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::I'll take my chances with topic bans for every MHP editor that is shown to practice Gamesmanship, Wikilawyering, Ownership, Insist that only their OR POV is correct or that fail to AGF of other editors (even 'laymen'). The discussions and editing would be pretty straightforward then, as Wikipedia provided for, all along. [[User:Glkanter|Glkanter]] ([[User talk:Glkanter|talk]]) 22:03, 17 February 2011 (UTC) |
::I'll take my chances with topic bans for every MHP editor that is shown to practice Gamesmanship, Wikilawyering, Ownership, Insist that only their OR POV is correct or that fail to AGF of other editors (even 'laymen'). The discussions and editing would be pretty straightforward then, as Wikipedia provided for, all along. [[User:Glkanter|Glkanter]] ([[User talk:Glkanter|talk]]) 22:03, 17 February 2011 (UTC) |
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::I have to disagree about the uniqueness of this arbitration. Since I've edited mostly in fringe science areas I've seen a fair number of arbitrations (never been a party, but have sat through several as an observer and commenter) and I would say that rather than being unique, this is a fairly typical arbitration case: a situation where there is an intractable, longstanding content dispute, with incidentally one editor who is sometimes uncivil or rude in interacting with other editors. The case will be filed to deal with that one editor's conduct, and in most cases that I've seen, the case will end with that one editor being sanctioned and the underlying content dispute left to rage on unresolved, indeed unaddressed and unacknowledged. The Wikipedia dispute resolution system just simply isn't set up to deal with deeply entrenched content disputes; the assumption seems to be that once you eliminate the troublemaker, then the rest of the editors will be able to work out the content dispute easily and peacefully. This of course fails to recognize the nature of most content disputes. But ArbCom's remit does not permit them to address content disputes directly, so there we are. [[User:Woonpton|Woonpton]] ([[User talk:Woonpton|talk]]) 22:11, 17 February 2011 (UTC) |
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== response to Glkanter == |
== response to Glkanter == |
Revision as of 22:11, 17 February 2011
Main case page (Talk) — Evidence (Talk) — Workshop (Talk) — Proposed decision (Talk) Case clerks: Dougweller (Talk) & x! (Talk) Drafting arbitrator: [[User:|]] ([[User talk:|Talk]]) |
Response to Martin
Martin's comment directed at me seems to merit a response, but it doesn't seem to belong in the evidence section, since it's not evidence or a specific comment/question about evidence. So I've put it here; if it's in the wrong place a clerk can move it, I'm sure.
@Martin: I'm equally puzzled why you think my evidence constitutes a "fierce attack." There is no attack. The diffs (which are his own words, after all) speak for themselves, I think; otherwise I wouldn't have taken the trouble to collect them. But ultimately the committee will decide how compelling the diffs are to them and will vote accordingly. My only "agenda" here is violations of WP:RS, which seems to me an important component in the problem. Unfortunately, ArbCom approaches content issues only indirectly, through specific editor conduct, so my general concern about rampant OR needed to be framed in terms of specific editor conduct in order to have a chance of being heard, and Richard Gill offers the most salient current example of OR. But if arbitration were set up in such a way that a person could register a request to "Do Something About OR!" without singling out anyone individually, I'd do that. This isn't personal; I'd be happy with any remedy that put some teeth into NOR and RS for all editors working in the area, that would be reliably enforced against violators going forward.
Obviously everyone sees this dispute a bit differently, but it's not helpful to disparage those who see it differently than you do.
The fact that I chose not to become involved in the ongoing dispute is immaterial to my presenting evidence. I have watched the dispute over several months, and there is no rule that a person has to be actively involved in a dispute in order to present evidence in a case; in fact I often prefer outside views to party's views when reading cases, myself, because they often have a fresher, more objective perspective than those who are closer to the dispute. Woonpton (talk) 02:01, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- Woonnpton, I was genuinely surprised to see your comments about Richard Gill, out of the blue so to speak. It is hard to see how a commentary with sections entitled, 'Richard Gill belittles other editors', 'Richard Gill engages in original research','Richard Gill promotes his own research on Wikipedia', and 'Richard Gill and COI' would not be construed as an attack. If this was not your intention then perhaps you should make this clear.
- I do not believe that WP policy needs to be reliably enforced, in my opinion this is contrary to the spirit of WP. I think Richard adhered to the principles of avoiding a COI if not the letter. He was openly adding and discussing his own material in full view of the editors of a very active article. I consider this more akin to offering his views up for approval rather than promoting his own work. It is very different from adding your own work to a relatively quiet article in the hope that nobody will notice until it become established.
