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Mediator request

You're not invited to the Mediation on the Terry Schiavo article. It's not a "sign-up" thing. Please avoid editing there. You are welcome at talk:Terry Schiavo, though.

Uncle Ed of the Misplaced Pages:Mediation Committee, 00:41, July 19, 2005 (UTC)

You seem to think that merely because you're an admin you have total leave to tell everyone what they should or should not do and where they can or cannot post, and that you have the right to generally just do as you please and be as discourteous as you like to anyone who doesn't want to play your games. I haven't violated any official wikipedia policy, if I'm raining on your parade by participating in Mediation, that's just too bad. --Uthar Wynn 01 01:03, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

And by the way, you're not invited to my Talk Page. It's not a "sign-up" thing. Please avoid editing here. --Uthar Wynn 01 01:03, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

Are you slimvirgin-ing Uncle Ed? If so, please be less arrogant. 4.250.132.22 12:20, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

Behave

You wrote: "rv, mikkalai stop being an immature dick". Behave yourself! You know better. (P.S. Read Duckecho's personal page and its discussion page. I knew the Gordan was a XXXXX but I had no idea! 4.250.132.22 12:20, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

Well, mikkalai is an immature dick. I'm not going to apologize for accurately describing the absolute worst wikipedia admin I can think of.

And as far as Gordon is concerned, he can go f**k himself. I've had it with the Terri Schaivo article - when delusional, arrogant whackos like Gordon are given the same degree of respect as people like Duckecho, nothing will ever get done. The Terri Schaivo mediation is a joke (ineffective), perhaps there would be some chance of coming to some sort of compromise if they IP banned Gordon's ass so he couldn't participate, but no, its going to go on forever because of one lunatic with an agenda. Uncle Ed is a ineffective time-waster who couldn't resolve the Schaivo conflict if his life depended on it, he's a total fraud and I won't apologize for insulting him either. --Uthar Wynn 01 16:31, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

You'll have to try harder than that, if you want to offend me! <chuckle> See User talk:Ed Poor/ways to offend me. Uncle Ed 14:51, July 21, 2005 (UTC)

I read the "ways to offend you", and I read the whole sam spade policy enforcement thing, and I really don't get it. I didn't research spade's edits that extensively, but I read the relevant sections of the talk page on the emo article + etc. I don't mean to be rude, but it seemed as if you were the one out of line, but as I said I didn't research his edits that well. Please explain how the offend me page saying "Be me" is related, I'm just not getting it. --Uthar Wynn 01 04:18, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

No, I'm not "slim-virgining" Ed, when Fuel invited me to join in an RFC on SlimVirgin, I declined. Some people may disagree, but I think slimvirgin is a decent, well-intentioned, basically rational admin who may not be perfect, but is certainly not the power-mad, abusive person people have potrayed her as. Even though we are on opposite "sides" of the Schaivo dispute, I don't have anything against her personally.

I don't really think Uncle Ed has bad intentions either, but he's a total joke and he's just wasting everybody's time. Even though he probably doesn't realize it, all he does on the Schaivo Mediation is play pointless little games that never accomplish anything and only keep the conflict going. Until obnoxious nut jobs like Gordon are taken out of the picture, the Mediation is completely pointless and FuelWagon is wasting his time and energy participating in it - he's not going to get anywhere (Ed will see to that). It won't matter how many good points he makes, whatever compromises he offers, Gordon and his buddies are not going to rest until the Schaivo article is full of half-baked lies and POV distortions. --Uthar Wynn 01 16:44, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Uthar, take this as from someone who knows: do not let another editor's behaviour, no matter how attrocious it is, get you banned. A phyrric victory is no victory. You're job as an individual editor is to bring your individual opinion to an article as to what will make it better. If you let the opinion of another editor, no matter how moronic, get you banned, then you are not doing your job. If enough clear thinking editors work on an article together, they should be able to come to a version that represents the truth of the matter, despite the best efforts of the POV pushers. You will have to decide if it is more important that wikipedia articles represent the truth and you swallow a bit of your pride or if you allow your emotions to win out and wikipedia to lose because the POV pushers win. These are your choices. There are no alternatives. Misplaced Pages's dispute resolution system makes it easy to spot people who curse and ban them, but it is difficult to establish something more subjective like the intentional insertion of a bad/POV edit. If you want to fight bad edits, you will have to find a way to vent without breaking the personal attack rules. Otherwise, if someone pushes a POV edit into an article, and you swear at them, then they can report you for swearing and you'll get blocked, and you'll report them for POV editing, and nothing much of consequence will be done. These are you choices: stop your personal attacks or let polite POV pushers win. choose.

FuelWagon 18:33, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

I am in total agreement with everything you've just said, with one exception: I don't agree that there are "no alternatives". There is, in fact, one other option, and it is the one I have chosen. I have ceased to edit the Schaivo article and in the future I do not plan to give much input regarding it - any satisfaction I may get in contributing to it will likely be far outweighed by frustration and anger caused by Gordon's ridiculous lies and asinine distortions. I admire your tireless efforts to improve the article and to ensure that the truth triumphs over all the POV bullsh1+, but unfortunately I do not possess the same persistence.

Regardless, I would be of limited value. I am fairly adept at debating various points of an article (in most situations), but when faced with someone like Gordon there is nothing, really, that I can do. When I am confronted with lies obviously ridiculous to any rational person, all I can do is state the truth and expose the falsity of the other person's statements, and I do not believe that any arguments I might make could persuade Gordon (and by extension, his supporters) to come to grips with reality.

