Arbitration enforcement action appeal by JFG
0RR restriction reduced to 72 hours on Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections by sanctioning admin and general agreement below. --NeilN talk to me 16:30, 23 April 2017 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found here. According to the procedures, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action. To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).
Statement by JFGFirst of all, I admit that a technical 1RR violation occurred as reported, with a 17-hour interval between two unrelated reverts; I simply didn't pay attention. However, I strongly deny the purported pattern of 1RR violations which has been cited to justify the sanction. This is a wikihounding campaign by SPECIFICO who has repeatedly accused me of violating DS or 1RR simply when she happens to disagree with my editing. She has been making unsupported DS violation claims and vague litigation threats against several other editors, e.g. most recently K.e.coffman here and Darouet there. I have warned this user repeatedly of the chilling effect she is creating, but she keeps trying to corner me on a technicality (and apparently succeeded today). Here are six instances of her direct accusations which turned out to be unfounded:
SPECIFICO never managed to find any genuine misconduct on my part. I consider this attitude to be disruptive and borderline harassment, however I refrained from reporting her behaviour and I treated it with as much humour as I could muster.[1] An editor once brought me to AE, and another to ANEW, and in both cases no violation was found; these were misunderstandings about what constitutes a revert. One of the reporting users graciously apologized but SPECIFICO piled on with a kind of "you'll get nailed next time" taunt, yet she never pushed the matter to WP:AE. Please note also that I voluntarily self-revert when notified of an actual DS violation (for example self-revert + pursuing discussion), whereas SPECIFICO simply ignores warnings when she breaches revert restrictions (for example this thread or that one, ignoring self-revert requests and issuing threats). SPECIFICO's hounding behaviour towards me has been so blatant that another editor, Factchecker_atyourservice, whom I didn't know, came to my talk page to joke about it by making a parody of her attacks. This thread is also worth reading, whereby another editor, Objective3000, admittedly sometimes in disagreement with me, considered that SPECIFICO owed me an apology for her aspersions. Imposing a permanent 0RR restriction on me would be validating the chilling effect intended by one adversarial editor, in practice denying me legitimate editing actions towards article improvements in AP2 topics. Given the fuzzy interpretations of what is and is not a revert, I run the risk of being blocked for simply making a bold edit that somebody will construe as a revert of some content. Sanctions are meant to be preventive, not punitive, and this 0RR restriction looks like punitive treatment for a series of mostly-unfounded DS violation claims. For my inadvertent violation today, I agree to voluntarily abide by 0RR for three days, and I request the formal lifting of this restriction after 72 hours. Furthermore, I request a strong admonition to SPECIFICO for a pattern of hurling baseless accusations at her fellow editors, thereby wasting everybody's time and energy towards unconstructive discussions. Finally, I'm sorry for burdening admins with a rather lengthy statement; I felt I had to provide enough context to defend myself properly. Statement by Ian.thomsonI admit that I had looked though and saw the multiple warnings, with diffs. The proclivity for manual reverts (along with SPECIFICO sometimes not linking to prior versions) makes it harder to sort through. There was a flame this time, and lots of smoke in previous instances. That said, my phrasing was "after multiple warnings," not "multiple violations." JFG said
Statement by (slatersteven)Well a look at 19th of feb show this revert [2], followed by this [3] which JFG's own edit summery says is a "self revert". Yes it is a technicality, but it is two reverts. I assume the warning on 23 refers to two reverts on the 22nd [4] and [5], opne was (it claims) a reversion of a banned user's material, but still (technically) two reverts. I stopped here. yes there do seem to also be multiple reverts on the 26th as well. The two instances of double revert I checked are not really egregious, in that one was a self revert and thus only technical violations.Slatersteven (talk) 14:54, 22 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by DHeywardOverturn. This was a rather hasty response to a nebulous charge. Are we really counting a self-revert as a violation of 1RR as the second revert? I noticed SPECIFICO leveling accusations of edit warring against JFG on the BLP notice board and no action was taken. There is a degree of forum shopping going on and it was unclear what action caused the imposing administrator to invoke a 0RR restriction. --DHeyward (talk) 16:05, 22 April 2017 (UTC) Clean block log for an editor accused of a pattern of edit warring? Not much of a pattern. Considering the sanction request was made on the article talk page with no discussion and no diffs for a pattern of behavior (which is really a pattern of complaints), this is a rather egregious overreaction to a 1RR violation from an out of process sanction request. JFG has never been blocked for edit warring so the argument for a pattern of edit warring is rather ridiculous. This was an ill-considered sanction. --DHeyward (talk) 16:16, 22 April 2017 (UTC) I'll also note that the talk page for the article where this request was made has hatted the discussion as being out of process with a notice that bringing sanction requests to talk pages can result in sanctions. This sanction should have never been issued. --DHeyward (talk) 16:29, 22 April 2017 (UTC)
The 72 hour agreement for lifting seems reasonable. --DHeyward (talk) 23:44, 22 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by My very best wishesI think JFG indeed violated 1RR restrictions on these pages previously. For example, one (revert of this edit) and two (clearly marked by JFG himself as a revert in the edit summary). Here is whole discussion if anyone would be interested in. I also admit reporting JFG previously on 3RRNB here. Here is why. My reading of WP:3RR was that undoing work by previous contributors (plural) like here would be counted as revert. However, JFG insisted that one must provide exact edit (diff) by specific contributor (singular) that he reverted. I am not sure that JFG was right, but the closing admin (El C) decided he was right. My very best wishes (talk) 21:25, 22 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by (involved editor)Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by JFGIn considering this matter, please note that the sanction would apply to "articles" plural, not just "the article" as User:El C mentioned below. JFG has been active (without incident) at multiple articles where the sanction would apply. Anythingyouwant (talk) 21:35, 22 April 2017 (UTC)
