Why do so many Wikipedia admins assume that all critics of Wikipedia are "banned former users"?

Because it's the easiest way to discredit critics. Wikipedians are lazy like that.

It's like someone gets kicked out of the Army and then they start criticizing the military every chance they get. Who would pay attention to them knowing their military record?

The difference is of course that there's some kind of paper saying you got kicked out of the Army. With Wikipedia, I can just say you got banned and it doesn't matter if it's true or not.

I'm a Wikipedia critic who is not a banned former user. Does that help?

Because it's the easy, lazy thing to do, like people have said it makes it easy to discredit critics. Unfortunately, there are plenty of critics of Wikipedia who were never "banned former users", one famous one being http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Seigenthaler , and just because a user was banned doesn't mean all their criticism is faulty, though there certainly is some bias. If someone got fired from a company due to poor performance, but they soon reveal that the company was engaged in illegal business practices / employee abuse, people are not just going to completely discredit the fired person's claims because the fired person is naturally biased against the company due to their own fault, they will demand an investigation. But it's easy for Wikipedia admins to do this because they can hide behind the shadow of anonymity and protection, dictating nearly everything that happens on one of the most important sources of information in the world today.

Because for many of them it is very hard to fathom the idea that anyone would of their own accord stop editing Wikipedia. It's more absurd to them than saying that Adam and Eve left Eden because they wanted to. They see editing Wikipedia as a privilege that Wikipedia grants to the community, and more importantly, a privilege that they can revoke for any reason whatsoever.

That's not how normal people see it: editing Wikipedia is a privilege, but a privilege that the user grants to Wikipedia, not the other way around. Quite rightly a normal person might think "If I'm going to take the time to hunt down 'reliable sources,' craft a halfway decent first draft and learn MediaWiki syntax (which is not all that easy, especially now that so much functionality is encapsulated in dense templates), and I'm not getting paid either money or prestige for my efforts, the least Wikipedia could do is be grateful to me."

The idea that the privilege flows in reverse of actuality accounts, at least in part, for that odd belief that only banned former users can see Wikipedia's flaws, as sour grapes.

Wikipedia is a cult-like community, and for any cult to thrive, there must be the specter of an outside antagonist. By routinely placing critics on the "outside" via a laughably ineffectual "ban", Wikipedia admins are able to haughtily puff up their own opinions, while disdainfully rejecting those of others.

Even some Wikipedia admins who might tut-tut at your question, saying that (heaven forbid!) THEY would never overgeneralize, are actually quite complicit in fostering an atmosphere that censors critics and lauds sycophants.

One of my favorite pieces of Wikipedia "circling the wagons" to dismiss a critic was when whistleblower Danny Wool went public about how Jimmy Wales was spending $1200 on steak dinners and trying to submit an expense receipt for a Russian massage parlor. The response was to put Wikimedia Foundation director Sue Gardner on video -- not to discuss how financial improprieties would be addressed, but to deny, deny, DENY all allegations. Even going so far as to say that Jimmy Wales "has never done anything wrong".

Wow -- completely free of sin, eh? Sound like a cults you might know of?

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, shudder to think it might be a duck!

That's a loaded question. You're taking an assumption, that 'many Wikipedia admins assume that all critics of Wikipedia are "banned former users"' and asking why it's the case. That assumption begs its own question.

As a Wikipedia admin myself, I certainly hope I can address that question. The assumption does not apply to me (I don't make such an assumption), and I'd imagine that many other "Wikipedia admins" would share my opinion (though no, I'm not about to run any statistical analysis on this, and I have no quantifiable idea of the general opinion).

The assertion does, however, contain a grain of truth: many "banned former users" are also critics, and many critics are "banned former users". This is a perfect example, however, of the general saying "correlation does not imply causation" (< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_... >). There exist both false positives and false negatives for the assertion in either direction!

Whether a critic is a "banned former user" is relevant, however, when they make that criticism. Is their criticism genuine, or is it a biased reaction to their being some "banned former user"? There's no way to tell off-the-bat, but an argument coming from someone without a personal vendetta is far more convincing than an argument from someone with one. It's the same sort of generalization that someone could make for someone in support of Wikipedia who might be a Wikipedia admin.

This sort of affiliation or enmity is important in making an argument, so it's natural that you see it used in argument. Some critics have historically presented themselves and their criticism without disclosing these sorts of things, so people in the know who disagree with that critic will naturally bring it up—it *is* in fact a way of discrediting that user, but it's a valid one. It's the same idea that gives journalists the responsibility to disclose their affiliations: trying to present oneself as neutral or even in favour of an idea, but with serious concerns about it, is a well-known propaganda technique ("grey" or "black" propaganda; see also < http://enwp.org/Black_propaganda >), and it deserves to be exposed if it's used as such.

If your assumption is correct, the "why" is simple: it's an ordinary overgeneralization. Call it out when it's wrong—that happens often enough—but don't make an overgeneralization yourself by assuming that Wikipedia admins are assuming that all critics are banned former users.