Dispute resolution (Requests) |
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A request for arbitration is the last step of dispute resolution for conduct disputes on Wikipedia. The Arbitration Committee considers requests to open new cases and review previous decisions. The entire process is governed by the arbitration policy. For information about requesting arbitration, and how cases are accepted and dealt with, please see guide to arbitration.
To request enforcement of previous Arbitration decisions or discretionary sanctions, please do not open a new Arbitration case. Instead, please submit your request to /Requests/Enforcement.
This page transcludes from /Case, /Clarification and Amendment, /Motions, and /Enforcement.
Please make your request in the appropriate section:
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Contents
- 1 Requests for arbitration
- 2 Requests for clarification and amendment
- 2.1 Clarification request: Gun control
- 2.1.1 Statement by GoldenRing (Gun Control)
- 2.1.2 Statement by Dlthewave
- 2.1.3 Statement by Bishonen
- 2.1.4 Statement by Simonm223
- 2.1.5 Statement by Ivanvector
- 2.1.6 Statement by Doug Weller
- 2.1.7 Statement by Black Kite
- 2.1.8 Statement by Levivich
- 2.1.9 Statement by RexxS
- 2.1.10 Statement by S Marshall
- 2.1.11 Statement by User:SmokeyJoe
- 2.1.12 Statement by Hobit
- 2.1.13 Statement by RoySmith
- 2.1.14 Statement by Sandstein
- 2.1.15 Statement by Cryptic
- 2.1.16 Statement by GMG
- 2.1.17 Statement by DGG
- 2.1.18 Statement by Drmies
- 2.1.19 Statement by Xymmax
- 2.1.20 Statement by Wnt
- 2.1.21 Statement by Spartaz
- 2.1.22 Statement by Fish and karate
- 2.1.23 Statement by Alanscottwalker
- 2.1.24 Statement by Deryck
- 2.1.25 Statement by Atsme
- 2.1.26 Statement by SMcCandlish
- 2.1.27 Statement by EdChem
- 2.1.28 Statement by Aquillion
- 2.1.29 Statement by Ymblanter
- 2.1.30 Statement by Nosebagbear
- 2.1.31 Statement by {other-editor}
- 2.1.32 Gun control: Clerk notes
- 2.1.33 Gun control: Arbitrator views and discussion
- 2.2 Amendment request: Eastern Europe
- 2.1 Clarification request: Gun control
- 3 Motions
- 4 Requests for enforcement
- 4.1 Arbitration enforcement action appeal by Dlthewave
- 4.2 Icewhiz
- 4.2.1 Request concerning Icewhiz
- 4.2.2 Discussion concerning Icewhiz
- 4.2.2.1 Statement by Icewhiz
- 4.2.2.2 Statement by Sir Joseph
- 4.2.2.3 Statement by GizzyCatBella
- 4.2.2.4 Statement by Wikieditor19920
- 4.2.2.5 Statement by Stefka Bulgaria
- 4.2.2.6 Statement by Zero0000
- 4.2.2.7 Statement by Calthinus
- 4.2.2.8 Statement by Levivich
- 4.2.2.9 Statement by TracyMcClark
- 4.2.2.10 Statement by ZScarpia
- 4.2.2.11 Statement by Nishidani
- 4.2.3 Result concerning Icewhiz
- 4.3 Arbitration enforcement action appeal by David Tornheim
- 4.3.1 Statement by David Tornheim
- 4.3.2 Statement by Seraphimblade
- 4.3.3 Statement by Kingofaces43
- 4.3.4 Statement by Aircorn
- 4.3.5 Statement by Hijiri88
- 4.3.6 Statement by Atsme
- 4.3.7 Statement by Tryptofish
- 4.3.8 Statement by (editor)
- 4.3.9 Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by David Tornheim
- 4.3.10 Result of the appeal by David Tornheim
- 4.4 BullRangifer
- 4.4.1 Request concerning BullRangifer
- 4.4.2 Discussion concerning BullRangifer
- 4.4.2.1 Statement by BullRangifer
- 4.4.2.2 Statement by Volunteer Marek
- 4.4.2.3 Statement by Aquillion
- 4.4.2.4 Statement by Phmoreno
- 4.4.2.5 Statement by Geogene
- 4.4.2.6 Statement by MrX
- 4.4.2.7 Statement by Masem
- 4.4.2.8 Statement by My very best wishes
- 4.4.2.9 Statement by Atsme
- 4.4.2.10 Statement by (username)
- 4.4.3 Result concerning BullRangifer
- 4.5 Galathadael
- 4.6 Philip Cross
Requests for arbitration
Requests for clarification and amendment
Clarification request: Gun control
Initiated by GoldenRing at 15:38, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
- GoldenRing (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)
- Dlthewave (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
- Bishonen (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
- Notification of Dlthewave
- Notification of Bishonen
Statement by GoldenRing (Gun Control)
In the course of a request at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard, I deleted User:Dlthewave/Whitewashing of firearms articles as an arbitration enforcement action. My reason for doing so is that WP:UP states that "Users should generally not maintain in public view negative information related to others without very good reason. Negative evidence, laundry lists of wrongs, perceived flaws, collations of diffs and criticisms related to problems, etc., should be removed, blanked, or kept privately (i.e., not on the wiki) if they will not be imminently used, and the same once no longer needed. The compilation of factual evidence (diffs) in user subpages, for purposes such as preparing for a dispute resolution process, is permitted provided it will be used in a timely manner.
In my view, this page is obviously the sort of "collation of diffs and criticisms related to problems" that the policy forbids. Dlthewave has repeatedly stated (eg diff) that the purpose of the page is as background to an opinion piece in The Signpost; since I have repeatedly asked and they have given no other explanation, I have taken this as an admission that the material is not intended for dispute resolution. My justification for doing the deletion as an arbitration enforcement action is the "other reasonable measures that the enforcing administrator believes are necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project
" provision of WP:AC/DS#sanctions.user. I'm aware that deletion is unusual as an enforcement action, but didn't expect it to be as controversial as it has proved.
Dlthewave appealed this at AE and in the course of the appeal, Bishonen advised them to start a request at WP:DRV, which they did. Bishonen undeleted the page so that those participating in the DRV request could see the content. I have objected to the undeletion as a unilateral overturning of an enforcement action but Bishonen has declined to self-revert this. I have no interest in wheel-warring over it.
A number of editors at DRV have objected to the deletion, for two main reasons: Firstly, that the content doesn't violate policy, and secondly that deletion is not a valid enforcement action (ie is not authorised under discretionary sanctions). Additionally, I and a couple of other editors have pointed out that DRV can't review enforcement actions, but a number of editors have objected this, too. These objections include some very experienced editors who I respect and I'm not so sure of myself as I was 24 hours ago. So I would like the committee please to answer these questions:
- Is deletion of a page an enforcement action that is authorised under discretionary sanctions?
- If the answer to 1 is "yes", was Bishonen's undeletion a violation of WP:AC/DS#sanctions.modify?
- If the answer to 1 is "yes", is DRV a valid venue to review deletions carried out under discretionary sanctions?
If the answer to 1 is "yes", while we're here, we may as well consider the substance as well: Was deleting this page in line with policy and a reasonable exercise of administrator discretion in an area subject to DS?
I would like to be very clear that I am asking these questions for clarification and am not looking for action against anyone; in particular, I am not requesting any action against Dlthewave for starting the DRV (they were, after all, advised to do so) nor against Bishoen for giving that advice or for undeleting the page (Bishonen is an admin I hold in high regard and while we disagree on this point of DS procedures, any action against her would be a great loss to the project; I would much rather concede the point and let the undeletion stand than see action here).
- @SilkTork: I don't know how much clearer I can make my rationale, but I will try: The policy says, "Negative evidence, laundry lists of wrongs, perceived flaws, collations of diffs and criticisms related to problems, etc., should be removed." The deleted page is a long list of quotes of edits made by other editors which Dlthewave himself thinks is "important to highlight the long-term pattern" of which their AE complaint is "a continuation" (diff). This is plainly a collection of negative evidence, and the attempt to lawyer around the language by not giving diffs by quoting the content of the diff and giving a link to where it can be found is, in my view, entirely specious. Dlthewave themselves said in the diff I have just quoted, "It is understandable that this may be viewed as polemical, howeveri feel that it is important to highlight the long-term pattern" - or, in about as many words, they know it violates policy but think their cause is more important. GoldenRing (talk) 22:59, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: I see what you're getting at. As far as I know, this page was not the subject of any substantive discussion prior to the deletion. Dlthewave brought an action at AE and another editor pointed out this page; I asked Dlthewave to explain how it was not a violation of POLEMIC (diff). Two and a half days later I had received no response (diff), despite Dlthewave having edited the AE complaint in that time (diff), so I went ahead and deleted it. I do not claim any of the speedy deletion criteria as justification for the deletion, but rather the authorisation of discretionary sanctions.
- Regarding your question about blanking v deletion, I took the word "remove" in WP:UP to include deletion and it is routinely interpreted this way at MfD, where POLEMIC is generally accepted as grounds for deletion, not blanking. Although there is some controversy about where the line between keep and delete outcomes is, no-one argues that POLEMIC is not grounds for deletion. Pages with similar content are deleted at MfD, see eg 1 2 3, especially the last one which likewise claims to document whitewashing of an article; there are many others in the archives of MfD.
- My reasoning for doing this as an arbitration enforcement action rather than through community processes was (and is) that maintaining such a page is not conducive to collaborative editing in the topic of gun control; that gun control is an area where discretionary sanctions have been authorised; and that administrators are expected to use DS "to create an acceptable collaborative editing environment for even our most contentious articles" (WP:AC/DS#admin.expect). If administrators working AE are suddenly expected to use community processes to resolve disputes, then what was the point of authorising DS?
- To answer a couple of procedural queries I missed in my last reply, Dlthewave met the awareness requirements at the time of the enforcement action because they had started a request at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard (the deletion happened in the context of this request) and I don't see how an editnotice is relevant to this particular action as it doesn't involve a page-level editing restriction. GoldenRing (talk) 10:18, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: I am seriously considering other ways out of this and have been for some time. Nonetheless, I think the committee needs to clarify whether deletion is a valid enforcement action; it is clear (most particularly from the comments at DRV and also those here) that a significant portion of the community think it is not, while I can't see how deletion is different to any other administrative action done under DS and authorised by the "other reasonable measures" provision of DS. In the meantime, I am a little unsure what you mean when you say, "such a deletion should meet with policy." There are a great many administrative actions taken routinely that are not authorised by policy but are authorised by discretionary sanctions: administrators cannot normally place topic bans, interaction bans, 1RR restrictions on users or pages, consensus-required restrictions, civility restrictions or BRD restrictions and yet these have all been applied unilaterally by administrators since the beginning of this year. Ordinarily, any of these would require a community consensus process (eg a discussion at AN for a topic ban) but are valid as unilateral actions because they are authorised by discretionary sanctions. How is deletion any different? Ordinarily it requires a community consensus process at XfD (ignoring for the moment speedy deletion criteria) but here it is a valid unilateral action because discretionary sanctions are authorised. And, in the end, what is more serious? Deleting a user page? Or banning a user? If you trust admins with the latter, you should trust them with the former. GoldenRing (talk) 16:22, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: I appreciate your point about arbcom needing the consent of the community to function and to be a positive force in the community. At the same time (and I know this is itself somewhat controversial in the community) my understanding is that all of the powers granted to administrators in discretionary sanctions are available because the community has ratified the arbitration policy which makes arbcom the final, binding decision-maker in disputes, not because of explicit policy changes. As GMG points out, the usual forms of DS are subject to a "boiling frog" effect; and this action is likely to be controversial not because it is invalid but because it is unusual. Posting it at DRV has involved a lot of users who are not accustomed to dealing with DS.If I had deleted a featured article on the main page without a very good reason, I would expect the action to be overturned at AN sharpish. That is the outlet the community has for controlling unilateral enforcement action with consensus.The committee still need to decide whether "other reasonable measures" means what it plainly says or rather "other reasonable measures except deletion," which some here are advocating. The committee still need to decide whether "All enforcement actions are presumed valid and proper, so the provisions relating to modifying or overturning sanctions apply, until an appeal is successful" means what it plainly says or rather "All enforcement actions are presumed valid and proper unless another admin unilaterally decides the action was obviously outside the scope of DS," which some here are advocating. GoldenRing (talk) 11:45, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
- @BU Rob13: That is a good point and I will strike my fourth question. GoldenRing (talk) 17:07, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- @RexxS: I would like to correct a few things you have said:
- It is absolutely prohibited to unilaterally modify arbitration enforcement actions; seee WP:AC/DS#sanctions.modify. BLP and COPYVIO are not the only absolute prohibitions.
- All enforcement actions have what you describe as "the usual immunity to reversion", whether they are valid or not because all enforcement actions are presumed valid and proper until an appeal in one of AE, AN or ARCA succeeds; see point 4 of WP:AC/DS#appeals.notes.
- We do not prohibit collections of negative information about other editors "for reasons of BLP" (if that were so, they would never be allowed) but because it's not a civil, collegial thing to do, though sometimes necessary for use in legitimate dispute resolution processes.
- And lastly, the elephant in the room: no careful reading is necessary, the whole page consists almost entirely of quotes of other editors statements at talk page. By what sophistry is this material not related to the editors who made those statements??? GoldenRing (talk) 23:24, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @RexxS: I hope no admins follow your interpretation of policy; it is a recipe for desysopping. The simple reality is that the community has accepted the arbitration committee as the final, binding decision-maker in conduct disputes and, short of changing the arbitration policy, the community cannot override its decisions. Some of its decisions are to authorise discretionary sanctions; to make administrator actions under DS appealable only to AE, AN and ARCA; and to give such actions a presumption of validity until they are overturned in a proper appeal. If you doubt this, you might find the level 2 desysop of Yngvadottir for a single instance of overturning a controversial AE action instructive (in fact an AE action which was only confirmed by the committee in a 6-5 vote). GoldenRing (talk) 11:36, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- @BU Rob13: I struggle to articulate what such a motion would even mean in practice. Essentially, I guess it means admins can delete pages as an enforcement measure so long as the page meets one of the criteria for speedy deletion or a consensus to delete exists at the relevant XfD venue. The only difference making deletion available under DS would make is that review would be reserved to AE, AN and ARCA rather than the usual deletion review process - yet PMC has argued for option B with review carried out at DRV! If "deletion done under DS" is going to be "deletion in line with deletion policy and reviewed at DRV" then it's indistinguishable from ordinary deletion and there's no point including it in DS - just propose a motion to exclude it.I do still feel strongly is that the existing DS wording allows deletion as it allows any other measure, and reserves review of such deletions to the arbitration appeal venues. The only argument I can see being made to the contrary is AGK's, which essentially says that a sanction placed on a page reading "This page is subject to 1RR" is not a sanction placed on a page. I don't understand it. Unless someone can propose another construction of the DS wording that excludes deletion, the now-closed DRV was out of process.Whether deletion should be allowed under DS is another question and not one I feel strongly about either way. As an enforcing administrator, I would probably prefer that the committee exclude deletion altogether from DS than to add further complexity to the scope and review processes for DS. GoldenRing (talk) 11:54, 12 March 2019 (UTC)
- @Opabinia regalis: To some extent I agree with you, and had I known what the outcome would be, I would have sent this to MfD. I saw AE deletion as a way to do this without drama, and clearly that was a mis-judgement; however, I would contend that much of the drama was not because of the AE action itself, but because it was sent to DRV out-of-process. And leaving the answer to the question "is deletion a valid AE action?" as "maybe" is not useful to AE admins who would like to know what the scope of sanctions possible under DS is. GoldenRing (talk) 10:22, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- @BU Rob13: Are you sure that only deletions outside mainspace should be valid AE actions? What about actions that are also valid under one of the CSD, but which is marked as an AE action? I can easily think of cases in American politics, for instance, or indeed gun control, that should be deleted under CSD but which an admin might want to mark as an AE action to avoid a highly dramatised DRV. I do struggle to think of a valid mainspace deletion outside of the CSD, but I don't want to say it couldn't happen. GoldenRing (talk) 10:21, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- @BU Rob13: I take your point about the optics of using DS to avoid scrutiny, but you also need to bear in mind that DS are authorised in areas where community processes have already broken down and are already ineffective, usually because there are large groups of otherwise-productive editors on either side of the dispute. Picking up your AP2 example, I think the likely outcome at MfD for such a page would be deletion. But I would choose to delete as an AE action every time because I know that if I send it to MfD, a crowd of fringe-supporters will emerge from the woodwork to argue against deletion; the same crowd will turn up at the inevitable DRV; and they will kick off at least three complaints at ANI in the course of proceedings and likely another two afterwards trying to contest the outcome. DS are indeed supposed to circumvent these highly-controversial community processes in highly-controversial topics. GoldenRing (talk) 11:37, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- @Premeditated Chaos: So why don't all TBAN requests go via AN? Why do we allow AE to circumvent the usual community process of placing bans? GoldenRing (talk) 13:38, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: A some at WT:DRV have noted, your proposal leaves it unclear whether a deletion within existing deletion policy can be marked as an AE action to make it only reviewable at arbitration venues. GoldenRing (talk) 10:45, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Dlthewave
I've abstained from comment here because I don't feel that I have any strong insight or opinion regarding the intricacies of Arbcom procedures, and I'm not going to push for an outcome that affects the entire community just so that I can keep my userpage. However, I feel that the Committee would be remiss if they did not answer the first of Goldenring's questions, "Is deletion of a page an enforcement action that is authorised under discretionary sanctions?"
–dlthewave ☎ 18:46, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Bishonen
@SilkTork: You have perhaps forgotten part of the process, then. Unless pages at DRV are temporarily undeleted, only admins will be able to read them, i. e. only admins will be able to discuss them in a meaningful way. It's not supposed to work like that. I followed these instructions for how to do it. Bishonen | talk 18:27, 25 February 2019 (UTC).
Statement by Simonm223
Is deletion of a page an enforcement action that is authorised under discretionary sanctions? Based on the argument by Ivanvector at DRV I would say no. It is not. Furthermore I think the argument that it constituted WP:POLEMIC in the first place is flawed. Simonm223 (talk) 16:21, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Ivanvector
This response is directed to GoldenRing's bullet point #1 only, as the subsequent bullets assume a view with which I disagree.
As I stated at DRV, my view is that page deletion is not authorized by discretionary sanctions, certainly not explicitly, and neither in spirit. While the standard provisions authorize administrators to act in arbitration enforcement through the use of editing sanctions and page restrictions, and we grant significant latitude to administrators to create restrictions within the bounds of these categories and to block users who violate those restrictions in the name of arbitration enforcement, these powers do not extend to editorial and/or political control, nor wholesale removal of content. Furthermore, nothing in the gun control case appears to specifically enact these powers. And generally, it is common practice that the Arbitration Committee does not weigh in on matters of encyclopedia or userspace content, and as such it is an improper assumption that the Committee would wish to empower admins with unilateral deletion powers. But noting the disagreement at DRV, I would also like this to be explicitly clarified.
As for Bishonen's action and DRV itself in this incident: if Arbcom has explicitly declared that deleting a page is a sanction available for arbitration enforcement, then I would agree that AE would be the correct venue to review an Arbitration-enforcement deletion. However, the community's venue for deletions out-of-process is DRV, thus DRV is a logical venue for this incident. It is standard and widely-accepted practice to undelete content while its deletion is under review, and Bishonen's restoration ought to be viewed in that light unless and until someone can point to already-established Arbitration procedure in which the Committee has explicitly authorized userpage deletion as a discretionary sanction, and if and only if that process is already established, then owing to the present disagreement Bishonen should be given an acting in good faith pass on this one, or a "to satisfy the pedants" admonishment at the most severe.
Stating for the record that I believe that everyone carrying a mop has acted in good faith with respect to this incident. I also hold both GoldenRing and Bishonen in very high regard, and I appreciate GoldenRing seeking clarification on this point. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 16:35, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- I would think that the situation described by Black Kite, in which an editor subject to an AE restriction creates a page in violation of that restriction, would be dealt with under WP:G5, and as a result the deletion itself would not be AE enforcement and the venue to review deletion would remain DRV. But maybe we are over-generalizing. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 17:35, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- Again, as others have tried to point out but are apparently falling on deaf Committee members' ears, the policy which directs the deletion of English Wikipedia content is the deletion policy; to the best of my knowledge it is the only policy which does now or has ever had community consensus for deletion of an entire page (as opposed to revision deletion, suppression/oversight, or other actions which maintain a visible history). Observant editors will note that deletions directed by the Arbitration Committee are not mentioned in that document.
- Quoting from the deletion policy's companion guideline, Wikipedia:Deletion process: "The speedy deletion process applies to pages which meet at least one of the criteria for speedy deletion, which specify the only cases in which administrators have broad consensus support to, at their discretion, bypass deletion discussion and immediately delete Wikipedia pages or media." (bold in original, underline added) It's been said by several others here and elsewhere already: arbitration enforcement is not one of the criteria for speedy deletion. The deletion process document also specifies in no uncertain terms that deletions may only be performed outside the scope of the policy when ordered by the Wikimedia Foundation.
- Now quoting from the arbitration policy, which under the heading "policy and precedent", reads: "The arbitration process is not a vehicle for creating new policy by fiat. The Committee's decisions may interpret existing policy and guidelines, recognise and call attention to standards of user conduct, or create procedures through which policy and guidelines may be enforced. The Committee does not rule on content, but may propose means by which community resolution of a content dispute can be facilitated." (emphasis added)
- The Committee members now arguing that content deletion is in fact within the scope of arbitration enforcement are engaging in modifying the deletion policy by fiat. While GoldenRing and the members of the Committee may have very good reasons for wanting to allow content deletion as an arbitration power, the deletion policy does not currently permit this and the arbitration policy explicitly forbids it. If the Committee wishes to reserve these powers for itself, a community discussion is required to modify both policies. Unless and until those discussions happen, the Arbitration Committee is not authorized to delete pages, and likewise has no power to authorize administrators to unilaterally delete pages in the name of Arbitration enforcement.
