User blog comment:FishTank/Introducing Vanguard, Wikia's Newest Volunteer Team/@comment-452-20160819225633/@comment-452-20161028181403

Thank you for answering the questions, FishTank, I certainly hope that your statements will prove to be correct.

I've already seen a Vanguard team member interfering with a wiki without announcing themselves, but I'll assume that they were not yet given guidelines.

"You've produced an exhaustive issue list but with zero concrete information on when they happened, where they happened, who were involved, and what was the exact situation."

- TK-999

"So that's the short version of the things I can think of off the top of my head."

- 452

Yes, the "short version" doesn't contain all of that information. It's not intended to.

It's intended to answer Yatalu's question. If Yatalu thinks it doesn't answer the question, Yatalu is free to ask follow-up questions, but I won't be giving any specifics here in any case, as they're not relevant, and this thread is already far enough off-topic as it is.

"Personally, I think you may have been a bit too quick to judge."

- TK-999

You've admitted that you don't have all the facts, so I think you're a bit too quick to judge.

I gave each and every one of them the opportunity to admit fault, and apologise.

I forget where I heard it, it was probably part of a comedy routine, but a great anecdote about maturity and the difference between a child and an adult is that when an adult drops something and breaks it, they will openly admit they did it, apologise without making excuses, and offer to replace it. Whereas a child will attempt to hide the fact they did it, and make excuses if they're found out. I've lived with both types of people.

"Don't forget that Wikia volunteers are human too, they make mistakes"

- TK-999

That's exactly my point. I haven't forgotten that: they apparently have. We all make mistakes, but only responsible, mature people will admit when they have made a mistake, and apologise. Anyone who makes excuses like "I'm only human"/"I'm very busy" instead of apologising is deliberately trying to avoid owning up to their mistake.

It's okay to make mistakes, everyone makes mistakes. It's not okay to make excuses instead of taking responsibility and apologising - especially not if someone wants to be trusted and respected. It's also not okay to give well-known condescending non-apologies such as "I'm sorry that this happened" as that just shows that they know they should apologise, but want to weasel out of admitting they were wrong.

The propensity of Wikia volunteers to not take responsibility for their actions is why they do not deserve to be automatically trusted and respected, because trust and respect are things to be earned.

"and they might not have time to revisit and rectify them"

- TK-999

If they have time to make excuses, then they have time to say "I see now that I was wrong to do that, I'm sorry I did that, thanks for informing me, I'll try to learn from this mistake in future".

Of course all of that only covers mistakes, but when a member of a volunteer group demands I answer their questions and threatens to report me to Wikia Staff for not answering them, or claim that local policies do not apply to them because of their special status, then they are abusing their position. There are no extenuating circumstances for someone making threats and claiming they are above the rules.

As TK-999's response didn't even mention Vanguard, I don't foresee this thread staying on topic, so this will likely be my final reply.

My questions have now been answered, and I have asked no new questions, so I have no further need to follow this blog post.

Yatalu, if you do have any followup questions related to my response to your previous question, I invite you to contact me on my Message Wall.