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Moving forward: Deferring GENSEX cases to AE

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Should the community encourage or require GENSEX cases to be brought at AE, or make no change? 18:26, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Potential encouragement ("soft") and requirement ("hard") wordings are given below; these are not the only wordings that could be used.

• Soft: Something like Reports primarily involving gender-related disputes or controversies are usually best-suited to Arbitration enforcement (AE), except when the matter is very straightforward or when AE is unavailable for procedural reasons (for instance, a requested sanction exceeds AE's authority, or a party against whom sanctions are sought is not aware). Beyond these two exceptions, any uninvolved administrator may, at their discretion and at any time, close an AN or AN/I discussion in this topic area in favor of review at AE; if the filer would not be able to start the thread, the admin should do so for them.
• Hard: Something like Reports primarily involving gender-related disputes or controversies, other than truly unambiguous disruption, should be filed at Arbitration enforcement (AE) unless there is a procedural reason that AE would not be suitable (for instance, a requested sanction exceeds AE's authority, or a party against whom sanctions are sought is not aware). Any uninvolved editor may speedily close a thread brought in contravention of this rule, directing the filer to AE; if the filer would not be able to start the thread, the closer should do so for them

-- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 18:26, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

• Nom statement : So, whatever the outcome of the above, it's clear that the thread was a shitshow. And the Newimpartial thread was a shitshow. In fact every GENSEX thread I can recall at AN(I) since I resumed editing 2 years ago has been a shitshow, apart from slam-dunk "new user using slurs"–type reports.We have a venue for this. It is called Misplaced Pages:Arbitration enforcement. It avoids basically all of the BS we see in these kinds of contentious threads. The vast majority of AN(I) GENSEX discussions fall within concurrent AE jurisdiction, especially now that WP:AC/CT has loosened the definition of sanction awareness. There is no reason that we need to continue hearing these cases at AN(I) if we don't want to... and does anyone actually want to?I've had this idea bouncing around my head the past week and it's just seemed more and more reasonable as things have progressed, especially as we've seen difficulties in finding admins willing to close these threads. Thoughts? -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 18:26, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• I would oppose, as I dislike the precedent this would set - AE and ArbCom are there to supplement, not replace, the self-management of the broader community. BilledMammal (talk) 18:32, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would also suggest that you convert this to an WP:RFC, as editors have begun to !vote on it. BilledMammal (talk) 18:39, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  I mean this completely sincerely: if someone in the community thinks the community can self-manage a topic area that is under CT, I would encourage them to go to WP:ARCA and to ask us to revoke the Contentious Topic designation for that topic area. We should not have the extraordinary grant of power, which is ArbCom delegating its broad authority directly to admins, is the community can handle it. I have repeatedly supported ways to eliminate areas from the CT/DS designation or to narrow their scope (see AP2) precisely because I think the community should handle what it can. So if something is a designated CT it means to me that the community isn't, at this time, able to self-manage that topic area and if the community actually is able to self-manage we need to restore the area to normal rules for admins and editors. Barkeep49 (talk) 18:49, 4 March 2023 (UTC) Edit: I should note I was making a general point here about any given CT. I think there are reasons to do and not to do this proposal of Tamzin's so am not expressing an opinion on that. Merely responding to Billed Mammal's thinking of how CT exists with-in dispute resolution. Barkeep49 (talk) 18:58, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  I might do that for some of the more obscure CT's, but to clarify my point here wasn't that I think that the community can fully self-manage this topic area, but that the community can partially self-manage every topic area that is under CT, and I don't want to set the precedent that they can't. BilledMammal (talk) 19:08, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  This goes back to our discussion last September. I appreciate your viewpoint that the community has failed to manage disputes in areas formally identified as contentious topics. Nonetheless, I think the arbitration enforcement system will be overloaded if every dispute is just passed up the chain automatically. I think editors need to exercise judgement and continue to try to handle issues at the lowest level possible. isaacl (talk) 22:57, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support hard - The Newimpartial and Tranarchist threads were among the worst things I've seen on this site when it comes to wiki drama. No need to have such a thing when AE can do it cleaner and more efficiently. I also believe this would lead to better results for everyone involved since we won't have involved users contributing, which undermines the integrity of consensus imo. Iamreallygoodatcheckers 18:35, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

My reservations that an admin panel at AE cannot handle certain types of disruption that require topic familiarity that skirts the edge of what we consider WP:INVOLVED aside, I'm somewhat in favour of the hard proposal, but either could work for me.

The biggest technical hurdle I see for making AE the primary/sole noticeboard for this would be the requirement that AE requires autoconfirmed before you can post a thread without it being removed. That obviously rules out editors with less than 10 edits over 4 days, but also rules out IP editors. If this does go ahead, a common sense exception for WP:MEAT might need to be made so that any uninvolved editor/admin, at their discretion can move/re-post the thread at AE on behalf of the non-autoconfirmed editor, with the checks and balances that the editor moving the discussion takes some responsibility for the move. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:36, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

@Sideswipe9th: In my mind, the AE autoconfirmed requirement would fall under "unavailable for procedural reasons". So would clear lack of awareness or requests for sanctions that exceed AE's powers (most notably sitebans). If that should be clearer in either proposed wording, I'm happy to clarify. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 18:39, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Aah yeah. If you do follow through with BilledMammal's suggestion above of converting this to an RfC, I would suggest clarifying that in the wording before making it a RfC. Otherwise, unless this side discussion becomes a monster thread of its own, it's probably fine just being clarified in these replies for now. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:48, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

• Weak Oppose. There are cases when reports can involve multiple issues. If only one of those issues is editing in GENSEX, it should not be the case that we are more or less requiring this sort of stuff to be sent to WP:AE. Reports involving gender-related disputes or controversies are usually best-suited to Arbitration enforcement is overly broad, even in the soft version.WP:AE can also be really difficult when trying to demonstrate issues that draw evidence from a large number of diffs (there's a hard cap on 20 diffs). I agree that WP:ANI has problems when it comes to these sorts of disputes inasmuch as it draws a lot of tangentially involved people to these discussions, but I do think that the filer should be able to elect to go to WP:ANI if they think that the open-ended format of the noticeboard will allow them to communicate their concerns more clearly to the community. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 18:48, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  In light of Tamzin's amending of the RfC prompt above, I'm amending my !vote for relevance. I still don't like the phrasing close an AN or AN/I discussion in this topic area (I'd prefer something like close an AN or AN/I discussion about disputes primarily involving conduct in WP:GENSEX so as to be extremely explicit regarding when admins can and cannot close ANI discussions), so I remain weakly opposed at this time. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 19:10, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

• For what its worth, as I read through the thread, I did think "much of this would have been avoided had this been transferred to, or originally filed at, AE." CaptainEek ⚓ 18:49, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support, undecided on variant. It's a CT for a reason; using CT procedures for a CT is a nobrainer. ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 18:54, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  Question: if this is becoming an RfC, where is the text actually proposed to be added? ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 18:57, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  I imagine this could work as a standard community-authorized general sanction. It doesn't need to go into policy anywhere. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 18:59, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  Why would it be a general sanction? Why is it not just a noticeboard procedural rule along the liens of "you must notify someone you're reporting"? Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 19:34, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  Specifically, support the soft variant. "Truly unambiguous" bothers me on the harder variant, thinking of cases like the recent Scapulus, who was handled swiftly at ANI, but where some editors did see it fit to show up later to complain about freeze peach. Clearly this was addressed well at ANI, but "truly unambiguous" is at least not unambiguous in this case. ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 19:18, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  I wrestled a lot with that wording (and the closer can always take note of general support for one option or the other, but not for some specific wording, and implement accordingly). But to explain my reasoning, the core challenge is that there have been a lot of cases—both with editors seen as anti-trans and those seen as pro-trans—where someone has felt "Surely this is blatant disruption, easy indef", and it's turned into days or weeks of nonsense. So I acknowledge that "truly unambiguous" is really strong wording, but it's the best shorthand I could think of for "Disruption that you, ideally as an experienced user familiar with what is and isn't considered disruptive in GENSEX, know will lead to a summary indef." Common sense would, of course, continue to govern either of these options, and AE would always have its inherent authority to reject a case, thereby making itself procedurally unavailable and allowing AN(I) to proceed. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 19:42, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  SnowRise brings up another point I didn't notice, that according to the hard option, any uninvolved editor could close a thread they deem should be at AE. I think this is an exceptionally bad idea. This means that even in a case where admins are unanimous that some behaviour is unacceptable, any sufficiently out-of-touch editor could declare a case not unambiguous enough and complicate the process excessively. ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 20:05, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  Update after further reflection: I think both variants risk curtailing the community's ability to self-govern and adapt by consensus in this area. I do think the idea has merit but allowing a move to be forced by either an individual admin or any editor is harmful, and I fear leaving everything up to AE admins could threaten our ability to respond flexibly to various kinds of disruption. I definitely agree that threads about more long-standing editors turn into huge messes on ANI and probably would do better at AE, but I don't think either of these proposals is the right way. ■ ∃ Madeline ⇔ ∃ Part of me ; 21:29, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

• Support hard As I mentioned above, (... it appears that is now simple for editors with a certain POV ... to remove other editors who oppose them from contentious areas without using the correct venue, which would be AE) when these discussions end up with the community they turn into the inevitable shitshows that this one and the NewImpartial one have been. We simply need to remove them from this arena, because otherwise the next one will be exactly the same. Black Kite (talk) 18:56, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Converted to RfC per comments above, with some tweaks to wording per @Sideswipe9th and Red-tailed hawk. More generally, I stress that the wording above is just two ideas of how to do this. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 19:01, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support with a preference for the hard variant, as I think the future will be like the past. I can appreciate the potential problem that a report can cross over multiple issues, but experience leads me to think that the most disaster-prone issue within such a report will dominate. A report that includes both a GENSEX issue and, say, edit-warring over WP:CITEVAR will become a trainwreck over the former. XOR'easter (talk) 19:10, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Comment I don't know what the solution is. This topic is one of several prime candidates for WP:ADVOCACY, WP:BATTLEGROUND, WP:SPA, WP:CIVIL, WP:PUSH, WP:SOCK, WP:MEAT and WP:NOTHERE. I don't like advocacy editing, but equally well we may need a balance of editors who have strong POVs to bring in-depth knowledge to controversial articles. It can't be allowed to be beneficial to WP:WIKILAWYER and gang up on opponents or we will get more SPAs and non-autoconfirmed users pig piling on culture war enemies. From what I have seen the normal ANI process works pretty well, and the admins manage to separate behavioral issues from content. The whole !vote thing is problematic because as we see a big deal is made of distilling it down to numbers rather than the much-touted abstract "consensus". Whatever the solution, I think this topic and a few others like it stand to test Misplaced Pages's processes for dealing with problem editors. —DIYeditor (talk) 19:12, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Immensely strong oppose. First off, this is a procedurally invalid proposal, even with the addition of the RfC tag: enforceable rules regarding disruption (particularly those with such broad implications for arresting disruption across a vast swath of articles) cannot be made by the admin regulars of AN alone, supplemented merely by the editors already involved in this singular dispute and a handful of others brought in by a FRS notice. If you want create binding guidelines on this project, you need to use the WP:PROPOSAL process: identify the WP:PAG you want to alter (or suggest a new standalone policy namespace), and then host a discussion on that policy's talk page with a notice at VPP, or just host the discussion at the Village Pump to begin. AN is absolutely not the right (indeed, is arguably the worst) forum to be suggesting new policy. If this should go further rather than being swiftly shot down, the discussion needs to be moved.

Second, putting aside the procedural considerations, I think the proposal (good faith though it obviously is) is a non-starter on its merits as well. Mind you, I think the present case giving rise to this proposal probably is an instance of a case that arguably should have gone to AE. But creating a mandate that all behavioural concerns arising out of GENSEX topics go to AE, aside from being inconsistent with how we handle every other WP:CTOP (our new handle for discretionary sanctions for those unfamiliar) issue, is clearly an unworkable proposition under our current community schema for arresting disruptive behaviour--and the particular wording proposed here (in both variants) only further invites confusion and difficulty. Without meaning offense to Tamzin, it's the worst kind of rule cruft where the community clearly needs some degree of flexibility and redundancy. While I do believe that CTOP should be invoked more liberally in edge cases to bring matters to AE (as a more streamlined process less amenable to pile-on by biased/involved parties) ANI has an absolutely vital role in allowing the community to review and correct long-term behavioural concerns in a way that this overbroad proposal would clearly and significantly abrogate, for limited gain.

Under this suggestion, any behavioural issue imputing the GENSEX topic area would be effectively stripped out of the hands of the broader community to impose CBANs or otherwise address disruption, and those decisions held in reserve for editors with a high level of permissions at AE. While I reiterate that this would actually be a good thing in a non-trivial number of cases, as we should use AE more extensively than we do for CTOP issues, a firm requirement directing all disruption involving GENSEX to AE is clearly overkill that would significantly reduce the broader community's ability to adjudicate longterm issues and otherwise jam-up our ability to effectively arrest disruption. Further, encouraging rank and file editors to start closing down ANI discussions that touch upon certain topic areas (in a way that would currently be treated as clear disruption itself) would be ripe for abuse: anybody who's spent any degree of time at ANI can predict just how flexible a vast number of editors will be with judging themselves as "uninvolved" in the dispute: the technical excuse that they didn't participate in the immediate dispute would still permits editors who are heavily involved in the issues in general (or who have beef with the filer, or are regular defenders of someone who comes to ANI again and again) to thwart oversight by invoking this rule.

Honestly, I could go on for quite a while: there are so many potential knock-on effects to this proposal which would needlessly complicate addressing user conduct in this topic area, and so many ways that it's one-size-fits-all approach does not connect with our current otherwise context-sensitive (and somewhat overlapping, as a good thing) remit of different forums for addressing disruption. But the overarching concern is that it drastically reduces the community's options for little practical gain, pulls oversight for determinations that ultimately should fall into the broader community's hands on occasion, and would introduce all kinds of opportunities for gamesmanship (ostensibly the very thing it comes to address). I just think it's a very poorly considered proposal. But again, if nothing else, it needs to be considered by the community at large in an appropriate forum, which AN decidedly is not. SnowRise 19:55, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't really understand your procedural objection, Snow Rise. This proposes rules that would apply only to WP:AN and WP:AN/I. There's not even any change in how AE would operate, other than possibly getting more GENSEX cases than before. This is a vastly less impactful change than, say, placing WP:GS/RUSUKR under an extendedconfirmed restriction, which was handled by a simple thread at AN/I. I don't even think an RfC was strictly required here, but I'm following the path of least resistance.As to the various negative effects you're worried about, I guess I'll focus on one thing you've said: ANI has an absolutely vital role in allowing the community to review and correct long-term behavioural concerns. Can you point to evidence of this actually being the case in the GENSEX area? In GENSEX AN/I threads I've been involved in, even when there's been some ultimate consensus, I really can't think of any that I would say show healthy self-governance. This strongly negative view of AN/I's handling of GENSEX issues is shared by, as of this comment, every commenter in this thread who substantially edits in the topic area, including ones who often sharply differ on content matters. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 20:10, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi Tamzin: I'm going to divide my responses between two posts, since these are semi-discrete issues, in order to faciliate any response and further discussion that may result:

• Regarding the procedural/placement issue, the mere fact that this change would pertain to how ANI operates hardly means that it will impact only the regular (mostly admin) editors at AN--let alone that it would only be of interest to this highly select segment of the community. This change would impact a vast number of editors working accross countless articles who may have recourse to bring behavioural concerns to the community at ANI. For that matter, considering almost every single hypothetical future thread that this proposal would seek to invalidate would typically have landed at ANI, rather than AN, placing it here rarifies the air even further, in terms of the regular editors who are likely to see it based on it's placement.

This is clearly not an "AN/I only" issue: it very obviously touches upon fundamental authority, consensus process of, and decision making generally reserved to the community at large (as opposed to the administrative corps in particular) and the proposal would heavily impact the community's ability to address long-term disruption in a particular topic area, relative to how literally all others operate. Such a discussion should take place in a cnetralized and highly visible community space, not just within site of a handful of admins, those already connected to a singular dispute, and handful of others pulled in via a typical FRS. At an absolute minimum you should make a posting a notice about this discussion at the village Pump and making sure the discussion is on the WP:CD ticker. And frankly, I just strongly recommend you move the entire discussion to VP itself. Otherwise, even if you get a consensus for the proposal here, you are just begging for an uproar afterwards, with accusations of an admin power grab, however good faith the intention here. I mean, if nothing else, what is the good-faith, community-respectful argument against moving this to a place where the community at large is more likely to be able to be aware of and weigh in on it? SnowRise 21:53, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

On the proposal impacting on the "community's ability to address long-term disruption in a particular topic area", how would you respond to the point raised above by Barkeep49 that I'd like to build upon in the next paragraph. Not sure if this should be a reply to your first or second point however, if you feel that it's better answered in response to the second, feel free to move this comment as a reply to your second point.

Because prior disruption in this content area has required significant ArbCom intervention, and the committee's remit is to operate on serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve, has the community already not demonstrated a significant inability to address long-term disruption in this content area? Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:06, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

No, with all due respect to Barkeep, that is a conclusion I believe is unsupported by compelling evidence, and certainly not one I am aware of ever having been endorsed by the community or by ArbCom in particular. WP:Contentious topics are not labelled as such because the community has a laisez-faire attitude towards them or has fundamentally failed to try to address them, or is per se incapable of doing so. Rather these are topics that are inherently divisive in the broader social systems of our societies at large, and thus such biases and conflicts are simply more easily imported into this project when topics are discussed/edit upon here, relative to some others, for completely obvious reasons. None of that militates for the conclusion that the broader community and our long-established rules and processes do not have a central role to play in addressing a heightened level of disruption in such areas--either as a general matter or, certainly, in terms of an express point of community consensus that has ever been adopted on this project. When we say "contentious topic" we mean "contentious topic", not "a topic the general community does not have a role in regulating". That's a massive non-sequitor and leap in logic, in my opinion.

