 | This is an essay on civility. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: Editors and people we write about are necessarily complex individuals and we generally do not get a complete picture of them. Although it is difficult, avoid reducing that complexity by resisting presumptions or excessive praise of an individual. |
In a speech written for the ALAN Conference, the American author John Green expanded on the importance of seeing others as complex individuals. Civility issues, misunderstandings, and discomfort on Wikipedia can sometimes arise from a failure to imagine others complexly. Imagining others complexly is not quite the same as assuming good faith in other editors, and includes other considerations like the tone we use to talk about living persons and accepting we cannot presume to know other editors very well, because there is only so much that can be known based on editing behavior and user pages alone.