Wikipedia talk:Drama

Do not delete
To avoid drama, please do not delete this article. If you WP:IDONTLIKEIT, you may propose that it be userfied - I won't object much to that. --Uncle Ed (talk) 20:29, 15 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I also didn't understand the edit summary, "restore redirect". Was there another article of the same name? When I came here, there was nothing, and since I'm not a sysop I can't see if there was a deleted article. Please explain further before replacing the essay with a redirect; at least give me a chance to userfy it if you WP:IDONTLIKEIT. --Uncle Ed (talk) 13:47, 16 July 2008 (UTC)


 * FYI, WP:DRAMA used to redirect to WP:ANI. Dgcopter (talk) 20:42, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Rewritten
The previous version was truly just an essay, but the topic is worthy of standing as a guideline if not policy, so I've rewritten it to align with current practices and policy. FeloniousMonk (talk) 03:55, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Disagree. Drama is ill-defined. One person's "drama" is another persons trying to enforce policy or improve the encyclopedia. Furthermore, heated disagreement is something which we must expect for the project to flourish and vocal disagreement could be labeled "drama". Moreover, general disruption is already blockable. JoshuaZ (talk) 04:27, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Don't rush to assume that a consensus on what drama is cannot be reached; the concept is no more difficult to understand or define than 'neutral point of view', probably much easier. Is 'disruption' at DE any better defined that drama is here? Not much, yet it has stood for sometime. FeloniousMonk (talk) 04:37, 18 July 2008 (UTC)


 * This all seems excessively long and unnecessary to me.-Wafulz (talk) 12:48, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe my earlier version could be the intro, and FeloniousMonk's longer version could be the body. --Uncle Ed (talk) 18:28, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

What The??
This page used to be a redirect to WP:ANI, was nominated fairly recently for deletion, and survived. Now the deletion discussion has completely disappeared, from both my list of contribs and the MfD logs, and this essay is here instead? What gives?? TotientDragooned (talk) 23:44, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Good idea
Good idea, suggest guideline status. Stifle (talk) 08:29, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

How to handle with drama
Firstly, hats off for a well-written policy article. I don't see why it hasn't been approved yet. There's one thing I don't get though. The text says "[...]openly challenge the behavior of dramamongers, not the content of their comments. Take away their cover by surfacing that this appears to be drama. Ask them directly if they have noticed any problem with their method. Say you noticed attempts to spread the dispute and would like to know what sparked such an action. If they make fun of your facts, ask them to explain what was wrong with the facts. Often they have no basis for their actions, so the more you press them for details, the more their drama will fall apart." This seems contradictionary to me; how can anyone "not challenge the content of their comments" and at the same time "press them for details" (about the facts they made fun of)? Perhaps an example could be given to illustrate this more fully? Cyborg (talk) 14:11, 8 August 2008 (UTC)


 * It seems to me contradictory to the idea of an Encyclopedia, to encourage a "fight" against behavior. In other words, the encouragement to "challenge the behavior of dramamongers". I believe that this method is not only a method that has yet to be proven to work universally across all ages and cultures, but it is in my experience also a method that's mostly counterproductive since the person that is creating the drama will only be more enthused by the attention it gets.
 * Work on an Encyclopedia should only be about the details and the information it contains and never about behavior or as to how the content is presented, because a focus on formal layers enter the personal space of individual tradition and subjective expectation. Drama is a behavior and in that sense it has to do with form and not with content and facts.
 * In my personal experience, drama DOES go away when you ignore it as behavior because it is another variety of a troll style behavior. Drama will NOT go away if you only address its behavior and not address the content at the same time. As a matter of fact, if you start responding to the behavior layer of the communication only, you waste time by changing the focus to behavior and drama - away from the content and the information. Anybody who has children at age 5 will understand this. Geraldaine (talk) 04:39, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

promote?
Looks like the idea to promote to policy or guideline has pretty much died. I think it's a wonderful essay, but I'd worry that it would actually have the effect of promoting more drama than reducing it. My personal opinion would be to essay the article, then create the WP:DRAMA as a dab. Possible items to include being: WT:RFA, AN, AN/I, WQA, any of the MOS talk pages, Fiction (notability), Date linking proposal, the majority of XfD discussions, and dozens of RFC pages, and .. well, I could go on - but I won't — Ched ~ (yes?)/© 10:32, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Removed promote proposal. Proposal tag has been here since July of 2008, and the last discussion on this page concerning the proposal goes back almost as far.  If someone wants to revive this - feel free to re-propose. — Ched ~  (yes?)/© 17:28, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I've restored the essay tag to this page, if that's okay. &#9775; Zenwhat (talk) 19:30, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Shameless promotion of event
Join us for the The Great Wikipedia Dramaout! For 5 days, starting July 18, 2009, Wikipedians are being asked to voluntarily refrain from editing all non-article areas of Wikipedia, and instead dedicate themselves to creating, cleaning up, and building articles. -- &oelig; &trade; 03:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Principle of least drama
It seems to me that this proposed guideline should have a section on the Principle of least drama: If there is more than one mechanism for accomplishing what you want on Wikipedia, choose the one that creates less drama. For example, proposing a merge or redirect rather than an AfD, questioning a revert on the talk page rather than testing the 3RR limit, or asking for page protection rather than a block. I've heard this useful principal mentioned, but I haven't found it in the Project space.--agr (talk) 15:50, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
 * Endorse - please write it. davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail)  02:55, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Added, comments please. --agr (talk) 02:49, 17 May 2010 (UTC)

Meta-drama and humourous drama
Sometimes drama can go from "complete waste of time" to "this is entertaining to watch" or even elevate to "drama about drama" in a meta-ish sort of way.

