"Nobody's Right" Tag

[Stephen]

Last August, @The_Red_Pen asked the collective what we thought would be a good name for a tag for a story that’s both NAR and NAW.

Cranky editor seeks tag suggestions!

Hey, friends. Me again. As you may have noticed, we often come to you with stories that could be either NAR or NAW and ask you to pick one. Almost as often, a common reply is “both!” That’s totally fair, but for various reasons, putting a story in more than one category, like Right AND Working, isn’t a viable option. Therefore, we’re trying to come up with a tag that describes a situation like this, where there’s more than one a**hole, like the “Everyone Sucks Here” thing from Reddit’s AITA sub. …

Ultimately, the tag “Nobody’s Right” was chosen.

I’ve noticed a few instances in stories where the comment section disagrees strongly with the use of the tag. The most recent one is this one:

No One Messes With My Librarians

In the above story, there are two in the wrong: a library regular and the original supervisor. The rest of the cast all behave appropriately, and the New Supervisor goes above and beyond to make sure the original supervisor does not work in the library ever again.

The issue people have with the tag is that whilst it might be intended to mean that it’s NAW and NAR, the wording implies that everyone in the story is in the wrong.

So… what does everyone think?

[Stephen]

Now I’ve introduced the topic, here are my thoughts:

I like the idea of having this tag, as it has been stated that having a story categorised as both NAW and NAR causes issues. So I think it either needs using on stories where absolutely everyone involved is in the wrong (and that’s going to be very subjective and extremely limiting the tag use), or the wording needs altering.

I favour the latter, and if I might be permitted, here are a few tag ideas:

• So much wrong
• NAR and NAW
• Wrong on both sides

[AlienToasterRepairs]

I think that there are quite a few stories on the site where everybody in them behaved badly to one degree or another and that the “Nobody’s Right” tag would be justified in those cases.

However, I agree with you and the comments consensus that the example you gave isn’t one of them. I like all of your suggestions but I’d add one more since a common theme is managerial inaction:

“Spineless Boss”

[omicronomega]

Personally, I don’t really pay attention to the tags, so I don’t really mind either way.
However, for those who do mind that the tags are used correctly: if the site is going to use a ‘nobody’s right’ tag, it should be placed on stories where in fact nobody is wrong… The library story isn’t one of those, because the new supervisor did everything they could to help OP.

[Stephen]

@omicronomega

it should be placed on stories where in fact nobody is wrong…

Did you mean “everybody is wrong” or possibly “nobody is right”? Or was that meant as irony?

[omicronomega]

it should have been ‘nobody is right’; that’s what I get for not proofreading my post

[Istvan_Kiss]

Yeah, while that was the most popular suggestion, upvote-wise, in the cited thread, most NAR commenters don’t frequent the forums, so they have no idea of the genesis of that tag, and if you only see the tag on its own, you’d rightly think that this is applied to stories where, in fact, nobody’s right.
As for an alternative, maybe “a jerk on both sides”?

[SkogKvinne]

These are some good tag ideas - agree that subjectivity may make it tricky in some instances.

[ShireNomad]

In cases where an employee sides with a customer against OP, and OP is in the right, I propose “Tag Teamed.”

“Nobody’s Right” can still work when the OP is also in the wrong, or is barely involved/an observer.

[Trealla]

How about something like “Multiple Wrongdoers”?

[Stephen]

Whatever they decide to call it, i hope they go for something unambiguous and not reliant on people having read the forum first.

[LeadingZero]

“Both sides wrong”?