CTOP (and DS before it) exists merely to grant relaxed use of certain tools in areas where rapid response to disruption is more likely to be needed, not to declare the rest of the community as irrelevant to such a fundamental function: if anything, the existence of a CTOP determination for a particular topic increases the likelihood the broader community may have to occasionally intervene directly concerning disruption connected with that topic, not that it should be forbidden access to it's normal role in that process: that's an incredibly counter-intuitive read on the purpose of CTOP in my opinion, and certainly not captured anywhere in the policy pages that describe those processes.

And again, I say this while being broadly supportive of an hierarchy and an important division of labor running adjacent to the community->admin corps->ArbCom->WMF ladder. But this particular proposal would take a particular topic area and isolate it more or less entirely from established non-admin community tools and norms for expressing consensus on problematic behaviour, and taking consensus action accordingly. I just don't see how that can be justified on the mere basis that this is a highly divisive subject matter: so are countless other topics, including (by definition) every other WP:CTOP subject. Are we going to follow suit for each of those topic areas and essentially hand the entirety of our decision-making apparatus on behavioural issues surrounding contentious topics to the administrative corps alone? I very much hope not: I think it would be an immensely detrimental development in the history of this project. Regardless, such a massive change to the status-quo with such significant impacts upon how we conduct this project and hold eachother accountable to community standards absolutely must be discussed with the fullest possible involvement of the community at large, not just here in the hallowed halls of AN. SnowRise 23:37, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

On the conclusion from Barkeep I've built upon, the Arbitration policy that I linked to before, and was ratified by the community, does pretty clearly state that the Committee's remit is to handle content areas that the community has been unable to resolve.

WP:Contentious topics are not labelled as such because the community has a laisez-faire attitude towards them or has fundamentally failed to try to address them,...Rather these are topics that are inherently divisive in the broader social systems of our societies at large, and thus such biases and conflicts are simply more easily imported into this project when topics are discussed/edit upon here Those two things aren't necessarily separate. Yes some of the CTOP topics are inherently divisive in broader social systems off-wiki, but because of that many of them are also topics that the community has historically had an inability to address. Some exceptions to this apply, for example while the Shakespeare authorship question is a CTOP area, outside of Shakespearean scholars and literary historians it's not really a topic that's divisive in a broader social context. As would the very Misplaced Pages specific Manual of Style and Article titles and BLP areas.

Let me put it to you another way. If was the community who had authorised the sanctions, even if ultimately the end result of the AE and wider discretionary powers for admins is the same, that would have been a clear demonstration that the community was able to handle disruption. However because this required an ArbCom case to be put in place, that alone is a pretty strong indicator to me that this is a content area that the community, for whatever reason, is unable to handle. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:46, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

I think I've left myself open to being misconstrued by not being as clear as I could and should have been and so that has happened in this discussion. What I have said is that the community cannot self-manage Contentious Topics. If the community were self-sufficient and able to self-manage it would be inappropriate for it to be an ArbCom designated Contentious Topic. On the whole I am of the firm belief that this community is incredibly capable of handling large and thorny problems of both content (which is obviously out of bounds for ArbCom) and conduct. Because of this I think some members of the community will sometimes think that Contentious Topic is just a shortcut to make life easier - in this case I saw it in Billed Mammal's stating that ArbCom is supplementing the community in Contentious Topics. It goes beyond that. In a designated Contentious Topic there are going to be significant shortcomings in the community's abilities to self-manage. But being unable to self-manage does not mean the community finds itself helpless in managing a Contentious Topic. Hence my edited comment that there are reasons to do and not to do this proposal, which I continue to have no real opinion on. Barkeep49 (talk) 00:52, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for the clarification, Barkeep: your observations described in those terms, my own perspective substantially overlaps with yours. Sideswipe9th my response also touches upon your last post, but I'm doubling up here in responding to Barkeep to avoid redundancy. Let us assume for the moment that a CTOp being invoked in a topic area is a tacit statement that the community has been unable to handle issues in a topic area with the usual tools. I think the reality is quite a bit more complicated than that, but let's take that for granted in the present discussion so we can move on to more central points. Because the more critical/dispositive consideration here is that the increased tools that CTOP authorizes are meant to supplement existing administrative and community actions, not replace them. Even if we assume that any time ArbCom authorizes CTOP in a given area, it comes inherent with the message that the community is not getting the job done with typical methods, that is still a non-sequitor with the conclusion that ArbCom has declared that the rst of the community is not to take its own actions to arrest disruption in that area, where and when it can (be it at ANI or wherever). Not only does that conclusion not follow from the given premise, but we have a massive body of processes where the community clearly does regularly restrain problematic editors in CTOP/historical DS through processes taking place outside of AE. And this parallel activity has been undertaken as long as DS/CTOP have existed.

So the end result remains the same: a finding of CTOP in no way forestalls the broader community from exercising it's own prerogative to implement TBANs or other CBANs (to take just one example of what the community is permitted to do in CTOP areas). Surely if the contrary was the case, we would have adjusted the relevant policies on CBANs to reflect this fact years ago. CTOP merely authorizes the use of advanced tools to block or otherwise restrain problematic actors a little faster, and makes WP:AE an option for reporting and getting a faster administrative response. What CTOP clearly does not do is forbid the community at large from also using its own discretion in conjunction with these liberalized tools, as it can (and does) use such community decisions/CBANs parallel to regular administrative blocks, in any other topic area where disruption arises. Again, that would be an absurd conclusion: why would we want the community to be less proactive in responding to areas of heightened disruption? Clearly we want (or at least entertain the occasional need for) increased use of CBANs alongside the use of CTOP/1RR blocks and AE filings. Insofar as CTOP/DS language has ever said "DS/CTOP is meant for areas where the community is having trouble keeping the disruption in check", it is for the purpose of explaining the need for looser standards for when warnings, blocks, and other preventative administrative actions can take place--not for the purposes of saying "these issues can now only be addressed at AE". If it were the latter, then countless of our policies and much of the history community bans would read completely differently. SnowRise 01:59, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

What I think this very fair analysis of Contentious Topics misses out on is that certain editors/discussions are, themselves, signals that the community is unable to handle something. This is why not only can admin act sooner and sanction with more severity than they can outside a CT topic area (what SR focuses on) but also can act with first mover advantage and knowing that their actions are less likely to be overturned on formal appeal because of the higher than normal requirements. Barkeep49 (talk) 03:09, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• As to the substantive arguments, you may very well be correct that regulars in the GENSEX space consider ANI an intractable travesty: while my background and editorial interests in both biopsychology and human rights semi-frequently bring me into contact with existing disputes in this topic area, I don't engage with the area with the regularity of such editors. However, a few thoughts as to that: first off, that is not exactly a rare perspective about ANI's complications, issues, and the general caliber of discussion there from editors in...oh, I don't know, let's say every single topic area under the sun. That low opinion of what can happen at ANI (unavodiable to a certain extent by virtue of the fact that it specializes in intractable disputes) does not automatically invalidate the role that space serves or the necessity for preserving the ability for concerned community members to bring issues there for the community's consideration.

So I would say the onus is upon you as the party proposing such a massive carve-out to explain why this one topic area should deviate so drastically from how our policies and procedures operate for every other topic. I mean, have you even considered the fact that your proposal would essentially make it impossible for any disruptive party in the GENSEX area to hereafter ever receive a CBAN from that area (or the project in general) as a result of their conduct? That's a pretty humongous abrogation of the community's inherent purview as it has historically existed on this project--and yet also just one of several such outsized implications of the proposal. Is GENSEX so much more inherently disruptive an area so as to seize the entirety of all such determinations from the community at large, even when compared against other DS/CTOP topics? I just don't think so. The community needs to be able to weight in on longterm abuse regardless of the topic area, and your proposal would instead shift that role entirely to just those admins participating at AE. That's incredibly problematic to me, for more reasons than I can begin to list here.

For that matter, putting aside for the moment how extensively this proposal would usurp the broader community's role in preventing disruption in this area, and hamstring our ability to respond to longterm abuse, I am equally, if not more, concerned about the impacts upon the interests of the reported parties. For all the issues inherent to ANI, it does permit for more shades of grey to enter the discourse than does AE. Taking TT's case as an example, some of us were compelled to modulate our recommendations based on the nitty-gritty details and context of the dispute. Let's remember that the responding admin at AE has a fundamentally different role from the closer of an ANI thread. At ANI the closer must, to some degree, take stock of any ameliorating factors which gained significant support among respondents, because they are finding a community consensus in the discussion. At AE, the admin's role is much more that of the party actually making the determination in the first instance, based on the information provided by involved parties. That's a fundamental difference that effectively narrows the decision making from a group (which can, in the aggregate, often reach a more nuanced and reasonable conclusion that balances competing interests) to a single person, who is more likely to act in a very black and white (or at least far more idiosyncratic) fashion.

Again, sometimes that is precisely what we want, for the sake of efficiency and fairness. But often we want the broader community weighing in, in complicated or nuanced cases with competing community interests, and creating a blanket rule that would just completely pull that decision making into the authority of a increasingly smaller subset of the community is a bad direction to take, and even more questionable when you consider that the proposal is that we do it for a given topic area on the justification that "it gets ugly at ANI sometimes when we discuss this subject matter", because 1) what topic would that not apply to? and 2) sometimes the areas with the most contention behind them are the ones we want the community at large to be able to dig into, to avoid oversimplifcation in the handling of those disputes. SnowRise 21:53, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

• Moral support - I'm generally in favor of making ANI operate more like AE (read: get rid of threaded discussions between the OP and accused party), and thus for as long as AN/I continues to not look like that, I'd generally support delegating more to AE over ANI. But, I do agree with Snow that there's procedural issues with raising this proposal here (at least as anything other than testing the waters), and beyond that would be more in favor of a proposal that cuts down on threaded discussion at ANI rather than just delegating work away from there in a piecemeal fashion. _signed, Rosguill 20:11, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  Reading through the proposal again, I guess my above reasoning puts me in the soft camp? But I don't think we need more guidance for this topic area so much as modest changes to how ANI operates, and for as long as ANI continues to be a free-for-all, AE will be a preferable forum for addressing pretty much any conduct dispute that it has authority to address. _signed, Rosguill 20:22, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

  There's a fine line between accused having an opportunity/obligation to respond to their accusers and the potential for accusations of WP:BLUDGEONing and the current format makes it hard to tell which is happening. Very much agreed with you @Rosguill. Lizthegrey (talk) 22:13, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose I don't believe this is something we need to formalize. However, a few times in this saga I've said that it would be a good idea for the closing admins to suggest that future incidents of this type might be better suited for AE. I still stand by that. I suppose this is similar to the Soft version above, but less formal. We can make a recommendation, but we don't need to make the process so rigid by reducing out flexibility to handle new situations at the most appropriate place. The Wordsmith 22:21, 4 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support, preferring hard This case has pretty conclusively proven that in a controversial topic area it's possible to remove an opponent who has not actually done anything wrong just by showing up to ANI. Needless to say, this is bad. So I support any reform that would fix this situation, including this one. Loki (talk) 01:27, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

who has not actually done anything wrong - hmm, seems like a questionable summary to say the least. Crossroads 01:47, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Strong oppose, this is a completely inappropriate carveout of one topic area, basically making WP:CBANs impossible for that topic. That is unprecedented and disempowers the community. It is not the place of a few people on AN and a few people unhappy with the recent closes to give/take that away. And the idea that AE is inherently superior to ANI is questionable. The limits there make it hard to document a pattern of misconduct; and without a pattern, it's easy and common for bad behavior to be handwaved away as though it is an isolated incident, or just sour grapes from transphobes or whatever. Crossroads 01:36, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Crossroads: CBANs are beyond AE's authority and would thus obviously not be covered by this. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 02:08, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  That is not at all obvious, and besides, then why propose this? It was two CBAN discussions that sparked this idea in the first place, and is motivating some of the votes. A technicality of "the discussion has to be explicitly for a CBAN from the get-go" would make it much harder for problems to be addressed because it's not common for one editor to have all that evidence personally and know that it is that severe. Crossroads 02:14, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  CBANS are pretty much exclusively a product of ANI discussions, so if you create a rule which prevents the community from bringing disruption attached to a given topic area to ANI, you effectively are creating a situation where a CBAN can never be applied to a user who has proven disruptive in that area. So, yes, your proposal very much removes CBANS (or similar actions taken as an expression of community will) as an option in any case of disruption that took place in the GENSEX topic area. Indeed, under your proposal, even an LTA or a suspected sock of a previously CBANned editor couldn't be brought to ANI to be dealt with if the disruption touched upon GENSEX editing. I honestly don't wish to be rude, Tamzin, so I hope you will forgive how stridently I am about to word this, but the fact that you didn't recognize this extremely obvious result of the proposal suggests you made it without due consideration for its very broad and numerous impacts. SnowRise 02:19, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, there are two possibilities here. One is that I didn't consider the possible negative outcomes. The other is that you're wrong about those negative outcomes being remotely likely. Unsurprisingly, just as you tend to think your analysis is correct, I tend to think mine is. Perhaps after ~15kB of reiterating your parade of horribles that will come to pass if we so much as discourage these discussions, now would be a good time to step back and let others decide how valid your concerns are. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 02:37, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  Tamzin I'm fairly sure I've seen you a lot around AN/ANI so I'm fairly surprised that you're so unfamiliar with how CBANS work. While some CBANs start from the get go as someone reporting some behaviour problem an proposing a CBAN, I'd say most CBANs do not work like that. Instead they start of with someone reporting some misbehaviour. Others than may report more misbehaviour. Sometimes the OP responds extremely poorly as well. Eventually someone decides their behaviour is bad enough and proposes a CBAN. The community discussions/!vote this and we hopefully come to a consensus. Even better if it is an uncontentious consensus although sadly that isn't always the case. The organic nature of CBAN discussions means that saying this proposal excludes CBANs simply makes no sense. How can a proposal exclude CBANs when we have no idea if a CBAN may result until we've discussed? Nil Einne (talk) 02:49, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Nil Einne: I'm well aware of how CBANs work. I'm also well aware that there has not been consensus to CBAN someone for edits primarily relating to GENSEX since... Since when? I can't think of a time in recent memory, and I can think of one particular case where a CBAN proposal failed despite strong evidence of systemic discrimination against trans editors. If someone gets TBANned at AE from GENSEX, and continues to disrupt in other realms, then AN/I can still handle it, probably much less dramatically. "User:Example was indef TBANned from GENSEX last month at AE. They have since made comments X, Y, and Z regarding abortion. This user is clearly NOTHERE and further sanctions re in order" has a much better chance at AN/I than "User:Example has been saying A, B, C in this dispute about trans pronouns and D, E, F in this thread on gender dysphoria and also unrelatedly X, Y, Z about abortion". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tamzin (talk • contribs) 03:10, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  Look, I don't want to get in a cycle of counter-criticisms with you, especially because I can recognize that your proposal is a goodfaith response to seeing one too many trainwrecks in this area that could have driven away a valuable contributor (thankfully, from the above, it seems we have avoided that outcome with TheTranarchist). However, I will say that the vast majority of the "15kb" you reference is a necessary response to your hand-waving away observations about some pretty major consequences of your proposed course of action--which I would not describe as a "parade of horribles" but rather a series of results that would be direct consequences of that policy were it implemented, and which (far from being hypothetical or hyperbole), would be automatic and inevitable outcomes.

As Nil Einne, Crossroads and myself have already explained, almost all CBANs result from discussions where they were not suggested at the outset, and your personal recollections and feelings about their necessity not withstanding, there's no good reason to believe the community might not need to CBAN someone in this area from time to time, and no argument for stripping that option from the community's potential responses to disruption. Considering we just had two such CBANS of the sort that you describe as uncommon in one day, and considering there have been numerous other GENSEX TBANS implemented at ANI over the years, clearly the need for such tools is not as super rare as you suggest. And frankly, anti-trans sentiment is a reason why we should be concerned to preserve this option, not toss it away, because it's equally (if not more) likely that the next person we need to indefinitely remove from GENSEX editing will be a problem user aligned against trans rights.

And even as regards that rare exception where a CBAN proposal is a part of the initial complaint, that actually highlights another can-of-worms knock-on effect that would result from the framework you are advancing here. Because as soon as people adjust to this new dynamic, here's exactly what is going to happen: every single time that an editor with an ounce of WP:BATTLEGROUND in them at the moment wants to bring what they perceive to be disruption in the GENSEX area to ANI, they are simply going to include a request for a CBAN in their filing, because that will become the most obvious way for them to get past the arbitrary "must be an issue that AE cannot address" threshold that is a part of your model. And I fail to see how forcing every complaint filed at ANI over GENSEX disruption to start out with the posture of a proposed CBAN is going to make the resulting discussions less inflamed. SnowRise 07:52, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Comment: Just spitballing. What about a system in which CT issues are still reported at ANI, but they can be forwarded to AE if it's determined that there was disruptive behavior? This would theoretically retain the benefits of the discussion format, but it would end the discussion before the thousands of words dedicated to arguing about whether sanctions are warranted and what sanctions are applicable. Of course, this system would not address the legitimate concerns raised by Crossroads above. I also think that any solution should involve reform that allows for topics to be delisted from CT more easily per Barkeep49. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 01:59, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  Puts the cart before the horse. If "it's determined that there was disruptive behavior" then a conclusion has already been reached and an appropriate sanction or warning can issue.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:48, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose Having watched AE proceedings over the years, I am quite confused on why anyone would see that as an improvement in venue. In fact the ability for a single admin to supervote by design, has been a detriment to the encyclopedia in my opinion. Arkon (talk) 02:02, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
• oppose. this is instruction creep. lettherebedarklight晚安 03:02, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose in a number of ANI cases involving an DS area, I have suggested that it might be simpler to take things to ARE. Indeed in a number of cases where someone was not formally aware, I've given alerts as a result of an ANI cases and if the problems were minor enough I've suggested perhaps it would be easier to just leave things be for now and take it to ARE if it repeats. I haven't done so since it changed to CT mostly because it's just something I do where I happen to see a case where this might help. In other words, I fully support the idea that often it is better for areas well covered by CT to be simply handled by CT rather than going through normal community discussion.

  However I'd oppose trying to force cases must be treated as CT without very strong evidence that this is the best for the community. And to be clear this includes the soft variant as it also include a degree of force.