This should be added to the essay. I'm not up to writing that part right now, so dibs goes to whoever does it first. davidwr/ (talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail)  02:54, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

This is very aggressive
It implies Drama is only on purpose; no, a lot of destructive drama is unintentional. e.g. "don't make pages at all about the shooting:( it's too soon:(". <-Drama, genuine but doesn't help. --Leladax (talk) 12:59, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * It also seems to imply that blocks and bans are never unfair, and that cliquish wagon-circling is appropriate behavior but objecting to it isn't. *Dan T.* (talk) 16:14, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Merge?
I noticed that WP:DRAMA and WP:Wikidrama redirect to this page but WP:WIKIDRAMA redirects to Is wikidrama bad?. This seems dumb, because the two shortcuts should clearly go to the same page. But the central point of this essay seems to be that Drama is bad for Wikipedia, and the central point of the other essay seems to be that Drama may not be bad. I created a new shortcut for the other essay, WP:ISDRAMABAD, but it seems wrong to me that this page be the default link whenever someone discusses drama.

I think the best solution is to have a single page, here, that discusses what Wikidrama is, why it can be a problem, and why assuming it is bad can be a problem. If people would rather have two position essays I could get behind that too, but calling this one "Wikipedia:Drama" implies that it is not taking a position and I think we ought to consider renaming it in that case. I don't mind performing the merge (and this page is kinda verbose and could use some editing anyway) but I figure this could be controversial, hence the discussion. Mango juice talk 16:17, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
 * This one should be renamed WP:Wikidrama is awful, cabal is best, because that's what it professes. The other essay make a bit more sense, so it should stay as is. FuFoFuEd (talk) 09:48, 6 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, a merge is in order. The central point is indeed that drama is bad, so no difference here. Shawn in Montreal (talk) 15:23, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Oppose: It's traditional and completely normal for WP to have diametrically opposing essays, and we don't merge them.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  23:12, 28 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Oppose along the same lines as SMcCandlish. The essays differ enough, no need to merge them. — Godsy (TALK CONT ) 20:09, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

Offensive and abusive term
This is an offensive and abusive term. It reminds of those right wing extremists that whenever someone refers to WW2 they invoke "Godwin's Law" to inflict censorship, even if the situation perfectly warrants it. --94.69.49.203 (talk) 09:46, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

A real sample of cabalspeak
"the community's inherent unity". srsly? The most drama-ladden board seems to be WP:AE, where the Israel-Palestine proxy-ewar is being conducted. Since when did those guys have inherent unity? FuFoFuEd (talk) 09:40, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Two questions

 * 1. Denying troublemakers and their audience a show by staying strictly on the topic of their behavior and not the content of their comments takes away their ability to spread the drama.
 * I did this and I was criticized by someone saying, "We focus on the content, not the contributors." But the differences over content seemed petty to me and it was hostile conduct that was the problem. But how would you respond to that correction?
 * 2. In the current conflict I'm watching unfold, I'm an uninvolved bystander. That is, I have no stake in the debate winner but I also haven't been hit any of the mud that is being thrown around. So, I can't say I'm a participant in the drama, more of a stunned audience member. Can I still take a role in bringing this dispute to the attention of editors/Admins who could address the problem?

Thanks! NewJerseyLiz Let's Talk 21:21, 16 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Don't listen to this essay! Always focus on the content, not the contributors--argue about the issue raised, not background or qualities of people who raised them.
 * This essay creates an impression drama tends to be deliberate provocations by "banned users" and enemies of the people trying to destroy the project, rather than genuine conflict. But of course, if you've seen the endless lists of established supermoderators (with titles such as "arbitrator," "oversighter," etc.) in Wikipedia falling out of favor in the tight struggles for power, the truth couldn't be further. 135.0.167.2 (talk) 03:21, 10 November 2013 (UTC)

The Principle of Least Drama - who theorised this?
This is seemingly original Wikipedia thought (I could be wrong). Which would be against guidelines. The idea seems correct but it is veiled scientifically studied idea. Of which I could not find anything of. Ned (talk) 22:45, 13 February 2018 (UTC)

Controlled burn
"You can't fight fire with fire" is not correct words.·Carn· !? 21:15, 1 January 2021 (UTC)