- I was not complaining that you had commented, outside views are always welcome, more noting that you had decided not to join in the discussion despite appearing to have strong views on the subject. In the end it appears that we agree on many things, especially the benefit of having experts present. Martin Hogbin (talk)
Where are the Clerks?
This arbitration is already spinning out of control, with the content dispute that has been raging for three years moving to the "evidence" page in the form of dueling content positions back and forth. There are now seven "evidence" sections, but only two of them actually contain evidence; the rest are just statements of opinions, opinions that have been expressed hundreds of times on the article and talk pages (and one of these op-ed pieces is already going on 2000 words). One finds oneself having to respond to opinions instead of evidence, just as on the talk pages of the dispute where people's own opinions are argued instead of sources. The evidence page should be a place where evidence is presented and discussed, not a replay of the content war that has been going on forever. I think part of the problem is that parties are unfamiliar with the arbitration format/process, but that could be remedied with a little advice from the clerks. Where are the clerks? Send in the clerks.... Woonpton (talk) 15:03, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- I half agree with you. This, I suspect, is a very unusual arbitration and maybe a slightly unusual approach is required. On the other hand I do think that the arbitrators in general should maybe propose a halt to addition of more opinion on the evidence page by editors who have already commented, or at least give some guidance. Maybe they plan to simply ignore opinion and look only at diffs but this would leave very little to arbitrate on and that is the problem, if this is just a conduct issue then it is far too trivial, in my opinion for arbcom.
- I think the arbitrators will need to arbitrate on the editing process. Civility, no OR, and NPOV will not resolve this dispute. As the evidence draws to a close, I will propose my simple-first concept as a way to resolve it. Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:55, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- I'll take my chances with topic bans for every MHP editor that is shown to practice Gamesmanship, Wikilawyering, Ownership, Insist that only their OR POV is correct or that fail to AGF of other editors (even 'laymen'). The discussions and editing would be pretty straightforward then, as Wikipedia provided for, all along. Glkanter (talk) 22:03, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- I have to disagree about the uniqueness of this arbitration. Since I've edited mostly in fringe science areas I've seen a fair number of arbitrations (never been a party, but have sat through several as an observer and commenter) and I would say that rather than being unique, this is a fairly typical arbitration case: a situation where there is an intractable, longstanding content dispute, with incidentally one editor who is sometimes uncivil or rude in interacting with other editors. The case will be filed to deal with that one editor's conduct, and in most cases that I've seen, the case will end with that one editor being sanctioned and the underlying content dispute left to rage on unresolved, indeed unaddressed and unacknowledged. The Wikipedia dispute resolution system just simply isn't set up to deal with deeply entrenched content disputes; the assumption seems to be that once you eliminate the troublemaker, then the rest of the editors will be able to work out the content dispute easily and peacefully. This of course fails to recognize the nature of most content disputes. But ArbCom's remit does not permit them to address content disputes directly, so there we are. Woonpton (talk) 22:11, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
response to Glkanter
Since there seem to be no arbitration clerks or arbitrators monitoring the case to respond to arbitration-related questions, I'll field this one:
Glkanter asks whether the arbitrators will consider the conduct of Rick Block as part of the arbitration, or whether Glkanter needs to "make countercharges against Rick Block." If Glkanter wants the conduct of Rick Block to be considered in the arbitration, he needs to present evidence, in the form of diffs, to support any assertions of misconduct. However, I will say, having just recently combed through all the interminable discussion pages, that in all that stuff I didn't see evidence of misconduct on Rick Block's part. However, maybe I just wasn't looking hard enough. But counter-charges aren't enough, you really have to back up those charges with diffs. The committee won't (or shouldn't, anyway) consider unsubstantiated charges; they need diffs. Woonpton (talk) 18:59, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for the response. I guess 'evidence' has a very strict definition in the world of Wikipedia. It seems you're suggesting, as you did previously on my talk page, that 'diffs' are the only acceptable form of evidence.
- And you're probably right. But how do I show show the *absence* of diffs? Each time Nijdam (or Richard) over the course of 2+ years monopolized a talk page, including the mediation and this arbitration, with OR, and Rick Block, the admin, failed to respond? Or when Dicklyon mugged me on the MHP talk page, and only Martin would address Dicklyon's gross, unprovoked transgressions? Then Rick Block had the gall to turn that single incident into an RfC on me? I've provided the diffs for that.
- Nijdam himself provided the proof that he ignores the AGF of other editors right in this arbitration, and I believe you provided a diff to a talk page example of the same. Never a peep out of admin Rick Block. But when Glkanter is perceived by Rick Block to have violated a policy, well, those diffs are everywhere. In fact, that's apparently the only issue of this arbitration. Kinda weird, no?