- Following on that argument, GoldenRing's deletion must be considered to have been performed under the auspices of speedy deletion, since arbitration enforcement cannot authorize that action, and there was no discussion. It is very clearly stated in the community's policies that the venue to dispute a deletion, speedy or otherwise, is WP:DRV. The Committee insisting that this deletion can only be appealed to the Committee is, again, modifying policy by fiat. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 18:16, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- @Premeditated Chaos: you're inventing policy again with your latest comment. As it stands, deletion under discretionary sanctions is forbidden because it is not expressly permitted, not the other way around, because the deletion policy (the only policy directing deletions) sets out when deletion is allowed, and expressly forbids all other deletions.
- @All the arbitrators: your straw poll is invalid. If you want to modify the community's deletion policy to permit deletions as arbitration enforcement, then do the work to modify that policy. That means putting it to the community in an RfC, not pretending that you can decide that that's how things are without any community input. The way this discussion is going is an alarming endorsement of admins doing any damn thing they please under a veil of arbitration enforcement, and of the Committee retroactively altering its own procedures to suit any such action. In this case, the Committee retroactively endorsed an out-of-process deletion, retroactively forbade discussion of the out-of-process deletion in the usual community forum for discussing improper deletions, retroactively endorsed (by omission) threatening with desysopping the administrator who restored the deleted page per the normal community expectation for discussing deletion challenges, and is attempting to retroactively modify the scope of standard discretionary sanctions to justify the entire affair. This entire discussion is an embarassment. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:57, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
- Just noting that the deletion review was closed five days ago now as "clear consensus is that this deletion should be overturned per the deletion policy", but the page remains blanked with the DRV notice. Presumably this discussion has had a chilling effect by which administrators are not carrying out the community's desired action out of fear of Arbcom reprisal, and for that matter, this is not only not an issue that the community cannot resolve, but it has already been resolved, other than this thread sitting open blocking anyone from doing anything. This request is close to entering its third week; to quote The Colonel, "get on with it!" Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 17:20, 14 March 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: the distinction between "to delete pages" and "to delete pages outside of the deletion policy" is moot, as deletions outside of the deletion policy are already not permitted; any deletion that is carried out with a rationale of arbitration enforcement is inherently outside of the deletion policy. None of this is putting an "AE admin" at a disadvantage over a non-"AE admin", (and when did we invent that distinction?) it simply means that if they wish to delete a page, they can do so under one of the methods and criteria already approved by the community, which is already a very broad scope. For example, in the situation you described, a page created in violation of an Arbcom restriction can be deleted under the community's criterion WP:CSD#G5. There's no need for an Arbcom back door here. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 13:56, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Doug Weller
I agree with Ivanvector. Such a deletion is not within the scope of discretionary sanctions. Perhaps an Arbitrator with a longer memory than I have may find such a procedure but I'd be surprised. Certainly it was not authorised by us during the four years I was on the committee. I think everyone has acted in good faith with this but I believe that GoldenRing was wrong and that the page should not have been deleted. I've looked at the page and agree with those who say that the content does not violate policy. I'll also note that no editors have been named although obviously they can be identified via the links. I'll add that even if it hasn't been used it is information that has the potential to be useful. Doug Weller talk 17:10, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Black Kite
I can think of situations whereby deletion would be in the purview of an AE action (for example, if a topic-banned editor was violating their TBan on a userspace page) but I agree with the two editors above that I can't see that this falls into this category. It is probably something that ArbCom could do with clarifying for future reference. Black Kite (talk) 17:28, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: It is SOP to undelete pages whilst they are at DRV so that non-admins can assess whether the close was correct - for example, whether a CSD deletion actually met the CSD criteria, or in the case of AfD whether the discussion comments were actually valid. In this case, with no AFD or standard CSD, then assuming the DRV is valid the page would have to be visible as otherwise no non-admins could make any judgement about the deletion. Black Kite (talk) 18:24, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Levivich
If no harm would arise from having this page discussed at MfD, then it should be discussed at MfD, rather than deleted by any one person's unilateral action. Obviously both admin acted in good faith in a situation that is unclear and possibly unprecedented; any suggestion of sanctions would be over the top. Leviv ich 18:01, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by RexxS
If an administrator erroneously deletes a page as an Arbitration Enforcement, when the page is not eligible for deletion under that criterion, they cannot claim the usual immunity to reversion of the action that we reserve for justified AE actions. From GoldenRing's own statement, the relevant criterion upon which they are relying is:
Users should generally not maintain in public view negative information related to others without very good reason. Negative evidence, laundry lists of wrongs, perceived flaws, collations of diffs and criticisms related to problems, etc., should be removed, blanked, or kept privately ... (my emphasis)
But nobody reading Special:Permalink/881981663 carefully would conclude that information on that page is "related to others
". All of the information therein is related to articles, and there is no Arbitration Enforcement available to prevent editors from gathering quotes or diffs from articles or from article talk. We prevent users from gathering negative information about others, for reasons of BLP, but that is not licence to extend the prevention to collating article text. 'Shonen's restoration of the deleted page to allow scrutiny does not breach WP:BLP or WP:COPYVIO (the only absolute prohibitions on restoration), and meets the test of COMMONSENSE.--RexxS (talk) 19:28, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- Response to GoldenRing. Contrary to what you think, BLP and COPVIO are the only absolute prohibitions to undeletion of content for obvious reason, see Wikipedia:Deletion review #Temporary undeletion where this is documented. Any other prohibition is subject to IAR and 'sanctions.modify' is no exception. It is merely a procedure of the Arbitration Committee and has no status greater than WP:policies and guidelines (which actually don't even recognise 'procedure of the Arbitration Committee' as policy or guideline). ArbCom must not confer on itself greater powers than the community is pleased to grant. It is free to create its own procedures, but does not have authority to create policy: that is the prerogative of the community. In the case of a conflict between a guideline like Wikipedia:Deletion process and an ArbCom procedure, then I suggest common sense needs to be the tie-breaker. The damage done to the encyclopedia by denying undeletion of a page when requested at DRV need to be balanced against the damage done to the encyclopedia by a temporary undeletion. In this case, the balance is obviously in favour of allowing undeletion.
"All enforcement actions have what you describe as "the usual immunity to reversion", whether they are valid or not."
I refute that. To misquote Jimbo, the presumption of validity is not a suicide pact. If a claimed AE action is obviously invalid , as yours was, then a reversion of that action in order to comply with a conflicting policy or guideline is perfectly reasonable. Even you recognise that 'Shonen's actions were reasonable.- I concede your point that BLP concerns are not the only reasons to disallow collections of negative information about other users; although that would be the rationale behind collections of negative information about living persons who were not editors.
- I completely deny your last point. All content in the encyclopedia is provided by editors: that is undeniably not what was intended by
Users should generally not maintain in public view negative information related to others
, otherwise no quotes would ever be allowed. The sophistry is in trying to stretch those words to justify deleting a page that quotes hundreds of different editors, and cannot sensibly be construed to contain negative information about those editors. Any such connotation is purely in the mind of the observer, and you've made the mistake of construing talk page comments critical of an article or of statements in that article as "negative information" about the editors who made the comments. - The elephant in the room is actually your error in attempting to convert a possibly justifiable deletion of a page (by normal process) into an AE action. AE actions were granted the privilege of immunity from reversion for a particular reason (the problems of second-mover advantage), in order to solve intractable problems of civility enforcement. Admins must be careful not to abuse that privilege by claiming AE action in borderline or invalid cases, otherwise the community may lose faith in the necessity for having such an exemption to normal admin procedures (WP:WHEEL). --RexxS (talk) 00:18, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by S Marshall
- I think this matter raises novel issues about procedure. Wikipedian culture takes deleting pages very seriously, and deleting a page out of someone's userspace feels quite violative to me. I was appalled to learn that a page that purports to describe the rules says that AE deletions can be reviewed at the AN but not at DRV. I feel that in the (probably relatively rare) situation where it's appropriate to review an AE deletion without direct scrutiny from Arbcom, then the most correct venue would be DRV. But I also feel that deleting a page as an AE action is the kind of thing that Arbcom should normally supervise directly, because an AE action should normally be about an editor's behaviour rather than a matter of content. Therefore the scrutiny should normally happen here.—S Marshall T/C 21:01, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: --- The deleter's position is that this could not be justified as an in-process speedy deletion and was done purely as AE (diff). I also don't fully agree with my friends RoySmith, Hobit, SmokeyJoe et. al. when they say DRV is mainly about content. I feel that what DRV is mainly about is the analysis and critique of sysop judgement calls and use of discretion. Interestingly, in the decade or so since I became heavily involved in DRV, we've never reached a consensus to ask Arbcom to desysop anyone -- which is why there's never really been any overlap between the two venues. We've found wrong calls, because sysops are only human, but we've never found serious misuse of the mop.—S Marshall T/C 12:17, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- Arbitrators, you're in the process of reaching a bad decision here, and it's worrying that you're reaching it with such glacial slowness. I think you're already overworked and you don't have the attention to spare on reviewing AE decisions in a timely way. Nobody has ever produced an example of a deletion that should properly be reviewed at AE; and we already have a prompt, effective, low-drama and trouble-free way of reviewing deletions at DRV; so it would be appropriate for you to make a decision explicitly pointing all deletions to DRV. You can do so with every confidence that DRV will call on you if you're needed.—S Marshall T/C 18:14, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by User:SmokeyJoe
- This clarification is not about Gun control, but is about whether, in general, page deletion is a reasonable measure of arbitration enforcement
- Page deletion is not a reasonable measure of arbitration enforcement. Certainly not if the page is not directly subject to an ArbCom ruling. Exceptions would be considered extraordinary.
- If page deletions were subject to AE admin arbitrary unilateral deletion, this would amount to a secret punishment. The user involved can't read the page deleted. The wider community can't read what was deleted.
- What is going on here is a turf war over the powers and scope of ArbCom. Not by ArbCom directly, but by their delegates, which is worse.
- ArbCom is supposed to stay out of content decisions. Deleting a page containing content is most definitely a content action. This page in question, while not content per se, is a page directed at content decisions. That's pretty close to content.
- This issue is the same as the deletion of Universa Blockchain Protocol, discussed at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2018 July 9. That one was overtly a content page issue. I think this is resolved with agreement that deletions like this should additionally cite WP:CSD#G11, which was agreed in hindsight to have applied.
- WP:Deletion policy is written in clear cut language. WP:CSD is even clearer: "The criteria for speedy deletion (CSD) specify the only cases in which administrators have broad consensus to bypass deletion discussion, at their discretion, and immediately delete Wikipedia pages or media. They cover only the cases specified in the rules here." If ArbCom AE admins also have deletion discretion, add it to CSD, for the record, and to ensure that the community is on the page. ArbCom should not be responsible for undermining the validity or respect afforded to WP:Deletion policy.
- WP:DRV is a long standing very successful forum and process. It is not an enforcement process, but a continuing education exercise. A measure of its success is that lack of repeat culprits being dragged through it. DRV is the highest court for content decisions. There is no cause for carving out deletions that are not reviewable by DRV. {{Temporarily undeleted}} is an essential part of DRV if you consider nonadmins to important in the management of the project. There is already a sufficiently conservative culture at DRV for being responsible with copyright, attacks, and BLP issues.
- --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:03, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- AE action to blank the page, protect the page, and block every user associated with the page, would not have been offensive to WP:Deletion policy. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:33, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- "Such deletions do not need to meet our deletion policy". AE deletions do not need to meet policy? Policy does not need to read at face value? What is the policy on AE deletions? ArbCom has broad monarchical reserve powers, but to use them to authorize delegated policy-exempt CSD? That's a characteristic of a police state. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:56, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
- Agree with Cryptic and RoySmith that policy clarity would be a good thing. Documentation at WP:CSD#G9 pointing to WP:AC/DS would be a good thing. It would mean that Twinkle could easily link to it. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:00, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
- In Wikipedia:Arbitration_enforcement_log, there are three instances of deletion:
- (1) User:Dlthewave/Whitewashing of firearms articles deleted for violating POLEMIC. GoldenRing (talk) 12:28, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
- (2) Sergio Urias deleted for reasons explained here. T. Canens (talk) 04:23, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
- (3) OYCH1961 (talk · contribs) blocked one month for disruptive editing, as described at this link. He recreated a POV-fork draft of the Senkaku Islands article that had just been deleted at WP:MFD. Editor was previously notified by Qwyrxian. EdJohnston (talk) 04:29, 31 August 2012 (UTC)
- (1) explicitly reviewed here. (2) and (3) explained within deletion policy.
- A bigger concern are the DSGS deletions that ArbCom seems to have delegate and does not supervise or review.
- Wikipedia:General_sanctions/Blockchain_and_cryptocurrencies#Log_of_notifications includes 15 mainspace deletions.
- Wikipedia:General sanctions/Syrian Civil War and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant lists others, including Chemical weapon conjecture in the aftermath of the 2017 Shayrat missile strike, by User:NeilN and User:BU Rob13
- With User:BU Rob13 here having personal involvement of the overreach of ArbCom in overriding deletion policy, I think he should recuse himself. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:26, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:26, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- User:BU Rob13, I accept that that deletion was part of a history merge, not a real deletion. However, there may be some problem that your log summary giving implied approval to the previous DS deletion, of a mainspace page. Have you personally ever done a DS deletion not within Deletion Policy or CSD? Have you ever explicitly encouraged or approved of another to do DS deletion not within Deletion policy or CSD? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:21, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment#Motion: Amendment to the standard provision for appeals and modifications is an outrageous overreach, I can only guess unintentionally. It would mean that a claim of arbitration enforcements prevents the matter being even discussed, until the glacial ArbCom mandated processes are exhausted. Where is the evidence that ArbCom or its appeal procedures are superior to the project-old DRV process, when it comes to shining light on abuses involving deletion? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 04:59, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- “before being ... discussed at another venue”
- Arbs creating a motion creating a gag order on *discussing* a problem with ArbCom overreach in a process created by arbs? —SmokeyJoe (talk) 21:52, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Arbs are continuing to think it "looks good", to fail to confirm that deletion is NOT a valid AE action, and then to draw even more power to themselves, the power to gag mere discussion, of ArbCom's AE enforcement overreach in cutting across deletion policy. This is not ArbCom merely writing policy, it is ArbCom breaking firmly entrench policy. I guess we are going to need that RfC at WT:DRV to rebuke this motion.
All queries or appeals regarding arbitration enforcement, including those
feltalleged to be out of process or againstexistingpolicy, must first follow arbitration enforcement procedures to establish if such enforcement is inappropriate before being reversedor discussedat another venue.
- * This isn't about feelings.
- * There is no need to address nonexisting policy.
- * At the DRV, the alleged against policy deletion has been thoroughly discussed by the community. Has anything been wrong with that. The DRV closer is waiting for the ArbCom procedure (here) before reversing. That is consistent with your motion.
- * Gagging project-relevant discussion anywhere, whether User_talk, or a formal DRV discussion, is not acceptable.
- * There is an interesting pretense that the temp-undelete is not really a reversal. I think that should be considered acceptable. Temp-undeleted blanked pages are not allowed to be edited or copied. Denial of longstanding temp-undeletion practice will me DRV goes back to the practice of referring to off-site cache copies, which is not desirable.
- * The venue of reversal is unimportant redundant wordiness and is not concise.
- --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:34, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Hobit
The basis for deletion comes from WP:UP. That same page says "In general other users' user pages are managed by that user. Except for blatant or serious matters, it is preferable to try contacting the user before deletion (see above). However, unambiguous copyright violations, attack pages, promotional text, and privacy or BLP violations can be speedy deleted using a suitable template, such as {{db-attack}}, {{db-copyvio}} or {{db-spamuser}}; other pages likely to require deletion (or where remedial action is not taken) may be submitted to deletion discussion.
Justifying a deletion by citing policy and then not following the policy for how to go about deletion seems problematic at best.
The reason for deletion is not a speedy criteria. And standard DS do not allow for deletion of a page as near as I can tell. I only see one other deletion in WP:AEL and that was justified on A7/BLP grounds. As S Marshall has indicated, AE enforcing admins very much deserve our support and I'm personally grateful to those that take on such a demanding and stressful job. But here there is overreach outside of the scope of either a single admin or AE. There was no rush and no reason WP:MfD couldn't have been used (where I suspect it would have been kept).
In any case, I agree with Roy (below)--this is about content not behavior. The discussion belongs at DRV. edited Hobit (talk) 04:45, 26 February 2019 (UTC) Hobit (talk) 01:55, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- A heavy reliance on WP:CONTENT (an essay with about 30 edits) to argue that ARBCOM has utter control of anything not in mainspace is quite the power grab. I'd urge members of the committee to be very very careful making the claim that ARBCOM can do whatever it wants outside of mainspace because it "isn't content". Hobit (talk) 14:43, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
- @BU Rob13: I am not making a claim about what is and isn't content. I am instead saying that claiming ARBCOM has complete jurisdiction over everything not in mainspace is a large power grab. Are you claiming ARBCOM has been empowered by the community to delete any content that isn't in mainspace? And you are using an essay to justify that? I'd rather go with something more clearly on-point "The arbitration process is not a vehicle for creating new policy by fiat. The Committee's decisions may interpret existing policy and guidelines, recognise and call attention to standards of user conduct, or create procedures through which policy and guidelines may be enforced." Taking deletion policy and moving it from the community to ARBCOM doesn't make sense in that context. The policy for how to deal with deletion is clear. And "The Committee does not rule on content, but may propose means by which community resolution of a content dispute can be facilitated." is making it clear that ARBCOM doesn't get involved in content. But that doesn't mean it has jurisdiction over everything that isn't content. Hobit (talk) 04:34, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- A heavy reliance on WP:CONTENT (an essay with about 30 edits) to argue that ARBCOM has utter control of anything not in mainspace is quite the power grab. I'd urge members of the committee to be very very careful making the claim that ARBCOM can do whatever it wants outside of mainspace because it "isn't content". Hobit (talk) 14:43, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by RoySmith
I don't often get involved in ArbCom business, so forgive me if I'm not up on the nuances of policy and procedure here. But, reading what User:SmokeyJoe said above: ArbCom is supposed to stay out of content decisions, I find myself very much in agreement. The converse is certainly true; DRV deals with content, and stays out of behavioral issues. It's common in DRV debates for somebody to write, We're only here to talk about the page deletion; if you want to pursue a user's conduct, there's other fora for that. This seems like a natural and useful division of responsibilities, and why it seems odd to be talking about ArbCom getting involved in reviewing a page deletion.