Result of the appeal by JFG
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E.M.Gregory
E.M. Gregory is cautioned to take more care in the future when editing articles subject to sanctions. Seraphimblade Talk to me 00:01, 26 April 2017 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below. Request concerning E.M.Gregory
Discussion concerning E.M.GregoryStatements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Statement by E.M.GregoryI lost my cool and reverted too hastily, forgetting to discuss the deletion first on the talk page. I backed off from brangling over I/P articles ages ago, after finding the discussions in re: Susya endlessly aversive. I now limit editing in I/P to articles that come up for AfD (like this one,) non-controversial topics like art and literature, occassional sourcing, and terrorist attacks - which I create and edit worldwide. This keeps me out of the swamp of deletion wars and personal attacks in which I/P editing is mired. But it also means that I simply forgot that reverting this deletion violated a rule. An error on my part. I do want to point out that the information deleted was sourced to an essay was by Itamar Marcus and published in the Times of Israel.[8] It was written in NPOV voice and was deleted without discussion during a tense AfD process with editors arguing delete on the grounds that the Jerusalem Light Rail stabbing attack was a single-news cycle event with no ongoing coverage. Removing this material during an intensely controversial AfD process framed by several editors as an argument that all terrorist attacks in Israel/Jerusalem/Palestinian Territories should be added to lists rather than kept as stand-alone articles. (Because I edit terror attacks, crime, and attacks that may or may not be terrorism worldwide, I was aware that this argument is contrary to our treatment of similar attacks in other parts of the world.) I do not know what Fram's motives ere in deleting this material, although certainly he has been adamant in opposition ot the existence of this article, describing it as lacking ongoing impact [9], Statement by FramE.M. Gregory, first read things attentively before making up statements here. I was not "attacking even what the calls "mainstream" media coverage as "unreliable""[11], that was a quote from now indef blocked user Cyrus the Penner (who was on your side of the debate from the start): they were claiming that mainstream media coverage is unreliable, a statement with which I clearly disagreed, but which showed his POV in editing the article and AfD. Don't attribute statements or opinions I have not made to me please, and certainly don't build a whole flimsy defense on these incorrect starting points. Considering the ArbPIA reminder of early april, and the 1RR reminder of 21 April, it seems unlikely that "I simply forgot that reverting this deletion violated a rule." Your description of [12] as an NPOV source can be judged by uninvolved readers on its merits, but in the end has no bearing on this AE request. Fram (talk) 13:05, 24 April 2017 (UTC)
@Shrike: because E.M. Gregory reverted the same thing twice? I didn't really pay attention to what others did separately, and the two edits by MrX are edits he could have done in one go as well (they are two separate sections, if I looked correctly). But if you feel that these as well broke the restrictions and deserve the same treatment, be my guest (I also don't know whether MrX has had ArbPia warnings and recent warnings about this behaviour, which Gregory certainly had, but again, I have not looked in this in detail). Fram (talk) 13:37, 24 April 2017 (UTC) @Shrike: E.M. Gregory self-reverted after you advised them to "Just self revert to be on the safe side"... Why this would put them on the safe side is not really clear, his false statements and allegations in this AE request or his inability to see that an opinion piece is not a reliable source for statements of fact about something that perhaps one day might happen don't give me much confidence that there is any understanding of the problems with his edits in this contentious topic area. Fram (talk) 13:48, 24 April 2017 (UTC) @Wordsmith. No opinion on whether this is the time when a first block is needed, or a final warning is sufficient. But the "clean record" of E.M. Gregory is dubious (the lack of archiving makes it hard to research this though). It seems that here they received a one-month topic ban from the Israel-Palestine subject in May 2016. So, while his block log is as of now empty, he doesn't have a clean record, not even in this very topic area. " he has admitted getting heated, and he did self-revert." Yes, after the discussion on his talk page, the ANI request, and this AE request were started, when another editor advised him to do so "to be on the safe side". Self-reverting to avoid a block is hardly a mitigating factor in my book. "the fact that this case was filed within half an hour of Fram opening an ANI thread[28] (and after E.M.Gregory had already admitted that he was hasty and made a mistake) smacks of admin shopping." I was advised at the ANI thread to start an AE request, but apparently following that advise is now "forum shopping"? Not really, no. Forum shopping is getting a negative response at one venue, and then trying again at another: it is not being sent by one venue to another, and then being accused there of forum shopping because you followed that advice. "Fram has, in fact, given out ARBPIA DS notices before, so he knows perfectly well that AE is the appropriate place for this." AE is the perfect place for people who have already had ARBPIA warnings (which I didn't know for Gregory at the time I filed the ANI request, just like I didn't know about the earlier topic ban until just now), and I felt that the issues were farther reaching than just the 1RR of ARBPIA. Anyway, your fourth point reads "Fram shouldn't have come here, this is forum shopping. Fram should have come here, this is the right place". Please make up you mind. Fram (talk) 15:03, 24 April 2017 (UTC) @Huldra: my first post on his talk page asked him to self-revert, but instead he reinserted the opinion piece after another user had again removed it. The situation here is not comparable to yours (which I haven't looked in to). ANI and ARE only came after a request to self-revert was not heeded and a further revert to include the contested material was made. Fram (talk) 06:41, 25 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by Shrike@Fram: Why did you report only Gregory there other users that broke 1RR?For example User:MrX [13] [14]--Shrike (talk) 13:33, 24 April 2017 (UTC) MrX self reverted and I think Gregory too.--Shrike (talk) 13:39, 24 April 2017 (UTC)
