> TL;DR: because we're all human, and human behaviour needs either > immediate face-to-face feedback or social enforcement to correct > selfishness and abrasiveness. Where face-to-face feedback is lacking, > social enforcement needs to take more of the load. > > > Many people have a false sense of entitlement to be caustic in dealing > with others, and have no better response to a request that they tone it > down than to escalate their bad behaviour. > > This behaviour is usually counteracted in face-to-face interaction, by > being confronted with the immediate result on the other person: most > people don't enjoy *seeing* other people become upset, so most people > tend to work harder to be more polite in face-to-face discussion. > > On an internet forum, especially one with such low bandwidth as text, > these feedback mechanisms are not sufficient (not immediate enough, and > not informative enough) for the person to experience a link from their > bad behaviour to the unpleasant consequences. > > > This isn't a new problem. It's not new to the internet, and it certainly > isn't new to humans. > > What is new, though, is that many online communities – the Python > community specifically – have decided we are not going to tolerate > anti-social behaviour, and we have also enacted policies to enforce that > decision. > > We'll always have some anti-social actors, and bad actions by otherwise > good actors. Many of them when confronted will respond with petulance > and name-calling and bullying and other schoolyard reflexes. We have to > be consistent in rejecting such behaviour from our community.
Well said. -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