I don't think it was appropriate to delete the user page. I also think it was perfectly reasonable (and SOP at DRV) to temp-undelete the page for review. I also want to echo what others have said; while there's clearly a disagreement about what the proper course of action should have been, it's also clear that everybody has acted in good faith here. There should be no thought of sanctions for anybody. -- RoySmith (talk) 03:03, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- I've done a lot more reading of the full history of this. My earlier comments notwithstanding, I agree with User:SilkTork that having two parallel discussions in different forums is a bad idea. At this point, I suggest that DRV defer to ArbCom on this one. -- RoySmith (talk) 15:29, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- User:Cryptic is exactly right. If the end result of this is to confirm that AE can include speedy deletion, then WP:CSD needs to add a category for it. My big fear (as somebody who also does a lot of temp-undeleting at DRV) is that given the current discussion, I could very easily see myself having undeleted this and then finding that I'd accidentally run afoul of a policy I didn't really understand, and put my mop at risk. If this fell under WP:G9, or a new G-whatever specifically for AE, it would have been clear that this was out of bounds. Clarity is a good thing. -- RoySmith (talk) 02:48, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
I don't know if I have standing here, but can I request that this get resolved sometime soon? Surely, six weeks is long enough to make a decision. I, as an admin, are left not knowing if temp-undeleting a page at WP:DRV could lead to my being desysoped. What we've got now is arbcom saying, "We reserve the right to desysop you if you break the rules, but we won't tell you what the rules are". That's not useful. -- RoySmith (talk) 15:40, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Sandstein
While I disagree with GoldenRing on the merits of the deletion, I agree with their submission of 16:22, 26 February 2019 in that the Committee should clarify whether deletions (other than those already allowed by ordinary deletion policy) are in principle allowed as discretionary sanctions, and whether any review of deletions labeled as discretionary sanctions must take place by way of the procedures for the appeal of AE actions. In my reading of applicable policy, the answer to both questions is clearly yes, but the opinions to the contrary that have been voiced at DRV show that this question needs clarification. Sandstein 16:36, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Cryptic
I've performed I'd guess around a quarter of the temporary undeletions at DRV over the past few years. Contra what's been stated both above and below, it's neither an absolute right (even barring copyvio and blp - there's been a number of cases where no admin's been willing to tempundelete in the cases of egregious spam, for example; I can dig out some example DRVs if it'd be helpful) nor, in particular, automatic: in practice we almost always wait until an uninvolved user requests it. I don't recall ever seeing the author of a page requesting temp undeletion for the purposes of DRV before; even had this deletion not been labeled an AE action, I'd certainly have declined, though I might have offered to email it. —Cryptic 20:57, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
Dialing my wonk-o-meter up to 11, I'm not seeing anywhere in WP:Protection policy that authorizes arbcom to authorize admins to protect pages, either. (It does mention arbcom with respect to unprotections, and very indirectly for extended-confirmed protections.) So the idea that arbcom can't authorize deletions just because it's not explicitly stated in WP:Deletion policy or WP:Criteria for speedy deletion doesn't get a whole lot of sympathy from me. That said, if the committee ends up deciding this deletion was correct, I'll go through the hassle at WT:CSD to try to get this properly documented, probably as a variant of WP:G9. —Cryptic 22:07, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
@RoySmith: re Special:Diff/891855139: Agree that resolution would be nice. The rest is a nonissue: you should be looking at the content and logs of pages you restore anyway, even temporarily. If it contains blatant attacks or copyvios, or it's labeled as a copyvio or an "arbitration enforcement" variant ("AE" or "discretionary sanctions" or "DS" or "AC/DS"), you don't just restore it on your own initiative even if you think the labeling's incorrect, you consult with the deleting admin. If the deletion isn't labeled as arbitration enforcement, then it's not a valid enforcement action, per WP:AC/DS#sanctions.log. —Cryptic 16:13, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by GMG
If we're going to allow that ACDS is legitimate grounds for out-of-process deletion, then we're probably approaching the point where we've abandoned the pretense that ArbCom does not make policy. GMGtalk 01:18, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
- To be fair, I've been saying for a while now that ACDS is also wholesale rewriting of our blocking and banning policy, but I think most people have just gotten used to it. So I don't expect most people will take this comment seriously, and if they do, it's just because the water got a little hotter than they're accustomed to yet. But them's the breaks when you allow ArbCom to rewrite policy while claiming they don't write policy. GMGtalk 01:50, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by DGG
- I too frequently make undeletions for review at Del Rev. I approach it a little differently,so I would not suggest that either their approach or mine is authoritative, nor do I presume to say what other admins do. . I have never refused to undelete for DR, except for copyvio, or if the request is disruptive or unnecessary. I interpret the rule as not requiring it, as merely making the necessary provision to not do so as a special situation. (And if it would apparently help the discussion, I do not wait for a request-sometimes the person bringing it to DR does not know its possible--and the person bringing it often is the author of the content) Since Arb Com authority does not extend to content, neither does AE. Though community consensus cannot override AE, neither can AE override the basic principles of community editing. If I rewrote an article summary to conform to my idea of what the true meaning of an arb com decision required, I could not call it AE to prevent others from reverting my change. Just as I cannot rewrite under AE, I cannot remove it under AE. AE is dangerously inflexible even if used in the ordinary way--giving individual admins sticky discretion over content in such a direct way as to permit them to delete by AE, is not within a reasonable scope. AE is not a free pass to anarchy; because of the stickiness, it requires even more careful judgement than other admin actions. If anything, we need how to restrict the scope rather than add to it. If the scope of AE is to increase, it can only do so by a change in arbitration policy by the community. DGG ( talk ) 06:04, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
- I am quite confused by the reasoning in the arb section. The basic rule of arb policy is that arb com has no direct authority over content. (its jurisdiction with respect to conduct can and sometimes does affect content, which is inevitable because the two are related, & because many conduct disputes are derived from content disputes). Since arb com has no direct authority over content, no remedy it enacts can give anyone authority over content, and no DS it enacts can allow for authority over content. Therefore, any admin acting under AE may not do so in such a way as to directly edit content. Editing content includes redirecting, or deleting, or undeleting. Arb com cannot do such actions as arbs, or authorize them as AE. They do have jurisdiction over any admin pretending to do them as AE. DGG ( talk ) 01:39, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
- BU Rob13, In addition to the pages strictly speaking in content space, I really cannot see the rationale for giving arb com or AE any direct control of anything except their own pages. People employ user space for many purposes, most having to do with the preparation and discussion of content. What is on those pages is not any direct business of arbcom--or AE. They already have all the power they need by the ability to sanction editors. Unlike possible speculations for what harm might be caused that is out of reach of speedy/MfD/office, this discussion was started by a use of AE to do an action that may or may not have had consensus; there is no way in which removal of that page could be considered an emergency, so it could have been discussed in the usual way at MfD followed by DR. (or speedy followed by DR, if is was really abusive or advocacy) . If people have power, there is a temptation to use it. There are some pages in user space that I regard as harmful to the proper purpose of WP--some deal with AP or other areas where AE is available. If I nominated them under MfD, most would probably not be deleted, but if I deleted them as AE, most of them probably would not get the necessary clear consensus to restore. Most active admins I know probably have some pages in mind similarly. If there's precedent for using this power, it will be used again. Arbitrary unilateral power is dangerous; some is necessary, but we should only have what is actually necessary, not everything that might conceivably be necessary under circumstances we cannot presently specify. (Getting back to AP, there a current RW analogy). DGG ( talk ) 04:24, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Drmies
If the standard operating procedure of undeletion for DRV can be called a violation of an enforcement action authorised under discretionary sanctions, I think we've reached sort of an end point grammatically and in terms of Arb Power. Sorry, but I think this is silly and pushing the point of authoritay too far. Drmies (talk) 15:19, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Xymmax
I came upon this when I went to close the DRV. The committee's discussion thus far, in my opinion, has yet to fully grapple with the core concern that I see from those critical of permitting DS deletion, and one that I share: permitting out of process deletion under the authority of enforcement of DS is taking DS enforcement away from being a tool to enable administrators to deal with disruptive conduct, and instead making admins arbiters of disfavored content. The dichotomy is real, as several committee members appear to feel that under appropriate circumstances an administrator acting under DS enforcement authority could delete a page (or I suppose an article) and be subject to review only at ARCA. The tools ordinarily used - topic bans, blocks, and page protections - are designed to reduce disruption by modifying user conduct. Deletion, uniquely, hides the information from ordinary readers, and that is why the comprehensive deletion process governs when there is consensus that such removal is acceptable. The committee should recognize that just as the AN community has special expertise in dealing with user conduct issues, Afd/Mfd/DRV and their ilk are where editors have particular insight these content issues. It would be concerning if the community's expertise were to be deprecated in favor of an enforcement mechanism made for user conduct issues. My personal preference here would be to see the committee take deletion off the table of DS enforcement options. Functionally equivalent would be to say the deletion process must be followed - a speedy deletion criterion cited, with review at DRV. Less satisfactory would be to limit such reviews to ARCA. Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 04:52, 6 March 2019 (UTC)
- I have to confess that I'm finding this conversation to be a bit frustrating. It would be helpful to me if each of the committee members would address the core issue here: under what circumstances may the committee delete (or I suppose, order deleted) a page. I'm not talking about the individual members of the committee, all of whom are trusted oversighters and admins, and have enormous discretion to act under that authority, rather I mean the committee as a group. DS are simply delegated powers, and the committee can only delegate powers that it has. So I ask, when, committee members, are you empowered to order deletion? Xymmax So let it be written So let it be done 18:11, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Wnt
I happened to see mention of this discussion and am alarmed by the way it is going. Reading this user page, it is clearly a complaint about the bias of articles, which is to say, it is directly applicable to Wikipedia editing. It is not addressed at any editor (indeed, has timidly omitted usernames). It does, of course, favor a certain point of view, but editors should be allowed to favor a point of view they agree with when it is being excluded from articles. I say this even though I am pro-gun rights and suspect many of the individual edits were correct.
The consequence of (literally) arbitrarily excluding such content is to propagate the idea that Wikipedia is biased and to encourage editors to share information like this off-site. The consequence of that is that Wikipedia loses any ability to suppress deliberate cyberbullying, while the editors lured to partisan sanctuaries are more likely to fall under the influence of actual lobbyist money. In every way, the quality of discourse is degraded by deletions like this. And unless the arbitration decision specifically prohibited making any new pages about a topic, such deletions cannot possibly be valid arbitration enforcement. Wnt (talk) 20:47, 8 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Spartaz
I just closed the DRV as overturn as the clear consensus of the discussion. Once you have completed your august deliberations could someone let me know if I can enact the clear consensus of the discussion or whether super Mario has won. Incidentally my autocorrect hates arbcom it keeps changing it to random or wrecked. Spartaz Humbug! 19:03, 9 March 2019 (UTC)
- Can we have an update on this please or are you going to prove my autocorrect right? Spartaz Humbug! 06:40, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Fish and karate
The arbitration process exists to impose binding solutions to Wikipedia conduct disputes (i.e., not content disputes requiring mediation) that neither community discussion nor administrators have successfully resolved. The arbitration process is not a vehicle for creating new policy by fiat. The Committee's decisions may interpret existing policy and guidelines, recognise and call attention to standards of user conduct, or create procedures through which policy and guidelines may be enforced. The Committee does not rule on content, but may propose means by which community resolution of a content dispute can be facilitated. (My bolding). Fish+Karate 11:16, 12 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Alanscottwalker
In my view "removal" in Arb/DS policy is meant in the sense it is used at WP:TALK or WP:BLP, that is an action that removes an edit or comment, it is not meant in the sense it is used in deletion policy or oversight policy. As we see from this case, it is not prudent to have the expansive construction of "removal" in Arb/DS to include deletion and oversight, which both have extensive articulated process, separate and apart. -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 10:43, 14 March 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork:, @Joe Roe:, @RickinBaltimore:, and the rest of the arbs: Part of the sticking point is when you write "outside of the deletion policy" do you mean all of WP:Deletion policy? Deletion policy includes, "Deletion review" [1], and WP:UDP. So, it seems you are not making things much clearer and are setting up further confusion, of the kind we see on this page with Bishonen's un-deletion.
- Is the community sanctioned, "Deletion Review" the process of review for these, so rare, almost unheard of, discretionary deletions? In particular, the un-deletion aspects (WP:UDP) that make for an informed community decision? Alanscottwalker (talk) 17:15, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Deryck
Wherever we draw the boundaries of arbitration enforcement, there will be fringe cases where admins may disagree on whether AE applies. ArbCom needs to decide whether it retains (or wants to retain) exclusive jurisdiction over the policing of AE boundaries. Today we're talking about page deletion, next time we may talk about the applicability of AE over protection in certain circumstances or some other admin action.
If ArbCom decides it retains exclusive jurisdiction over the boundaries, which I disagree with, then it needs to be prepared that any action that is declared by any admin as an act of arbitration enforcement will automatically escalate to ArbCom if someone disagrees with it. This seems to go against ArbCom's mantra that lower venues of dispute resolution ought to be tried first if possible (as is DRV in this case) before escalating to ArbCom in general.
As for the case at hand, I agree with RexxS and Ivanvector here. We ought to be narrow and cautious in the interpretation of AE provisions. While the ArbCom is allowed to make an (clarifying) amendment that DS covers page deletion, I don't think "removal" in the current wording includes page deletion, because as many other have pointed out, page deletion redacts the contents of the page history from public view. Deryck C. 14:40, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- P.S. I would like to echo others in this discussion in their praise of GoldenRing and Bishonen for their collegiality throughout this debate, and of the fact that this was brought to ARCA as a debate on principles rather than specifics. Deryck C. 17:58, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Atsme
Maybe, just maybe my comment will help motivate a close. Countless hours are spent/wasted trying to decipher ambiguous PAGs. The obvious solution would be to clarify the ones that create the problems. As editors are so often advised, it is not about who is right or wrong, it's about the disruption, and admins & ArbCom need to apply this to their own actions. It appears ArbCom invests a measurable amount of time and energy looking for reasons to not take a case...thus, the creation of AE...which sometimes leads to more confusion under the guise of saving time and energy. What we're doing in essence is substituting input from several admins for discretionary action and passing it over to a single admin, and if they execute the action improperly, off with their heads. Fix the ambiguities. I can't see that either admin is at fault here; therefore, trying to afix blame is not resolving the problem. Atsme Talk 📧 14:28, 20 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by SMcCandlish
Option C in the survey below seems to be the only valid option. Because WP:AC/DS is simply delegation of ArbCom authority to admins, and ArbCom does not make content decisions, general decisions to delete content as such are outside the remit of AC/DS, absent some other deletion rationale. However, if admins are already empowered to delete something under other policy, then doing so, within those policy limits, and as part of AC/DS action would be legitimate. For example, AC/DS is most specifically about blocks and topic bans, but admins can do other things, like impose a "move-ban" on someone mis-using manual page moves, and require them to use RM process. I don't think anyone would argue that if someone were disruptively moving pages in an AC/DS topic area that DS could not involve a move ban, despite not being mentioned at the AC/DS page. The difference here is that the deleting admin is making what amounts to an WP:IDONTLIKEIT content decision about the material in the page (I have no opinion on the allegation that this was politically motivated). That's not a rationale for DS action, and not a rationale for deletion, so no combination of DS + DP/CSD results in "I can delete this because I feel like it". In this particular case, the motivation seems genuinely WP:POLEMIC-enforcement-motivated (though I don't think I agree with the assessment that the material necessarily qualified under POLEMIC). We cannot predict the future with certainty, but can make educated guesses. Since AC/DS is applied to controversial topics, and disruption correlates strongly with controversy, it seems virtually guaranteed that unrestrained deletion under AC/DS will result in suppression by admins of material they disagree with, by translating "is opposite my or the majority view in a dispute" into "is disruptive". Content by itself is not disruptive (outside some narrowly defined classes like vandalism with butthole pictures, or OUTING with personally identifiable information); editorial actions are.
On the follow-up questions: DRV is and should remain an obvious venue for review of any deletion. It's not "WP:Deletion review except for some people". WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY and WP:GAMING are important. We don't want a decision under which any admin who seeks to avoid DRV and general community scrutiny for questionable deletions can simply claim some vague AC/DS rationale and thereby close all avenues of appeal other than AE (which is a star chamber that leans toward presumption of guilt of anyone accused by an AE admin, and is generally hostile to editors who challenge an AE admin's decision), or ArbCom (which is even scarier to most editors, though actually fairer). In both processes, there is a strong bias in favor of the admin who acted, both in the minds of those reviewing the action and usually in the admin party's knowledge of the excessively legalistic procedures surrounding ArbCom and its AE board. ArbCom is not bound by precedent, so the fact that it has historically treated all AC/DS actions as appealable only to AE or ArbCom is irrelevant. Explicitly allowing deletion as a DS action is dangerous, and removing DRV as an examination venue would be a disenfranchisement of the community without any real discussion or notice. ArbCom deciding that its clan of AE "enforcers" how has deletion impunity and near-immunity (option B in the survey, or even option C with DRV excluded) would be a poor and controversial move. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 21:09, 20 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by EdChem
I think that the approach proposed by AGK – to make it clear that deletions are not possible as an AE action – is the best way forward. I recognise the concern that SilkTork raises, but the alternative proposal is not the way to address that, in my view. As I understand it, SilkTork wants it to be clear that an admin may make a deletion under their ordinary authority under the deletion policy while also addressing an AE situation. However, by adding the extra mention of the deletion policy implies that the use of ordinary authority in relation to deletions is an exception. It admits the interpretation that the existing practice of an indefinite block with only the first year as an AE action is not permitted.
I suggest that AGK's approach / addition be preferred, and a relevant addition to the DS procedures state that:
- nothing in the DS policy restricts an admin from acting under their ordinary authority as part of addressing an AE issue – this would make clear that a deletion under the CSD guidelines, for example, or extending a block from a 1 year under AE to indefinite beyond that under ordinary authority remain available.
- any and all admin actions that are not explicitly available under the DS policy as AE-protected actions that may be undertaken are limited by the ordinary discretion and authority available to admins and subject to the usual procedures with which those actions are associated.
- any action taken relating to an AE issue under ordinary authority is not protected by the DS appeals restrictions and are addressed under standard procedures relating to admin actions – this makes clear that DRV and REFUND remain as they are and that appeals from a block beyond the 12 months of AE protection can be actioned in the usual ways.
The advantage of this approach, in my view, is that it covers not simply this deletion issue but any and all questions that could arise where ordinary admin authority is used. It makes the treatment uniform and avoids any claim that the deletions are treated differently. The second point would also cover any other area that might be questioned in the future. I don't know how much of this is already covered in the DS policy, but I think it is worth codifying. I looked at the policy quickly but didn't see any clear statement that makes this clear, and I don't know exactly where it would be added or how it would be worded. EdChem (talk) 00:44, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
- @SilkTork: You said
I'm not comfortable with the notion that a AE admin should have less authority than a non AE admin, and so create a situation where someone creates a page in direct violation of an ArbCom sanction, yet an AE admin could only delete such a page outside of ArbCom protection, and so there is uncertainty (again) over where the matter should be discussed.
- Firstly, I don't think it's a good idea to suggest that there are "AE admins" and "non-AE admins." I think a wiser approach is to consider that there are admins and that they can take actions under their ordinary authority and/or actions taken under DS / AE authority. The former actions are subject to ordinary procedures, the latter have special procedures and protections.
- Under what I am suggesting, an action in violation of an ArbCom sanction is eligible for any (appropriate) response authorised under DS and attracts additional protections. Any other action is taken under ordinary authority and subject to ordinary protections. The difference lies in what action is taken (DS authorised or not) rather than in by whom it is taken (AE admin or not).
- There is no uncertainty about where things are discussed / appealed. Either the action is authorised in DS and entitled to additional protections, or it is an action under ordinary authority and subject to standard procedures.
- In the specific case, it would be clear that GoldenRing's action was not authorised by DS and so was an ordinary deletion action, reviewable at DRV at (correctly) reversed as unjustified under policy. This is not to suggest that GR should face a sanction, though a general reminder that DS authorises specific actions and not any action that an admin might feel is desirable might be appropriate.
- If a page is created in direct violation of an ArbCom sanction, it is likely to be a candidate for deletion under CSD or AfD / MfD / TfD etc procedures. If a case of a page that is truly a direct violation of an ArbCom sanction but not eligible for deletion under existing policy is ever found, it should be subject to a discussion. Such a case would either demonstrate a gap in deletion policy, which the community should discuss and address, or an ArbCom sanction that is questionable in its basis, which is also something that should lead to a wider discussion. If it was something so bad that immediate action was needed and yet no policy justification was available, we have IAR or appealing to the WMF for an OFFICE action as potential solutions.
- Finally, I fear that your form of words risks unintended consequences. As AGK notes, it is vague which invites wikilawyering – what if the deletion policy is uncertain over a controversial change with an RfC underway and it is that area that may or may not be policy that relates to the page? Adding potential DS appeal / modification protections just adds unnecessary controversy, as the present deletion situation demonstrates. Also, as I noted above, if deletion is a special case under DS, what else that is mentioned in DS is not similarly special? What about things not mentioned in the DS procedures? I agree with you on the desirability of clarity but don't want to create uncertainty in other areas in the process. EdChem (talk) 01:11, 26 March 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Aquillion
The purpose of discretionary sanctions is to enable normal editing and consensus-building procedures to function even in situations where there is substantial disruption; their purpose is not to replace such procedures. The idea that an WP:AE deletion is not subject to WP:DRV therefore seems patiently absurd, especially given that DRV is, itself, historically an extremely high bar to pass (ie. the nature of an appeal means that in the absence of a consensus the default is that the article would stay deleted.) More generally, the problem stems from situations where WP:AE matters intrude on content decisions; based on that danger, I would amend WP:AC/DS#Modifications by administrators to state that by default, any content-based changes resulting from an WP:AE action (including deletions) can be reversed provided there is a clear consensus via an established venue like WP:DRV, without requiring that that be a consensus of administrators; and that in cases where there is a disagreement, such consensus is presumed to be sufficient to establish that something is a content issue. While WP:AE isn't supposed to apply to content in the first place, it is inevitable that there will occasionally be overlap, and it's important to establish that in cases where that occurs, an administrator cannot override or ignore consensus on content issues simply by invoking WP:AE (and that the default, in cases of confusion, is to go with a broad consensus when it exists.) --Aquillion (talk) 04:05, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Ymblanter
Note that earlier today I closed the AE appeal [2] and consequently restored the page in question. At the time, I was not aware of the existence of this clarification request (I have probably seen it on my watchlist some time ago, decided that it has no relation to my activities, and forgotten about it). I believe that the closure of AE is completely orthogonal to the request, since I believe nobody says the page may not be restored as a result of an AE closure. However, if anybody feels that the existence of this clarification request mandates that the AE request must sty open, feel free to unclose it.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:44, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Nosebagbear
@SilkTork: - I was hoping you (as the tweaking arb) could clarify how this is going to avoid looping round to the same problem - if it goes to AE, which would probably rule to adopt the broader interpretation of its own authority, then we seem set to end right back up again here as the "losing" side appeals the decision. The "appropriate forum" is only a symptomatic consideration since it would never be considered for DRV if arbitrary sanctions didn't/doesn't include deleting pages. Nosebagbear (talk) 20:29, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by {other-editor}
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.
Gun control: Clerk notes
- This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).
- Recuse obviously. GoldenRing (talk) 15:43, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SportingFlyer: I've removed your comment in the survey section as that falls under the Gun control: Arbitrator views and discussion section. That section is reserved for members of the Arbitration Committee. --Cameron11598 (Talk) 21:29, 6 March 2019 (UTC)
Gun control: Arbitrator views and discussion
- I'm still looking into the aspects of this, but as a general principle AE does give admins the discretion to " impose on any page or set of pages relating to the area of conflict page oprotection, revert restrictions, prohibitions on the addition or removal of certain content (except when consensus for the edit exists), or any other reasonable measure that the enforcing administrator believes is necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project", and if the admin considers that the "other reasonable measure" is deletion of a page, that would for me fall within the admin's discretion, so my response to point 1 is yes. That does not mean I think this current deletion is appropriate or reasonable, but that the principle of page deletion is within an AE admin's discretion. And it is important that the community adheres to ArbCom processes such that any ArbCom sanction can only be reversed by following appropriate procedures. So a) undoing an ArbCom enforcement without authority for doing so is a violation of the process, and b) appealing the enforcement in a venue other than the appropriate one is a violation of the process. As such for point 2 my response is yes in principle, and for point 3, it is no in principle. It is sometimes that an AE admin makes a mistake, and the process do allow for other users to question page restrictions, but they should follow process. As for this particular incident - were all the due processes followed? Was Dlthewave given an appropriate warning that DS applied to the page under question? And was the template Template:Ds/editnotice applied to the page in question? I am still looking at the page in question, and would like some more rationale behind why the page was considered to fall foul of "believes is necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project". What was the particular harm you saw in the page GoldenRing? My thinking at this stage, even with a convincing rationale for the page deletion, is that the unusual nature of the page restriction (deletion) and lack of clarity in this matter is such that I am not seeing any sanctionable behaviour for Bishonen's advice to take the matter to DRV. As regards undeleting the page. It's been a while since I got involved in DRV, but I don't recall it being a part of the process that pages were undeleted. And while we do give admins discretion to userfy pages on request, I don't think it should be considered that undoing an AE enforcement without first getting clear consensus at an appropriate venue is something ArbCom would be willing to overlook. That may have been a step too far, even with the confusions about the process. Bishonen, could you give us some of your thinking behind why you undeleted the page? SilkTork (talk) 18:16, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @Black Kite:, thanks for that - it's been a while since I had anything to do with DRV.