@El C: The user have self reverted [16] even before first admin comment. @Wordsmith:There are additional user that violated 1rr and self-reverted do you suggest to warn them too?--Shrike (talk) 19:45, 24 April 2017 (UTC) @El C:Do you suggest same sanction for other user that violated 1RR and self-reverted on the same article?--Shrike (talk) 21:51, 24 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by MrXI did inadvertently violate 1RR and I have self-reverted. I was making a series of small contiguous edits and did not realize that Icewhiz had made an intervening edit. E.M. Gregory seems to have strong views in this subject, as evidenced by his willful violation of two of the article editing restrictions, his 37 AfD comments, and suggestion that Fram and I have a political position with regard to the subject (I don't). This discussion and the article edit summaries hint that E.M. Gregory will probably stop at nothing to win disputes in this subject area. A block would be an unfortunate mar on his clean block record, but I do think a short topic ban would help.- MrX 13:58, 24 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by DovidI'm not involved here, as I have not done editing in this article. The request happened to catch my eye. After reading through the editing history of the article and a bit of the editors as well, I decided to comment. Forgive me for barging in. This seems to be overblown. A minor infraction of 1RR, which the editor has already admitted to and apologized for? The complainant is being more belligerent than the subject. No sanctions should be applied. A warning might be appropriate, but given that the editor has already owned up, and by his/her own statements appears to be self-policing against this behavior, it would probably be more of a sop to User:Fram than anything else. Perhaps give both of them a warning - User:E.M.Gregory for hasty editing that lead to rules violations, and Fram for i,,ature administrative action (escalating instead of de-escalating, admin shopping). Dovid (talk) 15:11, 24 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by HuldraOk, my 2 cents: I was given my first block after over 10 years in the IP area, 3 minutes after being reported by an obvious sock, without any previous warning, and without any chance to self revert. My second block was also given without any warning, and without any chance to self revert. Do I think E.M.Gregory deserves a block? Absolutely not. The fact that I have been treated like shit by admins, does not mean that I want other editors treated the same way. And, for those of you unfamiliar with the IP area; I’m very much on the "other side of the divide" from E.M.Gregory, in fact, I just AfD one of his latest masterpieces, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Murder of Georgios Tsibouktzakis. Actually, I would love to see him topic banned from the IP area...or at least, banned from making any new articles in the IP area. But blocked, when he self reverted? No, that is simply not right, IMO. Huldra (talk) 23:57, 24 April 2017 (UTC) Statement by DebresserE.M.Gregory took full responsibility for his mistake, both here and at WP:ANI,[17] so I recommend minimal action, perhaps even a warning. An editor who has been active in this area and has been able to avoid problems, should receive some credit here. Debresser (talk) 16:02, 25 April 2017 (UTC) Result concerning E.M.Gregory
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EJustice
This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Request concerning EJustice
- User who is submitting this request for enforcement
- Jytdog (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 18:30, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- User against whom enforcement is requested
- EJustice (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Search CT alerts: in user talk history • in system log
- Sanction or remedy to be enforced
- Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/American_politics_2#Discretionary_sanctions_.281932_cutoff.29 :
- Prior community discussion of the issues
- ENI thread: NPOV problem opened 19:30, 6 April 2017 by S. Rich
- ANI discussion: POV forks being created as school project opened 22:04, 6 April by User: The Wordsmith
- ANI discussion: Re: POV Forks opened by EJustice 13 April 2017
- ENI thread: Environmental Justice class project - update from Wiki Ed 15 April opened by User:Ryan (Wiki Ed)
- Thread at User Talk at Ryan (Wiki Ed) opened 17 April 2017 by User: Seraphimblade
- ENI thread: Advocacy classes and issues opened 24 April 2017 by Seraphimblade
- Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
- Course page with clear BLP violations about Trump (later noted at class liaison page here and removed in this diff) and stating the class agenda:
...in order to create a neutral, well-documented record of the assaults on the environment and environmental justice expected to unfold early in the Trump Presidency.
created 18 January 2017. While we have the "neutral, well documented" aspect, the agenda to use WIkipedia to raise the alarm is very clear. Please note that there are 6 sections for this class. Here they are at Wiki Ed: section 101, section 102, section 103, section 104, section 105, section 106. There are 180 students. Some of the articles and their fates have been tracked here. - 15 March 2017 Encouraging students to generate POV content, eg
I like the bold statements, even more so when supported by articles (like the Mother Jones one about puppy mill lobbyists!)
This was made at the Talk page of Impacts of concentrated animal feeding operations.- Am going to dig in here a bit. The article at that time was in this state and contained OFFTOPIC, POV content like
As the most disliked POTUS of the United States in at least 60 years, Donald J. Trump has a highly contentious agricultural platform.[1][2]
and pretty much everything else in that section and other parts of the page.
- Am going to dig in here a bit. The article at that time was in this state and contained OFFTOPIC, POV content like
- 15 March 2017 comment praising Environmental impacts of pig farming when it was in this state.