  As noted above, there are numerous possible consequences for this e.g. how we handle cban or other sanctions that aren't something CT can impose. Note also that CBANs technically include topic bans even from CT areas. While I am personally not fussed whether an editor is subject to a community topic ban or a CT one, there is always going to be editors who feel a community ones is better since it will require a community consensus to remove. (After all, we even had community site ban of an editor because the community was concerned about an earlier arbcom decision to unban the editor.) There's also how this affect cases that might be better for the community to handle since they are more complicated than the simpler disruption in a certain topic area CT handles best.

  I'd even more oppose it for any specific CT area (instead of all CT areas) without strong evidence there's a reason to treat these as special areas. I'm far from convinced that the two reason cases resulted in this are the worst we've seen at ANI. And concerns over people trying to get rid of opponents covers pretty much all CT areas and frankly anything contentious which isn't CT. E.g. the notability/ARS wars.

  Most importantly though, IMO this is simply a bad idea at this time. To some extent there is an aspect of hard cases make bad law here. But more importantly, emotions are clearly still running high over those two recent cases. I don't think it likely holding this discussion at this time is going to improve that or ensure we make a good decision. Instead we get comments like "who has not actually done anything wrong". Clearly quite a few members of the community do not agree with that for one or both of those editors. This includes many who are not opponents. While a discussion like this is always likely to be contentious and may get controversial comments, the best outcome and least disruption and harm to the community will come if we hold it when editors aren't already affected by two recent controversial cases, cases which resulted in this proposal. Fanning the flames when emotions are still so high is not going to benefit the community.

  To be clear, I'm not suggesting any editor involved in this proposal ill motivations, I have no doubt they're genuinely trying to improve Misplaced Pages and fix a problem that they feel was highlighted by recent cases. However having good motivations doesn't stop an editor making bad decisions and I feel that's clearly the case here. (Actually part of the reason why they have made such a bad decision is precisely why we should not be doing this. Perhaps they weren't able to see what they may have seen when if it wasn't so soon after those two cases namely that it was a terrible idea to discuss this right at this moment.)

  Nil Einne (talk) 03:28, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per most of the above, especially SnowRise. Not going to repeat it all. I do think that an "ARBGENSEX2" case is ultimately inevitable, but it will be after the community has failed to be able to resolve the problem without having to defer to ArbCom. And that time is not upon us yet. I agree also especially with Crossroads in observing that AE is not a good venue for establishing long-term patterns of disruption, only short-term "outbursts", because of its strict limits.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:46, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose - While I recognize that Tamzin's suggestion is entirely a good faith effort to deal with a pressing problem, I believe that SnowRise's analysis of the results that would occur if this were put into effect to be more accurate and representative of the general history of AN and AN/I. Community discussion can result in a CBAN, which requires that the community overturn it. It is therefore a more powerful sanction then an admin-imposed AE indef, which -- like every other admn-imposed sanction -- can be overturned at any time by any individual admin (for whatever reason). We should not lose the potential use of CBANS as an option. Beyond My Ken (talk) 08:32, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Beyond My Ken: I'm fairly sure you're wrong about CT sanctions as alluded to by User:Barkeep49 and maybe others above. As documented at Misplaced Pages:Contentious topics#Changing or revoking a contentious topic restriction, these can't simply be overturned at any time by an individual admin for any reason. That can only happen when it's an indef and was imposed by a single admin and it's been more than a year or the imposing admin is no longer an admin. Otherwise if the imposing admin agrees (including when imposing the sanction) but note this sort of means it's not overturned solely by any admin. Oh and if it's imposed by a single admin, they (but only they) can change or remove it themselves without needing to ask anyone. Maybe more importantly a case which makes it to AE will often result in discussion before sanction is imposed by rough consensus of admins in which case none of this applies and it needs to be appealed either at AE or AN or by arbcom. To be clear, this is only for sanctions imposed under CT. I believe in some cases an admin will just quickly impose a sanction as an ordinary admin action rather than under CT and AE will decide to just leave it at that. (And as noted to some extent even if it is imposed under CT, if by a single admin which I think is another possible outcome of an AE report, this admin could allow it to be treated like a regular sanction and overturned by any admin by saying so when imposing it.) Nil Einne (talk) 09:03, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  I may be confused about that, I'm not certain, but it *is* certain that if all GENSEX issues are required to be settled at AE, then a CBAN is out of the question, and I still consider a CBAN to be a more powerful sanction, because it comes from the community at large. It may be more cumbersome to *reach* a consensus to CBAN, but the direct consensus of the community is, to my mind, a stronger action. Beyond My Ken (talk) 11:31, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• OpposeAs a general principle leave it to us on the ground to thrash things out. The existing structure can take care of those fairly rare times we can't.Lukewarmbeer (talk) 10:08, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose - I appreciate Tamzin making an effort to find a way to improve our resolution of disputes and to avoid having difficult mega-threads like these two ANIs we just had. However, I am among those who does not believe that AE is better at resolving disputes than ANI (although I do believe in some cases we should make some ANI threads more formal, like AE, to e.g. reduce bludgeoning). I also don't think AN is the right place to decide structural changes to ANI; that should be at the pump; the Administrator's Noticeboard is not an appropriate place for any RFC in my view. Discussions here will attract attention from administrators, and RFCs might bring in FRS, but that's still not a pool representative of the overall community. Ironically, my procedural objection is rooted in the same principle as my substantive objection: fundamentally, if you reduce the pool of decision-makers from "everyone" to "administrators", you don't end up with a better decision. Levivich (talk) 15:34, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  Apparently we're testing the theory. Levivich (talk) 21:45, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

  So much for that. Closed promptly with "It is debatable whether ... that would be a matter for AE".  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:32, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

• Neutral on the soft proposal, though I think it should be worded to encompass all CT areas, oppose the hard version. I do think AE is a better venue for most CT-related conduct disputes, and I hope our admins feel empowered to strongly suggest that newly filed ANI reports be moved to AE when possible. I would be fine with admins closing such discussions and directing the OPs to AE, though I think all it should take to reopen them is the OP saying "no, I definitely want this to stay at ANI". I oppose the hard proposal as GENSEX doesn't need this treatment over other CT areas, and because I agree with those that are concerned about missing out on some ANI-specific potential remedies. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 19:27, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
• Note: I've placed a notice of this discussion at WP:VPP and listed it on the WP:CD ticker: these issues and the proposed solution have implications far too broad to be considered by just those of us here. SnowRise 22:27, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose - My lead reasoning will remain that our community members are intended to be able to pick their forum, depending on what they think can work best (I suspect GENSEX regulars are likely aware of the options). I oppose revoking that choice. There are more personal reasons someone might have this reason (e.g. So long as I continue to find complex discussions harder to understand in separated discussion than ANI rambling but more continuous format (while many are fiercely the opposite); or someone preferring to have an area settled by the general editing base than a small subset of admins), that encourage them to prefer one format over another. In terms of proposer's request to find alternate solutions, then I believe they may be best off indicating what the most problematic factors are, then mitigations to those can be advised, which may well more be in execution than mechanics. Time? Length of reading? Both no doubt come with negatives, but the flipside is both indicate significant numbers of editors trying to find a solution and struggling. A shift to AE may well resolve on those two aspects, but at the issue of cutting the people participating, or the views & evidence given. In which case, it's not a solution, but a tradeoff. We deal with tradeoffs all the time, but for any tradeoff, the proposal should be noting the negatives that arise and why we should accept their cost. I do not believe those costs are sufficiently covered here, with either option. Nosebagbear (talk) 00:09, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
• I've been a bit conflicted on this but I think I'm coming down on the side of weakly supporting the soft version of this proposal.—S Marshall T/C 08:33, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. It is my firm belief that this proposal would not have been made if it had been any other topic area. Gensex editors should not be treated any differently from other editors that wind up at ANI. Gensex editors are not special and exceptional. Misplaced Pages is not here to coddle any editors, regardless of their editing experience and editor level. Gensex editors must follow the same Misplaced Pages community policies that affect non-gensex editors, and if one of them pushes an envelope too far, he/she/they must face the same action and consequences faced by editors who have engaged in similar behavior in non-gensex articles. ANI is where issues regarding a user's conduct need to be discussed and determined. Pyxis Solitary (yak yak). Ol' homo. 12:02, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. For the same reason I opposed making ANI more like AE, there is a need for a place to report issue that has no bar of entry. No matter how low that bar can be made. Maybe taking discussions to AE is a good idea, and could be suggested once a report has been made, but there shouldn't be any formal direction on the matter. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 15:31, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
• Strong oppose hard, neutral on soft - AE is too bureaucratic. Allowing an admin to move a discussion to AE puts the bureaucratic responsibility to the admin, not the (possibly new) user who wants to file a complaint. Animal lover |666| 16:56, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
• Neutral to support on hard, support on soft - I know this sounds vague, but in this case, any solution is better than no solution. The way I see it, most GENSEX editors have it significantly harder on virtually every level and WP might not be well equipped to handle all of it with its existing administrative structures. @Tamzin I hope this will not come off as if I am rushing through the nuances of this proposal; rather, I am trying to say that this is one of those cases where, in principle, I'll support attempts to lessen the burden on GENSEX editors, even if those are not "perfect" by WP standards. I'll add that to VP discussion. And I really think some editors in ANI should take WP:WALLOFTEXT to heart. Ppt91 19:10, 6 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. Cases from all other topic areas can be brought here (can't they?). I don't see how it is helpful to make an exception for GENSEX. Editors should not be curtailed from raising important issues so that the most people can see them. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 02:27, 7 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose. Does not seem appropriate; cases should be filed where appropriate as appropriate. Stifle (talk) 14:59, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose I don't see even from the previous ANI threads that GENSEX topics are unique in a manner that would make AE the only appropriate venue, especially since AE tends to languish in my experience from lack of input. If there's thoughts that ANI itself could be restructured to address issues, that's worth talking about (BilledMammal's suggestions etc.) But I don't actually see how this solves any problem. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs 15:21, 10 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Actively trying to reduce community involvement in banning people for their problematic behaviour is counter to the core consensus-based approach to community management. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:09, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Snow Rise's very valid concerns around procedure and CBANs have still not been addressed. Obviously contentious topics like GENSEX invite contentious editing which is why said topics are over-represented at ANI, doesn't mean we need to palm them off elsewhere and out of the hands of the community. Satellizer el Bridget 01:02, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

A plea: Propose a better solution

I don't think I have ever felt truly desperate on Misplaced Pages before. I have not come here trying to offer a magic bullet to this problem. I have presented two drafts of solutions to a problem that is making a highly sensitive topic area unsafe to edit in. Most people who edit GENSEX have been neutral to supportive of this proposal. It has largely been the "AN(I) regulars" here saying no, we have to continue to stew in this mess—a kind of mess that, no doubt, AN(I) regulars are used to, else they wouldn't be AN(I) regulars. The people in this topic area do not edit so they can have month-long dramaboard threads. We edit because we see issues in Misplaced Pages's woefully inadequate coverage of gender issues. Inhumane treatment of BLP subjects. Coverage of sociological subjects that is sourced to Tumblr blogs rather than academic papers. Coverage of highly sensitive biomedical subjects that is sourced to Tumblr blogs rather than academic papers. All to push both pro- and anti-trans narratives, sometimes in the same sentence.

So I'm begging y'all, please. As a fellow editor. As someone who has poured her heart into writing two GAs in this topic area. This is a request for comment. I am requesting y'all's comments: Propose a better solution. Propose something that does not drive away editors from a topic area desperately in need of them. I still think my ideas work fine or would only nned slight tweaks—in particular "soft", which may oppose !votes haven't really addressed—but if you disagree, I get it. That's how consensus works. But there is a massive problem here. I don't think anyone familiar with the facts disputes that. If you won't support either these solutions, then something else. Please. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 23:18, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

The same sort of plea could be made about every WP:CTOP subject area. There's nothing magically special about this one. What you have boils down to a complaint about how WP:ANI operates, and we all have complaints about how ANI operates, but there isn't a clear consensus on how to improve it. "Carve my preferred topic out of ANI" isn't a solution, and an RfC predicated on that idea isn't going to be the vehicle by which we arrive at ANI reform.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  23:44, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

I edit in quite a few CTOP areas. I am not aware of another one that routinely triggers weekslong battles of this sort at AN/I. But if your response to a request for a better proposal is "I acknowledge a systemic problem, oppose a solution, and have no better solution to offer," all right, noted. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 00:30, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Instead of engaging in a petty straw-man argument, try reading what I wrote more carefully. To spell it out: This proposal is basically a poisoned well. If you want to propose ANI reform, do it in a clean proposal in an appropriate venue and there may be enough other editors fed up with ANI for the same reasons to support some changes. (Comment length/frequency limitations are a pretty commonly suggested idea, so that's a likely starting point.)  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  00:57, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

It's entirely possible to conclude that there's no better solution without radically changing how Misplaced Pages works, Tamzin. Yes, there are all manner of areas -- from deletion discussions to noticeboards to RfAs -- where things would just go so much more smoothly if we just figured out how to keep the "wrong" sort of people from participating. My blood pressure would be a fair bit lower myself if I could just exclude or evict people who disagree with me from discussions (which, in my observation, tends to be the fundamental element of "safe spaces").

But the bottom line is that contentious areas attract controversy. There is no feasible way to immunize Misplaced Pages against it. You speak about poor treatment of BLP subjects, people sourcing to blogs, the interference of politics, as if such behaviors are somehow unique to GENSEX-related topics. Heck, the bulk of my articlespace edits are to ice hockey topics, where the temperature -- if you'll forgive the mild pun -- is a couple orders of magnitude lower than in GENSEX. We still get screaming over such things.

And in many cases, that's simply the price of doing business. By choosing, over the years, to be a regular in areas like AfD and ANI, I've accepted that there's going to be a lot of screaming, a lot of disagreement, and a lot of assholes. If that's too much for me, I walk away. Ravenswing 07:03, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

( Peanut gallery comment) I may be overusing this template, but I really want to make clear that I'm a newbie here. I don't mean to be a bother. In my lowly opinion, the first substantive community response to a new editor's behavioral issue should not be a vicious, humiliating, overlong, utterly unsympathetic ANI case. And if you're just going to hand out a TBAN anyway, you might as well make it policy to slap an editing restriction on anyone with more than one warning in the GENSEX topic area. It would eliminate a lot of the pointless bureaucracy.In my lowly opinion, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. (Metric friends may substitute '28 grams' and '0.45 kilogram'. /j) If the WP:Adopt-a-user program were reasonably effective I wager you wouldn't find even half as many chronic, intractable behavioral problems in this area. You can try to whip GENSEX into shape all you like, but do you really think that increasing sanctions will entice new users to come edit the area? (I certainly am not enticed. Thank god I stay on the refdesks.) If the broader community were more proactive and less reactive in responding to flawed editing, things would surely not escalate so rapidly.In any case I don't really have a concrete suggestion. I would greatly like to see increased collegiality between old and new editors with a more developed mentorship program. But anything that gets the community to act before things have escalated to a TBAN is a better solution than what exists presently. Stop punishing people when you veterans haven't even figured out how to solve the underlying problem. In the meantime (I know my comment is unrealistic), I think AE is probably a better place than ANI for things like this. But maybe it would be best to introduce an "AE mode" for use at ANI, so discussions could be more structured yet not as limited in scope and jurisdiction. Just a thought.I don't mean to be impolite with this comment, just impassioned. If I've been incivil, let me know and I'll strike it. Shells-shells (talk) 00:14, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I'd be all for a radical restructuring of AN/I—perhaps limiting it into actual incidents and creating a separate Administrators' noticeboard/Recurring issues without threaded discussion—but that seems even less likely to happen than fixing the handling of GENSEX discussions. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 00:31, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Shells-shells, topic bans are not "punishment", they are protection of the project from recurrent disruption. I don't know what you think AE does, but go observe it for a while, and you'll see that it largely hands out topic bans (and blocks). It is unlikely that either of the GENSEX editors recently sanctioned at ANI would not have been sanctioned at AE.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:05, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I have read WP:PUNITIVE, yes, which is why I specifically used the word punishing. With the exception of its first sentence—I would rather say bans should not be "punishment"—I completely agree with your comment. Shells-shells (talk) 01:40, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Shells-shells, topic bans are not "punishment", they are protection of the project from recurrent disruption.

They are both. It's meant to be protective, but it's absolutely a "you did something wrong and now we're taking away your ability to edit here" punishment. — The Hand That Feeds You: 19:17, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, I do think there are some issues with that framing: it's really the low hanging fruit/Wikipedia equivalent of a politician's baby kiss to say ANI is ugly and that we wish the process of dispute resolution could be more collegial--and less dispiriting for newcomers in particular. But nobody is excited when a dispute or issue grows to the point that it lands at ANI, let alone when a CBAN has to be issued, and when I check in at ANI, I fairly regularly see people doing their best to make the process (borrowing upon your wording here) as un-vicious, un-humiliating, and sympathetic as they can, in the circumstances. But let's have a dose of realism and pay at least lip service to some important constraints here: sometimes there are values and priorities of our community and methodology (for providing reliable, neutral, factually-accurate material to serve the needs of our readers) that have to take precedence over encouraging the editing of every contributor, in every area, all the time.

That important caveat said, my overall thoughts are that you've identified a fruitful area here--indeed, maybe one of the few areas that actual stands a chance of improving the situation in question, as it stands. I think you are very much correct that more effort at the front-end, when onboarding volunteers, could pay immense dividends in the long run, in terms of decreased disruption, acrimony, and need to re-set editorial conduct when problematic patterns have already been formed. As you say, mentorship in one form or another is surely an under-exploited potential tool. I think there's a cognitive bias at work here that is not at all uncommon to institutions of governance: we are fixated with and dissuaded by the upfront costs, failing to rationally apply a longterm analysis.