Are all articles automatically undeleted for DRV, or is it just a selected few? And if it is a selected few what is the criteria for undeleting, and on average what percentage of articles are undeleted?SilkTork (talk) 19:00, 25 February 2019 (UTC) - @Bishonen:, thanks for that - very useful. So articles on DRV which are requested to be undeleted are done so, and in this case you were requested. I strike my questions to Black Kite, as your response has given me the appropriate information. SilkTork (talk) 19:05, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- Because of the unique nature of this AE action I'm not seeing that Bishonen has done anything sanctionable, though for the avoidance of future doubt, if my colleagues agree with me, I think we need to make it clear that nobody should undo an AE action without first getting clear consensus to do so at an appropriate venue. SilkTork (talk) 19:08, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks GoldenRing. I phrased my question awkwardly. I can see why you had concerns about the page, what I'm asking really is why you felt the need to delete the page rather than raise your concerns with Dlthewave, or blank it, or amend it in some other manner. Your deletion, albeit done under AE, was a speedy deletion. The closest justification under speedy is G10. Did you (do you still) feel that G10 was the rationale for deletion? Or was it purely based on the user page policy, which says that negative material should be removed or blanked, but doesn't say deleted. It is the decision to delete rather than use other options that I'd like to hear your thinking on. While I support in principle the notion that an AE admin have within their discretion the option to delete a page, my thinking is this should be done within policy, so I'm looking for the policy that allows deletion in this instance. At the moment I'm seeing a page that can be considered to be of concern, but it appears to me that the appropriate solution would be discussion about the page rather than deletion of the page. I've not looked closely - is there discussion about the page that you can direct us to? SilkTork (talk) 08:42, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- Thanks GoldenRing, that makes things a lot clearer. My thinking is that everyone here has acted in good faith and with a view that what they were doing was within policy and procedure. While I feel that in principle an AE admin can delete a page as part of DS, that such a deletion should meet with policy, and if the deletion is not to go through a community discussion process (ie, is a Speedy deletion), then such a deletion should meet Speedy criteria. So, as in this case the deletion was not done under Speedy, the page should instead have been blanked. As this deletion was done under AE, albeit - in my opinion - inappropriately, it should be discussed at WP:AE rather than DRV. At the moment we have discussion at both DRV and AE. Rather than create a constitutional crisis, one venue or other should give up the right to discuss it; or perhaps, GoldenRing, you could reflect on if an AE enforced blanking serves the purpose as well as a deletion, and agree on the DRV that it can be undeleted, so we can resolve that discussion there, and you can then blank the page under AE and Dlthewave can appeal the blanking at AE. SilkTork (talk) 12:10, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- GoldenRing "I am a little unsure what you mean when you say, "such a deletion should meet with policy."" What I mean is that ArbCom is a part of the community and runs with the consent of the community. All the things that we do we do with the consent of the community, and any of the things that we are allowed to do, such as topic bans, etc, have evolved out of consensus. The one big thing that ArbCom has is that any legitimate ArbCom action is binding, and can not be undone by a community discussion at, say DRV, but only be undone by an appropriate ArbCom process. But even that big thing is done by the consent of the community, and if the community don't like what ArbCom are doing they can at any point say, "Fuck this for a game of soldiers", and decide to close ArbCom. Yes, an AE admin can do what they reasonably feel is needed, but only within the consent that the community have already given us, and the community have not given us explicit consent to delete out of process. This particular deletion is actually a minor issue, and everyone here is discussing this as an interesting point of process, but if you'd deleted a featured article on the main page or Jimbo's talkpage, we'd have a serious issue on our hands. There are necessary limits to what ArbCom can do, and we must be aware of them and abide by them, and if in doubt seek consensus. SilkTork (talk) 07:07, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
- @Black Kite:, thanks for that - it's been a while since I had anything to do with DRV.
- My view is that deletion of a page is permitted as an enforcement action under discretionary sanctions. Indeed, there are intentionally very few limits on what sanctions an administrator can impose under discretionary sanctions. As such, I see Bishonen's undeletion as a violation of WP:AC/DS#sanctions.modify, albeit one that was carried out in good faith with the best of intentions while uncertain of whether the arbitration enforcement action was permissible. I will note that WP:AC/DS#appeals.notes (bullet point 4) indicates that any action taken under discretionary sanctions are presumed valid and proper until a successful appeal, so if there were a question over whether deletion is a permissible discretionary sanction, that should have come to ARCA initially. All AE actions can only be appealed at WP:AE or WP:AN, so this cannot be appealed at WP:DRV. Leaving a note at WP:DRV directing interested editors toward such an appeal would be appropriate in this situation. I decline to answer GoldenRing's fourth question for two reasons. Ideally, ArbCom should not be the first point of appeal of a discretionary sanction. Separately, the admin who placed a discretionary sanction may not appeal their own sanction. This is especially important for an appeal that potentially skips AE/AN, since that would deprive other editors of the ability to appeal at those venues under our procedures. ~ Rob13Talk 16:40, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- Such deletions do not need to meet our deletion policy, as a side note. Discretionary sanctions are intended to allow administrators the discretion to handle cases not covered by our typical policies and guidelines in particularly contentious areas. Administrators should be cautioned that overzealous deletions as AE actions are likely to be overturned. In the case of repeated occurrences, this could result in a restriction from carrying out deletions as AE actions or from carrying out AE actions as a whole. ~ Rob13Talk 16:44, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- @SmokeyJoe: I will not be recusing myself for multiple reasons. First, simply taking a somewhat similar action in the past does not preclude one from reviewing unrelated administrative actions. If this were not true, truly absurd arguments could emerge (e.g. "Since X arbitrator has previously voted against desysop for an administrator who did Y, they must recuse when a different administrator did Y in a different set of circumstances"). Second, and most importantly, I did not delete any pages as an AE action. After a page was deleted as an AE action, and without making any comment on the validity of the deletion, I undeleted it to perform a necessary history merge and then restored the action. My role was to undo a copy-and-paste move that was non-compliant with the licensing requirements on Wikipedia. That is the only action I took with relation to that page. I had no role in the AE action. Tangentially, I see you saying that deletion of any page must, be necessity, remove content. WP:CONTENT defines content as things in the mainspace and related navigational pages, so this deletion, which affected only a user page unrelated to any mainspace material, was not "content" under that definition. ~ Rob13Talk 17:40, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- @SmokeyJoe: So I've looked into that deletion more. I didn't remember it very well, since it happened in 2017. First of all, it actually wasn't an AE action. It was a general sanctions action, which is similar, but not identical. The authority there derives from the community, not ArbCom, and whether GS deletions in areas where general sanctions are approved is permitted is entirely a question for the community. This discussion/clarification has no bearing on that. Second, I actually declined to delete that page under CSD prior to NeilN's deletion, looking through the edit history. Lastly, the deletion appears to be because AssadistDEFECTOR, an editor who I recall being an extremely disruptive civil POV pusher who is now indefinitely blocked, forked off a conspiracy theory into its own article which treated the conspiracy as fact after consensus had been to take it out of the main article for that subject. While I would not have done the same action, I see why NeilN did it. The page was very clearly created purely to circumvent the settled consensus and force other editors to re-debate the removal of that content. In that sense, I think the deletion was supported by WP:CONSENSUS and WP:IAR. NeilN's deletion did clearly achieve what editors had already reached a consensus to do - remove a seriously fringe conspiracy theory from mainspace. See here for more detail. Hopefully, that provides more context to NeilN's deletion. Any further discussion on the "general sanctions" tangent should presumably go to a venue where the community can clarify whether deletion is allowed under general sanctions. ~ Rob13Talk 22:51, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- @GoldenRing: I'm sure this isn't what you intend to say, but your example of a mainspace AE deletion specifically to avoid a DRV discussion comes across as an admin using AE actions to avoid scrutiny. I would not support anything like that. AE actions should never be performed with the sole intent of avoiding scrutiny of a borderline action. I don't think moving the discussion from DRV to AE or AN is likely to decrease drama over a questionable deletion, in any event. See this whole ARCA as evidence of that, honestly. ~ Rob13Talk 17:44, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- The purpose of discretionary sanctions is to minimize disruption in contentious areas in order to allow Wikipedia's usual processes to proceed smoothly - they are not a replacement for them. Admin.expect backs that up by stating that admins should "allow responsible contributors maximum editing freedom with the need to keep edit-warring, battleground conduct, and disruptive behaviour to a minimum." In other words, enact the minimal necessary sanction to allow editing to proceed as usual, through typical community processes.Sanctions.page permits admins to enact a number of suggested measures, including "other reasonable measures that the enforcing administrator believes are necessary and proportionate for the smooth running of the project." There is nothing explicitly prohibiting deletion as an AE action. However, any AE enforcement must be reasonable, necessary, and proportionate, and I think it would be very rare for deletion to meet that standard. By its very nature, deletion does more to limit the editing freedom of responsible contributors than any other page-level sanction. Even fully-protected pages can be edited via edit request. For that reason, I would argue that use of deletion as an AE action should have a much higher threshold to pass before it can be considered reasonable, necessary, and proportionate.In my opinion, deletion as an AE action should not be used unless it can be demonstrated that there is significant disruption coming as a direct result of the page in question, and that there is no other reasonable way to mitigate or prevent that disruption. I understand that this is a fairly high standard, but that's the point - generally speaking, there are other tools available than an AE deletion, including regular community deletion processes. By analogy, you could cut your steak with a chainsaw, but it's much more sensible to go find a steak knife.With regards to this particular action, I don't think the high threshold I would expect to justify an AE deletion was met. There was nothing in the page that was so egregious that it necessitated immediate removal. There was no edit-warring on or about the page. There was no indication that taking the page to MfD would have caused more disruption than any other controversial XfD. In other words, I'm not convinced this use of deletion was reasonable, necessary, and proportionate. I don't think GoldenRing should be sanctioned for it, but I do think it was unnecessary, and in general, should not set a precedent for wider use of deletion as an AE action.In the same vein, I don't think Bishonen's temporary undeletion for DRV is a violation of sanctions.modify. It is customary to undelete pages at DRV so they can be viewed and judged by non-administrators; her intention there was clearly to allow the DRV process to proceed as normally as possible, not to simply reverse GoldenRing and walk away. I don't see that as sanctionable.I think we should heavily discourage the use of deletion as an AE action, but if we are not going to prohibit it, I don't think it's unreasonable to allow DRV to review AE deletions. The crowd there is going to be familiar with the deletion policy and evaluating administrators' application of it, which I think is relevant. However, the question of where to appeal these actions is not a hill I'll die on compared to the rest of my thoughts on the matter. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 21:17, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
- Feeling obliged to be less brief, but I find this a simple answer. I disagree with my colleagues. Deleting is not a valid action under discretionary sanctions, GoldenRing's action did not enjoy protection under WP:AC/DS, and we can consequently dispose of the other procedural questions.In the procedure for Discretionary Sanctions, placing sanctions is authorised for contentious areas. The nature of a sanction is left to the judgment and discretion of administrators, though it is loosely defined as "any sanction, restriction, or other remedy". However, I find it axiomatic that sanctions are actions that apply to a person. Discretionary Sanctions are a method of regulating conduct, not content. Blocking, warning, or topic-banning Dlthewave for conduct that disrupts the area of conflict would have been a discretionary sanction. Deleting the page on which Dlthewave performed that disruptive conduct was not a discretionary sanction. Even broad, page-level actions taken by administrators (eg "all these pages are subject to 1RR") apply to users, not pages. The Discretionary Sanctions system started out of a recognition that an area of conflict can be improved if the dramatis personae can be made to behave. Deleting pages is not within that scope. AGK ■ 11:43, 2 March 2019 (UTC)
- OK, I know I'm being annoying by dropping in on this waaaaaay late, but.... reading most of the comments here is sort of like reading a discussion about whether or not angels need a public performance permit before dancing on the head of a pin. Forgetting all the "paragraph 4 of subsection 2b of policy G" stuff, was this action useful? It seems like, on balance, it wasn't - the net effect was to attract a lot more attention to an otherwise-obscure page and occupy a lot of community time without seeming to have much effect on the person hosting this potentially-problematic material. (Am I missing something, or have they not commented on this topic?) For this specific instance, it seems like the easier route would have been the boring one - just take it to MfD. For any future hypothetical instance, the most useful answer to "can I delete stuff using DS?" is "maybe, but you're almost certainly better off doing something else". Opabinia regalis (talk) 07:23, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- @GoldenRing: Yeah, but "maybe" is the answer to just about every question of the form "is XYZ against the rules?" :) I mean, within reason - obviously copyvio and poop vandalism are out. But if it's all just internal back-office stuff, "you can try, but it might not work" is IMO a better answer than having us all look at this particular set of circumstances and reach a decision that turns out not to be a good fit for the next time. Opabinia regalis (talk) 09:44, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- For the purposes of clarity, I am inactive on this request despite having returned to active status as most of it has taken place while I was away. Mkdw talk 21:17, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
Survey
To see if we need to take this discussion further, it may be helpful to take a quick survey:
- Can AE admins delete pages under "other reasonable measures" as part of the enforcement process?
- A) No
- B) Yes
- C) Yes, but only per deletion policy
- C SilkTork (talk) 16:16, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
- B, with a strong note that deletions well outside the deletion policy will almost certainly be overturned at AE (or ARCA). ~ Rob13Talk 19:37, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
- B, as per Rob. RickinBaltimore (talk) 19:43, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
- B, in the sense that it's not explicitly prohibited. However as I've stated above it should be avoided unless there is absolutely no other way to mitigate some kind of serious disruption. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 20:15, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
- A. AGK ■ 23:08, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
- C Katietalk 15:13, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
- A/sorta C. The fundamental principle of arbitration is that it deals with conduct, not content. Deletion falls firmly in the "content" category. So even if the DS could be read as including deletion, ArbCom doesn't have the remit to authorise it. Of course as an admin GR is free to delete pages within the deletion policy as he wishes, but calling it an AE action doesn't make a difference, except to muddy the waters as to whether the community can overturn it (they can). – Joe (talk) 16:30, 7 March 2019 (UTC)
Post-survey discussion
- Assuming that everyone who supports B would support C if B would not pass, the rough consensus here appears to be for C. Should we propose a motion to that effect? ~ Rob13Talk 14:55, 11 March 2019 (UTC)
- I think that would be useful. Would you be able to do that Rob? SilkTork (talk) 11:41, 12 March 2019 (UTC)
- My choice of "B" was based on the wording of DS as it is currently written - ie, deletion is currently permitted because it is not explicitly forbidden - not because I think it is a good idea to include. I would oppose any motion which codified deletion as an acceptable use of DS (even option C, which is a meaningless distinction in my opinion) and would much rather we explicitly forbid DS deletion. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 20:33, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
- I have to say, I'm having trouble understanding other's views on this, because like AGK I think the answer is very obviously A. Could someone please explain how a motion along the lines of B or C would be compatible with WP:ARBPOL, "the Committee does not rule on content"? – Joe (talk) 22:35, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
- @Joe Roe: I view acceptable DS deletions as falling into the category of "removal of
contentpages outside the mainspace that is the product of a user conduct issue". For instance, if an editor in the American politics topic area kept a user page in their userspace that compiled "coverage" of conspiracy theories surrounding some modern politicians (e.g. Murder of Seth Rich, Pizzagate conspiracy theory) from fringe sources that could never be integrated into an article, I would consider a deletion of that userpage under DS to be proper. Such a user page would serve no encyclopedic purpose and would clearly represent the product of a user conduct issue (WP:NOTHERE) while not falling within the traditional CSD criteria. (U5 could apply, but not if the editor also had substantial edits in the mainspace.) Taking such a page to MfD would clearly result in deletion, but would be undesirable because it would bring attention to the fringe sources and potentially attract a disruptive brigade from off-wiki, as such discussions often do in that topic area. I think that type of behavior is exactly what DS is intended to solve: user conduct issues in particularly contentious topic areas. Sometimes, those conduct issues permeate entire pages, in which case deletion would be appropriate. I would be highly skeptical of a DS deletion in the mainspace, to be clear. ~ Rob13Talk 01:09, 14 March 2019 (UTC)- I've altered my above comment, since it was pointed out to me that WP:CONTENT defines content as stuff in the mainspace (and certain navigational pages). In that sense, this user page was quite literally not content. ~ Rob13Talk 02:13, 15 March 2019 (UTC)
- My thinking on this is more with regard to challenging an ArbCom enforcement action. The special aspect of ArbCom is that any decision is binding, and any enforcement of those decisions can only be challenged within prescribed process. If the community wishes to take away that aspect of ArbCom (as effectively has happened here) then that diminishes the special status of ArbCom. Now, if the community decides that ArbCom is no longer needed, and that we have reached a stage where the community can deal effectively with all disputes, then that's not a problem, but if the community wishes to retain ArbCom and its special aspect, then any action by an AE admin in the name of ArbCom can only be challenged and overturned in the appropriate venue. What we have here is an unusual situation in that an AE admin deleted a page under AE, and there is a question as to if this was allowable, and that question was resolved not by appropriate ArbCom process, but within a standard process. That for me is the part we need to clear up. But in order to clear that up we need to see if there is a consensus in the Committee for what is allowable. I can't see how deleting out of process is allowable because ArbCom has not been given that power. And I don't see that an AE admin is restricted in what they can do, so that they have less powers than any other admin. When an AE admin is allowed to do what is "reasonable" I am seeing that as "anything that any admin can do within policy" with the understanding that when an AE admin does that action it can only be challenged within the AE process. The significant difference for me between an action done by an admin under AE and an action done by an admin not under AE, is that the AE action has to be challenged under AE rules, and the non AE action has to be challenged under standard rules. A deletion under policy done by an admin not under AE can be challenged at DRV, and a deletion under policy done by an admin under AE can only be challenged under AE process. If we as a Committee can agree that an AE admin can do reasonable actions within policy then the special aspect of ArbCom and AE enforcement is retained, and any future such actions can be debated with AE process. For me, whichever venue this was discussed in, the outcome would have been the same - that the page should not have been deleted because it was out of process.
- @Joe Roe: I view acceptable DS deletions as falling into the category of "removal of
- Short version: An AE admin shouldn't be restricted in what actions within policy they can do. An AE admin should not do an action not allowed by policy. Questions regarding if an AE action was within policy should only be discussed within AE process.
- If we can get together a motion which says this, there can be a due process discussion at AE regarding the deletion, it can be formally overturned, and if an AE admin feels it appropriate, the page can be blanked (not deleted) under an AE action which can then be challenged at AE. SilkTork (talk) 09:35, 14 March 2019 (UTC)
- @DGG: Not all text on Wikipedia is content. WP:CONTENT defines "content" as things in the mainspace and related navigational pages. Removal of text or deletion of pages do not necessarily affect content if not undertaken in the mainspace (or related namespaces that generate content in the mainspace, like Category, Template, etc.) ~ Rob13Talk 04:54, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
- @Hobit: It's worth noting that all of our core content policies also refer to articles as the content. I'm a bit surprised that editors are making the apparent claim that any writing at all on Wikipedia is "content", which is implicit in the argument that any page deletion in any namespace would necessarily be policing content. Is this discussion right now content, in your view? ~ Rob13Talk 20:43, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
- @Hobit: I'm (of course) not saying ArbCom has jurisdiction over everything not in mainspace, just like I'm not saying ArbCom has jurisdiction over everything in mainspace merely because discretionary sanctions allow page protections there. ArbCom retains jurisdiction over past cases, including the relevant topic areas involved where we have enacted discretionary sanctions. To the extent those areas overlap with things not in the mainspace, I think deletion is one valid tool of many that admins could use when appropriate and warranted by the level of disruption inherent in a particular page. I think it should be used extremely sparingly, and ultimately, the community can determine at AE whether any particular deletion is warranted. ~ Rob13Talk 05:06, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- @Hobit: It's worth noting that all of our core content policies also refer to articles as the content. I'm a bit surprised that editors are making the apparent claim that any writing at all on Wikipedia is "content", which is implicit in the argument that any page deletion in any namespace would necessarily be policing content. Is this discussion right now content, in your view? ~ Rob13Talk 20:43, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
- GoldenRing, I strongly disagree with that reasoning. AE is a tool for allowing community processes to occur smoothly. It is not a replacement for those processes, no matter how controversial they have the potential to be. If, as you have argued, there's disruption XfD or DRV or ANI, you use targeted sanctions to remove the disruption and allow the community to proceed as normal. You don't just get to decide that something might be problematic and delete it because it might cause too much of a fuss. By your logic, one could justify deleting anything that might be controversial. Too many people arguing about a BLP AfD? Just delete it. Tired of people arguing about an India-related navbox? Delete it. No. No way. I absolutely object to the use of DS as a shortcut around community processes. That is absolutely not their purpose. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 13:10, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
- GoldenRing, sanctions under AE are supposed to be deployed when there is a problem, in order to control the problem so the normal process of editing and consensus-building can resume. You issue a TBAN when someone has demonstrated an inability to edit in an area without causing problems, so that everyone else in that area can get back to editing normally (and, hopefully, so the TBANned editor can go edit constructively elsewhere). You don't issue a TBAN pre-emptively before someone causes a problem on the assumption that they might. In the same vein, I don't think it's reasonable to assume that an XfD/DRV/ANI discussion will be so problematic that preemptively deleting a page is the best solution, especially when there are lesser sanctions available to handle disruption as it comes up. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 23:54, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
Motion: Discretionary sanctions procedure
- For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators, not counting 3 who are inactive, so 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.
