Cancer in our Communities

Communities can contain cancer cells too!

Just like the cancer cells in human bodies, there can be individuals/cabals cancerous to communities.. online and offline. Some say that cancerous cells are present in all bodies, but remain mutant and repressed in healthy bodies. When the body loses control over cancerous cells, they can take down the entire body, even to it's death. This similarity extends to communities too.

When a body can't look after itself, it needs another body to care for it. If it can't find any other body or bodies who care, it will just wither away and die. Any community which can't self-police needs external policing, which might not always be happily ever after.

Some users just can't resist being a bully. Bullies usually have their own henchmen, support structure, etc. Bullies usually have some sort of understanding with other bullies and don't tread on each other's toes. New users who come into the fold may not understand the existing power structure. It is usually the bullies' underlings who try to get such jobs done. The affected users are usually too upset to talk about it, and just disappear.

Typical bullies are usually some (psuedo) power users when they come into contact with new users. If the community won't name & shame such individuals, they encourage such behaviour.

The ethos of open-source is about adding our experience into the collective wisdom. This collective wisdom helps evolve humanity far beyond it could develop otherwise. We are all so much more richer when everyone can tap into knowledge pools.

What happens when common pools or wells are poisoned? People continue partaking unknowingly, and gradually become sicker. Then some decide whether to remain thirsty, or continue drinking from such tainted sources. Unless you have access to some power or authority, it is usually safer to move out from such communities to seek your peace & sanity elsewhere.

Cancer must be identified and weeded out. Don't bother with henchmen, as their top dogs are responsible for them. Identifying the top dogs and weeding them, will take out the nasty henchmen too. People in authority affect communities much more severely. As such, much more openness, integrity, and ethical behaviour must be expected from those elevated above others.

Gentoo communities are spread out and stretch across multiple projects - wiki, forums, irc, mailing-lists, etc. I have been seeing some underhand vitriol in the gentoo communities, and even had the pleasure of encountering some bullies directly, and indirectly too via their henchmen.

One such incident happened on gentoo-wiki. I watched and waited a while to see if someone was bothered about what happens in that community among the users. The ones elected by the community to be in charge don't seem to be bothered. Since then, I haven't been back there.

I want to name an individual, a3li. And not just because a3li bullied me on irc to stay off gentoo wiki, but also because I noticed a3li bully others too..

This a3li "speaking for the wiki project" told me to stay off gentoo wiki pages. He said I was trashing his wiki docs. He didn't have any examples to backup his baseless accusations. I guess, he just wanted to demonstrate his power over me. Anybody who bothered can list every wiki edit by me or others. No one bothered enough, and I didn't want to co-exist with such personas. So I decided I did not want to be part of his project. He and his ilk can run his kingdom exactly the way they want.. definitely not open, and most definitely against Gentoo Philosophy!

More recently, some others have been trying to bait me on gentoo forums. I seem to be caught up in something simmering there. A couple of them seem to have a rather perverse interest in following me around, and their behaviour seems to be.. classic bullying technique. One of them is "szatox", throwing stones from behind. Another is "Ant P." with a malicious tongue. I wonder if such behaviour is individual or more collective.

Would a healthy body tolerate cancer cells negatively affecting others? I suspect gentoo communities are not really open.. if they can be controlled by such nasty personas. Bullies should be ignored, unless a moderator says shut up. And then, let those bullies keep their cake and eat it!