- I am going to dig in here a bit. The article at that time contained content like
The Midwest has traditionally been home to many hog CAFOs, but it became particularly populated with them between the mid 1980s and mid 1990s, especially located in the Black Belt region referring to an area where many slaves traditionally worked on plantations, and after emancipation many freed slaves stayed to work in that area as sharecroppers or as tenant farmers.[3]
The ref is about North Carolina which is not in the Midwest; the ref makes no mention of a "Black Belt", nor race at all, nor slavery, nor sharecroppers. It is about hog farming in N Carolina. The next sentence does deal with race:To this day, many black residents in the Black Belt region face high levels of poverty, poor standards of housing and low quality of education, employment and health care.[4]
This ref does discuss race and poverty but makes no mention of hog farming or CAFOs. It is clear there is WP:SYN going on here, to build an argument. The content that these students generated is shot through with this kind of thing. Not what we do in Wikipedia. EJustice has no awareness of this. These kinds of edits were later criticized, and you will see EJustice's response to that.
- I am going to dig in here a bit. The article at that time contained content like
- 15 March 2017 Comment on draft of "Farmworkers in California" in a sandbox:
An important topic, so work on getting a strong scaffold/outline to make your big points!
- 6 April 2017 First comment in an AfD, saying article is education program and that it is fine. Article was userified.
- 10 Apirl 2017: comments on Water contamination in Lawrence and Morgan Counties, Alabama:
Additionally, any thoughts on how the Trump Administration's actions will impact this issue? can you find citations to such analysis?
- 10 April 2017 comment on draft - note that their attitude is hardening now:
1) keep your eyes on the prize -- focus more on strengthening and deepening your citations and evidence on issues of justice than on combatting those who seek to erase any mention of it.
- 10 April 2017: key comment -- comment on draft:
Remember however that your grade depends also on the extent to which you cover EJ in the article.
- 13 April 2017 first comment addressing non-students Responding to comments by User:dsprc made in response to questions from students about dsprc's edits, in this section of the Talk page. EJustice cites WP:Systemic bias and doesn't hear dsprc's policy-and-guideline-based objections. They have the "systemic bias" hammer in hand now, and will be responding regularly with that, instead of addressing issues.
- 13 April 2017 at EJustice talk page, responding to dsprc:
Your input above strikes me as gratuitous, meaning unsupported by fact. Feel free to point to actual text that represents non-neutrality or maligning of others. Please also reflect on how much you are violating Wikipedia's own expressed guidelines for avoiding systemic bias (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Systemic_bias#What_you_can_do).
- 13 April 2017 AfD !vote:
...The course, among many other things, aims to help neutrally document the Trump Administration's assault on environmental protection....Finally, please consider this advice about systemic bias from within Wikipedia itself
- 13 April 2017 partially deletes a PROD. See edit note.
- ANI discussion: Re: POV Forks opened by EJustice 13 April 2017 (linked above).
- says in OP for example
.... I think the underlying challenges the community faces with these articles have quite a bit to do with systemic biases. I'd suggest a read of this article to help understand some of the reactions the students' work is eliciting, and a focus particularly on what to do about it. Finally, a number of Wikipedians have suggested that our class syllabus is itself flawed and biased. I would welcome their input to improve it and make it more factually correct....
(problem is not its "factual correctness" - EJustice is not hearing the problem, and does this typical advocate thing, where the problem must be with other people.) - 14 April 2017 not seeing the problems
Sections and pages were deleted without any real evidence while the sections themselves were well supported by scientific journal and popular literature citations
- diff comment:
Their (my students') constructiveness and meekness in the face of hostile editorial responses that seem at times to be motivated by a dislike of topics related to race or class is admirable.
Emphasis added. Note responses to that, here and here. - Please also note this series of responses from User:MelanieN, going from at first very sympathetic, to somewhat exasperated and sharp, as their interaction with EJustice unfolds: diff, diff, diff, diff,
- says in OP for example
- 03:29, 15 April 2017 at an AfD. key comment
I agree with your assessment that the students' work (upper-division students at one of the world's pre-eminent universities) has been treated with untoward hostility. I could anticipate this because this work does get regularly attacked in the real world. (Check out Rush Limbaugh, 2004.) And we trained the students to stay calm in the face of such attacks and to do their best and, most importantly to rigorously source their statements. I disagree a bit about the cause of the turmoil. It is a political topic, but more importantly acknowledging issues of race and class challenges many of the known systemic biases within Wikipedia. Many of these topics though are not political, certainly not by the definition of BLP or the discretionary sanction for post-1932 politics. Are the legalities of tribal lands and waterways really about biographies or direct politics? If not, then what might be at play in seeking to eliminate this as a topic for Wikipedia?
The last question there is rhetorical, and it is clear what Ejustice believes the problem is. - 17:52, 17 April 2017 Again, in EJustice's view there is no real problem with specific edits students have actually made, nor with the mission of the class and its agenda; the problem is systemic bias among Wikipedians.
...It's (Environmental justice is) a big deal and has a lot to do with understanding and solving environmental problems. So it's educational content the world needs, provided by people trained to create it. ...My frustration with the editors who have engaged negatively is their blindness to their own blindness on this front...their unwillingness to see how hard it is to get this stuff discussed neutrally and to engage positively in the effort to do so. Every time I read WP's guidelines, I am fortified that the intent is to be positive and engaged, so I'm sticking with that.
- As is extremely common in student editing, copyvios were found, which EJustice doubted and pushed back a bunch of times to have versions restored - no concern that WP cannot host COPYVIO. Diffs: at deleting admin's talk; at ANI, back at admin's talk page; at their own Talk page; at User:Ian (Wiki Ed)'s talk page; diff, etc.