(1) Proposed:
- Support
-
- Proposed. I understand that some colleagues have asserted views to the contrary, above, but we need to progress towards a decision. I simply don't think we want page deletion to be used as a means of enforcing user conduct standards. This one edge case (after over a decade) should not be used to expand the scope of DS or the rights of Enforcing Administrators. AGK ■ 14:23, 24 March 2019 (UTC)
- I'm fine with this as is, but perhaps others might be happier with the addition of "to delete pages outside of the deletion policy", in line with the results of our straw poll above? – Joe (talk) 14:42, 24 March 2019 (UTC)
- Support as written. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 15:04, 24 March 2019 (UTC)]
- Support, with Joe's amendment. RickinBaltimore (talk) 18:43, 24 March 2019 (UTC)
- Oppose
-
Because this does not solve the problem. Alternative proposed. SilkTork (talk) 09:54, 25 March 2019 (UTC)Move to abstain to help move this forward. SilkTork (talk) 14:40, 9 April 2019 (UTC)Moved back to oppose in favour of new motion regarding challenging enforcement actions. SilkTork (talk) 02:44, 13 April 2019 (UTC)- Moving here, in favor of the second version. ~ Rob13Talk 13:31, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
- You know, I still agree with myself up above that this is not really a problem that needs a new rule. The answer should be 'maybe', as in, probably not, but if you make a good argument for a specific oddball case then sure. This particular set of circumstances didn't fit, but that doesn't mean it's a terrible idea that must be forbidden forever. I agree with AGK's first point - we probably don't want to make this a habit - but have the opposite feeling on the second, that is, if in over a decade we've come across only this one edge case, then that means we don't need to write any new stuff and choosing not to do so is not "expanding" anything. Sorry to anyone who's been reading this hoping for "clarity" or "bright lines" - I just don't think this is an issue calling out for definitive resolution. If it starts happening five times a month, we should revisit it then. Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:50, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
- Per OR. Katietalk 15:42, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
- Per Opabinia. I don't see this as needing a hard-line rule to forbid all deletions under AE ever, although I agree that in this case it was not necessary. GorillaWarfare (talk) 03:26, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- Per OR WormTT(talk) 09:12, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
- Abstain
For now. I may oppose, but my thoughts at the moment are basically that this comes up so infrequently and causes so much drama that an enforcing administrator should just use the other tools available to them in such a situation, even if they aren't quite as good a fit. If an editor is creating whole user pages that contain polemical statements in an area with discretionary sanctions, just block them for disruption. ~ Rob13Talk 15:39, 24 March 2019 (UTC)SilkTork (talk) 14:40, 9 April 2019 (UTC)Moved back to oppose. SilkTork (talk) 02:44, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Comments by arbitrators
- @Spartaz: My phone has learned "arbcom" by now, but the top alternative is "a boom". I think our phones are trying to tell us something... :) Opabinia regalis (talk) 07:16, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
Motion: Discretionary sanctions procedure (2)
- For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators, not counting 3 who are inactive, so 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.
(1) Proposed:
- Support
Putting forward an alternative. I'm not comfortable with the notion that a AE admin should have less authority than a non AE admin, and so create a situation where someone creates a page in direct violation of an ArbCom sanction, yet an AE admin could only delete such a page outside of ArbCom protection, and so there is uncertainty (again) over where the matter should be discussed. The above motion does not protect against such a situation, and so does not solve this problem. SilkTork (talk) 09:54, 25 March 2019 (UTC)Moving to abstain to move this forward. SilkTork (talk) 01:58, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Oppose
-
- No, because if the deletion is within the deletion policy, then there is no need to use DS as a reason for deletion in the first place. If it is that problematic, chances are it will fit under a speedy criteria (such as G10 if it is an attack page or G5 if created in violation of an existing sanction). If not, there is no reason it cannot be taken through the relevant XfD process (which can be controlled with DS sanctions if that causes problems). ♠PMC♠ (talk) 19:16, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
- First, per PMC. We are providing for discretionary sanction to not include deletions. We are not prohibiting an administrator from also deleting a page under their separate powers. We are, in passing, preventing absurd consequences like "Are these deletions subject to DRV?" or "Can deleted text be provided and adapted under WP:REFUND?" I should also oppose because the clause "per the deletion policy" is a vague, catch-all statement lacking the precision that we know administrators expect to be in place before they act. I am not sure I clearly understand what parts of the deletion policy it means now. Finally, I do not see what ambiguity is left behind by removing deletion as a D.S. as in the first motion – I have perhaps misunderstood SilkTork's contribution on this point. Also, I should repeat my earlier vote – deleting pages has not (except for minor cases under ARBBLP) been a form of discretionary sanction. Changing that now would be unnecessary and unwise. AGK ■ 22:06, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
- See my comment above. Opabinia regalis (talk) 06:52, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
- Per OR. I can't get behind making policy like this based on one instance of hundreds. Katietalk 15:44, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
- Per my comment above, but also because I don't see why it couldn't go through the standard deletion process. Page deletions are not normally something that are useful when discretionary sanctions are involved. GorillaWarfare (talk) 03:27, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- Moved to oppose in favour of new motion on challenging enforcement actions. SilkTork (talk) 02:45, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Comments by arbitrators
Motion: Amendment to the standard provision for appeals and modifications
- For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators, not counting 3 who are inactive, so 6 support or oppose votes are a majority.
- Support
-
- I think this is the essential point of concern, and would cover any future actions where people are unsure if an enforcement action is appropriate or not. Querying an action, such as deleting a page, is entirely appropriate, but to avoid confusion and internal conflict, we need to establish exactly where such a query should take place, and that the action should not be undone until it is established that it was in fact out of process. SilkTork (talk) 02:39, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- This is what important note 4 is intended to say, but your text is much clearer, SilkTork. Do you mind if we rework this to just replace important note 4 with this text? ~ Rob13Talk 14:36, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- We always can revisit this issue if there are still practical problems where deletion and arb enforcement meet. AGK ■ 14:42, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- I've deleted "such as DRV" because it could be taken as implying that deletion is a valid AE action (which we couldn't agree on above); I don't think the example is essential to the meaning. Otherwise, I agree this is a sensible procedure and, had it been followed in this case, we might not have ended up with such a lengthy dispute. – Joe (talk) 16:15, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- RickinBaltimore (talk) 20:04, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
- GorillaWarfare (talk) 20:42, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
- Looks good to me WormTT(talk) 09:14, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
- Oppose
-
- Abstain
-
- Comments by arbitrators
- User:SmokeyJoe. Yes, I understand the concern regarding slow moving Committee decisions; however, the process for challenging an Arbitration Enforcement, if no satisfaction can be gained from the enforcing admin, is generally to raise the issue at "AE", though "AN" may also be used. And those processes are generally about the same speed as DRV. And the motion does allow for further discussion at a venue such as DRV if the outcome of the initial discussion at AE is that the enforcement was not appropriate, but has not yet been reversed. The idea is to prevent the situation we are currently in, in which there is some doubt as to where an action should first be discussed. Also, in order to preserve the special status of the Arbitration Committee (that decisions are final and binding), this underlines that the principle is to ask questions and wait for a decision before reversing an AE action. SilkTork (talk) 09:21, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- BU Rob13 - yes, tweak away. I am firmly in favour of collaboration. SilkTork (talk) 15:05, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Before we enact this, can we adjust the “or discussed” wording? The claims of a gag order above are overblown, but we should make clear we aren’t prohibiting a discussion on user talk, etc. “being reversed or altered at another venue”? ~ Rob13Talk 05:32, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
Amendment request: Eastern Europe
Initiated by Icewhiz at 10:13, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- Clauses to which an amendment is requested
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eastern Europe#Amendments
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eastern Europe#Amendments
- Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eastern Europe#Amendments
- List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request
- Icewhiz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)
- Information about amendment request
- sourcing restriction for non-English sources for Jew-Polish relations.
- 500/30 protection for Jew-Polish relations.
- 1RR for Jew-Polish relations.
Statement by Icewhiz
In the past year, editing in the topic of Jewish history in Poland has been difficult. While WP:NOENG is policy - stating a preference for English sources of the same quality when available (generally the case for Holocaust history), and quotation requirements when challenged - NOENG has not been followed in this topic area. Non-English sources of a dubious nature have been inserted into articles, even BLPs, and in some cases, the content has failed verification: not present in the cited sources, contradicted by others. Requests for quotations and a rationale for use have gone unanswered, or dismissed with "the source is reliable" or "WP:AGF and Offline sources".
Admins at AE are reluctant to dive into such issues. This recent case was closed by @Sandstein: with: "Personally, the matter is too complicated and too much tied to content disputes for me to feel comfortable taking action; AE is better suited to relatively straightforward cases of misconduct."
[3]. I understand the sentiment here; dealing with users introducing content that fails WP:V when the cited sources aren't online, aren't in English, and/or are very long is difficult. The challenge of tackling source misrepresentations is evident in past AE threads:
List of prior AE actions
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Most of the complaints were on sourcing quality and misrepresentations of sources, while editors were sanctioned for a variety of conduct issues, such as personal attacks and battleground behavior. Admins discussed the possibility of sourcing restrictions (academic and/or English only), or enforcing misrepresentation of sources. A sourcing restriction was applied to Collaboration in German-occupied Poland where the situation did improve following the restriction, but no sourcing restriction was applied elsewhere. Disputes in the topic area have involved numerous other articles (WWII history, geographic locations, BLPs in the field).
I will note that use of sources is further complicated by the legislation which criminalized publication in Polish media of claims of Polish complicity in crimes committed during the Holocaust.[1][2][3]
There are excellent mainstream Polish-language academic sources, referenced by academia outside of Poland. In fact, the Polish Wikipedia often has a balanced representation of the subject matter (see this 2015 oped on a long-running WP:HOAX in Stawiski: "Surprisingly, the Polish Wikipedia articles evidence greater willingness to admit Polish participation in massacres of Jews."
corrected in 2018) Unfortunately, sources in Polish introduced to English Wikipedia are often not high-quality mainstream academic writing, but rather right-wing newspaper op-eds, interviews, blog posts, and pulp journals/books.
Please see general examples of misrepresenting sources: (more are available on request)
Diffs of source use failing verification + subsequent reverts / lack of quotations and discussion
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Possibly disruptive edits by non-EC users:
Edit Warring & non-EC edits
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References
- ^ Poland Holocaust law: France criticises 'ill advised' text, BBC, 7 Feb 2018
- ^ Gebert, Konstanty. "Projecting Poland and its past: Poland wants you to talk about the “Polocaust”." Index on Censorship 47.1 (2018): 35-37.
- ^ Hackmann, Jörg. "Defending the “Good Name” of the Polish Nation: Politics of History as a Battlefield in Poland, 2015–18." Journal of Genocide Research 20.4 (2018): 587-606.
- ^ Ambrosewicz-Jacobs, Jolanta. "The uses and the abuses of education about the Holocaust in Poland after 1989." Holocaust Studies (2019): 1-22.
- ^ La Pologne minimise les incidents lors d’un colloque sur la Shoah à Paris, Le Monde, 4 March 2019
- ^ Polish magazine's 'Islamic rape of Europe' cover sparks outrage, Guardian, 18 Feb 2018
I request that ARCA consider the following:
- 500/30 protection for the topic of Polish-Jewish relations.
- 1RR for the topic of Polish-Jewish relations.
- A sourcing restriction. Some possibilities:
- Revert restriction - editors performing reverts of challenged material are responsible for verifying the contents. Failure to verify, and provide supporting quotes, is sanctionable.
- consensus for non-English sources: In disputes over foreign-language sources in the subject area of Polish-Jewish relations, disputed sources are removed unless and until there is a consensus to include them. (similar to WP:NOCONSENSUS EL policy).
- Only English-language academic sources for historical subjects.
- Excluding low-quality non-English sources - Blogs, websites, and media sources that are subject to censorship (e.g. see the WP:HISTRS proposal). High-quality English-language sources can be found in most topics.
Such sourcing restrictions will turn "content disputes" on foreign-language sources that are difficult for enforcing admins to verify themselves into actionable violations of a sourcing restriction. As copious and numerous English language sources are available in Holocaust studies, a restriction won't limit our source pool much; reputable non-English writers get translated to English or analyzed in English language secondary works. Consistent introduction of material that fails WP:V should be taken seriously, however expecting admins at AE to read 50 pages in a foreign language is not reasonable. Our goal should be that Wikipedia conforms to mainstream academic scholarship on the Holocaust, and I believe such measures would be a step forward. A limited measure in ARCA regarding sourcing (in line with AE admin comments over several cases) & non-EC edits might lead to fewer disruptions, an easier time at AE (fewer cases), and can be achieved without a full-fledged case.
Statement by Piotrus
Since 1) I've been quoted by Icewhiz (through not notified, I refer specifically to this diff), and 2) this does concern one of my primary content areas, as I've created dozens articles on Polish-Jewish topics, such as Maria Roszak just few days ago and 3) this contains the most absurd request I've seen in my ~15 years here ("sourcing restriction for non-English sources for Jew-Polish relations."), I feel I should make a statement.
First. Regarding the 1RR restriction request, the "500/30 protection" (what is this, btw? I've never heard such term used on Wikipedia before... it is a form of semi-protection) and others (request to verify sources before reverting, etc.), as someone who has seen various edit conflicts in related topic areas in dozen+ years, including some that ended up at ArbCom, it is my view that there's no significant amount of vandalism, or long term edit warring, or any other malpractices that would raise to the level requiring any special treatment for this topic area or even for any particular articles (one can check history of major articles like Polish Jews or The Holocaust in Poland or such to see they are generally stable). While it would be nice to force editors to use higher quality sources, there's no reason to treat Polish-Jewish topic area any different from the rest of Wikipedia. While there are occasional disagreements, they are not raising above the usual noise level in this area.
Second, it would be absurd to ban or restrict non-English sources. AFAIK this hasn't been done for any topic area, and rightly so, as for each language there are plenty of reliable sources. To say that Foo-language sources (or anything that's not in English) cannot be used for XYZ-topic is a very serious accusation for any scholarship. While there are some particular cases we limit sources, they are very rare - I think there's a general consensus to be careful with Nazi-era sources, for example, but even then, there's no blanket rule saying that no Nazi-era sources are allowed (through perhaps there should be, I can similarly think of issues with ISIS sources, etc. - but those are extreme cases and we are hardly anywhere near this level of seriousness here). Over the years I've cautioned some people to be careful with Soviet-era sources for some topics, or modern Putin-era Russian historiography, and I concur there are some indications some (but certainly not all!) modern Polish historiography works exhibits a worrisome political agenda not unlike that found in Putin's Russia, and it is good for editors to realize this, but overall, WP:RS covers such situations pretty well, and if needed WP:RSN can be brought to bear on specific cases (ex. see this RSN discussion Icehwiz started, which IIRC led to the decision to stop using Paul (an English-language source, btw) as a source in this topic area. It's a proof that current tools and structures work, no special treatment is needed. To ban (and remove?) Polish and other non-English sources from Polish-Jewish topics would do immense damage to the project. Many articles in categories such as Category:Polish Righteous Among the Nations or Category:Jewish ghettos in Nazi-occupied Poland are based on Polish-language sources that simply do not exist in English. To ban sources ranging from Polish Biographical Dictionary to works by scholars from the Jewish Historical Institute or works published by many other Polish-Jewish organizations in Poland would be, IMHO, ridiculous. (As for 'remove low quality sources' plea, of course I support it - but to repeat myself, that's just like saying 'please enforce existing policies like RS'. Doh. Sure. Let's. We all agree. In all content areas. Nothing for ArbCom do look at here).
Nonetheless, the fact that such ridiculous request has been made bears considering in light that Icewhiz has often criticized Polish-language sources (ex. just yesterday here, or few months ago numerous times here - just search for NOENG; it's pretty much all Icewhiz criticizing NOENG/Polish sources; same here). While his criticism has not always been without merit (as sometimes he correctly identified low-quality sources), I don't see any relation between low quality sources he (or others, including myself) identify, and language. Sometimes we find and remove low quality Polish sources, sometimes they are English, occasionally they are in another language altogether. Language is not an issue. The fact that one can seriously make such request (April Fools has come and gone...) makes me wonder about their judgement, since to effectively try to argue that all non-English sources should be treated as if they were Nazi-German era works (i.e. automatically disqualified on the subject matter of Jewish history/culture/etc.) is not a sign of a sound editorial judgement.
Bottom line, if an editor feels that he has lost too many arguments, he should not turn to WP:FORUMSHOPPING. And trying to do so here may result in rather heavy WP:BOOMERANG. Because while there is nothing particularly wrong with Polish-Jewish topics on English Wikipedia (they are reasonably stable and neutral), there is some evidence that some editors are developing WP:BATTLEGROUND-like mentality, evidenced for example by spurious AE and even ArbCom-level requests (see my related wiki-essay). And that may be something that ArbCom may want to investigate, because a number of meritless requests at AE/ArbCom boards is an indicator of a potential problem (one that could warrant for example a ban from submitting spurious requests of such kind in the future). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 03:18, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by {other-editor}
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.
Eastern Europe: Clerk notes
- This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).
Eastern Europe: Arbitrator views and discussion
- On the face of it, this seems more like a case request than something for ARCA. If it's too complex for AE, we would need the extended framework of a case to examine the totality of the evidence. I would likely vote to accept this as a case request, but I decline to consider extending 500/30 to an entire topic area in the absence of a case. ~ Rob13Talk 06:27, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
Motions
Proposed amendment to the arbitration policy
Motion adopted (version 2) Bradv🍁 23:04, 8 April 2019 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Version 1Pursuant to the arbitration policy's section on "Ratification and amendment", the Arbitration Committee resolves that the following change to the arbitration policy will be submitted for formal ratification by community referendum: This amendment to the arbitration policy will enter into force once it receives majority support, with at least one hundred editors voting in favour of adopting it. Until this amendment is ratified, the existing arbitration policy remains in effect.
Version 2Pursuant to the arbitration policy's section on "Ratification and amendment", the Arbitration Committee resolves that the following change to the arbitration policy will be submitted for formal ratification by community referendum: This amendment to the arbitration policy will enter into force once it receives majority support, with at least one hundred editors voting in favour of adopting it. Until this amendment is ratified, the existing arbitration policy remains in effect. Enacted – Bradv🍁 22:58, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
Discussion and comments
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Restoration of sysop privileges to Necrothesp
Motion adopted (Version 1) – bradv🍁 02:57, 10 April 2019 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Version 1 (Necrothesp)On March 14, 2019, the administrator permissions of Necrothesp (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) were temporarily removed as a suspected compromised account under the Level 1 desysopping procedures. Following discussion concerning account security, and pursuant to the procedures for return of revoked permissions, the Arbitration Committee resolves the following: Enacted – bradv🍁 02:50, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Version 2 (Necrothesp)
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Motion adopted (Return of permissions) – bradv🍁 14:53, 10 April 2019 (UTC) |
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Motion 3: Return of permissionsEnacted – bradv🍁 14:50, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Discussion and comments (Necrothesp)I don't wish to beat up on this particualr admin (since that's already been done to the point where I'm sure the message has been received) but I would urge the committee to go with version 2, and to consider it a sort of final warning that admins are expected to secure their accounts and ignorance of the last 5-6 years (at least) of evolving policy on this matter is no excuse as we expect admins to be up to speed on important policies. And reports about this hae been in the monthly admin newsletter how many times now? I've lost count. Kinda a big part of the job, and if you can't be bothered to keep up you should be big enough to hand in the tools. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:18, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
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Requests for enforcement
Arbitration enforcement action appeal by Dlthewave
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).
- Appealing user
- Dlthewave (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) – –dlthewave ☎ 17:33, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
- Sanctions being appealed
- DiscussionLog
- Logged warning by Sandstein
- Deletion of User:Dlthewave/Whitewashing_of_firearms_articles by Goldenring
- Administrators imposing the sanctions
Sandstein (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
GoldenRing (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
- Notification of those administrators
Statement by Dlthewave
- I feel that the closing statement
"Springee, Trekphiler, RAF910 and Dlthewave are warned not to misuse Wikipedia as a forum for polemic statements unrelated to Wikipedia, or attacking or vilifying groups of editors, persons, or other entities."
, which appears to be copy-and-pasted from WP:POLEMIC, is not an accurate assessment of consensus among the admins who participated in the discussion. Among other things, it implies that all four editors are equally at fault, which does not appear to be what the admins intended in their support for a logged warning. Although Goldenring did delete a page in my userspace under WP:POLEMIC, there was no discussion of my "attacking" or "vilifying" anyone and one admin even stated"Dlthewave is in fact engaged in appropriate editing and discussion."
There was no proposal to issue a logged warning to Dlthewave. (As a sidenote, I also feel that issuing a polemic warning to the other three involved editors instead of a warning related to talk page conduct was entirely out of left field, but that is something for them to address in their own appeals if they choose to pursue them.) - I feel that Goldenring's deletion of a page in my userspace, User:Dlthewave/Whitewashing_of_firearms_articles, has a chilling effect on my ability to document and share what I view as a long-term pattern in the gun control/gun crime topic area. This documentation plays an essential role in addressing current problems that are, in my opinion, a continuation of that pattern. My intention is to demonstrate a pattern and not to attack the individual editors who have been involved in that pattern. This removal is especially concerning when the "opposing" attacks and accusations which I documented are allowed to remain in full view at WP:Firearms and other talk pages. I would be open to discussing ways to do this that would not be viewed as an attack page, since similar pages maintained by other editors have passed MfD.
- Although this deletion may have been within Goldenring's editorial discretion, I would like it to be reviewed by other admins and preferably discussed by the community at Miscellany for Deletion. –dlthewave ☎ 17:33, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Sandstein
After rereading User:Dlthewave/Whitewashing of firearms articles, I agree with the appellant that the page was not (quite) a violation of WP:POLEMIC because it did not name editors and did not make allegations of misconduct, except as implied in the title ("whitewashing"), but that alone probably doesn't merit a warning. Because that page was the reason for my warning, I am striking it and recommend that GoldenRing (talk · contribs) undelete the page. A case can perhaps be made for its deletion on grounds of copyright / attribution, but that's a matter for the deletion process. Sandstein 18:37, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
- Per my comment here, I've also withdrawn the warning with respect to Springee. Clearly I should have read the enforcement request more carefully; sorry for that. I think that we should be more careful in the future as to whether or not to entertain enforcement requests directed at multiple editors. Sandstein 22:59, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
- In response to Bishonen, GoldenRing is correct that an action that has been labeled as an AE action may only be reviewed by way of the process described at WP:AC/DS#Appeals, that is, here at AE, or at AN or ARCA – but not at DRV. Bishonen, I recommend that you undo your temporary restoration of the page for the purpose of the DRV, or you may be desysopped for undoing an AE action out of process, as described at WP:AC/DS#Modifications by administrators. Any admin who acts on the currently ongoing DRV by overturning the deletion may likewise be desysopped. Sandstein 15:26, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Springee
I'm clearly an involved editor. As I said before I think Dlthewave has a very strong POV on this topic and I frequently disagree with them. However, when push comes to shove, I don't think on good faith they viewed the page as a POLMIC. For what it's worth, I would support reverting Dlthewave's warning. Springee (talk) 19:12, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by GoldenRing
I disagree with Sandstein above and stand by this action. Dlthewave has stated right here that the purpose of this page is to document long-term problematic editing and policy is clear that such material is allowed only for dispute resolution and when used in a timely manner. I don't see the practical difference between, "so-and-so said this" (which the appellant seems to admit would be disallowed) and "someone said this and here's a link showing who it was" which is what they've actually done. GoldenRing (talk) 21:01, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
- @Bishonen: I'm not sure why you've suggested deletion review here. AE actions cannot be overturned at deletion review, only at AE, AN or ARCA. Have you also not just unilaterally undone an AE action? GoldenRing (talk) 10:19, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- @Dlthewave: I will reiterate here what I've said on the deletion review: if you wish to use this material for valid dispute resolution (probably either an ANI or arbitration case request) and can outline a reasonable timeline for doing so (either on-wiki or privately by email), then I will self-revert my enforcement action. GoldenRing (talk) 10:32, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- I would like to add, for what it's worth at this point, that I agree a formal warning to Dlthewave was not warranted. GoldenRing (talk) 12:07, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- Please note that I have requested clarification from the arbitration committee regarding my deletion at WP:ARCA. GoldenRing (talk) 16:02, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Simonm223
Marginally involved. I just found out about the removal of DLThewave's excellent summary of the challenges faced to bring firearms into compliance with WP:N including the way that a wikiproject has tried to present their MOS suggestions as policy. I've said as much at another venue, but this is definitely not a violation of WP:POLEMIC and should be undeleted for the valuable resource it is. Simonm223 (talk) 15:03, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Statement by (involved editor 2)
Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by Dlthewave
- The matter of the deletion itself should be deferred to WP:DRV as that venue is much better equipped for such reviews. Whether or not the action itself was appropriate should be discussed here or in a more general manner at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee (where Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions redirects). — Godsy (TALKCONT) 10:49, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Result of the appeal by Dlthewave
- This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
- I commented in the initial thread, so I'm not sure whether my response should appear in this section, or above with GoldenRing's and Sandstein's. The deletion of Dlthewave's userspace subpage was arguably appropriate under WP:POLEMIC, and within reasonable admin discretion on GoldenRing's part. While I'm not sure I would have done the same, I'm comfortable leaving the page deleted. That said, I don't think a formal warning to Dlthewave is warranted; there wasn't really any support for such a warning amongst uninvolved admins in the previous thread, and it seems like overkill. The proper response to a potentially polemical userspace subpage is to delete it, which has been done. There wasn't any convincing evidence of a pattern of behavior warranting a logged warning on Dlthewave's part, at least not that I saw.