On the other hand, I am not surprised that "adopt-a-user" has failed to catch on: what a patronizing choice of title for such a program. I imagine it has an especially discouraging impact on precisely the type of editors we are talking about here and would most like to reach with such a scheme: those who come here specifically to edit in CTOP areas: some of those editors would be just simply battleground and avoidant of the idea of the need for guidance by nature and others, as a consequence of what their communities have historically had to deal with, are justifiably sensitive to implied condescension. Anyway, that last point is a nitpick observation. I agree the mentorship angle is something this community needs to invest in. Not just to ameliorate the issues being contemplated here today, but for purposes of editor retention and community unity/harmonized outlook.SnowRise 01:55, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I may simply be naïve, but I don't think ANI is really as bad as people say. It seems to work pretty well as an ad hoc tribunal, or as a grand jury. But once in a while it gets acrimonious, and the last people who should be subjected to an acrimonious ANI thread are new users. In fact I think there's far too much bureaucracy facing new users anyway (even excepting ANI), but that criticism is also low hanging fruit. There ought to be better options, with lower stakes, in the first place.I agree completely with your second and third paragraphs. It would be wonderful for a mentorship culture to develop here, and 'Adopt-a-user' may well need a rebranding. Shells-shells (talk) 03:12, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Throwing this out there: ArbCom. We pay them to deal with problems that are, well, really bad. We haven't actually tried this yet; WP:GENSEX is not a "real" case. HouseBlaster 00:27, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I've said before that I think a GENSEX2 case is ultimately inevitable, but why do you think an ArbCom proceeding would be preferable? It would ultimately take several months, dig even deeper into various individuals' editing habits, and probably result in more sanctions, on more editors, that are harder to appeal. Few things drive editors away from a topic area better and faster than WP:RFARB attention.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  01:05, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't know that I would agree that such a case would be per se a bad thing: if it gets to the point that ArbCom forms a case, presumably it will be a situation where there are at least potentially bad actors needing scrutiny--which would not be a happy occasion but would surely be better than their hiding their heads in the sand. That said, it would all come down to the particulars whether it would be a positive development in the aggregate.

Those caveats made, I agree with your central point: I don't see how such a case would really remedy the systemic issues being contemplated here. For all its overriding authority, ArbComs remedies in a situation like this are rather limited. They can make a subject CTOP (and this one already is), they can sanction individual editors, sometimes they publically hold harmless someone who got pulled into a dispute through no disruptive fault of their own, and they can take steps to protect individuals from harassment. All vital work, such as it goes, but making substantial changes to our community structures and processes, at least in this context, is largely outside of their remit. To the extent we want to reform ANI or any of our other community processes, it's just not something we can pass to their shoulders. The buck stops here. SnowRise 01:19, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

It depends what the issue is? If the issue is certain editors who cannot behave in the topic area, but the issue becomes too obfuscated in ANI discussions for the community at large to get involved, then ArbCom would be a good venue to deal with it. DS I don't think dealt with these problems too well either, and ArbCom directly does I think. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:07, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

Sorry T. I do feel bad about opposing one of your remedies without proposing an alternative. The thing I keep hoping for in GENSEX is a group of three to five admins that hang around. It's the main difference I see between GENSEX and American Politics or Pseudoscience. The early intervention of an admin warning is little seen in GENSEX. I'm looking for things like "If you continue to bludgeon discussions/to misgender the article subject/to rely on evidently unreliable sources/to skirt the bounds of civility, I will block you." They'll have been witness to the patterns of editing that might eventually prove to have been problematic. The only other suggestion I have is stricter enforcement and clerking at AE. If we're counting on that as the good option, let's tune it up. Though I do think there are deep problems in GENSEX, I don't share the view that it's at the top of the CT/general sanctions problem pile. Within the past year, we've had knock-down-drag-outs tied to Armenia-Azerbaijan, Russia-Ukraine, AmPol, and Palestine-Israel. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 00:59, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

"The thing I keep hoping for in GENSEX is a group of three to five admins that hang around." And there's an answer right there. Ravenswing 07:06, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

If there were no sanctions imposed, would you be making your proposal or this plea? Arkon (talk) 01:23, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Two out of three sanctions proposals went "my way", including one that I literally proposed, and the third one I only weakly opposed, so... -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 01:46, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

That doesn't feel like an answer. There was literally nothing different in these reports than the thousands of reports before it, other than the accused throwing out so many bytes of text without reprimand. If your concern is separate from the results, you may want to wait and propose in isolation. I think divorcing your concern from the results may be helpful to your cause. Arkon (talk) 01:55, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I have not framed this thread as an objection to the outcome of the TT thread. I've framed it as what it is: about that thread, and several others, being "shitshow"s. -- Tamzin (she|they|xe) 02:00, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Tamzin here is clearly frustrated with the manner in which WP:ANI operates generally in these sorts of cases, and I don't think that this is purely some reaction to being dissatisfied with a single closing statement. She is being extremely candid in this thread, and, while I disagree with her proposal above, I do share her sentiment that there are certain topics and situations where ANI is not capable of handling disputes without consuming an inordinate amount of community time in exchange for at most marginal benefit to the community. She's being sincere here regarding her motives, and I don't think it drives the conversation forward to insinuate otherwise. — Red-tailed hawk _(nest) 05:13, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

For three months, trial structured discussion at ANI:

1. ANI reports are to be titled using the format "Editor name(s), topic area(s), type(s) of disruption". For example "BilledMammal, Platypus, Disruptive cite-tagging"
2. Editors wishing to make a statement on the report should create a fourth level section (====) titled using the format "Statement by editor name". There is no word or diff limit, but editors are advised that the longer it is the less likely it is to be read.
3. Editors may edit their statement as required; normal requirements to ensure that replies are not deprived of context are waived, and editors making replies are advised to quote any relevant sections.
4. Editors may reply to no more than five statements; there are no limits to the number of replies they may make to those statements. Editors may additionally reply to any statement that discusses their behavior. Replies should not introduce new information, and should instead seek to clarify or discuss the information raised in the editors statement.
5. Statements should remain closely related to the initial topic raised. If additional behavioral issues need to be raised, including behavioral issues related to the editor who opened the discussion, editors should create a third level section (===) using the same format of "Editor name(s), topic area(s), type(s) of disruption".
6. To propose community sanctions, editors should create a fourth level section (====) titled "Proposed sanctions on Editor name(s)".
7. Editors !voting on community sanctions proposals should keep their !vote concise and reference their statement for more detailed arguments and evidence. Editors may not reply to other editors community sanction !votes.

The intent of this suggestion is to keep discussions on topic, to prevent bludgeoning and impenetrable walls of text, and to try to introduce a level of neutrality into the opening of the discussions. It also attempts to keep things less structured and limited than AE, as I don't believe that level of structure is appropriate here.

Issues I see are that the structure will be excessive for some discussions (for example, WP:ANI#IP range from Poland, trouble with one article - although I do believe the proposed title format of "Polish IP range, Weedkiller (album), edit warring" would be more informative than the existing title), that it will make boomerangs more difficult, and that the structure will be difficult for editors to enforce. However, if editors are interested in attempting to apply structure to ANI, I hope that making a proposal - even an awful one - will at least spark a discussion on what that structure could look like. BilledMammal (talk) 02:24, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Bill, I know it's a big ask, but I think a rudimentary mock-up in a sandbox might be helpful here: perhaps it's just me, but I am having a bit of difficulty visualizing the overarching format of how these pieces fit together. SnowRise 03:09, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

@Snow Rise: See here; I hope it manages to make it more clear. BilledMammal (talk) 03:37, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Definitely helps. Was close to what I had in mind when I originally !voted "Let ArbCom (or delegate) sort it out in a more structured way" because of the mess of accusations and counter-accusations threaded together. Lizthegrey (talk) 08:07, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Reading sectioned discussion is always a massive pain to try and understand any lengthy discussion - I've never seen a good explanation of how to easily read replies and replies to replies in a smooth fashion in such a discussion, as well as seeing how the discussion tone in general changes as it runs. So on that basis alone, I'd be against any such trial - but especially as a general ANI structure. I believe points 1, 4, 6 do have serious potential value to them, and point 5 could be used in certain circumstances/categories of discussion, although I'd like to see a clarification on how it worked with threads that raised multiple behavioural issues initially. Would each need its own section? Nosebagbear (talk) 16:54, 8 March 2023 (UTC)

First Law of Misplaced Pages Reform: Calls to reform a page, made on the page to be reformed, will result in no reforms. Levivich (talk) 06:48, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

I've started a discussion at Misplaced Pages:Village pump (idea_lab)#Allow administrators to enforce structured discussions in CT/GS to workshop a possible proposal. I feel that keeping it separate from this discussion may help keep it focused. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:37, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

User:Jasper Deng’s closing of a discussion

Jasper Deng recently closed Talk:Hurricane Orlene (2022)#RfC - User created map or NHC Map as an non-admin, uninvolved closure. In the closing comment, Jasper Deng singled me out saying me stating a neutrally worded RfC was “inappropriate and disruptive”. Per Misplaced Pages:Closing discussions, the closing comment sure be neutrally worded. In the discussion, there was previously no mention of the discussion being disruptive or inappropriate. I then attempted to work the situation out on Jasper Deng’s talk page in User talk:Jasper Deng#Request for a strikethrough. My request for the comment to be made more neutrally worded (with support from myself, the RfC starter on the closure) was met twice with no. Based on their full wording of the discussion closure, “Elijahandskip In light of the RfC we already had, this is inappropriate and disruptive. At the least, this is the wrong forum; such a change would have to be projectwide and discussed at WT:Weather. We will not be using the NHC-made maps.”, I highly suspect this user should not have closed the discussion as they appear to be biased and refusing to stay neutral in their closing remarks. The comment sounds more like something you would see in a RfC comment, not a closing discussion remark. In closing discussions, one person should not be singled out under any condition, let alone being pinged in the closing remarks.

As such, I request the closure to be overturned and request a new person to close the discussion (As noted on Jasper Deng’s talk page, I support the closure of the discussion). Jasper Deng also appears to not have any idea about how to properly close discussions, so a potential warning or topic-ban from closing discussions should be considered until they can properly show that they understand how to stay neutral in closing discussions. Elijahandskip (talk) 01:22, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

• Important Extra Note: Discussion was originally started at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#User:Jasper Deng’s closing of a discussion, but was noted to have been placed at the wrong venue due to it involving an RfC. This is an exact copy/paste of the discussion starting message on that page, as directed by an admin. Elijahandskip (talk) 01:22, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
• Comment. From what I can gather, this is a dispute among the members of the same project about an article within the scope of that project that implicates a possible WP:CONLEVEL-type conflict of consensuses where on one side there is the outcome the project-wide RfC (involving a template with a pre-collapsed portion of the caption), and on the other there are MOS:COLLAPSE and MOS:PRECOLLAPSE. This should have been addressed in a dialogue about: (1) whether objectively there is a discrepancy; (2) how to resolve the ostensible discrepancy, probably within Template:Storm path. Has there been a significant discussion about the appropriateness of collapsing? The underlying cause for this appearing on a noticeboard is how the RfC starter was talked to prior to starting the RfC: "no consensus", "works fine", "no reason to change" (ignoring the stated reason). So maybe something needs to be done to help these editors move along, and ANI definitely didn't seem like the right environment for that. But I'm not sure if I'm correct on all the facts; I prefer not making any further comments in this discussion. —Alalch E. 02:20, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Partially correct. The main reason I brought this to the noticeboard wasn’t more of the WP:CONLEVEL issue (as I didn’t even think of that at the time), but the improper closure of the RfC and borderline personal attacks through a non-neutrally worded closure. The WP:CONLEVEL is an issue, especially since it was used to justify closing the discussion pre-maturely. The closing comment was more of an actually !vote rather than a closing comment. That was why it was brought to the noticeboard. Somewhat a stem off of WP:CONLEVEL, which was the justification for the closure. So I see two interlaced problems: the WP:CONLEVEL closure ideology and the use of the RfC closure as a way to “get back” at what the person calls a “disruptive” editor. Elijahandskip (talk) 02:34, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

• This is getting out of hand. What do we need to do in order to curb these ongoing incidents? Is it now necessary, as Robert McClenon suggested, to declare that weather and tropical cyclones in particular are contentious topics?--⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:31, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  Some topics are contentious topics because they have battleground editing because they are regions of the world that have been historical battlegrounds where people have died. Tropical storms also tragically cause human deaths. Does that in turn mean that tropical storms are subjects of battleground editing? Robert McClenon (talk) 15:18, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't think in this case it is because of people who have died, but for some reason the Wikiprojects around weather-related topics seem to have become a hotbed of WP:OWNership, WP:CONLEVEL issues and off-wiki canvassing to an extent I haven't seen since WP:EEML in the ancient times. The latest big dust-up is at WP:ARBWPTC (I know you're aware of this, I'm more summarizing to give context for people who may not be). Contentious Topics, Discretionary Sanctions and General Sanctions are typically declared not because the topic itself is contentious, but because there are repeated user conduct disputes that the normal tools the community has are unable to break. The Shakespeare authorship question, for example, hasn't killed anybody as far as I know but is still designated a Contentious Topic. While AE wouldn't be adept at dealing with off-wiki coordination due to the private nature of evidence, it might not be a bad idea for AE to get a crack at handling the conduct disputes. Perhaps it could be folded in with WP:ARBCC to cover "weather, storms and climate change" by motion in the same way that WP:GENSEX was created. Community-level General Sanctions could also be another option. Additionally, it might be a good idea to hold a Community-wide RFC to discuss CONLEVEL and the role of WikiProjects versus local talkpages in determining consensus, since it might need to be updated or clarified. The Wordsmith 16:29, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  User:The Wordsmith - I was being sarcastic about the deaths. But, in my opinion, there are at least two classes of contentious topics. There are those that are contentious because of nationalistic editing, because the subject matter is inherently contentious, and those that are contentious because one or more editors are just stubborn. And you know that I was aware of an ArbCom case in which I provided evidence. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:49, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  Exactly I saw that you had posted evidence on the case, so I made a note indicating that my summary was more for other editors who hadn't seen the history. And noted on the sarcasm, it can sometimes be hard to pick up on in a place like this. The Wordsmith 19:37, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  Yes. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:49, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  At the moment, the biggest problem with the Weather/Tropical Cyclone projects at is that we have just updated the general colour scheme, which is/was expected to cause a lot of disruption, as this is a big and major change that several people who use our maps don't like and want RV'd but were needed for us to meet Misplaced Pages's standards around accessibility criteria. I will note that during the various discussions surrounding the colours, an RFC was held that went over the track maps in detail and noone brought up using the NHC maps. Probably because it creates problems around what maps to use in other basins, where we are not able to use maps from the RSMC/TCWC for various reasons, including them not being generated or being allowed on Misplaced Pages for copyright reasons.Jason Rees (talk) 20:03, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  That seems odd. Per the closing remarks in the RfC I started about NHC maps, Jasper Deng eluded to it already being discussed, saying “We will not be using the NHC-made maps” while calling the discussion, “innapropriate and disruptive”. But on the noticeboard discussion, you point blank just said it was never brought up? So what, WP:CONLEVEL and WP:OWN are legit major issued right now. Jasper Deng solely closed an RfC, speaking for the WikiProject as a whole, for a discussion that had not taken place before. That right there seems to be enough grounds to support a topic ban from closing discussions. Jasper Deng has edited Misplaced Pages for a long time (over 14 years), and clearly has an understanding of the rules and processes on Misplaced Pages. What is everyone’s thoughts on the topic-ban proposed? Elijahandskip (talk) 20:23, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

@Elijahandskip: My best advise for this whole issue, drop the stick. - FlightTime (open channel) 20:50, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

@Elijahandskip: I feel that you are overreacting here and trying to open Pandoras Box just for the sake of opening it here, as it almost certainly has been discussed somewhere on Wiki over the last 20 years, but I only looked at the Colour RFC, rather than the 50+ archives of WPTC/WPWX. If it hasn't its probably because its obvious that it would cause problems with what maps to use in other basins, where we are not able to use maps from the RSMC/TCWC/JTWC becasue they are not generated or allowed on Misplaced Pages because of copyright.Jason Rees (talk) 21:04, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

Definitely. I'm frustrated with the way WikiProject has become, and I think a community solution to handle this WikiProject (or making weather a contentious topic) is urgently needed to put a stop the drama that had consumed the WikiProject for some years, maybe ever since 2016-17. MarioJump83 (talk) 07:24, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

• I note the topic is already mentioned on EEng's very useful list. That should be enough to give the participants cause to think about what people in general think about their obsession. Phil Bridger (talk) 21:39, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  LOL. MarioJump83 (talk) 07:24, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

• Comment – I will say that it is highly embarrassing to have yet another noticeboard incident out of this Wikiproject, and it is sad that this project is quickly becoming known to many editors as one of the biggest problem areas across the whole encyclopedia. United States Man (talk) 22:40, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

  It's making weather-interested users to look bad by this point. MarioJump83 (talk) 07:24, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

• There is nothing procedurally improper about an uninvolved editor closing an RfC early as "inappropriate and disruptive". It is not inherently non-neutral to describe a discussion as such. If there is no dispute that the discussion itself should remain closed, I would also endorse the idea of moving on. Mz7 (talk) 07:23, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

But should Weather have general sanctions? That question wasn’t yet answered. 74.108.105.35 (talk) 20:45, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

I dont think we need general sanctions as we have to remember that we are a multi-national wikiproject and some drama will always happen through misunderstandings. As an example, most weather project members are from the US, I am from the UK while Mario is Indonesian and we all talk a slightly different version of english and have different ideas of how to present stuff.Jason Rees (talk) 21:36, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Considering the rampant sockpuppetry, multiple ArbComs, canvassing issues, and AN(I)‘s about the project, it seems to be a contentious enough topic to require a discussion about general sections. There isn’t normally this much drama in other projects. 74.108.105.35 (talk) 22:19, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

Of course. I don't see these issues happening this much if weather is designated a contentious topic. It will still happen, but it is going to be on a more controlled manner. MarioJump83 (talk) 08:38, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

Declare WP:Weather a contentious topic?

