Wikipedia:Don't come down like a ton of bricks

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
a murderer
.

Wikipedia has a lot of

something that required the guideline to be made
. A huge list of policies and guidelines have been created to solve various problems, and remembering every single one of them is impossible.

manual of style
, as it may invite comparisons to a ton of bricks.

What this means is that policies and guidelines

verifiability policies, so they won't necessarily know that adding unsourced content is a bad thing. It's really important not to come down like a ton of bricks[1]
on them—they don't deserve to be treated like they've just kidnapped the First Lady.

In fact, even users who've been around for a while might not have come across certain parts of Wikipedia where those policies are most relevant. Somebody might have a sizeable number of edits that are just small typo fixes, but then they discover something they like is

try to fix
the problem for them.

Users occasionally disagree or do things that are technical violations of The Rules™. We should avoid rancor among good faith contributors by agreeing to disagree or overlooking minor violations. Sometimes the damage from formal dispute resolution is greater than any potential benefit—you might be able to recite the entire set of

speedy deletion criteria
standing upside down blindfolded in shark infested custard, but the newbie whose talk page you just stuck a big fat template on certainly can't, and may need a sympathetic and calm word before they convince themselves that Wikipedia isn't worth the bother. In that case, it is much better to let go of disputes.

See also

References