- here, I tried to call their attention to the underlying problem with the mission of the class via the excellent Wikipedia:Beware of the tigers essay. Their response which included
I think the key thing that editors are getting wrong is their inability to separate topics that are particularly triggering in today's political environment from good neutral content about things like environmental racism..... But the inability of critics to separate their feelings about the topic from the facts makes some of the feedback less than useful.
andMy frustration with the editors who have engaged negatively is their blindness to their own blindness on this front...their unwillingness to see how hard it is to get this stuff discussed neutrally and to engage positively in the effort to do so. Every time I read WP's guidelines, I am fortified that the intent is to be positive and engaged, so I'm sticking with that.
. and later (diff)You strike me as a live tiger
This turning things back on people is the same thing they did in the ANI, and is what advocates always do in WIkipedia. They subsequently moved the DS alert I gave them and that discussion to a subpage, User:EJustice/notrelevant. The title of which speaks for itself. - comment at AfD, repeated 19 April 2017 here at the article talk page as an instruction to their students:
Feedback from instructor: The literature cited shows that more regulation leads to more employment and economic growth in Appalachia. This paradox increases the notability of this subject and the page could be streamlined based on this connection.
When I asked what that means exactly, EJustice wrote this. In other words, this instruction to the students was conjecture and advocacy stated as TruthTM. This is where the class is coming from and where they are being led, in their Wikipedia editing. This is not what we do in Wikipedia. This is a thesis that someone would argue for in an essay. - 23 April 2017 another attack on motivations of me and others.
- 25 April 2017 as above. Which prompted this filing.
References
- ^ Denson, Author: Ryan (2017-01-25). "The Numbers Are In: Trump Is The Most Hated Newly Inaugurated President EVER". Addicting Info | The Knowledge You Crave. Retrieved 2017-03-05.
{{cite web}}
:|first=
has generic name (help) - ^ Ball, Molly. "Trump's Last Vacant Cabinet Post". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2017-03-06.
- ^ Furuseth, Owen J. (November 1997). "Restructuring of Hog Farming in North Carolina: Explosion and Implosion". The Professional Geographer. 49 (4): 391–403. doi:10.1111/0033-0124.00086. (nb, citation fixed)
- ^ Wimberley, Ronald C; Morris, Libby V (2002). "The Regionalization of Poverty: Assistance for the Black Belt South?" (PDF). Southern Rural Sociology. 18 (1): 294–306. (NB, citation fixed)
- Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
- (none)
- If discretionary sanctions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts)
- Alerted about discretionary sanctions in the area of conflict in the last twelve months, see the system log linked to above and diff on 14 April 2017
- Additional comments by editor filing complaint
EJustice's trajectory within WP is very typical of advocates who arrive here, mistaking Wikipedia for something that it is not. EJustice arrived with a clearly stated agenda, has mostly ignored feedback, and has accused those who raised issues with their content of being blinded by their own biases. No self-awareness, no acknowledgement that a bunch (not all) of the student editing has violated policies on many levels (POV, SYN, failing verification, COPYVIO), nor glimmer of openness to seeing Wikipedia for what it is. (It is hard to write about race and class everywhere in the world, including WP - maybe especially in WP with our policies and guidelines and mission, and our community full of messy humans)
EJustice set this POV-editing agenda for a class of 180 people; EJustice is driving (their grade depends on it) and encouraging students to add essay content to Wikipedia arguing an environmental justice agenda, against Trump's agenda; this is the WP:Beware of tigers problem. EJustice has demonstrated this in their AfD !votes, their talk page comments, and their responses at various boards.
I feel awful for the students. See this conversation with a student on my Talk page. That student is trapped between what their professor is demanding and Wikipedia's policies and guidelines.
EJustice being here under the Education Program has kind of exacerbated the overall problems - pulling out this diff from a volunteer at ANI, already cited above: If it wasn't for the wiki edu connection, User:EJustice would have already been warned, if not blocked, for POV pushing per WP:NOTHERE.
This is.. awkward and unfortunate and is surely something that will be discussed when the semester is over when the Wiki Ed staff are not working like crazy trying to help students complete their assignments.
But EJustice's activities have caused widespread disruption and absorbed a ton of volunteer time, as you can see from the discussion boards cited above. They continue to personalize objections to content created by students, instead of dealing the policy-and-guideline based issues themselves, as shown by the last two diffs above in particular. In the case of EJustice as a Wikipedian, in my view they should be topic banned from contemporary politics, and be informed that this goes for future classes via TAs per MEAT. This is a very bad outcome but I don't see another way. Jytdog (talk) 18:30, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- shrunk. Acknowledged. Jytdog (talk) 19:14, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- User: Sandstein I thought about that too. Where I came down is that per the dashboard page cited in the first bullet of diffs, the agenda for this class was driven in reaction to Trump's environmental agenda. The focus of this class is raising awareness of EJ issues and of Trump's "assault" on them. If you control+f this for "assault" and "Trump" and look at the article titles created by the students, you will see that EJustice talked about "assault" not only in syllabus but in an AfD, and that the focus of the class is Trump. At the ANI thread they opened they said
The topic of environmental justice is particularly tricky right now. President Trump is on the record...