I hope this doesn't seem like a cop-out, although to be honest I suppose it is. For it, I give you my sincere apologies. --Uthar Wynn 01 03:15, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

PETA

Hi Uthar, could you say why you changed "terrorist threat" to "terrorist organization," when I think the source says the former? Or did I misread the reference? SlimVirgin 18:41, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

Both phrasings are used in the source, the "terrorist organization" one is extracted from another sentence. The DHS guy uses the phrase "that doesn’t de-emphasize our interest in *other* domestic terror groups" right after talking about the ALF/ELF which definitely means that they consider ALF/ELF to be "domestic terror groups" aka "terrorist organizations". It's an indirect quote, but the implication is unquestionable.

So yeah. It's kind of convoluted. Which phrasing to use is really a matter of choice, both phrasings (the previous one and mine) are, literally speaking, accurate to the source, I chose "classified as terrorist organizations" because "described as terrorist threats" could imply that ALF/ELF aren't groups organized for the express purpose of carrying out terrorist activities (contrary to the DHS view I mean, i'm trying to stay true to the DHS meaning), and/or that it's just a description from a certain DHS person, as opposed to official DHS policy. I think the "terrorist threats" phrasing has too mild a connotation when compared to the implication of the DHS, that these are "terrorist groups" and their members are "terrorists".

To sum it up, I changed the phrasing because while the "terrorist threats" phrasing is literally accurate to the source, I think the "terrorist organizations" phrasing is both literally accurate and more accurate to the tone of the source.

Hi Uthar, thanks for the explanation. I didn't realize that he talked about "other terror groups" right after talking about the ALF, so what you say makes sense. I'd still prefer to use "terrorist threat," however, because it's in quotation marks, and that's the DHS official position so far as I can tell. My other concern is that the FBI acknowledges that the ALF sticks to its non-violent policy in the U.S., and yet wants to classify them as terrorist threats, which makes no sense to me, given that all the definitions of terrorism in use that I'm aware of involve deliberate violence against civilians. It's because of discrepancies like this that I'm keen to stick to quotes and citations from reputable sources when referring to these groups as "terrorist." Let me know if that's okay with you. Cheers, SlimVirgin 02:16, July 21, 2005 (UTC)

Using the "terrorist threat" phrasing would be just fine, as I said before, both are accurate to the source and I do understand why you want to use that one.

As far as the ALF is concerned, attacks on personal property designed to intimidate others in to not owning/using/working at/going to said property (be it a home, an SUV, a research lab, McDonalds, whatever) are attacks against civilians (not against their person, but still against them) designed to cause fear, fear of using or owning something or someplace that ALF opposes. These "deliberate attacks on civilians that are meant to instill fear" fit the definition of terrorism in my opinion. Not the kind of terrorism that springs to mind when the word is used, but terrorism nevertheless.

It also depends on how you define "violence". Violence could be used to mean specifically physical harm to a person's body or it could be used in a broader sense. I would find it misleading, for example, to describe a rioting mob which is breaking through shop windows, pillaging, looting, and torching homes and businesses, as "non-violent" (assuming in the example that they did not physically harm anyone).

Also, I believe eco-radicals (I know its a neologism, but I couldnt find a better word) have been responsible for physical assault on scientists working in animal-testing laboratories. I am sure I read somewhere about a scientist who had his knees broken with a baseball bat by radicals, but I couldn't give you a source for that. Same thing with threats against animal-testing scientist's families. This was in a "mainstream" publication, but it was years ago and I haven't the slightest idea where I read it. ALF and ELF aren't really very organized groups, really anyone can go do something and say its for the ALF or ELF - Al-Qaida has become increasingly the same way, becoming more of a "brand" than an "organization". I don't think these attackers claimed to be working in the name of ALF or ELF, but they certainly agreed with the causes of ALF/ELF and might have considered themselves members of the movements.

I know "terrorism" and "terrorist" are loaded words, but I feel safe labeling ALF and ELF as "terrorist groups", I don't think it would be against NPOV. Feel free to tell me your opinion on all this. --User:Uthar Wynn 01 03:56, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Tone and substance

Thanks for toning this down. It's easier to respond to the substance of a criticism when not distracted by the tone. You probably made a bunch of good points there, but frankly I tuned out after reading some personal remarks there. Uncle Ed 14:41, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, that rant (as well as several of the ones above) was/were written in the "heat of the moment", Gordon's antics are simply more than I can put up with. I noticed that you had reworded/crossed out some of my comments above on this talk page, please don't do that as it may cause confusion as to who decided to change them. I have retracted my personal insults against you (sorry about that), you haven't done anything to deserve them - some of my anger at Gordon just spilled over on to you. I am not, however, going to retract the remarks made about Gordon and mikkalai, even though I would phrase it differently were I to write it again, I meant every word. --Uthar Wynn 01 02:25, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Warning

For this comment on Meconium.

		The Original Barnstar
		Few editors really understand what policies and guidelines are for. Fewer editors really understand what it means to contribute to the Encyclopedia. Fewer still are the minority of the huge population on Misplaced Pages that have what it takes to stand up against all those who don't understand, and Uthar Wynn 01 is one of them. ALTON .ıl

Judging by the activity on your Talk and User page, I guess you are inactive, but your contributions still merit this Barnstar, so revel! ALTON .ıl 03:08, 15 April 2007 (UTC)