Regarding the logged warnings, I do take Springee's point that they perhaps paint the remaining 3 editors with an overly broad brush. There are clearly gradations of concerning behavior, with Springee on the mild end and Trekphiler/RAF910 showing a much more sustained and problematic battleground attitude. I'll leave it up to other admins whether we should modify the warning to exclude Springee, but it is worth considering while we're here. MastCell Talk 21:19, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
- Hmm. This is definitely a confusing situation. Reading the deleted page, it does seem borderline WP:POLEMIC so, perhaps, GoldenRing was right in deleting it. But, Dlthewave brings up a good point. If they do plan on making a future case then how else can they keep a record of the edits they see as forming a pattern? They could do it off-wiki of course, but isn't it better to be open about one's activities? While the deletion was within admin discretion perhaps, in cases of this nature, it is better to leave them as is with a note to the editor that they can't leave it sticking around for too long. Imo, the warning should be withdrawn. --regentspark (comment) 00:22, 24 February 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not sure about deleting the whitewashing essay; I can't seem to make up my mind. Suggest dlthewave take it to Wikipedia:Deletion review. An admin should be asked to temporarily undelete the page for purposes of discussion as soon as the DR is opened. But I don't have any trouble agreeing with Sandstein, Springee, MastCell, and Regentspark that dlthewave's warning should be withdrawn and struck from the log, and Sandstein has already done so. Bishonen | talk 01:11, 24 February 2019 (UTC).
- @Dlthewave:, I've temporarily undeleted your page for the deletion review. Bishonen | talk 22:01, 24 February 2019 (UTC).
- Your deletion can't be overturned at Deletion review, GoldenRing? Are you sure? In that case, obviously I suggested it because I didn't know any better. A bit of bad luck that apparently nobody who did know saw my suggestion for Deletion review here at AE, some 20 hours before Dlthewave actually opened the deletion review. I'm not sure what should be the next step, considering there is quite a lot of discussion at the review already, and some disagreement about how to proceed. But whatever action is taken, rest assured I won't feel "undermined" by it, as somebody suggested there. I'm personally fine with whatever, although I want to apologize to Dlthewave for potentially complicating his situation. As for "Have you also not just unilaterally undone an AE action?", no, I haven't. If you're referring to my temporary undeletion of the page, for the deletion review only and with the front page covered by a template, per the instructions here, I can only ask you not to be so silly. If you're talking about my giving Dlthewave bad advice, well, I've explained how that came about (=ignorance on my part). Bishonen | talk 12:54, 25 February 2019 (UTC).
- What an absolute joy you are to work with, Sandstein. It's a wonder more admins don't flock to help out at AE, where honest mistakes get met with immediate threats of desysopping. I do want to point out that there's a pretty clear consensus at DRV that the page doesn't violate WP:POLEMIC. @GoldenRing:, do I understand correctly that you are not going to recognize that consensus because it is being discussed on the Wrong Page(TM)? If this is the case, then I suppose we should tell everyone at DRV their opinions are not wanted there, re-delete the page, and then have the exact same discussion here. Or alternately, GR could rescind the deletion.... --Floquenbeam (talk) 15:59, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
- I not only agree that restoring the page for deletion review is not an abuse of process, but that deleting the page via AE would be an abuse of process. The way to remove userspace essays that are contrary to policy is MfD., and review of decisions there is at Deletion Review. DGG ( talk ) 06:53, 26 February 2019 (UTC)
- GoldenRing, do you intend to delete under AE every page in an area subject to DS (such as AP or PIA) that you think might arguably be the result of an action that violation an arb ruling,? DGG ( talk ) 17:16, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
- And I have just noticed, Sandstein, that your closing at the AE Discussion used the wording of the arb case "for polemic statements unrelated to Wikipedia, " but the entire discussion above about whether it violated POLEMIC is irrelevant, because the page is obviously related to WP. And the arb com wording continued " attacking or vilifying groups of editors, persons, or other entities. " I do not see any editors named on the page in question. It was discussing edits. (Of course the editors were implied, because the statements wee linked, but nothing about the editors is question is said on the page, only about the edits. DGG ( talk ) 17:16, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
- This has been stalled for a month, the deletion review was closed as consensus to overturn, and we need to proceed in one or other way. I see consensus to withdraw the warning, and this has been already done by Sandstein. The situation is more difficult with the deletion of the page, but if I take into account all opinions at DRV and also that all uninvolved admins here who commented after the close of the DRV supported undeletion, I would say there is consensus to undelete. I will wait a couple of days before closing, may be somebody wanted to comment and forgot or overlooked this discussion.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:28, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
- I support User:Ymblanter's idea of undoing the AE deletion of the page, based on the apparent consensus of admins in this thread. Arbcom is still debating whether 'AE deletion' can ever be considered to be an option, but there is no risk of any conflict with Arbcom if the present deletion is simply undone on the merits. (We would be closing as though AE deletion was really allowed, but this *particular* deletion was reversed through the normal AE appeal process). It appears that a deletion review has already occurred which supported restoration of the page. EdJohnston (talk) 18:10, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
- I indeed closed it as overturn, and subsequently got strong objections from Goldenring concerning the restoration of the page (see their talk page), which I disagree with, but it is good to give another administrator a chance to deal with this.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:50, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
- Given the votes on the pending motion, we must proceed on the assumption that deletion of a page is allowed as a discretionary sanction. In my view, POLEMIC falls on the conduct side of the conduct/content divide: deciding whether a user page violates that guideline does not require one to make decisions regarding any encyclopedic content. Therefore, deleting a user page under POLEMIC does not fall into the category of deletions that may impermissibly settle a content dispute. Having considered the comments at the DRV to the extent they addressed POLEMIC (as opposed to the process issue), and after independently reviewing the page, I cannot say that GoldenRing's interpretation and application of that guideline is outside reasonable admin discretion, and that's all that is needed to sustain a discretionary sanction. Decline as to the deletion. As to the warning, the appeal is moot. T. Canens (talk) 01:57, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Icewhiz
No action with respect to Icewhiz (without prejudice against another admin taking action). Nishidani is blocked for a week and banned from creating or making comments in WP:AE reports related to the Arab-Israeli conflict, except if they are the editor against whom enforcement is requested. Sandstein 14:33, 14 April 2019 (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 Icewhiz
Tendentious editing is defined in WP:TE as a manner of editing that is partisan, biased or skewed taken as a whole. It does not conform to the neutral point of view, and fails to do so at a level more general than an isolated comment that was badly thought out. On Wikipedia, the term also carries the connotation of repetitive attempts to insert or delete content or behavior that tends to frustrate proper editorial processes and discussions. WP:ARBPIA3#Tendentious editing further says that Users who disrupt the editing of articles by engaging in sustained aggressive point-of-view editing and edit-warring may be banned from the affected articles. I believe the evidence below demonstrates that Icewhiz is such an editor engaging in sustained tendentious editing. Icewhiz routinely removes material on spurious grounds when that material is, in his view, negative towards Israel. He will routinely make opposing arguments based solely on the POV presented. He will oppose reliable sources when it suits him and support unreliable sources when it suits him, sometimes making the exact opposite argument nearly simultaneously depending on the POV of the source.
In sum, his efforts at Rouzan al-Najjar consisted of originally pushing propaganda, removing that it was propaganda when covered by numerous reliable sources as such, and pushing in opinion pieces of the sort he rejected when it suited his own POV elsewhere.
Again, the only thing consistent about these actions is how they reflect on his POV. When his POV is presented no tag may be included absent a consensus for it (which is honestly kind of silly, if there were already a consensus then the article content would be adjusted), but when his POV is not given what he feels is its appropriate prominence the tag must remain absent a consensus to remove.
I understand this is a long complaint. I dont know how to demonstrate tendentious editing without exceeding 500 words as the act is defined by a long term pattern and not just one or two diffs. I also understand it deals with content, but I think the evidence demonstrates continued tendentious editing and not merely a content dispute. One cannot make opposing sides of the same argument and pretend that they are two individual content disputes. Either Icewhiz feels that blogs may not be used or that they may. Either Icewhiz feels that opinion pieces may not be used or they may. Either Icewhiz feels tags may not be removed without a consensus or they may. Icewhiz apparently feels all these things, it just depends on what POV is under discussion. That is, to my understanding, textbook tendentious editing.
@Sandstein: I've dated the diffs, however I dont think their age makes them stale. The very nature of WP:TE is that it requires showing a pattern. A pattern is something that occurs over time. How would one show a pattern over time without showing diffs from the past? nableezy - 18:10, 9 April 2019 (UTC) Yes Icewhiz, I called this claim that this established a consensus a lie. Because it says "no consensus". Calling something that says "no consensus" "a consensus for language in this article" can best be described as what exactly? nableezy - 19:20, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
I suppose Sandstein may be right and AE is not well suited to such a request. But, Sandstein, it is exactly a person who is not interested in the subject that should be looking at this. Just look at the bullets for tendentious editing regarding sources. Can an editor be acting in good faith when they both support the use of a blog by an unnamed person with an h-index of 0 and then reject the use of a blog by an established expert on the topic because her h-index is 5? Can an editor be acting in good faith when they remove op-eds by non-experts published in reliable sources because they are op-eds by non-experts and then also add op-eds by non-experts and respond that its fine because it was published by a reliable source? Ignore the content entirely. Can an editor in good faith make such opposing arguments? Or is it tendentious editing when their arguments flip depending on POV? nableezy - 14:59, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Discussion concerning IcewhizStatements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Statement by IcewhizDue to the extreme length of the complaint, with diffs ranging back almost a year, I can not respond in 500 words and address each accusation here. I will note that in regards to the trim to Israeli occupation of the West Bank (which I discussed prior, after, and initiated Talk:Israeli occupation of the West Bank#RfC: Article size that resulted in the article being trimmed in the end) - I already responded in Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive245#Icewhiz - closed "Not actionable; content dispute". I can explain all my actions, though I will note I am not a robot and that my view of Wikipedia policy has evolved over time (e.g. today I am much less of an inclusionist in relation to a year ago). Admins - please point out which diffs I should respond to, if at all. I do want to raise the immediate background to this complaint: Israeli permit system in the West Bank. Nableezy moved it from "system" to "regime", after 2.5 days of discussion (Talk:Israeli permit system in the West Bank#name), 02:06, 12 March 2019. After his move was challenged, he 14:56, 19 March 2019 move warred. Not only that - he opened an ANI against Wikieditor19920 who challenged him (closed no action, Oshwah moved the article through a few different titles - until it moved back to system). At ANI - Nableezy repeatedly called me "dishonest" (after I challenged his assertion that "regime" was the stable form of the title) - [28][29]. A subsequent Talk:Israeli permit system in the West Bank#Requested move 19 March 2019 closed with "system" remaining. Nableezy then decided, 21:57, 7 April 2019, to add a direct-quote to the lede from one (of the minority) of sources that uses "regime". When I challenged this quote by Berda in the lede, that resulted in 2 out 3 sentences in the lede being sourced to Berda (sentence 2 already containing her definition - from a published source) - my edit summary wasn't just "BLOGS", it was "WP:BLOGS. No need for direct quote in lead.". I further expanded my argument on talk - diff - that presenting Berda twice in the lede, was UNDUE, and that there was no need to use unpublished work here (as published work is not lacking - including published work by Berda). I did not challenge Berda as a source overall - I challenged the direct quote, from an academic blog (as opposed to her published work), specifically in the lede. In last few days (7-8 April), in the permit system talk page Nableezy has called me or my edits/arguments: "dishonest"/"deceitful"[30]. I requested him to strike these statements (as a personal attack) [31], which he refused. He continue to use language such as "lying"[32], "dishonest arguments"[33][34], "being dishonest",[35]. He did not strike "being dishonest" even after admitting "you are right".[36] (this in regards to this source,[1] which uses "regimen" in a sub-title and in paragraph2 (further down there is a regime) and which we were quoting in the citation as "regimen"). In References
Statement by Sir JosephThere is so much to say here, especially considering that many of the diffs are old, and that this is just a wall of text and trying to blast yet another opponent out of the sphere. I will just note one thing, Nableezy complains that Icewhiz says Finkelstein is biased, of course he's biased, indeed, the very first sentence of his article calls him an activist, "Norman Gary Finkelstein (/ˈfɪŋkəlˌsteɪn/; born December 8, 1953) is an American political scientist, activist, professor, and author." Any serious editor in the IP area would not use Finkelstein as an unbiased source. If you do take this matter seriously, I urge you to take it with a grain of salt. Sir Joseph (talk) 17:35, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by GizzyCatBellaI would like to issue a solemn appeal to reviewing administrators to study this report in depth and with special attention. Additionally, please allow some time for other editors to share their comments and opinions.GizzyCatBella (talk) 20:17, 9 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by Wikieditor19920Having interacted with both parties, I regard this as a frivolous and vindictive report. Nableezy almost exclusively edits within the ARBPIA area with a distinct edge. If any of Icewhiz's edits, collectively or individually, are considered to show a discernible bias actionable under WP:TE, then an evaluation of Nableezy's contributions by that same standard would have to lead to equivalent or more severe sanctions. Also, the diffs provided could be attributed to errors in judgment or reading sources; in other words, mistakes made in good-faith. Hardly a compelling basis. I don't want to exceed my limit here, but Zero0000 should have disclosed in his statement below that he consulted with Nableezy about this report prior to its filing. Wikieditor19920 (talk) 14:56, 10 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by Stefka BulgariaI agree that too many diffs going back almost a year isn't helpful. Looking at Icewhiz's more recent edits, he seems to have been actively participating in TP discussions working with other editors in a level-headed manner. If there is a disagreement to the point a RfC/RSN/etc. is needed, then those would be more apt venues to explore. Other than that, I don't see a violation here by Icewhiz. Stefka Bulgaria (talk) 20:37, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Zero0000Icewhiz is an intelligent and knowledgeable person who could easily be one of our best editors. Alas, he doesn't want to be. His transparent purpose in the I/P area is to defend the good name of Israel by means of endless pov-pushing combined with endless tendentious argument. My honest opinion is that Icewhiz is one of the worst editors to have ever appeared in the I/P area of the project. I don't blame casual observers like Stefka for not seeing the problem at a glance. It takes longer experience to learn that nothing Icewhiz writes can be accepted without checking, and that "discussion" for him means writing anything, anything, that supports his pov. Nableezy restricted himself to self-contradictions. I won't. Here Icewhiz argues that an anonymous blacklist is a reliable source, and follows up with "McCarthyite" does not mean inaccurate.. He is way too experienced to actually believe that, but the blacklist fits Icewhiz's personal pov. Here he quotes from a Hebrew court ruling without telling us that the very next sentences give contrary context. (Basically, the ruling said that the charges were very serious but the evidence for them was insufficiently compelling; Icewhiz brought just the first part.) These examples are not aberrations but just Icewhiz being Icewhiz. Many of Icewhiz's talk page contributions can reasonably be called trolling. Nableezy's first case provides an example. Here he brings a dictionary definition of "doctored" to argue that a video which had purposefully been cut in order to change its meaning had not been doctored, even though the dictionary definition fits perfectly. I do not believe this was an argument in good faith; rather, Icewhiz' pov was in danger and he had to write something. Such lack of integrity is why the project would be better off without him. Zerotalk 03:33, 10 April 2019 (UTC) To Calthinus: "Tendentiously cutting" is a form of doctoring. But that is not the point, since nobody ever tried to put the word "doctored" into the article. Icewhiz didn't want the article to mention the fact that the Israeli army had cut the end off a recording in order to smear (per several reliable sources) a medico they had just killed in cold blood. Since it is impossible to argue for such censorship on a policy basis, Icewhiz chose instead to sideline the discussion by bringing a dictionary definition for a word used only on the talk page. Zerotalk 07:47, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
It's true that I discussed this case with Nableezy before it was opened, though he didn't (I think) follow any of my suggestions. We discussed it quite openly (not a single email) and if there is any rule against that I'd like to hear about it. This problem has been brewing a long time and I've often wished I had the time and stamina to open such a case myself. Zerotalk 15:14, 10 April 2019 (UTC) To Calthinus: It's a pity you entirely missed the point. I'm not going to repeat what I wrote already. This one incident is minor in isolation, but alas it is just one example of very many. Also, please read WP:AGF. It is a right that can be forfeited by misbehavior and this noticeboard is a place where evidence for that can be presented. Zerotalk 00:27, 12 April 2019 (UTC) To Calthinus: There was no disagreement over which word to use. That is your basic error in understanding. Zerotalk 00:48, 12 April 2019 (UTC) To Calthinus: You really don't get it. Icewhiz "disputed" the meaning of a word that nobody tried to use. That's not a disagreement over which word to use. Zerotalk 01:10, 12 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by CalthinusIf I had to sum up a number of things I despise about wiki, this would be a poster case ... alas this hairball could never be condensed to fit on a poster, not least because half of the crap involved is essentially fluff that is likely totally inscrutable to anyone not balls deep in Israel-Palestine wiki bloodletting. Alas, if they were, they couldn't possibly be impartial. Here's one of many points that I think illustrate the issue here - the statement by Zero above. It takes totally out of context an argument about semantics (in this case, the word "doctored" -- indeed something can be "tendentiously cut" and not be doctored -- as the NYTimes perhaps more correctly put it [[38]]) and tries to turn it into some case of "trolling". But most people in good faith would see a simple disagreement... unless they already hated one side's guts. Zero admits Icewhiz "could easily be one of our best editors" -- well the one thing I agree on is that his life on wiki might be more enjoyable if he didn't feel he had to constantly deal with ARBPIA matters, but that is his choice. As much as I hate to say it, what Zero sees as Icewhiz being some sort of manipulative, tendentious editor who the project would be better without (even though he "could be" one of the best if he "wanted to" -- very odd thing to say if you're also saying we should get rid of him), I think most observers would simply see a guy who is trying to stand up for what he believes in, and simply has a disagreement with someone who doesn't seem to be properly differentiating misalignment of opinions with lack of good faith.--Calthinus (talk) 06:33, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by LevivichI respectfully request the 500 word limit be enforced, as well as some reasonable measure of staleness (June 2018? Seriously?). Excessively long submissions prevent other editors (including admin) from participating, are unfair to the editor being reported, and to every other editor who has ever worked hard to reduce their AE posting down to 500 words. These standards should be applied equally to all editors. Thank you. Leviv ich 14:11, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by TracyMcClark@Calthinus: No reader would ever see this specific word since this is not about adding the word "doctored" to the article but about some editor using it on the talk page. Not a single editor suggested to add the word to the article. You got fooled by Icewhiz as intended and since it's not your first response here it's clear that you got fooled (at least) twice by the Icewhiz.--TMCk (talk) 23:01, 11 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by ZScarpiaThis Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) article states that the IDF video of Rouzan al-Najjar was edited in such a way as to deceive. That is, it 'was' doctored. One of the more over the top bits Icewhiz point-of-view pushing I've come across concerns the 'Freedom of Humanity' mural which featured in the current Labour Party Antisemitism controversy in the UK. It was alleged that the mural depicted antisemitic stereotypes and was therefore antisemitic. The artist defended it, giving the explanation that the figuress portrayed, rather than stereotypes, had been real-life bankers, most of whom were non-Jewish. In Icewhiz's opinion, stated on a variety of occasions, the artist's views are fringe and of no consequence. See the comment made here at 11:07, 10 March 2019 (UTC) for one example. ← ZScarpia 23:48, 12 April 2019 (UTC) Calthinus, 06:33, 10 April 2019 (UTC): "I think most observers would simply see a guy who is trying to stand up for what he believes in ...". Of course, the problem comes when an editor is so wedded to what he believes in that he fails to appreciate that it may only be a viewpoint. And sympathy would normally be conditioned on what beliefs were being stood up for. Didn't David Duke contribute here for a while? ← ZScarpia 00:04, 14 April 2019 (UTC) @Sir Joseph: please read what I wrote. It was alleged that the mural depicted "antisemitic stereotypes". The defence was that it depicted real people, most of whom were non-Jewish. ← ZScarpia 06:12, 14 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by NishidaniThe endless conflict in this area is all between those who read sources and the article circumstances precisely, and those who refuse to grasp the clear-cut distinctions made, and engage in spinning. Just one egregious example from this thread alone: Zero writes:The deliberate doctoring of the video by Israel is an important part of the story and must be presented in detail. Icewhiz replies:Zero himself (who) advocated (without citing any source) inclusion of "deliberate doctoring of the video" That the video in question was deliberately 'doctored'/'tampered with' to skew the facts is attested in numerous sources, and it matters not a jot which synonymous word you use. Zero did not advocate the use of the word 'doctored' without a source, (though it would have been easy to justify per the Jewish Weekly The Forward's source). He argued that the incident of tampering (which the article accepts, and which he happened to call doctoring) be thoroughly covered. In such persistent habits of distortion by shifting the goalposts to create a strawman argument and thread about what other editors write, turning observations into advocacy, lies the gravamen of the claim of tendentious editing. No one should deny the right of people with an extreme nationalist perspective the right to edit wikipedia, though their place here is best secured by meticulous adherence to policy, rather than throwing sand in the eyes of other editors about what constitutes policy, from edit to edit. That Icewhiz has extremist views is shown by his remark here, in which he identified mainstream pacific centrist scholars of world distinction as on the fringes of the Israeli radical left. Avishai Margalit, David Dean Shulman, Baruch Kimmerling, Zeev Sternhell, Yehuda Elkana and their likes are, for Icecwhiz, not centre-left, not left-wing, not radical left, but dangerously beyond even extremist leftism, something like little red book waving deviationists from the official line. I have no problem with extremists, as long as they stick to the rules, rather than game them. Nishidani (talk) 09:18, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
Result concerning Icewhiz
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Arbitration enforcement action appeal by David Tornheim
Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found here. According to the procedures, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved administrators" 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).
