Rise of Martinets

A Rise of Martinets is the phenomena of visible figures using etiquette as an excuse to trump ethics. Pettiness and small points of order are permitted to justify duckspeaking and mask deep groupthink, e.g. a comment containing facts and pointing out lies or misleading statements is deleted due to a claim that it is somehow "rude". Vital information fails to reach responsible community leaders. Etiquette itself loses its ethical ground. Shallow self-claims overcome and swamp deep ones.

Usually a consequence of a decline of civility that permits the Martinets to rise and make themselves, often, a de facto police force. If the Martinets achieve formal power, i.e. to IP ban or censor talk pages in a wiki, this will usually accelerate the decline.