Based on the evidence above, should WP:WEATHER be declared a contentious topic? 72.68.134.254 (talk) 14:12, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

• We're not quite in the right venue for that. Designation of a WP:CTOP needs to be done by ArbCom either as a motion or a full case. Be sure you have all of your ducks in a row before you initiate such a case, in other words proof of failed prior attempts to resolve disputes. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 14:43, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

  Without expressing an opinion on the idea, the community has authorized CTOP-like arrangements before without ArbCom, such as has been done on Cryptocurrency and professional wrestling. Courcelles (talk) 14:54, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

• Do we really need to do this? I fear that the answer may be "yes" but does this really belong with the other topics on this list such as the Arab–Israeli conflict? I mean, the weather is not a particularly contentious topic among the general population - it only seems to be a few fanatics who insist on making it so. Wouldn't it be better to get rid of those few fanatics? Phil Bridger (talk) 14:58, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

  That probably would be for ArbCom to decide. And didn't we already have some wheather-related cases, which apparently didn't go for the nuclear option? _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 16:26, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

  Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/WikiProject Tropical Cyclones was primarily about off-wiki coordination in the project, we did not necessarily look at the topic itself as a contentious issue. Primefac (talk) 16:37, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

  Wasn’t Russia-Ukraine declared contentious by general consensus at AN? 47.23.10.234 (talk) 17:34, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

  That happened prior to DS becoming CTOP. I should also note that, from what I understand, CTOP is not intended to short-circuit community-authorised sanctions regimes. —Jéské Couriano (No further replies will be forthcoming.) 00:15, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

• I'm in favor of this, but I'm not sure AN is the right venue, and if it is, gain enough attention in the wider Misplaced Pages community. Strong support I'm done with the drama that consumed this project for years. And I think this should be made a RfC. MarioJump83 (talk) 12:55, 20 March 2023 (UTC)
• It's not a contentious topic, it just has a large concentration of contentious editors. There's a distinct difference - stuff about the Balkans or PIA or contemporary U.S. politics is inherently contentious, the same doesn't really apply to spinny clouds. It's just that weather for some reason attracts, quite frankly, a lot of immature editors who struggle to get along with one another. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 17:18, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

  Maybe discretionary sanctions then? 98.113.8.17 (talk) 21:18, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

  You made my day, IP editor -- Guerillero 00:09, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

  "it just has a large concentration of contentious editors" Isn't that exactly what the phrase means in wiki speak? We designate topic areas as contentious based on editor behavior not some judgement of their contentiousness outside of wikipedia. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 21:21, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

  Agreed. For example, Longevity is a contentious topic. Longevity is just about... well, the oldest people on planet Earth. You might argue that the debate on science vs pseudoscience is sufficient enough to make it contentious, but it's not something that at first glance you would inherently consider a topic charged with vitriol such as the Balkans. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:44, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, this is why people much smarter than myself handle declaring things contentious topics. If doing so will make it easier to block spinny cloud editors who misbehave, count me in support. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 19:21, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

• Frankly I'm so sick of seeing content disputes brought to AN/I as if they were actual behavioral issues because the editors at that project can't play nice together, if someone can come up with a proposal to declare weather contentious, I'm there. Valereee (talk) 15:21, 21 March 2023 (UTC)
• I mostly "TLDR" the other stuff above, but if this is a contentious topic, then everything needs to be. Not everyone agrees on everything anyway. That being said, I made a whole list of things that I wanted the severe weather project to be this year. Since then, I've broken up some arguments, got banned for 31 hours for breaking the rules, contemplated leaving Misplaced Pages entirely, and been attacked by multiple IPs all under the Andrew5 label. I know that it was my fault for putting us in the spotlight, but this needs to get under control. Enough is enough. This is yet another total "Bruh" moment. C'mon people. ChessEric 03:15, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
• Support - Multiple contentious editors make it a contentious topic, and a procedure for dealing with them is in order. Robert McClenon (talk) 07:12, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  By the way, every IP comment on this discussion should be ignored. They are Andrew5 socks. ChessEric 14:56, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

• Every project has some degree of drama, but the weather project seems to be extreme. This can be seen in the ArbCom link above, Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/List of United States tornadoes in May 2008, the FleurDeOdile drama, and the repeated canvassing concerns that have struck the project since 2021 (Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Tropical cyclones/Membership guidelines and other numerous ANIs. And, honestly, if the WikiProject cannot trust any IP for a fear of sockpuppetry, that sounds like a further reason to put discretionary sanctions on, because it simply seems like it will make it easier for editors to deal with this. Andrew5 is not the only dock master lurking around, Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Tropical Storm Colin (2022) shows a completely different sock master running around. For some reason, weather seems to attract a lot of polarizing editors, and a control method is needed to keep the project in check. 108.58.9.194 (talk) 20:52, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  Agree. To be noted there's a drama involving Iphonehurricane, A1Cafel (victim of this drama) and Lightning Sabre prior to all of these dramas. They're quite productive actually prior to massive socking, but in retrospect TBAN should have been slapped on them instead rather than blocking them, which caused them to lash out. MarioJump83 (talk) 03:46, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

• My only qualm is I’m not sure what can help. There is no sanction that can directly fight against canvassing. A WP:1RR restriction would help to fight against edit warring but there’s nothing that can directly be done against the insane meatpuppetry this ANI proves it was an ongoing problem in the WikiProject for almost two years now), and is the main reason the WikiProject is in trouble. I’m not sure what general sanction could be applied. And, we can’t restrict it to 500/30 protection because most of the policy violators are extended confirmed. We could have an auto confirmed restriction to protect against andrew5 socks, but that’s seemingly all we can do. --172.85.249.214 (talk) 18:38, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Request for review of Discospinster as admin

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• ChatGPT (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Discospinster has undone the removal of unreliably sourced opinionated content and requested consensus for the removal. I believe he is purposefully leaving up misinformation due to his bias, when it should be removed until AFTER consensus is reached to have it up. ClearConcise (talk) 15:00, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

6 reverts in 10 minutes. How did you think that was going to work out for you? ValarianB (talk) 15:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

That was clear as day edit warring, as you went leaps and bounds over WP:3RR. RickinBaltimore (talk) 15:08, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

@ClearConcise: You failed to notify Discospinster of this thread, which is required.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:09, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, wasn't aware it was required, hopefully this is how you notify @Discospinster. @ValarianB... it's also 6 reverts from Discospinster, so how should it work out for that? Of course it's an edit war, and I'm perfectly okay with discussing it in talk and coming to consensus, but it should be removed until AFTER consensus is reached. The misinformation shouldn't be left up while it is being disputed. ClearConcise (talk) 15:15, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

@ClearConcise: A ping is insufficient notification, please see the top of this page. 331dot (talk) 15:17, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

I've done it for them.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:18, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

@Bbb23 Thank you, cause I'm not following how to do a notification from the message in red at the top of this page regarding notifications. ClearConcise (talk) 15:22, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

For future reference all you really need to do is post a comment on their user talk page; the template does that in a way to save you some typing, but it's not required to use the template. 331dot (talk) 15:25, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, the template will give you a very formal message, but you can say "yo I reported you at ANI" and that's sufficient notification. Loki (talk) 17:21, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• So, moving on from so the somewhat minor infracture of failure to notify, perhaps Discospinster could tell us how, in their interpretation, their six reverts in nine minutes and then their blocking the party they were edit-warring with, fully complies with their responsibilities under WP:INVOLVED. SN54129 15:47, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  The editor continued to quickly revert even after I left a note on their talk page explaining the issue, with no response. Furthermore I changed the content to make it clear that the claims of bias were in fact claims (i.e. opinions). In my opinion, those further reverts were acts of vandalism and I was justified to make a partial block. ... discospinster _talk 16:09, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Discospinster: Your opinion should be based on policy: INVOLVED is clear (editors should not act as administrators in disputes in which they have been involved), WP:VAND is also clear that Even if misguided, willfully against consensus, or disruptive, any good faith effort to improve the encyclopedia is not vandalism. You misused WP:ROLLBACK to achieve your ends. Finally, WP:ONUS is also clear that The responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content. And yes, while all policies are caveated by "...except obvious vandalism", you of all people should know that this was a content dispute and that you went too far. I suggest removing the PB and everyone moving on.. fast. SN54129 16:34, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  My opinion was based on policy, and you referred to it above. Given the comment about "misinformation" (here and comments on ChatGPT's talk page: "These accusations are being used as a tool to try and garner pity for the so-called "victims" and they need to be removed from this encyclopedia article."), and the fact that the user has made few other edits, and none since 2017, it is even more clear now that User:ClearConcise is editing towards an agenda and not in good faith. I stand by my actions. ... discospinster _talk 16:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I did not come to this article with an agenda and I am insulted by your accusation. I was merely reading an article and when I saw an agenda on the page and I took action to improve the article by removing the agenda. ClearConcise (talk) 16:54, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Wait, let's get something clear - you want us to believe that you, in good faith, had no agenda, but you are not remotely willing to extend said good faith to Discospinster, whom you have described as "purposefully leaving up misinformation due to his bias"? --Golbez (talk) 17:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I am willing to extend good faith to Discospinster and engage in talk and come to consensus. Shouldn't the disputed content be removed until that consensus is reached? ClearConcise (talk) 17:14, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  No, it should not, unless it's a BLP violation or something really, starkly, WP:INAPPROPRIATE for some other important reason. This is not such a case. —Alalch E. 17:17, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  No, that's not how it works. WP:BRD: You were bold, they reverted, now you discuss. It's not a BLP, it's not unsourced, so, you don't get to unilaterally declare it's not acceptable. You have to actually justify it, with your words. --Golbez (talk) 17:37, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  There is no notification of a message in my talk readily visible on the site (that I see anyway). I was not aware that you had left a note on my talk page. I have responded to it, and you have not responded to me, does that show that you are not engaging in good faith? It's not vandalism to remove misinformation that is pushing an agenda. In the same vain, I could just as easily say it is vandalism to continue putting it back. The content should be removed until AFTER a consensus is reached, and the fact that @Discospinster banned a user for removing their own "vandalism" and continues to leave this disputed information up until that consensus is reached is proof of Discospinster's bias. I have engaged in talk regarding this page, and I ask that Discospinster be removed from being able to admin a page they are showing bias on, and that I be unbanned. ClearConcise (talk) 16:22, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Not only is there a message on your Talk page, but you responded to it.--Bbb23 (talk) 16:27, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  The way I see it, you were both edit warring, as no exception applied, as far as I can see. So a block was certainly warranted, though Discospinster should not have been the one to impose it and, to be fair, they could have been blocked as well. —  Salvio 16:29, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I agree. The harder part is what to do about it now.--Bbb23 (talk) 16:34, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  As far as ClearConcise is concerned, I was thinking that the block could be lifted as long as they accept not to make further edits to the article until the discussion on the talk page has achieved consensus, since there is no need to act quickly and we can let the discussion come to a natural conclusion. As far as Discospinster is concerned, on the other hand, I'd like to see some acknowledgment that their conduct violated WP:INVOLVED and reassurances that this was an occasional misstep unlikely to be repeated. —  Salvio 16:38, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I agree, we both should be blocked but I will still ask that the disputed content be removed until there is a consensus on whether it should be there. ClearConcise (talk) 16:39, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, so much for my suggestion. In that case, the block is still necessary to prevent further edit warring. —  Salvio 16:43, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  As mentioned above WP:ONUS, The responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content. I of course agree not to edit until there is consensus as you suggested, I just think it's clear it should come down until that consensus is reached. ClearConcise (talk) 16:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  This isn't how ONUS works, you don't get to remove something that had been included for a while and became subject to implicit consensus and enforce your removal through edit warring, demanding others to form a consensus until you yield. It's great to try bold removal, but once challenged, there's only one way: talk page. ...and if regular talk page discussion doesn't work there's WP:DR: ask for a third opinion, seek mediation, try the NPOV noticeboard and the dispute resolution noticeboard. There's tons of stuff available, and making six reverts is not among them. —Alalch E. 17:05, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I agree I messed up with the edits, but I disagree that this is not how ONUS works. ONUS is specifically for this reason... to put the burden on the person who seeks to keep disputed content. ClearConcise (talk) 17:18, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Not when there is already, as I said, implicit consensus. In either case, invoking ONUS means that your disputant can't WP:STONEWALL to protect the status quo and has to engage in a conversation if they want retention, but it doesn't mean that you can enforce removal through edit warring. ONUS is not a license to edit war. If someone is not respecting ONUS by insisting on inclusion and not engaging substantively in a discussion, you need to ask for a third opinion or try many other mechanisms of dispute resolution. —Alalch E. 17:22, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Okay, thank you for the info. I'll read up on this 3rd opinion thing. ClearConcise (talk) 17:23, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'll let admins and others judge the actions of DS. I agree with ClearConcise in that policy is that something added is added through consensus and only shares that consensus until disputed and then ONUS is on the those wanting to keep or add to prove it belongs. However, I agree with Alalch E. that the where is the most important aspect and the most egregious breech with regard to the article. Consensus through discussion. Not discussion through edit summaries but on the talk page. --ARoseWolf 17:57, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• Well so much for WP:AGF and not casting WP:ASPERSIONS.-- Deepfriedokra (talk) 16:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• You lost me; to whom are you referring?--Bbb23 (talk) 16:09, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• I've unblocked CC; it's clear that either that needed to be done, or DS needed to be blocked from the page too. Unblocking seemed the path of least drama. DS should not take any further admin actions on that page, and should re-read WP:VANDALISM if they honestly believe that's what they were reverting. That was not vandalism. I'm pretty disappointed in their doubling down. If either one of them makes a revert on that page again before there is a consensus for it, I'll block them for continuing to edit war. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:07, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  At some point, we should all acknowledge User:Rhododendrites; while we argue about who is to blame for what, he's been editing the article - without reverting - to improve it and address some of CC's concerns while not blanket removing it. Hat tip. --Floquenbeam (talk) 18:15, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I wholeheartedly agree with Floquenbeam's actions here. The least invasive approach while also making crystal clear which bright lines cannot be crossed.--⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 17:35, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• A clear cut wp:involved violation is a serious thing should as a minimum get what Salvio suggested which was: "As far as Discospinster is concerned, on the other hand, I'd like to see some acknowledgment that their conduct violated WP:INVOLVED and reassurances that this was an occasional misstep unlikely to be repeated." If DS won't do even that there a problem that needs fixing. North8000 (talk) 17:33, 22 March 2023 (UTC)
• Vandalism needs to be clear-cut for the exception to 3RR to apply; doubly so for a subsequent use of admin tools. And what was the urgency here? Why could this not have gone to AIV? At the very least I'd have expected DS to post here for review. DS needs to acknowledge error here; this is a textbook violation of WP:INVOLVED. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:40, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I have to agree, this needs explanation. Valereee (talk) 17:59, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I also agree. ~ ONUnicornproblem solving 18:21, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  +1, I'm afraid. It would be hypocritical of me to say I've never got carried away in an edit war, but reverting the same edit by the same person on the same page six times in rapid succession then blocking your opponent is a poor show. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:29, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I've looked into this a bit further, and there's some ameliorating factors. It appears DS had no history with this page, so unless someone has evidence to the contrary, I'm assuming he saw this at recent changes. In such a case, I have no problem with reverting and blocking for obvious vandalism. I question whether this was obvious, and especially whether it was obvious at the time. There were verifiability problems, as was made clear in subsequent edits. Also: if you're going to revert and block, why wait for six edits? Vanamonde (Talk) 21:53, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Honestly if they rerevert, don't revert a second time, go to talk page (BRD) or give a warning or something, anything other than 3RR. SwampedEssayist (talk) 13:55, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