etc. Contemporary politics is every where in this. That is why their behavior falls under these DS, in my view. Jytdog (talk) 20:28, 25 April 2017 (UTC) - Sandstein thanks for reply but I struggle with your analysis. The content generated by the students was specifically and generally Trump related, at EJustice's direction. EJustice's comments accuse those objecting to the content of being full of bias -- that we (I am among them) are incapable of editing neutrally about contemporary US politics because of that bias. So the comments are an effort to influence content about contemporary US politics; we do not permit editors to be active in US politics who behave this way. Not to mention, who drive other editors to add this kind of policy-violating content about contemporary US politics. I do appreciate the nod toward AN should you remain with this position and a consensus of admins ends up agreeing with you. That is a valid alternative route. This also prompts me to consider that a community ban might be a more... appropriate solution. But let's see what other admins weigh in with. Thanks again. Jytdog (talk) 21:06, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- OK, seems like most people are leaning toward AN as a better venue. I am fine with withdrawing this in favor of that venue. Not sure if that is relevant to a darn thing but wanted to say it. If this is withdrawn, my next step would be to simply provide a link to this request at AN, so that none of us have to re-post what has already been said. If this stays open for further admin input, am fine with too. Jytdog (talk) 01:37, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- User:GoldenRing my primary concern is a) EJustice's continued intervention on their own but even more so, semesters to come. Action would be to prevent further disruption, which seems not unlikely. Jytdog (talk) 01:39, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested
- diff
Discussion concerning EJustice
Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.
Statement by EJustice
Statement by The Wordsmith
@Lord Roem: I intend to make a more substantive comment, but I will request that you grant Jytdog a waiver on his statement length. This issue encompasses a massive number of articles involving many editors, and extra space really is necessary to put this issue in context. The only reason I didn't bring it to AE myself is because of the sheer scope of this. And as always, I consider myself WP:INVOLVED on 2016 Election-related articles in general and this Berkeley issue in specific. The WordsmithTalk to me 19:15, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- I've been dealing with this nonsense since I happened upon one of the articles while browsing AFD. Upon doing some routine research, I was horrified to find the rest of them. A full list (of the ones in mainspace, anyway) is at User:Train2104/Berkeley NPOV articles. A handful of them, such as Environmental policy of the Donald Trump administration, are okay, though that only came about through a large effort involving many editors resulting from a note I dropped on Talk:Donald Trump. Prior to that, it was a mess of POV pushing and Original Research and Crystal Ballery. Going by the looks of it, roughly half of them have already been deleted or otherwise removed from article space. And through it all, EJustice has maintained that anyone opposing or criticizing the work being done is doing so because of their own biases. I really think there's a fundamental disconnect between what Professor Gelobter thinks Wikipedia is for, and what we actually do here. Many experienced editors and admins have tried to help him understand, but I don't think he's willing to budge. A topic ban for him and his students (many of which have been meatpuppeting on each others' AFDs) is the only way that I know of to end this disruption, short of waiting for the semester to be over and then a massive cleanup. The WordsmithTalk to me 19:50, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by Bri
I'll make this short and sweet.
- I encountered this group's editing also, and found it beyond problematic.
- The courses are obviously US politics agenda driven and inherently POV.
- The 10 April diff [22] is particularly concerning in that it appears to show students being pushed until they conform to the course's agenda. I don't know how this works at UC Berkeley, but this amounts to WP:MEAT in our sphere.
- Also here he is offering legal advice to his students that are at odds with our norms.
- The course leader should not be allowed to participate further until they demonstrate that they understand our community processes and norms.
- Bri (talk) 20:32, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by MelanieN
I have been involved to a slight extent with EJustice and his students, primarily at one of the articles: Environmental policy of the Donald Trump administration. At that article several of us have been working with several of the students, collegially and with good results, and it is a proper encyclopedia article. I have interacted with EJustice himself on only one occasion, the ANI that Jytdog quoted from above. Speaking as a regular editor (not as an admin because of my involvement), I have two points to make.
- "Environmental policy of the Donald Trump administration" is a proper subject for Wikipedia, comparable to other articles about the various policies of various presidents. I was unaware of all the other articles that have been created (180 students? OMG!), and having looked at a few now I am pretty much appalled. Almost none of them are proper subjects for an encyclopedia article. "Impacts of concentrated animal feeding operations"? "Environmental impacts of pig farming"? "Water contamination in Lawrence and Morgan Counties, Alabama" for heavens sake?? At most these subjects could be a paragraph in a related article. These are not articles, these are student term papers, and they should have been assigned and graded as such. From the subject matter, to the format, to the neutrality or lack of it, they are completely unsuitable for Wikipedia. This was inherent in the class itself, which is frankly oriented toward a particular political viewpoint. In the future this professor should not assign his students to do their term papers in the form of Wikipedia articles, and steps should be taken at the education project to ensure that this does not happen again. Unfortunately, almost all of these inappropriate articles are going to have to be deleted or redirected.
- The user EJustice has been very belligerent about attributing any criticism or deletion to bias, rather than to enforcing the guidelines of an international encyclopedia. That's just a defensive reflex on his part; EJustice knows nothing about the political or social opinions of editors here. That's by design; most of us try to edit in such a way that our own beliefs and attitudes are not reflected in our editing. (I personally have been accused of being everything from a flaming liberal to a Trump apologist.) But EJustice has a fixed belief that anyone who disagrees with his agenda must be doing so because of their own biases. That fixed belief, and the WP:IDHT attitude it generates, are incompatible with being a Wikipedia editor. It appears that EJustice is NOTHERE to improve the encyclopedia, but rather to use it to promote his own viewpoint. IMO action needs to be taken on that basis.
