pedantic bothering with the rules instead of with the business of having fun, or whatever other business is at hand - in the case of Wikipedia, writing an encyclopedia. The difference might be compared to the difference between hard and soft security - a hard system of governance works until it stops working, and then it is totally non-functional. A soft system, like Calvinball, may not rule the same way twice, but it will never collapse under its own weight either.

Some of course, in their zeal to run things their way, forget that there is a goal: to write an encyclopedia.

On the other hand, dictatorship can be an extremely liberating model (for the dictator, anyway), in that it allows adaptation to any situation, and allows a minimum of pedantic bothering with the rules. What is important is to make sure that the principles, goals, and objective, codified consensus of the whole community are what determines the course of action to take in a situation, and not a cult of personality surroundng an individual person, or some other set of motivations being imported under the guise of "having fun" or "writing an encyclopedia."

The road to hell, it is said, is paved with good intentions. Good goals do not excuse shoddy means.