• Discospinster is one of the very few administrators, perhaps the only of them, I ever had to warn about edit warring. That was three months ago, Special:Diff/1123628128, in response to this content dispute in the Kannada article. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:16, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  The IP in that case was removing well-sourced content with increasingly belligerent sniping in edit summaries. Without comment on anything else, reverting POV warriors in India related topics doesn't bother me; not being able to would rapidly degrade the quality of articles in that topic area. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 20:08, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Looking at WP:GS/CASTE, I have to admit I can't really argue with that. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:15, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• I don't see a major problem here. One of the criteria for vandalism (WP:VAND) is "Removing encyclopedic content without any reason" and that's exactly what ClearConcise was doing. OK, DS should not have blocked them directly and should have reported them to WP:AN3 (where they would undoubtedly have been blocked), but the result is, in the end, the same. Black Kite (talk) 19:23, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Of course there was a reason. It doesn't need to be a good one; the point is that anything done in good faith (such as demonstrated by the edit summary of ), no matter how disruptive, is not vandalism. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:25, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Seriously? The edit summary was "This is an opinion piece cited by biased unreliable sources" yet they removed an entire section including sources such as the New York Post, Mint, USA Today, the Boston Globe and The Verge. Were they all "opinion pieces cited by biased unreliable sources". Here's a clue - no, they weren't. ClearConcise was not acting in good faith and was committing vandalism - they needed to be at least partial blocked. At the moment, they aren't, so we've failed on that one. Black Kite (talk) 19:40, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, we have a shortcut for the New York Post at WP:NYPOST ("generally unreliable for factual reporting especially with regard to politics"). I'm not saying ClearConcise was right content-wise, nor that they have not been edit warring. All I'm saying is that your vandalism accusation lacks actual evidence. At very, very least we can surely agree that this wasn't "obvious vandalism" of the type exempted for reverting by WP:3RRNO #4, unless you're now also questioning my well intentions. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:45, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'll give you the New York Post (I was getting confused with the NYTimes - I'm not American) but I'm sorry, removing an entire section with an edit summary which bears no relation to what you're actually doing is, simply, vandalism. And of course I wasn't criticising your intentions, simply pointing out that CC needed to be removed from editing that article. Black Kite (talk) 19:56, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Per WP:3RRNO: "Reverting obvious vandalism—edits that any well-intentioned user would agree constitute vandalism, such as page blanking and adding offensive language."--Bbb23 (talk) 19:58, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Ahem. "Removing encyclopedic content without any reason" (WP:VAND). Black Kite (talk) 20:02, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  But a reason was given, here. I have no opinion either way on whether the content should be in or not, but it was not obvious vandalism. GiantSnowman 20:07, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Which is the point where I'd say that the reason doesn't need to be a good one, closing the circle the discussion has now run. We're missing the point of this thread though: Discospinster has broken WP:3RR and blocked their edit warring opponent. As both is prohibited, an apology, clarification, something assuring that it won't happen again, is requested. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:08, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Agreed, but as an absolute minimum. Blocking an edit war 'opponent' is a very serious mis-use of tools. GiantSnowman 20:12, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Er, actually, the reason does need to be a good one ("Content removal is not considered to be vandalism when the reason for the removal of the content (is provided in) a non-frivolous explanation for the removal of apparently legitimate content" - WP:VAND again). This one was not only frivolous, but simply false. Black Kite (talk) 20:32, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  As long as ClearConcise believed that their editing was improving the encyclopedia, it wasn't vandalism. It isn't even vandalism if removals are made with completely unvoiced good intentions. The distinction between vandalism and non-vandalism disruption is about intent. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:41, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I hate to repeat this, but that's not what WP:VAND (which is a policy) says. It clearly says that removing encyclopedic content with no good reason given is vandalism. Giving a reason which is clearly untrue is not a good reason. Black Kite (talk) 20:43, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  There is a difference between having a reason and voicing a reason in an edit summary. The first sentence of the policy tries to explain this in bold and italic formatting. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:45, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Yes, it clearly says, in bold and italic, "any good faith effort to improve the encyclopedia is not vandalism". Removing encyclopedic content six times with an edit summary which is clearly untrue is not good faith. I'm not entirely sure how much clearer this could be. Black Kite (talk) 20:52, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Even if misguided, willfully against consensus, or disruptive, any good faith effort to improve the encyclopedia is not vandalism. Black Kite, what makes you so sure this was not a good faith effort? Crazynas 20:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Don't know how many ways you can be told, but just because you don't think it was a good reason, doesn't mean it wasn't. I still believe it it's a good reason, and now I'm only wondering how long I need to wait for Discospinster's lack of talk to be considered stonewalling so I can remove the section again (for good reason). ClearConcise (talk) 20:47, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Um, so that's a threat to continue an edit war in the name of ending an edit war? Wow. — Trey Maturin™ 20:48, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I've engaged in good faith talk, and I'm simply wondering how long someone is expected to wait before it is considered stonewalling. Why is everyone being so obtuse? ClearConcise (talk) 20:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Good faith talk (perhaps) but appallingly bad faith editing on the face of it. You. Were. Edit. Warring. Whatever happened next was on your own head. — Trey Maturin™ 20:54, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  It takes two to edit war. There was no reason for Discospinster to vandalize my edit. (see, I can make meaningless accusations too) ClearConcise (talk) 20:56, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  It's not about the accusations now. You are now involved and have no reason to edit that page anymore. Philipnelson99 (talk) 20:58, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  "Vandalise" has a very specific and loaded meaning on Misplaced Pages, as you well know. Your use of it here is inappropriate, as you also well know. I withdraw my (admittedly sarcastic) agreement that you are talking in good faith. You're not. You're trolling. — Trey Maturin™ 20:59, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  + 1. I didn't really have an opinion on this discussion either way until they started replying in a hostile manner on this thread. And I'm starting to doubt whether this thread was begun with intentions of actually discussing an admin's conduct. I believe admin's conduct isn't a serious enough topic on the wiki, but acting this way isn't good for anyone. Philipnelson99 (talk) 21:02, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  +1 as well. I was more in agreement with Black Kite on this and now seeing the editor's comments... EvergreenFir (talk) 21:06, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I was banned by a party to an edit war, I've been called a troll by Trey Maturin, falsely accused multiple times of egregious vandalism, and now threatened by Black Kite to be perma banned, and I'm being hostile? Wow. ClearConcise (talk) 21:14, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  You came to AN of all places, did you expect it to be a cakewalk and that your own actions would not be scrutinized? Philipnelson99 (talk) 21:16, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Is there some reason we should expect coming to AN of all places to be be difficult? Levivich (talk) 17:22, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  ClearConcise, if you are editing in good faith, there is exactly one single thing you can do to prevent digging a hole that is hard to get out of: Stop participating in this AN thread unless you are asked something. I hope that my messages above make clear that I'm not questioning your good faith, so perhaps you can take that advice from me without assuming it's hostile or biased against you. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:17, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  In your case, about this one specific section? Forever. Someone else will have to do it; you doing it would be continuing an edit war. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:55, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  @ClearConcise Bare minimum, in a generic context (not specific to this dispute), if you have brought it up on the talk page and there has been no response for 24 hours and the person has edited within that 24 hour window, then you would be justified in taking action. However, in this situation, where you have already engaged in an edit war and the dispute is at AN, wait at least until this thread is closed, or a week, whichever is longer. ~ ONUnicornproblem solving 21:01, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Honestly, the people saying in this situation not at all, ever, are probably right. ~ ONUnicornproblem solving 21:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would definitely not recommend that course of action. Philipnelson99 (talk) 20:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  While I'm thankful for your clarification that you have been editing in good faith, I should point out that you specifically should not be removing the section again in any definite amount of time. You have reached a point where discussing on the article's talk page, and trying to convince others to make the edit, is the only legitimate option left. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I can assure you that a 7th revert on that article would be the last edit you would make here. Black Kite (talk) 20:53, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• Let me ask the admins commenting here: say you were to encounter a user with fewer than 50 edits, on a page you have never edited nor been involved with in any way, who is mass-removing content, refusing to discuss, and undo-reverting anyone who tries to make any change whatsoever within one minute of the edit, and prior to this the user has not edited in six years. Would you block them? I would, I often have in the past, and I wouldn't think twice about it in the future. Likewise I find myself not thinking twice about endorsing Discopsinster's use of admin tools to throttle a clearly disruptive and tendentious editor, per the "any reasonable administrator would have probably come to the same conclusion" provision of WP:INVOLVED. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 20:25, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• Totally agree. Some people - including some admins - appear to wish to enable obvious disruptive editors. I am unclear as to the reasons for that. Black Kite (talk) 20:34, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  +1. A decade ago, when I first dipped my toe into editing here, "involved" meant "invested in the article in question". Then it meant "invested in the article or editor in question." Then "invested in any way." Then "interested in any way." Then "has previously edited the article or spoken to the editor." Then "once commented on a thread about the article or editor." Now we're suddenly at "reverted what appears to be obvious vandalism by an uncommunicative editor and then blocked that editor." No comments on whether this was the correct course of action, just a belief that the very appearance of being "involved" is enough to condemn. Time to draw a line on this insane instruction creep. — Trey Maturin™ 20:46, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I do not have your tenure, but I share your sentiment. DS should have sought redress at AIV. Or DS could have just blocked sooner and called it WP:DE (which it was). Or semi-protected the page. But because they reverted more than 3 times, we're here. EvergreenFir (talk) 21:09, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I agree. It would be nice to have a discussion about admin conduct in these situations but I don't think this thread was made in good faith. Philipnelson99 (talk) 21:11, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'd say more communication with the editor and more formal warnings at minimum. Without them, it looks more like a content dispute than addressing WP:DE. EvergreenFir (talk) 21:23, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Absolutely. Philipnelson99 (talk) 21:24, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'm in this boat too. I revert tons of editors on AP, gensex, COVID, caste and other similar topics when I see the obvious removal of sourced, consensus text. If someone were removing far-right or spread COVID disinformation from an article where it is well sourced and obviously has at least implicit consensus with an edit summary like "removing untrue information from biased sources" is it really revert or block for an administrator? That type of summary is so common in vandalism it triggers edit filters. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 21:20, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Please look at that history again and change or remove your accusation. Undoing the Undo of my change is not "undo-reverting anyone who tries to make any change whatsoever". ClearConcise (talk) 20:37, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

They're completely correct. The only mistake that Discospinster made was letting you vandalise the article six times. You should have been blocked well before that. Black Kite (talk) 20:40, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Okay, I'll take another look.

• 21 March, 18:10-18:20 (): You removed approximately 4,000 bytes of material you disagreed with, eventually the entire "accusations of bias" section and a portion of the "limitations" section, calling out the sources as opinion pieces. The opinions were notable opinions published in relevant reliable sources and were attributed either to those sources or to the individuals or organizations who originally stated them as opinions, per WP:OPINION. This was your first edit since September 2017, and your removal was reverted in parts by five two (corrected below) different editors over the next couple days.
• 22 March, 14:09 (): you returned and again removed the entire "accusations of bias" section and the same section from "limitations". Thus, you undid any edit anyone had made in the interim.
• Over the next few minutes, Discospinster's first edits to the page again restored the reliably sourced sections, with explanation, and they began copyediting presumably to clarify your concerns. You reverted to restore your version within three minutes.
• You then began blanking the content with no explanation at all, and each one of your reverts is within one minute of the previous edit. This did not stop until you were blocked, and you did not attempt to discuss at all until 14 minutes after you were blocked from editing the article.

Allow me to also point out that WP:ONUS says that "he responsibility for achieving consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content", not "all content must be removed unless and until User:ClearConcise personally approves of it". Numerous editors contributing to the section including the six three (corrected below) who restored the content after you removed it are a good sign that it was your removal that was controversial, and per WP:EW and WP:BRD (and numerous other policies and guidelines) the onus is on you to explain why the information should be removed. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 21:32, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

I think this pretty much settles this entire issue. Philipnelson99 (talk) 21:34, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Also, I don't think anyone has yet observed that Discospinster part-blocked ClearConcise specifically from editing only the article, which I've also done to force an editor to engage rather than blocking them outright. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 22:32, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• I suppose I would ask the administrator why they choose to revert six times? Look, we don't edit war with vandals, we block and move on. The fact that they (Discospinster) continued to revert and not report or block implies to me they knew that this was not prima face vandalism, and means this falls on the side of being a content dispute. Does anyone looking at this edit history think that after Discospinster's fourth, putting their toe across the line, revert that ClearConcise would suddenly get the message and stop? Crazynas 21:07, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  If they were seeing it as straight up vandalism, then yes. We extend a tremendous amount of rope to vandals. We extend a preposterous amount more to people who should know better. We extend an almost infinite amount to obvious trolls. The one edit warring here was the original troll, not the sysop. Perhaps the admin should've blocked the troll earlier/quicker rather than extending the rope the troll was dishing out for themselves (not an admin, but I would've blocked after the second revert), but that decision has to lie within the realm of admin discretion. — Trey Maturin™ 21:25, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  This is why I have stock in rope companies and glue factories EvergreenFir (talk) 04:48, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  Ivanvector, for me it's the so-many-reverts-so-fast of an edit that wasn't actually clear vandalism, then block that needs explaining. We can argue whether it was clear vandalism -- although in this case it doesn't actually look like it; the edit summary was "This is an opinion piece cited by biased unreliable sources. Are you going to post a summary of all "accusations" that are made by biased unreliable sources?" -- but certainly this removal wasn't anything that was urgent. This wasn't a BLPvio or anything close to egregious. It was content being disputed and removed because of a concern about sources. Why not instead of edit-warring, open a talk section and ping the other editor for an explanation? If there's no answer, revert again, and if they revert again without coming to talk, sure, p-block from that article to force them to the talk page.

  That said, I think this is an issue that just needs to be acknowledged and not repeated. I kind of feel like maybe DS got caught up in things. Valereee (talk) 13:10, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Some of this looks surreal. A two person clear cut edit war and a 3RR one, (BTW I would have agreed with DP in that content dispute) and one of the two users involved uses admin tools to block the other. And some are saying that there's no problem here. And not even a response from DP to the graceful easy way out suggested by Salvio? North8000 (talk) 20:50, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• Agree with Black Kite here, and from the initial comments in this thread I did not have that view, but actually looking at the edits reverted I cant see them as good faith edits. Making some vague wave to a single source while deleting a whole chunk of material along with other sources is not a good faith edit. I think an involved block to stop the immediate edit-warring was fine, but it should have been brought for some review at AN3 or elsewhere shortly thereafter. nableezy - 21:04, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• Yep, this is a very long thread considering we are clearly being trolled here. If I wasn't about to go to sleep, I'd seriously consider a block here. Someone else may want to consider that. Black Kite (talk) 21:06, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Not an admin (because why the fuck would I put myself through that hell in order to get more fucking hell all of the time) but yes, this is clear and outright trolling. Block the troll and then we can talk about whether the sysop actions in question need further consideration. But not until we block the troll. — Trey Maturin™ 21:14, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'm afraid I don't see the problems with the block that others do. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 22:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  What nableezy said. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 22:04, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Wait. Six other users reverted op? -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 22:07, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  Actually, looking at it. It looks like one other editor reverted the removal prior to DS getting involved.

  I might be missing something though. Philipnelson99 (talk) 22:16, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  No? Where would you even get that from? — DVRTed (Talk) 22:26, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  See the above comment by @Ivanvector: Numerous editors contributing to the section including the six who restored the content after you removed it are a good sign that it was your removal that was controversial, and per WP:EW and WP:BRD (and numerous other policies and guidelines) the onus is on you to explain why the information should be removed. Philipnelson99 (talk) 22:28, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

  (edit conflict) I counted five before DS restoring portions of the first removal, but I see now that I miscounted. The partial reverts that led to all of the removed content being restored were by LightNightLights (, ) and Félix An (). Three other editors also edited different parts of the article before CC reverted again, and then DS reverted. So to be "fair" they were reverted by three editors, not six. Ivanvector (/_Edits) 22:31, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Also agree that ClearConcise's edits appear to be vandalism. look at the edits they were making yesterday before the edit war, e.g. claiming There is no article supporting this claim. while deleting a citation to an academic paper . 192.76.8.84 (talk) 22:13, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

What I'm seeing here is an admin and a non-admin engaged in an edit war over POV, and the use of admin tools to win said edit war. Everyone agreed that it was clear-cut until a couple other admins arrived and tried to endorse the use of admin tools to win an edit war, using a blatant misinterpretation of WP:VAND and attempting to WP:BAIT OP. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 22:31, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

I think you may win the award for "worst take in the thread". 192.76.8.84 (talk) 22:40, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Seconded. From what I can tell, DS hadn't interacted with that article until now, so it seems a bold claim that he did it "to win an edit war". I tend not to care about edit wars on articles I'm not actively involved in. It also smells of not assuming good faith, which, I mean, would certainly match the OP's attitude. --Golbez (talk) 22:44, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

yeah, you clearly haven't read all of the comments here then... Philipnelson99 (talk) 22:49, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

+1. I'm glad somebody suggested OP to stop actively participating on this thread and they decided to do so because the attempts to bait the OP on this thread is painfully obvious. — DVRTed (Talk) 22:52, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

no I'm saying YOU haven't read all of the comments here. this situation is far more nuanced than your description suggests. Philipnelson99 (talk) 22:56, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

I wasn't responding to (You) nor was I questioning whatever you said (or didn't say). — DVRTed (Talk) 23:03, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Pardon my interruption, but I think your repeated comment that you clearly haven't read all of the comments here is discourteous and not conducive to a collegial atmosphere. In general the temperature in this thread is already far too high, and I don't think comments like these are helping much. Would you consider striking them? Shells-shells (talk) 23:04, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• Hm. It's okay to use admin tools to win an editing dispute if the other bloke is a badwrong vandal type? I smell Boris Johnson level hypocrisy.—S Marshall T/C 23:54, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

• For the record, I dont think DS was in an editing dispute, I think all their actions at that page were administrative in nature. Its not like DS had some past editing history showing that they really wanted this material in the article. So I dont think thats an accurate description of what happened. I was about ready to scream bloody murder after the start of this thread, but actually looking at the sequence I see legit nothing wrong here. nableezy - 00:07, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

If the "editing dispute" consists of a "vandal type" vandalising an article by repeatedly deleting massive chunks of sourced content giving explanations which are evidently false then yes, it is acceptable to use admin tools. It is quite clearly spelled out in relevant policies (WP:INVOLVED WP:EW etc) that cleaning up after "vandal types" is an acceptable reason to overrule policy. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 00:07, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

In addition see no evidence that there was an "editing dispute" in the first place. Discospinner did not contribute to the article text, was not involved in the editorial process at all, and their only involvement in the article was reverting the blanking and a block, both of which are administrative actions. The only edit they made was a trivial wording tweak , which in no way reaches the level required for WP:INVOLVED to be an issue. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 00:15, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

And yet no editing dispute has been presented. There was unproductive behavior and editing that an admin was correcting in an article they had no previous involvement with. The desire to stretch WP:INVOLVED to encompass such activity is strange. At best, a criticism not reporting to AN for review by other admins is due. The idea that an admin should be admonished for attempting to resolve the issue through editing, instead of immediate page block is well... Backwards. Slywriter (talk) 00:17, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I re-added the content on the ChatGPT article about the AI praising Biden while refusing to do the same for Trump, citing Snopes, which is a reliable source according to Misplaced Pages. Félix An (talk) 02:34, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

No. I reject what Slywriter and 192.76.8.84 say. Once you've edited an article, you should not perform administrative interventions resulting from editor behaviour on that article. This is quite simple and easy to understand.—S Marshall T/C 08:32, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Except not that simple at all. Obviously, if you have been editing as a normal editor on an article, you should usually refrain from taking administrative action on it except in the most obvious of cases (and even then, not if you have been in dispute with the editor concerned). However, as in this case, if your interaction with the article has been limited to an administrative one (in this case reverting the repeated removal of sourced content with a fraudulent edit summary) then there is no issue. Black Kite (talk) 11:17, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I think reverting is an editorial action and not an administrative one. I think it's as clear as day that DS should have gone to AN3 about this. We need these rules about involvement because they (imperfectly, but importantly) help prevent various kinds of abuse.—S Marshall T/C 11:22, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

That's a ridiculously oversimplified way of looking at the issue. Whether reverting is an editorial or administrative action is context dependent. If someone replaces an article with profanity or deletes all it's content or replaces it with spam then reverting them is simple vandalism clean-up and is an administrative action, reverting becomes an editorial action when you revert someone in a good faith content dispute. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 11:50, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I think an administrative action is an action that you need administrator tools to perform, and an editorial action is one that any editor can perform. The only scope for complexity that I see is whether rollback is an administrative action; I don't think it is but you could defensibly argue the other side. Reverting without using rollback is normal editing that you don't need to pass RFA to perform and doesn't invoke WP:ADMINACCT. It's a pity because if DS had just used AN3, this would have been a straightforward case of RBI.—S Marshall T/C 13:54, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I think an administrative action is an action that you need administrator tools to perform, and an editorial action is one that any editor can perform. Bullshit. There's a whole range of administrative actions that do not not require administrator tools to perform. Closing a thread at WP:AE is an administrative action, but only requires editing a page. Giving an editor a logged warning under the contentious topics regime does not require administrative tools, but is an administrative action. Closing a contentious XFD as "keep" does not require administrative tools, but is an administrative action. Closing a thread at AN/ANI with consensus to topic ban an editor does not involve the use of the tools, but is an an administrative action. Closing a contentious RFC does not require the use of the tools, but is an administrative action. You need to look at the context of what the admin was doing, not just the technical means used to do it. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 17:19, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

If your position is that issuing a DS warning is an "administrative action", then I don't just disagree, I also don't understand how you can think that? A DS warning is a prerequisite for some kinds of administrative action but it's something any editor can do and is routinely done by involved parties. You also bring up discussion closes, and I agree that a discussion closer ought to be accountable for their close and WP:ADMINACCT applies, but, it's called a "non-admin close". The clue's in the name there, I would think.—S Marshall T/C 17:36, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

A logged CTOP warning goes in the AE log. It's an entirely different issue than issuing a DS alert, which any editor can do. An alert does not presume misconduct, whereas a logged warning is only given in response to such. Courcelles (talk) 18:26, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Did you actually read what I wrote? When I said "giving a logged warning" I meant "giving a logged warning", not "giving a contentious topic alert". I meant following the CT procedures, giving an official warning as a sanction and recording it in WP:AE/Log. That is an action restricted only to admins but no admin tools are required, you only need to be able to edit a semi-protected page.

