Lesson learned[edit]

I hope that you are willing to work with others in an open-minded fashion, Jytdog,. Unfortunately, I doubt that you will, since you didn't appear to have understood what Atami said in the COI. I was expecting a scholarly environment, not a blog - but I was also expecting people to be friendly and welcoming. Lesson learned - people are mean and nasty on Wikipedia. I feel harassed and abused, hounded mercilessly. The tactic where you pretend to be reasonable for a while and then you change your mind and refuse to compromise was especially effective. I hope you are happy - you've successfully run me off. Congratulations. CJ (talk) 13:37, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for talking, although I don't believe you really came to my Talk page to have a conversation. (Surprise me, please!) You ignored Atama's judgement that you were very close to POV-pushing. I hope you take a moment and re-read what he wrote there. His concern with POV is more serious to him than any COI. And as I wrote to you, WP:ADVOCACY and WP:COI are closely related. In any case, you are right, that our conversation on the qigong Talk page was not rational. Wikipedia has sourcing policies & guidelines that provide the foundation for rational conversation about content in Wikipedia; I told you this many times and tried very very hard to tell you about them, and how we use them. You chose not to engage with those policies, which made rational conversation impossible. Writing about what you feel or believe, is just not rational conversation on Wikipedia. Creating straw polls for content, in which no sources are presented, is not how we do things. You consistently chose every way but engaging with the best MEDRS-compliant sources available, in your effort to get more positive content into the article. If you decide to come back, I hope you choose to learn our sourcing policies and guidelines and how we generate content from them, and that you engage in rational conversation based on them. Which is indeed a fun and interesting (exhilarating, even) scholarly conversation to have. To the extent you are too busy to do that, I totally respect your decision to stop editing. Good luck to you, where ever you go! Jytdog (talk) 13:57, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

 Surprise!

I don't know why I'm continuing to continue this discussion, but I think, underneath it all, you are actually a decent person and not the arrogant, mean-spirited person which you sometimes come across as in the stark world of text-only. Being the eternal optimist, I have faith you might actually listen to me and make some changes that would improve Wikipedia overall - for everyone. Your userpage reveals you to be dedicated and hardworking, so I will assume that your poor treatment of me is an anomaly, but hopefully one you wish to avoid again.

Let's start with the idea that a person must be an expert in the culture of Wikipedia before contributing to any articles. Really? I will tell you this is a new phenomenon, because in 2006, when I first joined Wikipedia that was not considered appropriate. Everyone was welcome, and people's contributions were valued for their content, not how well they argued about the esoteric guidelines. It is a very effective "club" a Wikipedian can bash over the heads of newbies, and unfortunately it seems to have become habitual on the part of Wikipedians. "You must be one of us," is the underlying sentiment, "and to be one of us you must spend years mastering the intricacies of our culture." Quite frankly, the reason you get a lot of people complaining about suppression of ideas is because it is true. Wikipedians are controlling the content by refusing to let anyone who isn't "one of them" add anything.

Secondly, we are not really talking about knowing Wikipedia guidelines, because I have read all the guidelines - both years ago and now. I followed all the guidelines to the letter. What you are talking about is your interpretation of the guidelines, which differs significantly from the written guidelines. So you are setting yourself up as the "keeper of the rules", but the "rules" to which you refer are written only in your head. Your own self-COI investigations demonstrate your thinking - you are passionate about the five pillars of Wikipedia - perhaps a bit too passionate. From the outside, it appears that you do it to keep complete control over content - you make yourself king of the article. Anyone who differs in their interpretation of the guidelines deserves to be pilloried and abused. After all, you are the ruler, even though you are enforcing your misinterpretation of the rules, not the actual rules. Your "reporting" of me for conflict of interest is a prime example. I was right about the interpretation of COI according to Atami, but instead of acknowledging that and (perhaps) apologizing, you jump on the next misinterpretation - POV. Your very passion about the pillars of Wikipedia are blinding you to your use of them to promote bias by suppressing dissension.

I have published half-a-dozen scholarly articles in peer-reviewed juried academic journals. Of course I know what an impartial point of view, and I have not changed any article so that it was biased. I am simply trying to correct the bias that already exists in the article. It is human nature for us not to see our own biases, so I understand that. I therefore recommend that you should be the one to read the warnings and understand the information that Atami has cited. You are highly biased, and accuse anyone who tries to "even the playing field" as being the biased one. Of course I tried to put positive information about Qigong in the article - because there was already too much negative information. It is the BALANCE that enables the impartial point of view. That's what Atami said, and that's the way it's ALWAYS been on Wikipedia. You, on the other hand, are misinterpreting the rules and therefore are suppressing one side while allowing the other side. A big no-no.

Thirdly, you make yourself king of some articles over which you have no knowledge. I had contacted another editor to help me, and they said that many experts in topics have problems because they feel that their expertise and knowledge, acknowledged in the real world through degrees and peer-reviewed publications, are not accepted on Wikipedia. Only here would someone with a doctorate in a field, with several peer-reviewed publications and/or books on a topic - only in this world would this person be ignored while an anonymous nobody with no publications or books is the "final word" on an article simply because they have nothing better to do with their time than to sit and watch to make sure no one is changing anything. Note - I am not saying that you are that person - I know very little about you. For all I know you have an advanced degree in Qigong and/or Integrative Medicine, and have several published books or peer reviewed articles. I don't know because, unlike me, you have not revealed who you are. (Though frankly, your comments about not combining Tai Chi and Qigong is rather revealing since, if you were experienced, you would know that Tai Chi is a type of Qigong, and that what is used in research is actually Qigong, though they call it Tai Chi. But that is getting into details beyond what is appropriate for an encyclopedia article.)

In summary, this is the last you will hear from me. My advice to you is what I said before; don't just suppress change. Your recent discussions with the Professor, for example, are very reasonable. Ensure that there is a balance of positive to negative, and be nice, not nasty to new people. Just because you are civil doesn't mean that you cannot be nasty - you can be civil and nasty. Try to be civil and nice. For example, don't quote esoteric Wikipedia rules by their acronyms, simply suggest to new people an alternative wording that would be acceptable that conveys what they are trying to say (even if you don't personally agree with it). Remember that sometimes the established sources themselves are biased, so you may need to widen your universe of possible sources in order to maintain an impartial point of view. Keep with the spirit of the pillars. Work a little harder to be helpful, not toxic, to people you think are newcomers, and you will improve Wikipedia for everyone. CJ (talk) 14:41, 23 February 2014 (UTC)