The word "Clique" has negative associations.
Presently, (Nov 15, 2003), these are the terms that show up on MeatballWiki when you search for "Clique":
- MeatBall:AccessLevels - "The upper echelons often formed cliques." That is, cliques are in power, and that's a bad thing for everyone else.
- MeatBall:AuthorshipCredit - "you don't want any systems that are particularly prone to malicious users or small cliques gaming the system." Again, cliques taking power.
- MeatBall:BackRoomDecision - "In reality, it is difficult for anyone in a group to know whether a given group decision was secretly pre-determined by some clique." More cliques taking power.
- MeatBall:BeProfessional - "Backstabbing, rumors, Rufmord (slander), cliques, importance of connections, you name it." More cliques taking power.
- MeatBall:CommunityMember - SunirShah admonishes: "No. Don't form cliques. I offered the BarnStar as a point of discussion, not a Constitutional ammendment."
- MeatBall:CommunityStraddling - SunirShah: "In high school, I fancied the idea of a sociophage as someone that moved gracefully between social circles, introducing the practices of one clique to another." Finally, a neutral use of the term.
- MeatBall:DarkSideOfCommunity - It begins with: "The dark side of community is cliquishness." What is cliquishness? "Basically, it's when a group of people is unfriendly to newcomers and outsiders" See also what it says about "Connection," "Elitism," and "Rumor." All associated with cliques.
- MeatBall:IdentityValidation - "Like any clique, they come complete with inside jokes that they seek to lay upon the public-at-large to differentiate themselves."
- MeatBall:LambdaMoo - "I was a very active LambdaMoo user around 1999, and politics there had been largely overrun and pulverised by a few very divisive cliques with a lot of bad blood."
- MeatBall:LangueFrançaise - (Doesn't count, because Clique is part of a French word, likely "Click".)
- MeatBall:OutcastNewcomer - "Some communities are cliques, and practically impossible to join."
- MeatBall:OutsiderTrading - "Like any entity dispensing career advice, it stressed the paramount importance to the career seeker of what is called "networking", which is to say getting in with one or more cliques."
- MeatBall:PeerPrivilege - "It is not obvious that this "is a good thing", because it is effectively taking responsibility away from those who are not in the privileged clique."
- MeatBall:PrinceOfStories - "…I think people should use real names is because it looks like a community of real people - not just a clique of internet guru friends."
- MeatBall:UseRealNamesDiscussion, MeatBall:UseRealNamesRefactored - "Using real names has nothing to do with friendly vs. clique, I think."
- MeatBall:WhatIsaZaibatsu - "zaibatsu, Jap. = money clique. The great family-controlled banking and industrial combines of modern Japan."
- MeatBall:WikiWikiWeb - "Actually the "scaling" problem is more related to the clique nature of the participants: Mostly second-rate geeks that are very interested in telling everyone else that they should be and act, "just like us"." A rare and accurate telling.
Clearly, cliques are seen in a negative light. They are generally seen in two terms:
- Exclusion - Cliques are things you can't join, unless you get on somebody's good side.
- Power - Cliques aim for power, and keep the power that they gain. You aren't in the clique, so you don't have power.
Because of this negative light, there's a tendency for wiki cliques to identify themselves as "communities," rather than "cliques," even though, by observation, it is not the case.
Who wants to self-identify as power-hungry, and exclusive?
That said, for many people, the word "community" has negative associations. They may be uncomfortable with the idea of "selfless good people," or "shiny happy people holding hands," connotated by the word "Community." See: Using It In a Very Specific Sense That Excluded Him and Everyone He Knew, about the word "community."
CategoryGroupDynamics?