Closing any kind of contentious or controversial discussion is an inappropriate thing for a non admin to do per WP:BADNAC point 2. Closing those discussions is an action restricted to administrators, despite no admin tools being required. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 18:38, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Agree with S Marshal. Editing an article is editing an article. Doing it as part of your recent changes patrolling does not "supercharge" your edits with a priori justifiableness, imbue your edits with an aura of indisputability etc. Recent changes patrolling is just why an editor arrived to a certain article, but once they have edited it, this editing is equally subject to the normal editorial process as any other editing of articles, and they've taken upon themselves to conduct themselves as a "normal editor". —Alalch E. 11:39, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Except that's not how it works in reality, otherwise an admin who had reverted, even once, a good-faith but disruptive edit would not be able to prevent an editor from continuing their disruption. And that's good-faith disruption; in this case there wasn't even the first tenet of that, IMO. Black Kite (talk) 11:53, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I think that's too black-and-white. For one thing, I really don't think we should be requiring admins to check the edit history to see if they've ever edited that article before they semi it for a few days. But even in cases where they have edited it heavily and/or recently, I don't have an objection to an admin doing what they believe any reasonable admin would do. Reporting something like obvious vandalism by multiple IPs because the subject is in the news just turns what could be a few seconds of one person's time into multiple minutes of two people's time, possibly significant time of the first admin because they may feel responsible for babysitting the article while waiting for help to arrive. Valereee (talk) 13:53, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

• Discospinster does a lot of recent changes patrol. She had no connection to that article. She reverted a non constructive editor, warned, and then blocked them from the article. This is in no way inappropriate. And I will add that ClearConcise, on the other hand, does give the appearance of editing with an agenda. Perhaps someone should review their edits?-- Deepfriedokra (talk) 02:43, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
• I'm not happy with the precedent being set here. Essentially, if an editor removes (what they believe to be) inappropriate POV language, then anyone who "has no previous activity on the article" can come along and violate 3RR to put it back, but only the remover is at fault. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 03:04, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  Correct, it is an unhappy precedent to give so much attention to this person who showed up today to revert sourced content six times without discussion, comes here, accuses an admin in long standing of bad faith while simultaneously they couldn't be arsed to do the bare minimum requirements for a post here, and their punishment was solely that they were blocked from the article that they were edit warring on without engaging in any discussion. Yes, it is an unhappy precedent that people pointing this out are accused of baiting and misrepresenting policy. --Golbez (talk) 04:29, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Reading through this entire discussion, my opinion has gone back and forth about this incident. But looking at Discospinster's recent contributions, they spend most of their time reverting vandalism and blocking disruptive editors. I think they just happened upon this article and had no involvement in it prior so this wasn't a content dispute. They might be chided at reverting an edit that many times but we are talking about an active administrator making an error, not a serious case of INVOLVED that needs to be pursued. I also might have brought the page block here to AN for discussion but we don't know what was going on with DS today, this could have happened in the middle of the night for them or they had other work to take care of. This is not making excuses, this is just an acknowledgement that this is a volunteer activity for all of us and we don't have to respond on other people's desired schedules. This is not the way that I would have handled this incident but, honestly, I don't deal with vandalism a lot and I try not to second-guess admins who focus on areas of the project I have less experience in. At this point, I just hope Discospinster returns to make a final comment after reading through these comments, not to make an abject apology but just to present their side of the story and most likely confirm what others have said here. Any way, I agree with a lot of what has been said but I also understand how editors in good faith could see this situation differently. I think it helps to look beyond this one article to look at the edit histories of those involved to put this dispute in some context. Liz 06:00, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I did make a couple of comments above that explained my intent. I've read through the comments here and really the only thing that stands out is to is the suggestion that I'm in the wrong because I should have blocked sooner. That's a new one for me. ... discospinster _talk 13:57, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

DS, I hate to pile on, but you wrote above (bolding where IMO you turned yourself into an editor having a content dispute): The editor continued to quickly revert even after I left a note on their talk page explaining the issue, with no response. Furthermore I changed the content to make it clear that the claims of bias were in fact claims (i.e. opinions). In my opinion, those further reverts were acts of vandalism and I was justified to make a partial block.

And, really, the other editor responded in two minutes to your post on their talk with an explanation of why they thought the removal was justified. I'm not sure why you're doubling down on this. We all have the experience of looking back and thinking, yeah, I could have handled that better. Valereee (talk) 14:45, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

@Discospinster: if the only thing that stands out is that you should've blocked sooner, then that's worrying; as multiple editors and admins have commented, you shouldn't have blocked at all. The chronology is a red herring. SN54129 15:15, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I think @Liz is spot on. I deal with similar instances, even on articles I've edited in the past. IMHO, WP:INVOLVED does not mean admins cannot used tools to stop disruption on articles they've ever edited before or on topics they have been involved in. It does mean you cannot use tools to "win" or to punish someone you disagree with. It also means you should refrain from using tools if there is an appearance of bias. But none of that is the case here with DS.

Despite what @Serial Number 54129 has said, I 100% think DS should have immediately used warning templates and, after level-3, blocked the user for their disruptive editing. Or DS could have semi-protected the page for WP:DE. Note that the disruptive editor had been reverted by other users and had been engaging in the behavior at least a day beforehand. EvergreenFir (talk) 15:55, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, if you want to split hairs, EvergreenFir; the point is, they should not have got into an edit war at all, whether they wanted to block or not. SN54129 11:45, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

• That edit was obviously not vandalism, because it hits multiple criteria at WP:NOTVAND. Someone patrolling for vandalism shouldn't have even touched it, because it's not vandalism. The edit warring wasn't WP:3RRNO exempt (it was just regular edit warring), and the block was WP:INVOLVED. Good unblock. I agree with those above that this was a content dispute and a textbook INVOLVED violation. Now I think we also have an WP:ADMINACCT issue due to lack of meaningful engagement here. Levivich (talk) 14:03, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I agree wth all of that. I'm completely baffled by many of the posts in this thread. But that's nothing new. DeCausa (talk) 14:50, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  By my count, five or six admins have now demonstrated in this discussion that they misunderstand the WP:Vandalism, WP:Edit warring, and WP:Dispute resolution policies in a way that affects the use of admin tools. This was such a minor issue that could have been solved with a "whoops my bad", but now it's looking more like a systemic issue. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 18:16, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  Lying in your edit summary while blanking material does not magically transform the vandalism of blanking reliably sourced material into something other than blanking reliably sourced material. Does anybody actually think that blanking was done in good faith? If not, an admin responded to disruptive editing the way disruptive editing is meant to be responded to. nableezy - 18:40, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I think lying is a very strong word here. To me this look like POV-pushing by someone who may sincerely believe the sources were unreliable. Don't get me wrong, I think CC is a problematic editor and I doubt they'll be here long if they don't straighten up and fly right, but can we really conclude they were intentionally lying? Valereee (talk) 18:51, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  The initial summary was All of the claims are unverifiable claims from sources that are themselves biased and/or opinion pieces. A, no they are all verifiable, and b, no the sources are not all biased or opinion pieces. Fine, maybe lie is too strong. How about making manifestly untrue claims that do not withstand even ten seconds of scrutiny? nableezy - 18:56, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Valereee How is this anything other than lying? There is no article supporting this claim. they say, while deleting an academic paper that directly supports the claim. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 18:57, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  As usual, 192 nails the exact point. Black Kite (talk) 19:03, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I think I've unfortunately taken us on a tangent, but wrongheadedness is not the same as lying, and it doesn't constitute vandalism. Valereee (talk) 19:04, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't know I thought the follow up edits removing things saying they were opinion pieces looked like bad faith removal of properly sourced content. I could be wrong though. Philipnelson99 (talk) 19:06, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  Not sure I'm following, but absolutely agree if there were bad-faith edits that removed properly sourced content, that's absolutely a bad thing, and we need to deal with it. But it's still not necessarily vandalism that is an urgent issue that justifies 6 reverts in 9 minutes, an edit to try to deal with the complaints, and then a block. Valereee (talk) 19:13, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'm specifically talking about this edit. I'm honestly to the point where I don't know if DS's actions were justified. It certainly seems like edit warring, but I feel like I would've probably reverted the linked edit above. Philipnelson99 (talk) 19:19, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Valereee How is that edit "wrongheadedness"? They claimed that There is no article supporting this claim. while deleting the citation that directly supported the claim. They were flat out lying about content not being supported by citations. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 19:11, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  IP192, I have seen multiple well-intentioned editors who completely disagree on what a source says. I'm not actually sure this sheds any light on this issue, though: whether or not the editor was lying, it's still not vandalism. It still doesn't justify edit-warring. Valereee (talk) 19:15, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  The article

  Yet, research suggests that ChatGPT exhibits a pro-environmental, left-libertarian orientation when prompted to take a stance on political statements from two established voting advice applications.

  The source

  Prompting ChatGPT with 630 political statements from two leading voting advice applications and the nation-agnostic political compass test in three pre-registered experiments, we uncover ChatGPT's pro-environmental, left-libertarian ideology.

  I don't know how you could present that as the article not supporting the claim.

  it's still not vandalism Illegitimate blanking of encyclopaedic content is vandalism, it's litteraly listed at WP:Vand#Blanking. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 19:26, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would have asked if by "no article" he meant that it was a WP:PREPRINT and then agreed with the edit if no further publication info could be found. fiveby(zero) 21:45, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  We appear to be disagreeing on what "where a non-frivolous explanation for the removal of apparently legitimate content is provided, linked to, or referenced in an edit summary" means. Which is fine, we can disagree, but at some point I think it would be valuable for experienced, well-intentioned editors, and especially administrators, agree on whether misinterpreting sources -- even intentionally -- constitutes clear vandalism and exempts one from 3RR and especially from INVOLVED once you yourself have edited the contested content. Valereee (talk) 12:06, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  It also hits multiple points at WP:VAND. Frankly though, if I'm seeing an editor with 40 edits reverting six times to remove a mostly RS-sourced section in an article, I'm going to assume that's disruptive, if not vandalism. I'm actually astonished at the number of people who think DS has done something wrong here, and am wondering why they are supporting an editor that is blatantly trolling us. Black Kite (talk) 18:54, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't agree with the edit, I think CC is likely a net negative, but I do think DS overstepped, yes. As I said once above, as he appears to have seen this at recent changes, I don't think he's using admin tools to further his POV: but it's borderline enough that he should have sent this to AIV, or asked for independent review. This is not the standard I've seen applied to identify disruptive editors; ARBPIA and ARBIPA topics would be a lot quieter if admins editing them could do this sort of thing non-controversially. Vanamonde (Talk) 18:59, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I dont think that last part is true. It seems to me more about consternation about admins generally than the edit specifically. And I was on that side based on the description in the OP and the initial comments too, like wait what they reverted how many times and then blocked???? But all the reverts are straightforward vandalism patrol, and I put that in the administrative tasks bucket even if that is something that non-admins can do (like say close RM or RFC or AFDs, as keep at least). I dont get how anybody can actually look at the edits and find anything to blame DS on besides her not issuing the vandal warnings prior to p-blocking. nableezy - 19:00, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  Agree with Vandamonde. Valereee (talk) 19:06, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I give up. You're being trolled and there are loads of people who I actually respect criticising an admin for dealing correctly with a troll. That's the situation we're in now. Black Kite (talk) 19:18, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  But, BK, it doesn't actually matter whether in this case, this is someone who should be blocked. What matters is that we come to some agreement on how admins should arrive at that. Valereee (talk) 21:12, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  But the relevant rule here isn't even WP:VAND but WP:3RRNO, which allows edit warring only over obvious vandalism (their emphasis), which is defined as edits that any well-intentioned user would agree constitute vandalism. There's a bunch of well-intentioned users here who don't agree it constitutes vandalism. So, that's it, Discospinster can't edit war over it.

  Also, obviously, once you're in an edit war you don't get to block your opponent for vandalism. I don't really care about Discospinster's motivations at that point: I accept that they had perfectly good intentions, but despite that, all of their actions in this situation were wrong.

  (Furthermore I really think Black Kite is misreading WP:VAND, because it gives wide latitude for any good faith reason for removing content, and the rest of the page is clear that mere "disruptive editing or stubbornness" is not vandalism.) Loki (talk) 19:20, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  An edit summary that is a flat-out falsehood is not a good faith reason for removing content as has been pointed out multiple times above, most notably by the 192 IP. But, whatever. Black Kite (talk) 19:27, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  It's not a good reason for removing content, certainly. But that's not what "a good faith reason" means in this context. Even obviously disruptive reasons are good faith as long as they're not deliberately intended to harm the project. And I don't see any evidence that this was: it was an obviously bad edit but not a bad-faith edit and therefore not vandalism. Loki (talk) 20:53, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Discospinster, maybe there is a "middle of the road" was to resolve this. If this happenned again tomorrow, and that exact same full set of reverts had already occurred, what would you do? North8000 (talk) 19:15, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

That's a bit unfair, since if it happened tomorrow, this conversation has already happened, and could have a chilling effect. For example, I'd probably be less likely to do these actions, not because I disagree with them, but because of waves arms wildly at this trashcan of a thread. Not worth the hassle. --Golbez (talk) 20:03, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Of course this situation would influence it. I think that "guiding effect" would be a better term than "chilling". North8000 (talk) 20:26, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Oh, boy. I've been on Misplaced Pages maybe 5 days, but what the heck, I'm going to comment. I think that DS acted inappropriately, but that CC is legitimately wrong. I think that too many people are trying to figure out whether DS or CC is wrong, but the reality is that both wrong. I won't speak on the subject of what action to take, but let this be another opinion to consider. (I'm so probably going to regret this soon >-< SwampedEssayist (talk) 19:49, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

• I think the core issue here is the conflicts that arrive when multiple levels of AGF begin to interfere with/reinforce each other. A clear example of the cascading effect is this: On the first level we have an AGF question, whether or not the edits were vandalism (the difference is of course intent)... On the second level we have another AGF question, given that the edits were reverted as obvious vandalism we would appear to be required to AGF that to Discospinster they did appear to be obvious vandalism (a question that is IMO completely independent of whether the edits actually were vandalism). On the third level we appear to have the question of whether this conflict was brought to this noticeboard in good faith, and in the ensuing conversation we seem to get into fourth and fifth layers even. To me AGF here means that we cut both of them a break and trust that both have learned their lesson, if in the future this becomes a pattern we can revisit the limits of AGF. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 20:51, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  While I'm a little more critical here, I agree the appropriate response on a practical level is "no action". Loki (talk) 20:55, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I think I agree with that sentiment. Philipnelson99 (talk) 20:56, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I support that. SwampedEssayist (talk) 21:13, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I broadly agree. AGF to me means that we should assume everyone thinks that they're doing the right thing, but not necessarily that they are. As far as a "solution", Floq solved the issue two hours after it started by unblocking and setting an expectation of no further edit warring. At this point, I'm much more worried about the fact that there's no agreement, even among admins, about the most basic readings of policies like WP:Vandalism and WP:Dispute resolution. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 22:08, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'm also somewhat concerned at how DS got drawn into edit war as an admin... SwampedEssayist (talk) 22:12, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

• I've got no idea how to resolve the conflicting interpretations of whether this was a vandalism situation or an INVOLVED block. And let's face it, at this point we're not likely to resolve this to anyone's satisfaction. But I would like to point out that the OP's editing philosophy, as stated on his userpage, is as follows: Given the username, you should see I'm here to keep the internet clean and simplified. When you've removed all you can remove, what's left is beautiful. While their recent controversial edits may align well with their own editing philosophy, said philosophy does not align well with how we do this whole encyclopedia thing. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 01:53, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  Agreed. Philipnelson99 (talk) 01:56, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  Yes! Yes! Yes! -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 02:02, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  I think the best way to "solve" this is to carefully review some of these policies to be more in harmony and harder to bend toward one's own interpretation, as throughout the whole thing everyone has used the same policies against one another. Is there a way to reach a new consensus on WP policies? I'm not too good with the noticeboards yet. SwampedEssayist (talk) 02:01, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  While policies are technically subject to revision, the realistic answer is that we are not going to revise major policies such as INVOLVED and VANDALISM in the aftermath of a minor controversy that will be all-but-forgotten within a few days. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 02:19, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  This is minor? >~< I'd hate to see a big one. SwampedEssayist (talk) 13:46, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

If I were trying to troll AN in to spending hours discussing edits that literally nobody thinks are good I could not have done it this well. Round of applause for the OP. nableezy - 02:56, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