- Appealing user
- David Tornheim (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) – --David Tornheim (talk) 09:35, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
- Sanction being appealed
- Topic ban from the subject of GMOs imposed here at WP:AE on July 2016. Also the appeal of that decision in July 2016 at WP:ARCA before the original case had closed. ([41], [42])
- Administrator imposing the sanction
- Seraphimblade (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
- Notification of that administrator
- Notified 09:40, 11 April 2019
Statement by David Tornheim
- I am appealing my topic ban from GMO’s imposed in July 2016—almost three years ago. Of course, I have not made any edits in the area since then.
- I was blocked a few days after the topic ban for this post on Jimbo’s page which links to GMO talk page comments. That is the only time I have ever been blocked.
- The only other action by an admin against me in the nearly three years since I have been topic banned is this warning in an area unrelated to GMOs.
- If my topic ban is lifted, I will help keep the area up to date with the most recent science using the best reliable sources.
- I think my edit history speaks for itself that I have been a net positive for Wikipedia.
- Recent and long-term interests:
- Removing vandalism (using Huggle)
- Articles for Deletion (WP:AfD)
- Helping new editors who have fallen astray of the rules and are on the road to being blocked or banned--especially those who make the same mistakes I made when I was new
- History -- I recently created an article on Richard Clough Anderson Sr. and fixed all the confusion between him and his son Richard Clough Anderson Jr.
- Historic architecture
- Geology
- Politics
- If this topic ban is lifted, I will be a productive and collegial editor in this topic area.
- I have learned my lesson. Three years has been enough time for me to reflect on how to improve my editing behavior and mature as an editor. At the time I was topic banned, I was still a relative newbie with probably less than half of the edits I have now. I have since learned how to address conflict by working collaboratively. I recently spent a day at a Wiki-conference and met many real life editors, and this also helped me better understand Wikipedians, their interests, their personalities, and their priorities—something that is hard to really understand from simply editing on-line.
- Thanks for your consideration. --David Tornheim (talk) 09:35, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
- I do not want to be perceived as combative, because my focus is being collaborative and collegial even when disagreeing with other editors.
- Regarding "I ___________, and in the future I'll __________."
- I will focus on content, not editors.
- Posting the things I did at Jimbo’s page was a pretty bad idea. I am appalled and ashamed by the post I got blocked for on Jimbo’s page after the topic ban. I have no idea why I was naive enough to think that would not have consequences.
- Without hesitation, I can categorically promise that I will not talk about GMOs on Jimbo’s page. Although I had thought of Jimbo’s page as a public forum, I do not intend to advertise any more RfCs on his page or mention other editors’ behavior. Again, I will focus on content, not editors. I rarely post at Jimbo's page and that is unlikely to change.
By the end of March 2015, he was participating relatively routinely at ANI.…especially given that, by the time the topic ban was implemented, multiple warnings had already been given.
- I think this illustrates that I was a newbie who did not fully understand the rules and Wikipedia norms, which was exactly why I got those warnings and the topic ban. I tell newbies not to participate at AN/I, unless accused. At that time, I posted way too often at AN/I, which was a mistake that has taken time to learn from. Now I rarely post there: It is better to work collaboratively and collegially.
- This warning cited to justify the topic ban was because I was a newbie and did not understand WP:BLUDGEON. For a long time, I thought it was perfectly okay to disagree with numerous editors at an action. After reading WP:BLUDGEON, I know now that’s not acceptable, and I do not do that now. I have learned the value of brevity.
- Those warnings were a learning process for me. Because I have learned from them, I have not been blocked since, and have only had the one recent warning.
- Is there anything else you feel I did wrong that I have not owned up to for which you seek further assurances?
- --David Tornheim (talk) 06:57, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- Past editing:
- Regarding updating the science: This is the kind of edit where I added an updated scientific review article. It is still in the article. How is such an update "disruptive"?
- Meanwhile, issues concerning obsolete studies in a similar article that are non-WP:MEDRS, non-WP:MEDDATE compliant have languished for 7 months ([43],[44]). Glyphosate-based herbicides repeatedly references this obsolete 16 year-old report (and this 22 year-old report) which has been superseded by this 2011 report commissioned for the same agency. There are not enough editors left in GMOs to make the correction. Are GMOs and pesticides somehow exempt from our sourcing rules? --David Tornheim (talk) 22:57, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Seraphimblade
A couple of things concern me about this request. The first is a lack of specifics. Learned lessons about what? Won't do what again? If this appeal is intended to be based upon understanding what went wrong and undertaking not to have it happen again, I would want to see specifics as to "I ___________, and in the future I'll (not do that and/or __________ instead)."
The second is the recent (~5 months ago) warning for canvassing on Jimbo's talk page. That's very reminiscent of the behavior that led to the topic ban to begin with; indeed, inappropriate use of that page was brought up at the AE request that led to the topic ban. Also, I quite honestly find the characterization of these incidents as "relative newbie" mistakes to be rather misleading. David Tornheim's first edits were in 2008, and while there were several long (sometimes years long) breaks in between editing periods then, his first editing as a routine practice began on 10 February 2015, in the GMO topic area. By the end of March 2015, he was participating relatively routinely at ANI. So to claim that he was a clueless newbie in July of 2016 is, I think, rather difficult to swallow (especially given that, by the time the topic ban was implemented, multiple warnings had already been given; this was not a bolt from the blue). I also find the point by Kingofaces43 to be well in order. This wasn't a case of an editor one time losing their cool and engaging in an edit war or throwing around aspersions, it was a long period of disruption despite repeated warnings to stop. If it weren't for the recent canvassing incident, I might be inclined to say the ban can be easily reinstated, but given that I really question what those lessons learned were and would be inclined to decline the request. I wouldn't necessarily feel that way indefinitely, and it's certainly not to say that the contributions in other areas aren't appreciated as they certainly are, but I'm not convinced that rejoining the GMO area is the right way to go at this point in time. Seraphimblade Talk to me 00:37, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Kingofaces43
As the one who filed the initial AE, I do have some significant concerns here. The main ones being why David would want to edit in this topic again at this time and if they're truly addressing the core behavior that caused the problem here.
If you read through the AE and evidence throughout it, their behavior had been stirring up other editors for quite some time, leading to multiple editors being sanctioned for partaking in WP:ASPERSIONS. That is a principle I outlined more in the AE that we had to pass specific to GMO/pesticide topics.[45] David's topic-ban largely finally settled down the topic for years, so there should be a very high bar for saying that preventative measure isn't needed anymore. We've been having troubles with other editors at recent AEs with similar issues, so there is a high risk of the topic being disrupted even more if that behavior starts again in even the slightest. Their last warning on canvassing, reminiscent of their previous behavior seen in the GMO/pesticide topic, was also about five months ago, not three years as David put it.
The other area is that David frequently tried to insert WP:FRINGE material claiming there wasn't a scientific consensus on GMO safety, etc. claiming RS's said so. [46] Normally, topic-bans in fringe areas are there to prevent the rest of the community's time from being sucked up, and as admins mentioned at the AE (especially MastCell), our time had already been significantly taken up with David's actions that were more expansive than the acute issues at that AE.
For both of those things, I don't see anything specific in their response clearly showing the battleground behavior with related aspersions or the fringe advocacy would really stop. It's saying they did ok in other areas, but there's obviously a catch-22 in that you can't know how an editor off their ban will behave until they are back in the topic. That should also be weighed with how serious the behavior was towards disrupting the topic as a whole and how easily the topic can be disrupted again. While there is technically room to appeal, that is significantly narrowed when it looks to admins like David is better off sticking to their new topics. Kingofaces43 (talk) 23:01, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Aircorn
I watch, or try to watch, every GMO related page (I don't include pesticides as GMO) and can not recall any edits in this area from David since his topic ban. I actually didn't mind David too much when he was editing outside the GMO safety kerfuffle as I found them reasonably easy to work with, especially giving our conflicting views. In fact I kinda liked that he didn't just entrench himself in the GMOs are safe/dangerous debate like so many others. I even thought we may have worked well together on Genetic engineering in fiction at one point. It has been a pretty stable area recently (outside of Roundup which I don't personally consider part of the GMO suite) and we have finally got some decent articles up. It would be a shame to go back to the old ways of having to argue every point incessantly and they unfortunately carry a bit of baggage from before in this regard. However, we have the safety stuff bound by possibly the highest form of consensus here so there is little harm of that blowing up again.
I am not a fan of forcing editors to grovel on past mistakes, but I would like to know more specifics on what they actually want to edit within these articles. I will help keep the area up to date with the most recent science using the best reliable sources
is the only real indication and while that sounds good it can be problematic. Recent science are not always the best sources to use, especially if they are primary studies and contradict other more established ones. In many ways this was one of the catalysts of the safety drama and something David, although he was not alone in this, had problems with.
Three years is a long time in Wikipedia. If they have been editing productively in other areas then I personally would not be against giving them a second chance. AIRcorn (talk) 10:33, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Hijiri88
I don't see any good reason to remove this ban. David violated it almost immediately violated it while essentially denying he was subject to it, was blocked, then left the project for a while. He came back and started taking a "let the world burn" attitude to administrative procedures, apparently as "revenge" for his own TBAN, and even started hounding the users he blamed for his TBAN, like Jytdog, and even random bystanders, like MPants. If it weren't for his perhaps sometimes good content edits, I'd be actively pushing for his restriction to be extended to a siteban, since I honestly can't figure out how such an uncollaborative editor has managed to survive here as long as he has. We certainly shouldn't be rewarding his behaviour by lifting what restrictions he already has. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:32, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Also, the repeated blatant canvassing and IDHT regarding the same, and harassment of those who called him out about it. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 07:41, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- @Atsme: The question should really be whether it stopped disruption on the part of David Tornheim and caused him to reflect on his behaviour; I'm seeing little by way of self-reflection or apology in the above for any of David's misbehaviour since his ban, and so he really shouldn't be rewarded for this behaviour by having his one editing restriction repealed. He also hasn't explained his skirting the bounds of the ban last summer, including his repeated hounding of the editors he blames for his ban right down to their being indef-blocked for completely unrelated reasons (note that he kept beating that dead horse until one minute before the editor was blocked). The fact that he was only directly blocked once is not evidence that he's been respecting the spirit of his ban. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 03:58, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Atsme
I agree with Aircorn - 3 yrs...seriously. Did it truly stop disruption? No, it did not. It's a controversial topic. I say give him a chance. What harm is there in giving someone a chance? What happened to AGF? Atsme Talk 📧 23:42, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Tryptofish
Despite having been on opposing "sides" of the original GMO dispute, I like David personally, and I remember not too long ago complimenting him on some excellent advice he gave to a newbie editor about how to avoid conflicts. So I fully agree with him that he has a good track record of making helpful contributions. But that doesn't mean that he needs to have the restriction lifted, or that the GMO topic area would benefit if it were. David says as of now that these two discussions show that "[t]here are not enough editors left in GMOs to make the correction." That assertion worries me. Those two discussions were initiated by another editor who was subsequently AE topic-banned from GMOs, and the talk page discussions that followed indicated that the content issues are not quite as simple as David's comments here seem to indicate. Just a few weeks ago, there was a small flare-up of the GMO disputes that, thankfully, quieted down pretty quickly, and the last thing that we need is to reignite that again. I said myself barely two weeks ago that I was looking to update the sourcing on glyphosate and that I intend to make revisions that would correct some POV issues that remain from the old sourcing: [47], [48]. For personal reasons, I've temporarily decreased the amount of my editing over these past two weeks, so I haven't yet made those revisions, but that hardly amounts to an urgent problem that requires more editors. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:19, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by (editor)
Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by David Tornheim
Result of the appeal by David Tornheim
- This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
- Decline appeal per Seraphimblade. There's a fine line between "The sanction is working at preventing disruption" and "The sanction no longer serves a purpose because disruption is unlikely to occur again." Right now, I think we're at "the sanction is working at preventing disruption", and I don't see a reason to make lift it. TonyBallioni (talk) 17:17, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- Comment I'm on the fence. On the face it seems like a reasonable appeal and I would lean towards granting it per WP:ROPE. On the other hand though I'm unfamiliar with this particular topic area I understand the concerns about borderline Battleground behavior, fringe, and POV pushing. It's easy to say "I will help keep the area up to date with the most recent science using the best reliable sources" but it is also not difficult to POV push by cherry picking from high quality sources. So I guess my question for David is, are you willing to compartmentalize whatever your own personal views might be, and to do your best to actually write from the POV of the best reliable sources? (See Wikipedia:Writing for the opponent for an idea of what I'm talking about.) ~Awilley (talk) 20:36, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
BullRangifer
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 BullRangifer
- User who is submitting this request for enforcement
- Rusf10 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) 18:44, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- User against whom enforcement is requested
- BullRangifer (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Search DS alerts: in user talk history • in system log
- Sanction or remedy to be enforced
- Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/American politics 2 :
- Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
- 4/12/19 Asserts with no evidence that Attorney General Bill Barr lied to congress lied to congress to "please his boss". WP:BLPTALK
- 4/12/19 Makes the same claim about Barr again and suggest that block/bans are necessary for those who disagree. Also, says Barr "just riled up Trump's base, the ones who believe this and other conspiracy theories, and who now come here to misuse Wikipedia to push their political agenda." WP:BLPTALK
- 4/12/19 Tells an established editor that he should be topic-banned and is pushing fringe beliefs. WP:PERSONALATTACK
- 4/12/19 Suggests that regular editors are pushing conspiracy theories, need topic bans, and are incompetent without providing evidence. WP:PERSONALATTACK
- 4/12/19 WP:HOUNDs an other editor, demanding that respond to him immediately and again suggests Barr is a conspiracy theorist.
- 3/27/19 Calls Barr's ""impartiality" is a farce" and that "his impartiality is not evident or to be expected." WP:BLPTALK
- Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
- 7/20/18 Received a warning for personal attacks on another Donald Trump related page.
- 3/13/19 Received yet another warning for personal attacks on a Donald Trump related page.
- If discretionary sanctions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts)
- Received DS alert 1/24/19 [49]
- The above warnings have occurred in the past 12 months.
- Additional comments by editor filing complaint
BullRangifer routinely labels editors he disagrees with (particularly any that speak favorably about Donald Trump) as fringe and conspiracy theorists and tells them they need to be topic-banned. This type of behavior is extremely disruptive and he has been warned repeatedly. Furthermore, he has also suggested (without evidence) that Attorney General Bill Barr lied to congress about spying that may have occurred during the 2016 elections just to please his boss (Donald Trump)and to "riled up Trump's base, the ones who believe this and other conspiracy theories, and who now come here to misuse Wikipedia to push their political agenda." Besides a BLP violation, this is the type of blog-style rhetoric that we do not need here. Given his WP:POLEMIC essay [50], WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior, and disregard of previous warnings (see above), I strongly recommend that some type of action is taken this time (not just another warnings).--Rusf10 (talk) 18:44, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
@Sandstein:- I'm sorry I wasn't more clear in my original filing. The suggestion that Bill Barr's statement to congress "I believe spying did occur" was made only to please his boss is an obvious WP:BLPTALK violation. Lying to congress is a crime and to suggest that Bill Barr did this without any proof should not be tolerated. Telling other editors that they are "pushing fringe beliefs" and should be topic-banned amounts to WP:PERSONALATTACKs. I also added an additional diff.--Rusf10 (talk) 21:28, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
@Aquillion:The evidence you presented against me is absurd. By your own admission, these are at most minor violations. And I would say most of them, don't even rise to that level. Do you honestly think there is something wrong with using the phrase "muddying the waters" or telling someone they are making a strawman's argument is a problem? These are just alternate ways of telling someone they are bringing something irrelevant into the discussion.--Rusf10 (talk) 21:40, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
@Phmoreno:You are correct, BullRangifer's behavior is unacceptable and so is Volunteer Marek's. I purposely ignored his Wikipedia:Wikilawyering below, knowing that it contained many misrepresentations (which you did a good job of pointing out). I didn't even bother to look into his allegation against you, which he did not support with diffs. He accused me of not providing any evidence, yet I did. @Volunteer Marek: where is your evidence against Phmoreno? Provide diffs, otherwise your statement below constitutes a personal attack and WP:ASPERSIONS--Rusf10 (talk) 03:32, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
@Volunteer Marek: first of all, I am NOT your buddy. Second, with the exception of the first diff, you just provided them now and there are still other claims you made that you still ahve not provided diffs for, so do not accuse me of lying and then think that everyone else here is too stupid to realize. Now that you actually provided diffs: 1. [51] there is no consensus on using the Epoch Times as a relaible source as per WP:RSP2. [52] misrepresentation, the editor did not call Phmoreno fringe, but was asking for sources to avoid the appearance of WP:FRINGE 3. [53] quoting Devin Nunes, am I missing something here?--Rusf10 (talk) 04:06, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
@Sandstein, Awilley, Timotheus Canens, and Masem: Because "Boomerangs" are now being called for, I felt the need to fully defend myself against USER:Aquillion's allegations since he omitted context when presenting diffs against me. With the exception of the muddying the water comment, which has been blown out of proportion, my comments were in response to other inappropriate statements including those made by BullRangifer. Since it is too long for me to post here, I created a new page to respond fully: User:Rusf10/Response to Allegations--Rusf10 (talk) 03:25, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested
Discussion concerning BullRangifer
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 BullRangifer
Statement by Volunteer Marek
This is some gross misrepresentations by Rusf10. Let's see
- "Asserts with no evidence that Attorney General Bill Barr lied to congress " - FALSE, what BR said is that Barr's words were "uncertain, off-hand, without evidence, spoken to please his boss, and he's pulled back on what he said", all of which can and is supported by sources on the related article's talk page.
- " suggest that block/bans are necessary for those who disagree" FALSE, there's not a damn thing in that diff that mentions blocking or banning anyone. And regarding BR's comment about those "who now come here to misuse Wikipedia to push their political agenda.", what's wrong with it? The title of the freakin' discussion thread this is referring to is "Meatpuppetry at Spygate from r/The_Donald" (with plenty of evidence provided by User:Starship.paint to show that there is indeed a coordinated effort going on to disrupt Wikipedia in order to push a political agenda)
- Tells an established editor that he should be topic-banned and is pushing fringe beliefs." Uhh, because it's true? User:Phmoreno has tried for awhile now to insert unreliable fringe and conspiracy sources into these Wikipedia articles. Like something called theconservativetreehouse [55] or a conspiracy book by some guy from Alex Jones's Infowars show [56] [57] (I apologize ahead of time for those links) [58] [59]. [60]. Here is Phmoreno referring to reliable, mainstream sources as " fake news propaganda" and asserting that we need to "tell what really happened" (i.e. push a nutty conspiracy theory on our readers) Here is another editor observing that Phmoreno is trying to push WP:FRINGE beliefs [61] (User:Darknipples at bottom of section) Here is Phmoreno claiming that there has been a "failed coup d'etat" against Trump [62]. I mean, if that isn't fringe wacky shit, I don't know what is. In this section when asked to provide sources for his fringe assertions, Phmoreno first replies "I don't have time", then provides this garbage. Just looks through that websites front page and tell me that someone who takes this shit seriously has any business editing articles on American politics. Etc. There's more examples of this WP:NOTHERE kind of behavior from Phmoreno that can be easily provided (let me know)
- Ditto
- Yeah... pointing out that we follow policies on Wikipedia is NOT WP:HOUNDING. But you know what might be? Filing bad faithed dishonest WP:AE requests.
Rusf10 makes the accusation that "BullRangifer routinely labels editors he disagrees with (particularly any that speak favorably about Donald Trump) as fringe and conspiracy theorists". No. BR does point it out when some editors try to use conspiracy theorists or fringe sources on Wikipedia. But that's the fault of the people who try to pull this stuff, not BRs. He does NOT "label editors he disagrees with" in GENERAL in such terms, neither routinely or otherwise. Rusf10 has not provided ANY evidence to support that false accusations so this constitutes a personal attack and WP:ASPERSIONS
This is WP:BOOMERANG worthy.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:57, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
@Phmoreno - the diff you link to is a different diff that Rusf10 linked to that I was discussing. So your "Actually" is kind of... false.
It is also utterly dishonest of you to claim that I said John Solomon is "garbage". I called THIS SOURCE YOU TRIED TO USE "garbage". Because it is. As is obvious with even a cursory glance at the article in question or the main website of whatever that is [63]. Please retract your false statement.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:30, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
And dude, your whole "I will do a presentation" thing sounds like a freakin' super creepy threat. That alone should get you sanctioned.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:33, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Hey User:Rusf10, buddy. If you actually read my comment you'll note that it is chuck full of "evidence". There's a diff or link for everything. So stop pretending otherwise. You're not fooling anyone, people can read you know. You say "he did not support with diffs". Here is a diff I provided. Here is a diff I provided. Here is a link I provided to a relevant discussion ([64]). Here is a a link I provided to a relevant discussion ([65]). EVERYTHING I said was diff'd and supported. So stop lying. People can read.