I thank Jytdog for this careful research and exposition of this massive problem. Unfortunately AE may not be the proper venue for the problems raised here, and we might have to do it all again at AN in order to take the actions which are called for.--MelanieN (talk) 21:28, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- @Lord Roem, Sandstein, and El C: You mentioned a topic ban, presumably of EJustice. To be clear, what topic are you considering banning him from? Also a comment: banning User:EJustice himself from editing does nothing to prevent him from sending 180 students here to post POV term papers. --MelanieN (talk) 23:17, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by Seraphimblade
I'll comment here since I've been rather involved in this issue. I fully agree that this is becoming a major problem. Normally, when I've run into issues with class projects, I've found that instructors and students are quite willing to receive and act on feedback, and it doesn't have to go any farther than giving them some advice and being there if they have questions. Unfortunately, that has not been true here. EJustice has seemed fundamentally unwilling to change the approach they've taken, even after having been told repeatedly that it is unacceptable. At this point, I don't know what else we can do but apply sanctions.
To the question by Sandstein, many of this class's edits are American Politics related, but there have also been issues with BLP. Discretionary sanctions always are applicable to BLP issues. But something needs to change here, because this is reaching a serious level of disruption, and with the instructor being unwilling to change what they're doing, I don't know what else to do. I warned some time ago that it might come to this if it continues, and, well, here we are. Seraphimblade Talk to me 21:38, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by Train2104
I encountered this course after seeing the first ENI report linked in the "prior community discussion" section above. Their behavior has been problematic, magnified by the sheer volume of students and articles involved. I echo the comments by the various editors above, and thank Jytdog for bringing this here, for it is sorely needed. The edits are clearly motivated by American politics, and as such, should fall under discretionary sanctions.
Students look up to instructors as role models, and we expect instructors to demonstrate good behavior to their students. However, here, we are considering sanctions against a particular editor, not against all 180 students. We do not know the behind the scenes processes that occurred leading to this, including the choice of article topics, etc. But we do know that the syllabus was deliberately written with a goal in mind, and thus by extension, the course and assignment have an advocacy goal, one clearly not compatible with the purpose of Wikipedia. Nor do we know whether or not this user has attempted this course in the past (pre-Trump of course). But clearly they have refused to listen to our advice, and instead accuse us of systemic bias and not supporting his cause - when we try to be as neutral as possible. The fact that there are 180 students, far less than 180 articles (thankfully!), and that numerous SPA/meatpuppet votes were cast at the AFD's tell me that role accounts were likely used. This also violates policy, and is a violation the instructor should clearly be aware of, in addition to the copyright matters above. I echo StAnselm's comment at ANI - we are here only because of the protections (real or imagined) afforded by the Education Program, and if this were a blind meatpuppet army they'd long be blocked.
I support the application of sanctions against this instructor, and urge the community to participate in the postmortem analysis and discussion that Wiki Ed has promised will occur over the summer, in response to this and numerous other course-related problems this semester. The semester is almost over, so I'm not sure of their effectiveness, but Wikipedia does not operate according to the calendar of any particular university. – Train2104 (t • c) 00:47, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by Wiki Ed
I've just posted a statement about this AE request on behalf of the Wiki Education Foundation here: Wikipedia:Education noticeboard/Incidents#Statement by Wiki Ed regarding AE. It's not posted on this page for two reasons: first, it would exceed the word count; second, we wanted to comment on the situation and our role in it, but, of course, would rather not opine on the outcome of this process. --Ryan (Wiki Ed) (talk) 01:32, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by Seraphim System
I agree in large part with the comments above - there have been problems and User:EJustice has not been responsive to feedback, and has blamed other editors for being motivated by bias (I can only speak for myself, but I am not promoting a POV about this and did not appreciate being accused of racial or gender bias). Is there systemic bias? Yes, absolutely - but as I have said before, that is not a free pass to disregard policies like WP:SYNTH WP:OR WP:CRYSTAL etc. Even if all these policy guidelines are followed, there will still editors who are disruptive and non-neutral - but there is not much room for debate here, the policy violations were clear and routine.
That said, I'm not convinced AE is the right place for this - from the diffs provided I don't see any evidence that the editor has edited in the sanctions area himself, or that these articles were even in the sanctions area when this conduct took place - maybe they should have been, but for a significant duration of this course they were not. Environmental Impacts of Pig Farming for example - not in the sanctions area. These pages should have been correctly templated and protected from the start, they were not. This general behavioral complaint should be raised in the correct forum, if only so we don't slide further down the abyss of chaos and disorder. Seraphim System (talk) 03:51, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
Statement by (username)
Result concerning EJustice
- This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
- I'll review soon, but your request is way too long. Please shrink it to comply to the 500-word limit. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 18:44, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- I think what's been been presented is more than enough. It's unfortunate that we have to face this with a university course that has the potential to strengthen existing articles w/ better research and sourcing... but the editor in question is very clearly POV-pushing and refusing to listen to feedback. We've sanctioned with less extensive evidence. I believe a topic-ban is appropriate, with the added proviso that the editor should be very wary about asking his students to edit where he can't. They need to understand what WP is for and what's not appropriate. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:05, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- Adding that while I think the above is enough to act on my own, I'd like to hear other admins' thoughts before jumping in. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:07, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- The more I think about it, the more I think AN might be best to handle this if only because this isn't just a potential sanction against one editor, but the entire class, as MelanieN mentions above. I'd feel uncomfortable making such a broad decision on my own, especially when we're not unanimous that DS applies. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 23:36, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- Adding that while I think the above is enough to act on my own, I'd like to hear other admins' thoughts before jumping in. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:07, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- I agree with others that the length of the complaint should be overlooked. GoldenRing (talk) 01:44, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- I think what's been been presented is more than enough. It's unfortunate that we have to face this with a university course that has the potential to strengthen existing articles w/ better research and sourcing... but the editor in question is very clearly POV-pushing and refusing to listen to feedback. We've sanctioned with less extensive evidence. I believe a topic-ban is appropriate, with the added proviso that the editor should be very wary about asking his students to edit where he can't. They need to understand what WP is for and what's not appropriate. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 20:05, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- At first glance we do seem to have conduct issues here that could justify a sanction, but I would like it to be made more clear how this is about the "politics of the United States" and therefore within scope of discretionary sanctions. Apart from a few Trump-related comments, the diffs in evidence are basically about topics related to environmental justice and environmental protection in the US. This is of course a political matter in a broad sense, but then most controversial public policy issues are. My understanding of the sanctions is that they were enacted to deal with disruption in the topic area of partisan or party politics, such as elections-related content. If they are understood to cover every controversial public issue, they'd cover basically everything related to the U.S., which I don't think was the intention. Sandstein 20:18, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- Unlike Jytdog, I don't think that, just because EJustice may possibly have had political reasons for their actions, these actions are within the scope of discretionary sanctions about U.S. politics. In my view, it is required that the potentially disruptive edits are themselves related to U.S. politics in order to be sanctionable. I would therefore not take AE action here. However, a request for a community topic ban, which is not limited by topic area, might be made at WP:AN. Sandstein 20:32, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- I tend to agree with Jytdog that, due to the focus of the edits (rather than merely the motivation, as Sandstein claims), it can be seen to fall within the scope of ARBAP2—but a topic ban can work just as well to end the disruption. Clearly, something needs to be done, as the statements by several editors above attest. El_C 22:30, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- Perhaps, we should take this to the wider community (at AN), since the 180 students may also need to be placed under restrictions. Sounds like a plan. El_C 23:58, 25 April 2017 (UTC)
- I've left a note at AN asking for admin input.
- If the class is done for this year, the I guess the 180 POV-pushing accounts are no longer a serious problem. Something needs to be done about EJustice though. I'm not entirely convinced that a than from post-1932 American politics will be the answer; aren't we then risking the same types of problems in whatever area their class is assigned next year? I'm frankly tempted to just indef them, on the grounds that indefinite does not mean infinite and if they can demonstrate that they've understood the purpose of Wikipedia and how they can do education programs constructively then they can be unblocked, but I'd like some more support for that idea before trying it. GoldenRing (talk) 01:37, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- @Jytdog: Exactly. My thinking is that this is someone who shouldn't be here until we see an attitude change. GoldenRing (talk) 01:48, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- I agree that this falls under the US politics sanctions. If the party is over, there is no point in chastising the students, if there was ever a point to that. The instructor's behavior, however, is far from acceptable, and if they don't respond here, they're very likely to get a topic ban from editing or assigning anything remotely political. Drmies (talk) 02:02, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
Mar4d
This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Request concerning Mar4d
- User who is submitting this request for enforcement
- D4iNa4 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) 02:35, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- User against whom enforcement is requested
- Mar4d (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
Search CT alerts: in user talk history • in system log
- Sanction or remedy to be enforced
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/India-Pakistan
- Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
- 25 April 2017 Changed the section title from "Alleged intelligence activity and support for insurgents" to "Insurgents and intelligence operatives", like the section includes only proven convictions, when its full of allegations. On edit summary he wrote "+ref", he didn't mentioned he made a misleading title and added a new event.
- 24 April 2017 Warned the editor the he went "above WP:3RR", despite he made just 2 reverts.[23][24] See WP:BATTLE.
- 24 April 2017 Censoring content by removing all mention of Pakistan despite Kashmir conflict refers to conflict of Kashmir in Pakistan, and 4/7 editors on talk page agreed to include Pakistan.
- 25 April 2017 on SPI, he claims "seems they were not notified about this SPI", when policy is that notifying "isn’t mandatory". Either call it WP:GAMING, or stirring up drama.
- 25 April 2017 Trying to preserve article about an obviously non-notable person, when the page creator himself requested deletion[25]
- 24 April 2017 Misrepresenting sources. On edit summary he claims that "source makes no mention of OBL personally involved in the conflict", despite source does back the sentence by saying "led by Osama bin Laden, was inducted by the Pakistan Army into Gilgit and adjoining areas to suppress the revolt"[26]
- 23 April 2017 clear violation of WP:BLPCAT, the person has never identified himself to be Pakistani. Before making such a category, Mar4d had to first source that information on the article body.
Interesting thing is that this all comes under 2 days, and remains continuous for many years. Above diffs show how he misrepresents sources, engages WP:BATTLE, violates WP:BLP, pushes WP:POV, censors content, etc. Given his block log and this amount of disruption in such a small period, it would be best to have him banned from entire South Asia. D4iNa4 (talk) 02:35, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
- Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
- [27].
- If discretionary sanctions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts)
- 12 August 2016
- Mentioned by name in the Arbitration Committee's Final Decision linked to above.
- Previously blocked as a discretionary sanction for conduct in the area of conflict, see the block log linked to above.
- Previously given a discretionary sanction for conduct in the area of conflict on Date by Username (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA).
- Alerted about discretionary sanctions in the area of conflict in the last twelve months, see the system log linked to above.
- Gave an alert about discretionary sanctions in the area of conflict in the last twelve months
- Participated in an arbitration request or enforcement procedure about the area of conflict in the last twelve months, on Date.
- Successfully appealed all their own sanctions relating to the area of conflict in the last twelve months, on Date.
- Additional comments by editor filing complaint
- Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested
- [28]
Discussion concerning Mar4d
Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.
Statement by Mar4d
Statement by (username)
Result concerning Mar4d
- This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.