zlacker

A sideshow is what’s happening on Wikipedia. There’s a cabal of editors that shut off any mention of a lab leak, using mis-applied content guidelines designed to protect against quack medical advice. Talk pages are constantly purged, which is a sign that someone desperately doesn’t want a consensus to form. Anti-pile-on policies are used as a way to ignore criticism.

Are these Chinese government agents? Overzealous students studying in North America? Gain-of-function grad students protecting their turf?

There were a smaller number of suspicious accounts that overzealously pushed the lab leak, possibly agents of Taiwan, but these were banned swiftly.

With the anti leak thought-policing editors, normal editors are intimidated into silence. Despite all the talk of dealing with organized manipulation around the 2020 election, the foundation hasn’t bothered intervening. Normal amateur editors don’t have the resources to push back against zealous state-actors.

This issue could pose a devastating blow to Wikipedia.