And I did NOT accuse you of "not providing evidence". Buddy. I accused you of providing FALSE evidence. As in claiming a diff says one thing, when it actually says another. For example - again - you claim that in this diff BR accuses Burr of "lying". He does not. He says something else.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:46, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Please note that after I pointed out that Phmoreno was making false claims about what I said he changed his wording to make it look like I was the one misrepresenting him. Not struck it. Changed it straight up. He's been around for a very long time, so he knows that that kind of thing is sketchy.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:03, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Aquillion
The groundless nature of Rusf10's request is detailed above, but I'll point out that Rusf10 himself has unclean hands in this topic area, perhaps to the point of WP:BOOMERANG. A few combative diffs from the past month:
- Accuses someone of
muddying the waters
, twice, for raising concerns over meatpuppetry. 4/11/2019 4/11/2019 (Note that the page now has 300/50 protection due to obvious meatpuppetry that was, in fact, occurring during that discussion; see discussion here.) - Calls someone's summary of a source a
strawman's argument
. 3/25/2019. And the crusade against Fox News continues...
3/24/2019Again, you are so blinded by your own bias, you have no idea what you are talking about.
3/23/2019.- On BullRangifer's talk page:
I would be very careful with trying to promote conspiracy theories about why Roger Ailes created Fox News or what his intentions were. That's a BLP violation and consider yourself warned.
3/22/2019, in relation to [66]. First, Ailes died nearly two years ago (putting him at the very limit of what BLP might be considered to apply to, even in far more extreme cases than this). Second, this aspect of his biography is well-established and extensively discussed in reliable sources; while it may not have universal support, it's not something that could be a WP:BLP violation. Threatening someone with BLP over it almost two years after Ailes' death is therefore an unambiguous abuse of process. He coupled this with a BLP sanctions warning; while such notices don't imply wrongdoing, it is hard to accept that Rusf10 thought that an editor as experienced as BullRangifer was unfamiliar with BLP or its sanctions - in other words, he was abusing process and notices to try and intimidate an editor. Please don't patronize me.
3/18/2019Your response is the exactly the reaction I expected.
3/18/2019If you're going to call me out, at least do so by name.
3/18/2019 Note that the editor was not, as far as I can tell, calling him out in any way.
Individually some of these are minor, but this is over the course of less than a month (and he wasn't hugely prolific in that time period); together they show an WP:UNCIVIL, combative style, a WP:BATTLEGROUND approach to the topic area, a refusal to WP:AGF, and a desire to abuse process in an effort to intimidate or remove editors he disagrees with - especially BullRangifer in particular. --Aquillion (talk) 20:54, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Phmoreno
I agree with what Rusf10 presented.
In my upcoming lecture on propaganda and ideological subversion I will show the audience a screen projection of a Wikipedia Talk page on one of these anti-Trump articles and give examples of the standard tactics these propagandists use: attack the sources as being unreliable or not permitted when primary (both usually not supported by Wikipedia policy), slant the narrative by prohibiting anything that contradicts the left wing talking points and finally attacking editors who try to write something truthful. I will also show how contrary narratives are labeled as "conspiracy theories" or "fringe" or "far-right fringe", phrases which BullRanger uses with great frequency. (BullRanger will be one of the editors I will highlight.) After I gather feedback I will turn my presentation into an article and have it posted on a website that gets several million daily views.
In response to VolunteerMarek:
2. Marek takes issue with Rusf10: "suggest that block/bans are necessary for those who disagree" FALSE. Actually, the diff 4/12/19 states :* You're still calling RS "fake news"? That should earn you a topic ban for working against our RS policy. That repeated claim is evidence you are NOTHERE to follow our policies, but to push your fringe beliefs based on unreliable sources. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 15:01, 12 April 2019 (UTC) I was calling the article "fake news", not the sources (although there is a recent article listing 32 false claims by MS media on Trump topics); however, BullRanger needs to read the reliable sources policy. Notice BullRanger: attacks the sources, mis-states WP:RS, threatens me with a topic ban, labels my views "fringe beliefs".
3.1 Attacks my sources. Also fails to mention numerous times that I have cited The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal andThe Hill(John Solomon).
3.2 VolunteerMarek bends the truth about my statement by saying " Phmoreno first replies "I don't have time", then provides this garbage". I did post a reference and here is what I actually said:
I do not have time to post them all.[1]
- 3.3(
Calls John Solomon article "garbage". The article is about something Solomon wrote. Solomon is considered to be the leading reporter on this story.
In summary, editors like BullRanger have destroyed the credibility of Wikipedia Trump related articles. This has been pointed out numerous times on the Talk pages. The only good thing I can say is that this is such bad propaganda that it is recognized as such by any half informed or sensible reader.Phmoreno (talk) 03:12, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- ^ "FBI email chain may provide most damning evidence of FISA abuses yet". Foxnews.com. 2019-03-25. Retrieved 2019-04-12.
Statement by Geogene
Phmoreno just made a threat [67] that should result in an immediate indefinite block, under the same principle as WP:NLT (chilling speech). Geogene (talk) 03:32, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by MrX
Masem, would you please move your comments out of the 'Results concerning...' section per the italicized instructions. You are involved in the recent disputes on the article.- MrX 🖋 12:21, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Masem, you are involved. In fact, you initiated a content dispute over the title of the page, giving your (incorrect, evidence-free) opinion that
"This page must be moved back to "Spygate (conspiracy theory)" to avoid the immediate BLP problem, as well as to meet the conciseness needed for disambiguation terms, and in case anyone that gets here thinking this is the NFL one, a hatnote is sufficient to point them to the right direction."
[68] It doesn't matter how you arrived at the page, or that you"made no other discussion regarding content"
(you have frequently weighed in on content disputes related to Donald Trump). You initiated a content dispute and now you are attempting to adjudicate a conduct dispute about participants in the content dispute. You can't do that. Is it going to be necessary to request clarification from Arbcom on this? By the way, this is not first time that I have protested about you violating WP:INVOLVED and ignoring the instructions on this page: This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators..- MrX 🖋 14:39, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Awilley, try harder. I have shown seven diffs of his direct involvement with the content. The evidence is crystal clear, but we can let Arbcom explain to the community why admins are allowed to flaunt policy and Arbcom procedures when it suits their content preferences.- MrX 🖋 19:45, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Masem
(The following content was moved out of the uninvolved admin section. I still strongly disagree that in this specific content dispute I am involved for discussing the question of the article title, but rather not divert the discussion from the matter raised at AE --Masem (t) 20:05, 13 April 2019 (UTC))
- Agree that there's no action either way, outside that all users are showing BATTLEGROUND behavior in regards to sourcing. We're not going to use sources that clearly fail RS, but at the same time, there is room to discuss the nature of how the RSes are reporting on the matter with regards to WP:YESPOV. Sticking to either of these points is inflaming the other view. Neither side is showing any compromise. Recommend TROUTs around, but caution that another flairup would likely require action across the board. (Comment: I have participated in a discussion related to the title of the Spygate page but make no claims or comments about this specific content dispute, so consider myself uninvolved to that point.) --Masem (t) 22:45, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- To response to Mr. X above, I reiterate the point here: I do not consider myself involved in this specific content dispute: the only contribution on the page I did was when I saw the page title (as "Spygate (Donald Trump conspiracy theory)" appear at the edit warring noticeboard, and expressed concern that the page needed to be renamed to something shorter to meet naming policy and avoid the potential BLP. I'm also writing this response before I go to responde to a ping that named me regarding a name change on that page. I have made no other discussion regarding content and certainly not around the specific disputed area here. --Masem (t) 14:07, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- Agree that there's no action either way, outside that all users are showing BATTLEGROUND behavior in regards to sourcing. We're not going to use sources that clearly fail RS, but at the same time, there is room to discuss the nature of how the RSes are reporting on the matter with regards to WP:YESPOV. Sticking to either of these points is inflaming the other view. Neither side is showing any compromise. Recommend TROUTs around, but caution that another flairup would likely require action across the board. (Comment: I have participated in a discussion related to the title of the Spygate page but make no claims or comments about this specific content dispute, so consider myself uninvolved to that point.) --Masem (t) 22:45, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by My very best wishes
I think only diff #3 by BullRangifer [69] maybe a little problematic, simply as criticizing another contributor on article talk page. However, that contributor was recently indefinitely blocked [70]. All other comments by BullRangifer were either about content or comments on the WP:ANI which serves to discuss the behavior by other contributors. Therefore, I do not think any sanctions against BullRangifer would be appropriate here (agree with Sandstein). On the other hand, this is clearly a battleground request (the 3rd one) by the filer. Therefore, some sanctions against Rusf10 could be appropriate. My very best wishes (talk) 20:10, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- So, I would really recommend closing this case as "no action", especially taking into account that some of the admins are active in the area of US politics, which is good, but might create an impression of bias. My very best wishes (talk) 18:07, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Atsme
This whole AP2 fiasco has gotten way out of hand. The bias is obvious. It's sad to see our admins being pressured into making decisions they don't want to make but are forced to in order to keep the peace. It's no longer about maintaining NPOV for the sake of the project - it's a war between the left and the right unlike anything I've ever seen before in my lifetime, and I've been around a long time. Masem has been one of the most neutral and above-board admins I've seen since I became a WP editor, and he has not always decided in my favor. I've always believed that Sandstein was one of the few pragmatists we have left, and I've followed his decisions; all were based on what he believed was fair and reasonable. I like BullRangifer as a person and considered him a wikifriend but he has gone overboard and needs to be reeled-in. It's not just him - this obsession or hatred for Trump is tearing us apart, and it has to stop. Volunteer Marek is unrelenting, yet rarely are we seeing any decisive actions taken against them - the few times I've seen were shortlived. Glaring evidence has been presented but I already know what's going to happen - some of it already has, and it's sad because it hurts the project in the long term. Atsme Talk 📧 22:03, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by (username)
Result concerning BullRangifer
- This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
- I would take no action because the request does not explain how these edits violate any applicable conduct policy - except for one allegation of "hounding", but a single edit cannot constitute evidence of this. Sandstein 21:04, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
- (my response moved to above section --Masem (t) 20:05, 13 April 2019 (UTC))
- I would still take no action. It is true that editorializing and politicking on a talk page is inappropriate. Talk pages exist to discuss source-based changes to articles, not to speculate about the motives, etc., of political actors (WP:NOTFORUM). But that does not rise to the level of requiring sanctions, unless it happens to such a degree that it disrupts useful discussion. This has not been alleged here. I also do not think that criticizing a prominent national politician (who, as a public figure, must expect all sorts of criticism) on a talk page violates BLPTALK to a degree requiring sanctions, even though, as mentioned, it is inappropriate. Likewise, I agree that editors must not attack one another. But they may tell others that their conduct is at odds with Wikipedia's values, as BullRangifer did when the now-blocked Phmoreno made blanket dismissals of reliable sources as "fake news propaganda". To the extent that BullRangifer may have been too confrontative, I think that they did not do so to a degree that warrants sanctions. Sandstein 13:43, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- (my response moved to above section --Masem (t) 20:05, 13 April 2019 (UTC))
- Just noting that I indefinitely blocked User:Phmoreno per User:Geogene. Phmoreno knows about NLT blocks and the chilling effect they have and his edit above and in his sandbox[71] have the same effect and are unacceptable. Doug Weller talk 12:56, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- It is hard not to see this report as a continuation of [72] and [73]. This is the third time in a year that Rusf10 has filed AE requests against Bullrangifer, and each time Bullrangifer gets criticized for making overly personal comments and Rusf10 gets criticized for filing contentious reports against ideological opponents. Since both sides have been warned multiple times about this (See here for Rusf10 being warned explicitly about WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior and assuming bad faith) I have on my own initiative placed some limited discretionary sanctions on each editor, tailored to specific problems I see in their behavior. (Auto-boomerang for Rusf10 and No personal comments on article talk pages for Bullrangifer) I would also not oppose a boomerang here against Rusf10.
Responding to MrX above, I don't see that as evidence of Masem's involvement, and I don't think that Masem has taken an unreasonable position here. ~Awilley (talk) 18:17, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- I agree with this approach, broadly speaking; both editors should disengage from this confrontation. I myself would not have used this kind of sanction which needs continued enforcement and supervision; but that's your decision. Unless other admins intend to take action, I think this can be closed now. Sandstein 20:18, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
- I intend to keep an eye on things. Also to be fair to Bullrangifer, asking BR to disengage from "this confrontation" implies that they were engaging in a confrontation with Rusf10, which I can't see was the case. BR's comments, at least the ones linked here, seem to have been mostly directed at User:Phmoreno and meatpuppets from r/The_Donald, not at Rusf10; and BR hasn't made any comments here at all. You can't get much more disengaged than that. ~Awilley (talk) 02:06, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
- I also don't see anything actionable in this request, and would not be opposed to a boomerang. T. Canens (talk) 02:28, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Galathadael
Blocked indef as a normal admin action. Sandstein 20:19, 13 April 2019 (UTC) |
---|
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 Galathadael
Brand-new user immediately jumped into unsupported conspiracy-mongering attacks on a living person despite being warned to review policy and avoid such behavior. Seems pretty clear-cut. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:14, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Discussion concerning GalathadaelStatements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Statement by GalathadaelAre you serious? You're reporting me? Who's the living person I'm attacking? Stefan Halper was sent in by the Obama administration to spy on the Trump campaign. That is a fact. You don't get to just report me and try to shut me up just because you disagree with me. If anything's clear-cut, is that something needs to be done about you editing my comments. Galathadael (talk) 02:18, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Rusf10Technically, it is correct to say that Stefan Halper spied on Trump Campaign members. Of course, to be clear just because he was spying does not mean he did anything wrong or illegal. He was sent by the FBI which at the time was part of the Obama Administration. Here's a source [74] We could also use the term informant, here's a piece in an rs that discusses the use of the term spy being applied to Halper [75]. Basically both terms are interchangable, but one sounds more serious than the other. Regardless, since this can be documented to an RS, there's no BLP violation. Frivolous request.--Rusf10 (talk) 02:33, 13 April 2019 (UTC) @Masem: Just wanted to point out Volunteer Marek's edit summary which I believe is a WP:PERSONALATTACK [76] which says "jfc, how many times have we been through this same song and dance? With Peter Strzok, with Seth Rich with another dozen articles that were subject to these external attacks with goofy administrators enabling and ass kissing the trolls until it got completely ridiculous. Stop wasting our time"--Rusf10 (talk) 04:13, 13 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by DumuzidWhile the general allegation here is true, that Mr. Halper indeed had some kind of intelligence gathering role with regard to people associated with the Trump campaign, in such incendiary areas it pays to be specific with one's language. I think "gather intelligence" or some such is preferable to spying, and I think "people associated with the campaign" is preferable to "the Trump campaign" or (as I have sometimes seen it) "Trump." But those are really fairly minor quibbles, I think. For me, the real problem is reference to having been "sent in by the Obama administration." For all I know, this may be true. But all I see in the RSes is references to the FBI. While technically you could call this part of the "administration," I think it gives the impression that elected officials or high-level political appointees outside the Department of Justice were involved. That, at this point, violates BLP for me pretty glaringly. After all that, I think there's a reasonable area for compromise here. Cheers all. Dumuzid (talk) 02:43, 13 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by Volunteer MarekUser:Masem, a statement that " Stefan Halper was sent in by the Obama administration to spy on the Trump campaign" is most certainly a WP:BLP violation, especially if no sources are provided to back it up. And sorry but your #3 is nothing but Whataboutism, or as we like to call it on Wikipedia WP:OTHERSTUFF. You also don't actually provide any evidence that this is indeed true. But at the end of the day, if someone violates BLP with regard to some Trump official or something, that does not make it ok to violate BLP for other people and you should deal with that OTHER case.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:55, 13 April 2019 (UTC) Also, the article is semi-protected, and if you're worried about battleground on the talk page, well, gee, maybe that has something to do with the fact that there has been a large influx of SPA accounts, coordinated and "called to action" off Wiki on a troll subreddit. And most of these accounts look a lot like the subject of this report. So if you are really concerned about it, perhaps directing your energies - by, like, say, semi-protecting the talk page - towards the source of the problem, would be more appropriate.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:59, 13 April 2019 (UTC) Statement by MrXMasem, would you please move your comments out of the 'Results concerning...' section per the italicized instructions. You are involved in the recent disputes on the article.- MrX 🖋 12:18, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Mr ErnieSandstein everyone is a "single purpose account" during their first few edits. This guy made an account yesterday, and probably has no idea what AE is. How is an indef the appropriate first step? Unbelievable. It is not difficult to go to Stefan Halper's article and read about exactly what he did. Here's a handy article that summarizes it well. No BLP violation. Harper also ran a spying campaign during the 1980 presidential election. If the shoe fits... Mr Ernie (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2019 (UTC)
Statment by Masem(The following content was moved out of the uninvolved admin section. I still strongly disagree that in this specific content dispute I am involved for discussing the question of the article title, but rather not divert the discussion from the matter raised at AE --Masem (t) 20:06, 13 April 2019 (UTC))
Statement by (username)Result concerning Galathadael
|
Philip Cross
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 Philip Cross
- User who is submitting this request for enforcement
- GoldenRing (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) 17:13, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- User against whom enforcement is requested
- Philip Cross (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
Search DS alerts: in user talk history • in system log
- Sanction or remedy to be enforced
- Wikipedia:Editing_restrictions#Philip_Cross : Philip Cross is indefinitely topic banned from post-1978 British politics, broadly construed. This restriction may be first appealed after six months have elapsed, and every six months thereafter. This sanction supersedes the community sanction applied in May 2018.
- Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
- Diffs of previous relevant sanctions, if any
- diff Blocked for violation
- If discretionary sanctions are requested, supply evidence that the user is aware of them (see WP:AC/DS#Awareness and alerts)
- Named in an arbitration remedy.
- Additional comments by editor filing complaint
A non-autoconfirmed user, User:Guantolaka, has posted an edit request at WT:AE due to the restriction on non-AC accounts making reports here. Ordinarily I would dismiss a request which is an editor's first edit but the editor claims to have been directed to do so by the committee. I have contacted the arbitration committee by email and verified that there is a plausible reason for a newly registered account to be making such a request (though the reason is not public) and that they did indeed direct the editor there.
Over the past few days, Philip Cross has been making a number of edits to Indictment and arrest of Julian Assange. Guantolaka contends that this falls under the topic of British politics from which Philip Cross is banned and so these are violations. I left a note on Philip Cross's talk page advising him to be careful around the edges of his ban, but this does not seems to have led to any change.
I don't have a strong feeling one way or the other whether these are violations of the ban and would like other uninvolved admins to weigh in please.
- Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested
- diff
Discussion concerning Philip Cross
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 Philip Cross
Statement by Guantolaka
Thank you for filing the request, GoldenRing. I fail to understand comments that say this page does not "relate to British politics". Here are some quotes taken from the page:
- '...the British Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, ... and British Prime Minister Theresa May, who commented that "no one is above the law," are in support of the arrest.'
- 'Ecuadorean president Lenín Moreno said in a video posted on Twitter that he "requested Great Britain to guarantee that Mr Assange would not be extradited to a country where he could face torture or the death penalty. The British government has confirmed it in writing, in accordance with its own rules."'
- 'British Veterans for Peace UK call british government to « respect the rights of journalists and whistle-blowers and refuse to extradite Julian Assange to the US'
Cross edited the page containing the text above and removed an article with title 'Protesters Call on UK to #FreeAssange Outside British Embassy in DC'
I'm not questioning his edits here, merely pointing out that this is very much in the realm of British politics, and Cross "is indefinitely topic banned from post-1978 British politics, broadly construed."
NorthBySouthBaranof: Assange has been in the UK for a long time, he's now in a UK prison. It's a pretty big political story in the UK. Hardly a small matter a politician has happened to comment on in the press. As for striking my comment, I made an edit request in talk as advised by the arbitration committee, and rules for commenting here appear to be that "All users are welcome to comment on requests." Guantolaka (talk) 22:16, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- Masem: The wording of the topic ban is "indefinitely topic banned from post-1978 British politics, broadly construed." Guantolaka (talk) 22:29, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by NorthBySouthBaranof
If the standard for being connected to "post-1978 British politics" is "anything that a politician has ever commented on in the press," I think that's a standard which is far too broad and unenforceable. I'm also concerned about allowing a clear breach of the AE rules - we have here a complaint not by a member of the community in good standing, but an anonymous single-purpose account created specifically to complain about a long-established user. Their comment should be struck. We don't need possible scrutiny-evading socks participating in these processes; even if this is not a sock, it seems to me that creating an account solely to complain about someone else is a violation of WP:NOTHERE. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 22:07, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- The precedent being set here - that ArbCom can permit unaccountable anonymous SPAs to file administrative complaints about long-standing users - is, in my opinion, a pernicious one. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 22:19, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by Pawnkingthree
This looks like a breach of the topic ban to me - the decision as to whether Assange is extradicted to Sweden or the US is a political one, made by the Home Secretary. [90] Philip Cross should have stayed away from anything to do with Assange as it clearly touches UK politics. Pawnkingthree (talk) 23:16, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
Statement by (username)
Result concerning Philip Cross
- This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
- I would take no action. Neither the article nor the edits relate to British politics. Assange is a political figure and a topic of political controversy, but more of international politics, rather than specifically British politics. Sandstein 17:26, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- No action, given the diffs. Agree that while at some point there is an interaction of Assange/Wikileaks to UK politics due to information that was leaked, the article about his asylum and arrest and likely subsequent trial is not "broadly" about UK politics. --Masem (t) 22:25, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
- Guantolaka, there's a limit to what "Broadly" is taken as. Assange has little connectivity to any sitting member of the the UK government; as Sandstein points out, Assange may be a political figure, he's not a political figure in UK circles as much as within US ones. (Or another way to state this, if we were doing with the AP2 (American politics) case, I would definitely consider Assange in the "Broadly" of that topic. But for the UK, not really. Being under arrest by UK authorities is not the same as involvement in UK politics. --Masem (t) 22:55, 16 April 2019 (UTC)