User:Dank55/Essays
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Larry Sanger's parting words: User:Iridescent/Larry
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For our tribal ancestors, from whom we get most of our instincts, language was probably easy, so being corrected was probably usually an insult. Also, if other people were using words you didn't understand, it probably meant that you were being excluded, since they could easily tell you what they meant if they wanted you to join them. Nowadays, when you see unfamiliar words, it probably just means the writer reads different things than you do. But advertisers, spin consultants and political hacks often manipulate people by building up our suspicions, using our instincts against us, the ones that equate unfamiliar words with feelings of mistrust and exclusion. For these reasons and more, many people avoid words they don't already know, and have a bad reaction to being "corrected", including by article reviewers like us.
Fortunately, from what I've seen at WP:FAC and WP:GAN, the suspicions are wrong. In the same way that people who seem to enjoy wielding power don't make good admins, people who seem to enjoy correcting language don't make good article reviewers, and none of the reviewers whose work I'm familiar with are like that. Reviewers regularly use the Wikipedia style guidelines to depersonalize the reviewing process, so that it's not about the preferences of the reviewer or the editors. Arguments over language and style are usually redirected to the style guidelines talk pages, where they can get a full hearing. The reviewing processes seem to be working well, despite the difficulties.