- So far, 3 or 4 other editors have mentioned either directly, or described, Rick Block's ownership of the MHP. Doesn't that count for something? There's been much more posted on this arbitration indicating that the barrier to progress on the MHP article is Rick Block, and not Glkanter.
- And I provided some diffs for the perverse ways Rick's favored POV have been used in the article to subvert the will of the other editors.
- And, of course, when Rick Block attacked me personally in the mediation, well, for reasons still unclear to me, all those diffs have been deleted.
- But, in the unexplained absence of official Wikipedia representatives in this arbitration, thank you very much for your thoughtful response. Glkanter (talk) 19:23, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- Just a comment: I would urge you to be less angry at Rick Block for not taking action against people in the incidents you relate; the fact is that administrators are not allowed to use their administrative tools in content areas and/or disputes in which they have been involved as an editor or a disputant, and if he had done so, he could have been desysopped by the arbitration committee. It's too bad that there weren't other administrators watching, if administrative action needed to be taken, but it's unfair to blame RB for not acting, since as an involved administrator he really couldn't. It's unfortunate that no one has explained that to you before. Woonpton (talk) 19:39, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- [written before edit conflict]
- In addition, Martin Hogbin's evidence shows, I believe at least 6 diffs where named editors have been directly foiled by Rick Block in their attempts to make edits to the article that Rick Block just couldn't support. Because all of those otherwise highly regarded, long time Wikipedia editors were suddenly struck dumb in regards to NPOV. At least as Rick Block sees it, anyways. Honestly, and this is *not* directed at you woonpton, isn't enough, enough? I mentioned this stuff in the now-disappeared mediation, and I was told to stop, my edits were reverted, and I was threatened with removal from the mediation unless I could follow the ground rules I had agreed to. It was more important, apparently, to have good ground rules following in the mediation than good faith editing. And people can't understand why the MHP mediation, just like the MHP talk pages, couldn't accomplish anything? Oh, brother. Glkanter (talk) 19:50, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- [written after edit conflict]
- I'm only pointing out that Rick Block took many, many measures against me, countless warnings on my talk page, filing an RfC, filing this arbitration, whining to mediators about my posts, that he *never* once, not a single time did with Nijdam. Probably not Richard, either. Not because I was violating rules, but because no matter how many times he repeated his baseless arguments, I would respond in a manner that did not support his NPOV violating arguments and edits to *his* article.
- I don't think I've displayed anger. Righteous indignation, perhaps. It's about time Rick Block was held accountable for his actions, and inactions. Glkanter (talk) 19:50, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- Filing an RfC, filing an arbitration, having an opinion in mediation, warning other editors about infractions of policy, are not administrative actions; any editor can do the same. I feel your sense of injustice, but in order to demonstrate the injustice, you'd have to show that the behavior on the part of other editors in each case was as "bad" as the things you were warned for, and while that may be the case, it's a harder case to make. Everyone has their own opinions about whose behavior is disruptive and whose is not, and people aren't required to agree about this. And of course anything that happened in mediation cannot be an issue here. Sorry I can't be more helpful. Woonpton (talk) 20:05, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- Well, that's the beauty of Gamesmanship & Wikilawyering isn't it? At first, you don't realize it's happening to you. Then, to make other people recognize it, you have to say something about it. *But*, until you're proven 'right', you're prima facie guilty of personal attacks. Plus, everything in dispute resolution makes it clear that the complainer will *probably* be seen as the real offender. The ultimate Catch-22. Of course, why that rule of thumb (j'excuse/j'accuse) doesn't blatantly apply to Rick Block's filing of this frivolous arbitration against me escapes me. And why, unlike everything else on Wikipedia, are the mediation diffs unavailable? That makes zero sense to me.
- But thank you for addressing these issues, and giving me the opportunity to express my concerns in a structured, (non-pontificating) manner. Glkanter (talk) 20:20, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- Just a note for anyone reading this: Glkanter's claim that I've never said anything about policy to Nijdam or Richard is not in the least accurate. Two examples that took all of 5 minutes to find: [1] [2] -- Rick Block (talk) 20:53, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
- June, 2009 and an irrelevant diff? How about something just a *little* more current and relevant? Are you aware of a single instance of Nijdam referring to a reliable source without demeaning it? And how many times did you admonish him for this violation? How about the times when he wrote that he dismisses the views of certain other editors (woonpton provided that diff, and he says it right in this arbitration), clearly violating AGF? I know for a fact you mentioned that Nijdam refuses to respond to my comments, at least once, in an attempt to belittle me. I'll have to search for that diff. You never warned Nijdam [about the AGF expectation from all editors], as you so eagerly did me, anytime I challenged your dominion over all things MHP on Wikipedia. Glkanter (talk) 21:10, 17 February 2011 (UTC)