User:ThadeusOfNazereth

My username is ThadeusOfNazereth, but my real name is Thadeus Smith. I've been editing on Wikipedia as an IP user and a registered user under different accounts since sometime in 2014 (when I would've been only 13-years-old), but with my young and underdeveloped mind I could never seem to keep my passwords straight. I've been at this account since August 8th of 2016, and I have no plans to change that.

My interests on Wikipedia are relatively specific. I tend to spend most of my time patrolling recent changes and correcting vandalism, both intentional and unintentional. If I'm not doing that, I'm either engaging in article-specific Talk Page discussions or updating political articles as current events permit. I haven't ever felt that I have the expertise to spend hours crafting new articles or fine-tuning existing ones, although I do envy those who do.

As I've begun to participate in dispute or policy discussions more and more, I've realized how important WP:CIVIL and WP:NOCON are. One of the most worrying trends I've noticed recently is users getting away with aggressively rude edit summaries and ignoring consensus to make changes. We shouldn't allow contentious changes to be published while we try and reach consensus, rather, we should always revert to the status quo to ensure the least amount of harm.

I get asked questions a lot by my real-life friends and family about why I care so much about Wikipedia. I am politically and philosophically an anarchist, which means that I oppose coercive hierarchy in all its forms. Because I am so young and uninfluential in the grand scheme of things, I often feel I can't have an impact on the oppressive structures that surround us in daily life (like the state, structural marginalization, the capitalist system at large), which makes it easy to lose hope. I view Wikipedia as an anarchist's wet dream. An online, community-governed, cooperative way to share knowledge without bias or censorship (for the most part) is incredible, and contributing here helps me feel as though I'm making a difference.

That sense of pride makes me comfortable revealing some of my personal details here. Outside of Wikipedia I work as an elementary, middle, and high school speech and debate coach. I'm currently an undergraduate at Pacific Lutheran University in Washington State, where I study Political Science and Gender, Sexuality, and Race Studies. My capstone projects both focus on competitive debate: Speech and Debate as a Breeding Ground for Grassroots Activism and Gender Disparities in the High School Speech and Debate Community. After graduation, I'll be attending the London School of Economics, studying Human Rights & Politics.

Much thanks to Acalamari (talk · contribs) for this userpage template.

Recommended Reading

I try and read as much as I can, although it seems to get harder and harder to focus with each passing day.

Fiction

• The Raw Shark Texts by Steven Hall is about a man being chased by a conceptual shark that wants to eat his memories and erase who he is.
• Arc of a Scythe by Neal Shusterman is a trilogy set in the world of tomorrow. Death has been made obsolete, but the population still needs to be controlled.
• The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart is about four kids who have to infiltrate a school whose headmaster plans to brainwash the world.
• The Archive of Alternative Endings by Lindsey Drager chronicles how the stories we tell are censored, shared, and told.

Non-Fiction

• Against Civilization by John Zerzan is a collection of essays on how our own greed is slowly destroying us and what we can do to stop it.
• The Constitution: An Introduction by Michael and Luke Paulsen explores the history of the US Constitution and how it has been changed (for better or worse) over time.
• Basic Income: A Radical Proposal for a Free Society and a Sane Economy by Phillipe Parijis explains how we can make a Universal Basic Income work.
• Pataphysics: A Useless Guide by Andrew Hugill is about the philosophy of the metaphor, the fictional, and the non-existent.

Online Reading

• Antilibraries is a collection of books that have yet to be read.
• The SCP Foundation is the greatest work of collaborative fiction to exist on the Internet.