• Well said, Nableezy. Also, I'm with Black Kite. These edits were vandalistic--they removed verified content with a false edit summary, and then they come here to hang DS out to dry? NOTHERE. Pity so many of us were biting. Drmies (talk) 03:04, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  Removing content sourced to a WP:PREPRINT is vandalism? Asking for a friend. fiveby(zero) 04:23, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  No, but claiming all the sources are opinion pieces when the sources cited include this straight news and this straight news is. nableezy - 05:25, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  Some users cannot come to an agreement with others who are willing to talk to them about an editing issue, and repeatedly make changes against consensus. Edit warring is not vandalism and should not be dealt with as such. Dispute resolution may help. See also: Tendentious editing. Editors that do not understand this should refrain from editing until they read the relevant policy, and admins that do not understand this should have their user rights called into question. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 05:45, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  How do you come to agreement on a lie? Those are not opinion pieces. Somebody is repeatedly removing something and claiming what they are removing is not what they are removing. And, since you missed the several times it was quoted from the relevant policy, Ill try to quote it again for you. Removing encyclopedic content without any reason, or replacing such content with nonsense. Content removal is not considered to be vandalism when the reason for the removal of the content is readily apparent by examination of the content itself, or where a non-frivolous explanation for the removal of apparently legitimate content is provided, linked to, or referenced in an edit summary. Yes, there was an edit summary. That edit summary was simply not true. Whether it was intentionally not true or unintentionally not true, it was not true. And literally nobody is defending the edit. But yet we are going on two days of this section lol. nableezy - 06:00, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  The fact that we disagree with the reason doesn't mean that there's no reason. That's the difference between vandalism and other types of disruptive editing, and it's an important difference when admin tools come into play. If it's unintentionally not true, then accusations of vandalism are not only incorrect, but actively disruptive. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 06:09, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  I am not saying I disagree with the reason. I am calling the reason a lie. The disruption is removing things with a lie as the reason why. Disruptive editing, and not just vandalism, is also revert-worth. And also block-worthy. nableezy - 06:12, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  I "bit", as Drmies would put it, because I think that WP:INVOLVED matters and I do not accept that reverting vandalism is an "administrative action". I have raised no objection to any proposal to block the OP, and in the circumstances I would not object. But we apparently do need to nail down what's an admin action and what isn't.—S Marshall T/C 08:56, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Drmies: Amen, brother. Amen! -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 10:58, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  There is clearly sincere disagreement, here, Drmies. Whether or not the OP was attempting to troll us, we clearly need to come to some agreement on whether an admin should be blocking even an editor who should be blocked after that admin has started editing the disputed content. It's not somehow taking the bait to be able to see that this is actually a point where experienced, well-intentioned editors are in sincere disagreement. Maybe we need to take the OP and DS out of the picture and just open a discussion about when and how an admin turns themselves into an editor. Valereee (talk) 11:18, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

  I strongly agree. SwampedEssayist (talk) 13:37, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

IMHO most people would identify the original edit as a problematic edit, not vandalism, that there was a two way edit war and a 3RR one, and that DP was wp:involved. And we have folks here trying to say that all three of those statements are false, and you need to determine that all three are false in order to determine that the block was OK. And worst case scenerio DP just needs a trout. We might be seeing a process problem here inherent to admins reviewing an admin action. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 13:04, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I agree. This is definitely revealing some problems with how WP cases are handled, because we're now at each other's heels over policy interpretations, was it "good faith", was it "vandalism", etc. before we can even move on to what should be dished out to the parties involved. This is highly inefficient handling of a case and we need to figure out a way to wrap this up soon in a way that everyone (quote unquote) can agree with. SwampedEssayist (talk) 13:37, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I agree with N8 that no more than a trout is needed, but the need for even just a trout does first need to be acknowledged by DS. I'm going to share a blast from my own checkered past. Reasonably similar concern. Someone pointed the issue out to me, I said, "That's fair, it felt to me like but I can understand how it didn't feel that way ." That was the end of it. Not even sure I actually got a trout, IIRC. Valereee (talk) 13:41, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I am dissapointed noone noticed Cite arXiv, no damn clue if that is what the OP was saying, and probably doesn't matter. but that template should cause any editor to look twice. fiveby(zero) 13:56, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I guess so. I do want to emphasize that it's hard to be familiar with every discussion about every citation template especially ones from seven years ago. I'm not saying that excuses adding it back it or that there isn't an obligation on an editor restoring an arXiv citation to check to see if it is actually WP:RS. Philipnelson99 (talk) 14:11, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

additionally, if you didn't know that arXiv allows user uploaded content, it's actually kind of hard to tell that it's NOT published academic content and the edit summary There is no article supporting this claim. seems like an outright contradiction if working under that assumption. Philipnelson99 (talk) 14:14, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

It's a deceptive template, and almost all legitate usages should probably be turned into {{Cite journal}}. I have no idea when or if an admin stopping edit waring should look at the content. But i would expect that, when it did become a content question and editors felt confident enough to start throwing out 'troll', 'vandal', 'lying', etc., they would have exercised their due diligence. They didn't. arXiv should have been an immediate read flag. It might be a contributing factor nobody needs blamed or shamed over, just if admins are not aware of WP:PREPRINT, they should be. fiveby(zero) 14:59, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Without getting into whether these edits meet the definition of vandalism, or not, am I reading this correctly that there is an actual belief that if an admin reverts vandalism, that we are now considered WP:INVOLVED? If so, that's so asinine, that's actually comical. If that comes to pass, I might as well turn in my mop. Jauerback/_dude. 13:58, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Why {{ec}}? SwampedEssayist (talk) 14:06, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

No, @Jauerback, you are not reading this correctly. The question is whether DS became involved when they started editing the disputed content and continued to revert the other editor when DS's edits were reverted. Other are arguing that because the OP is probably NOTHERE, no harm no foul. Valereee (talk) 14:11, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Maybe S Marshall needs to clarify, because he has made these comments throughout this discussion: ...because I think that WP:INVOLVED matters and I do not accept that reverting vandalism is an "administrative action"... and I think reverting is an editorial action and not an administrative one. I think it's as clear as day that DS should have gone to AN3 about this. We need these rules about involvement because they (imperfectly, but importantly) help prevent various kinds of abuse... and I think an administrative action is an action that you need administrator tools to perform, and an editorial action is one that any editor can perform. Jauerback/_dude. 14:23, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

An admin who blocks his opponent in 3RR edit war sounds like WP:INVOLVED to me, but CC was clearly making bad edits (what I would say is vandalism, but the good faith thing...). Not very professional or admin-like imho. SwampedEssayist (talk) 15:09, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

The close mentioned other venues for possible further discussion but omitted Misplaced Pages:Administrative action review Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 17:44, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Which was a fairly sensible omission under the circumstances, as a thread there would almost surely become a duplication of this one. Newyorkbrad (talk) 13:23, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

And it's deprecated.-- Deepfriedokra (talk) 16:38, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

User:Explicit - Conduct related to file deletions

I happened to upload a file for fair use on the Hunter Biden laptop controversy page many weeks ago. A poll on the talk page affirmed editors' consensus to include that file as an illustration for a section of that article. The file is an image of the cover page of a tabloid newspaper. I provided what I believe is a valid rationale for fair use of that image on that article page in that context. The file can be seen on the Post website, here and has been reproduced in other media that discuss the Post's story, for example Business Insider and other RS publications. See, e.g. this recent use.

@Explicit: deleted the file and has not responded to my numerous requests on their talk page and via Wiki-email to reconsider/engage with respect to the deletion and the basis for fair use. Upon a quick look at their talk page, I see many other editors who, like me, have asked for Explicit's attention to their deletions, with no constructive response from Explicit. I think I understand fair use, but I am certainly no expert on the subject. However I believe it's unacceptable for Explicit to make large numbers of deletions and then fail to respond to the editors who uploaded the files in good faith.

I'd like to get the file reviewed and understand what if any further documentation is needed to establish it for use on the article page. I cannot find my original explanation, which I presume was deleted along with the file itself. I also would like Admins to consider whether Explicit should be permitted to continue deleting files while failing to respond to editors on their talk page. Thanks. SPECIFICO talk 16:20, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Email is not adequate notification. Doug Weller talk 17:09, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Hello Doug. I first pinged many times in posts on their user talk page. SPECIFICO talk 17:23, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I notified Explicit about this discussion. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 17:41, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I already did that about an hour ago. SkyWarrior 17:45, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Pings aren’t either as I understand it. Doug Weller talk 21:11, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

• If it is just one file, wouldn't the proper venue be WP:DRV and not this noticeboard? Courcelles (talk) 17:53, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  To confirm, the file at issue is File:NY Post Cover 10 14 2020.PNG? If so, there was no explicit source given for the image (a direct link to where you got it from) which is sufficient cause to delete an image. I see why this file was deleted, but NOT why you haven't gotten this explained clearly, assuming I'm looking at the right file. Courcelles (talk) 17:57, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

  And I see now I am talking about the right image. The content on the file page was "2020 Newspaper headline page, not currently for sale. Widely reproduced in media that have discussed it, per Fair Use.

  This page shows story that launched public controversy that is the subject of Hunter Biden laptop controversy. Not material that is for sale. Provides context for an important section of that Misplaced Pages page. The image does not reproduce the text of the news article itself."

  Sorry to say, that, yeah, I agree with deleting this as tagged for no explicit sourcing. But I also think it's easily fixed, just link to where you got it from. What I don't like is that Explicit could have explained this in the last couple weeks. That's an ADMINACCT issue. (Sorry for my multi-edit rambling... the more I looked into this the stranger it got.) If you'll agree to link the source and write a NFCC rationale that's a bit more explicit about how it's useful, I'll be happy to undelete it and if necessary it can be referred to FFD. Courcelles (talk) 18:04, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

• I agree with Courcelles. SPECIFICO, you might want to just re-upload the file using Misplaced Pages:File upload wizard, which will collect all of the necessary information and neatly arrange it in a template for you. I'm a bit concerned about the lack of responsiveness in terms of WP:ADMINACCT, but that could be easily resolved if Explicit just left a message here promising to reply to queries involving his use of the tools in a timely manner from now on—hopefully that's what will happen. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 18:11, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for folks' comments. As I said, I am not surprised to have made an error in the documentation, but direct communication either before or after the deletion would have prompted me to attempt correcting it and saved much needless attention to this. SPECIFICO talk 19:17, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) I'm not an admin so I can't see the image, but based on what's posted above I just want to add that fair use and non-free content use aren't one and the same. Misplaced Pages's non-free content use policy has been intentionally set up to be more restrictive than non-free use as explained in WP:NFC#Background and WP:ITSFAIRUSE. There are many things acceptable as fair use being used out in the real world that most likely wouldn't be considered WP:NFCC compliant, and non-free content isn't allowed simply because lots of other people are using it as "fair use". So, it would be better not to mix up the terms because it just adds to confusion. So, adding a source might resolve the WP:F4 issue, but it wouldn't automatically make the file's non-free use policy compliant. Further assessment might be necessary at WP:FFD. Just for reference, a newspaper front page image is similar to a book cover, album cover, magazine cover, etc. in that specific sourced critical related to the image itself is generally needed per WP:NFC#cite_note-3 and WP:NFC#CS for non-free use to be considered justifiable. Simply having lots of stuff about what the NYP wrote in Hunter Biden laptop controversy about the controversy isn't necessarily something that needs a non-free image to be seen to be understood by the reader. Just glancing through the article, I don't see anything specifically about this image (even though I can't see the image) which means I'm not really seeing how omitting it is affecting anyone's understanding of the article. Those are likely the kind of things that will be pointed out if this is discussed at FFD; so, any sourced commentary about the image itself you can find to add to the article would help strengthen a claim for non-free use. Finally, I've looked at the article's talk page and I've found Talk:Hunter Biden laptop controversy#NYP image, but I wouldn't say that's a consensus to use an non-free image of the front page. Once again, it would probably be better to discuss things at FFD since a local talk page consensus can't supersede policy per WP:CONLEVEL and FFD is the venue (like the other XFDs) for community discussion over the image. Moreover, instead of re-uploading the image, it would probably be better just to find the source and then request the file be restored via WP:REFUND or WP:DRV. F4 deletions, I believe, are eligible for REFUND; so, simply providing a proper source for the image might be enough to get it restored. If not, then there's WP:DRV where the file's deletion can be discussed. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:31, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

I am no longer active on the English Misplaced Pages to the extent I was prior to 2023. I don't look at my talk page much and a simple WP:REFUND request would have resolved the issue. ✗plicit 23:49, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

You are still performing a large number of deletions. "I don't look at my talk page much" is not really compatible with WP:ADMINACCT, which requires you to respond promptly to queries about your administrative actions. Pawnkingthree (talk) 00:19, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Explicit, this is a disappointing answer. Drmies (talk) 03:06, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Explicit, it appears that you have carried our roughly 500 adminstrative actions in the past week or so, and yet you say I am no longer active on the English Misplaced Pages to the extent I was prior to 2023. That's jarring. You can freely choose to not use your tools if you wish and therefore pay little attention to your talk page, but if you choose to use your tools at a rapid-fire pace, then you are obligated to be responsive to good faith inquiries on your talk page. Please state definitively whether or not you acknowledge your obligations under WP:ADMINACCOUNT. Thanks. Cullen328 (talk) 03:21, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

+1 Valereee (talk) 11:24, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

+1, as admins we're required to respond to queries about our admin actions. Even a simple "I'm sorry I don't have time to look right now but you can ask at " is better than radio silence. You can't be an admin and be incognito (much as we might wish we could sometimes). HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 11:45, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Explicit deletes many files at exactly 00:00 every day. Explicit says he is not as active anymore. I believe him. After all, this is clearly automated deletion of files, because no man could delete so many files at exactly the same time each day. Automated deletion of files is bad because it violates Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines when the community does not approve it first. Explicit must be held accountable for botting without community approval. Maine 🦞 12:56, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Looking through the logs, I see that Twinkle is being used. The admin version of Twinkle has a button to batch-delete pages, such as every page in a maintenance category. So, it would be possible to say, review the files in the category from 2330 to midnight and then push the button at midnight, but the sheer fact that I went back 1,500 logged actions and didn't see a minute missed (I.e. the deletions happened starting every day at exactly midnight UTC) makes me wonder if you are on to something here about a script being used to make these deletions without review of each deletion? Courcelles (talk) 13:09, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Today, I'll submit an arbitration case. If automatic deletions have been occurring, this is a flagrant abuse of the administrator toolkit, especially given that Explicit has been unresponsive. After doing this for so long, Explicit's deletion rights must be revoked, necessitating their removal as an admin. Maine 🦞 13:13, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Maine Lobster, I strongly encourage you to leave that for a more experienced editor to do, if they deem it appropriate and necessary. At a minimum, Explicit should be given time to explain their actions to this board. BilledMammal (talk) 13:18, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

The case is clear. I will do what needs to be done unless you want to do it today instead. Maine 🦞 13:20, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I strongly warn you against doing so. You do not have the administrative/backroom experience to show that you can construct an arbitration case. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:26, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Regardless of Maine Lobster's inability to understand Twinkle, there's nothing to build an arbitration case about, anyway, as no-one has yet pointed out (a) even one example of Explicit's deletions being wrong, let alone a continuing pattern, or (b) any evidence that the deletions are being done without human overview. Black Kite (talk) 13:32, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Most, if not all, of these deletions really are that clear-cut. A file's description page doesn't have the requisite information, somebody tags it and (hopefully) notifies the uploader, they get a few days to fix the problem; if they don't, it's eligible for immediate deletion. An admin just needs to check that the tag was correct and has been there long enough. It's a very simple process that requires very minimal human review, so it's not surprising to see an admin using Twinkle to delete en masse.

The only issue here is Explicit's lack of response to queries about their deletions. Hopefully they'll commit to being more responsive in future and that will be the end of the matter. No need for drama. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:49, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

You're really telling me that Explicit, who claims they're not active, went through 500 files for manual review in the last five days? Something isn't right here. Maine 🦞 13:50, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I don't know whether they did or not, only they know that; but you could probably manually check 500 articles in two or three hours. It's really just checking that the tag is correct, a matter of a couple of seconds. Black Kite (talk) 14:19, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Maine Lobster really needs a WP:CIR block as a timesink, it's obvious they don't have a clue and they're not willing to listen to instruction or advice. They've already been told twice to stop messing around at administrative boards and both times have agreed with the message and said they will stop. Their comments on these boards are at best clueless, spamming threads with "Support, Editors who ... need to go" is not useful behaviour . They've already been told about signature accessibility issues but don't seem to have listened to that. They have repeatedly introduced BLP vios into the project, having about 20 edits oversighted/deleted as a result, and even more ridiculously they've been using anti-vandal tools on the people removing their BLP violating comments and filed edit warring threads against people removing their poorly/unsourced additions because they were misrepresenting sources . 163.1.15.238 (talk) 14:30, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I'm discussing with them at their talk. Valereee (talk) 14:42, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

They're now p-blocked from projectspace in an effort to hopefully avoid an indef. Star Mississippi 19:23, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Two things: Explicit really needs to show up, and MaineLobster needs to back off for orchestrating drama and maybe write some articles—and change their signature to comply with accessibility standards. Drmies (talk) 13:35, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. This is concerning, but not a "go directly to Arbcom, do not pass go, do not collect $200" situation. Those are exceedingly rare, and the odds a 200 edit account would spot one when you have highly experienced editors, multiple admins, and even a few former arbitrators in this thread that aren't seeing it that way is so vanishingly small. Courcelles (talk) 13:39, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

If there is another batch of deletions at 00:00 25 March 2023 UTC, we're going to be in that exceedingly rare situation. Levivich (talk) 14:51, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

What is the issue with my signature that needs to be addressed? I am willing to make any changes that are necessary, however I would like to know the reason behind it. Maine 🦞 13:51, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

I'll answer at your user. Valereee (talk) 14:35, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Agreed on both accounts. This may well be an issue that the Committee will need to get involved in eventually, but certainly not yet. The community hasn't yet demonstrated that the normal methods of dispute resolution (i.e. this thread) have failed. These mass deletions and lack of accountability are a cause for concern, but let's examine it and see how the discussion plays out before considering escalation. Though sometimes I miss having the structure of WP:RFC/U as an option, even with all the drama they caused. The Wordsmith 17:27, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

The deletions at exactly 00:00 have been going on for years. Midnight UTC is exactly when every file in a dated file category becomes eligible for deletion. It's plausible that Explicit checks the dated category and then batch deletes exactly when every file becomes eligible for deletion; for some CSDs like WP:F5 there isn't much to check (and I feel like an adminbot could automatically handle F5?). But I find it weird that it's that consistent. Whether the deletions are fully or semi-automated it's clear Explicit needs to be very forthcoming about what's going on and comply with WP:ADMINACCT. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:20, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

If they truly have been happening on the dot every day for years, it must be fully automated. No human would be available, online, and never fudge the timing for that long. —Compassionate727  21:32, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Having looked through the logs more, I do see the occasional being late by a few minutes, and the occasional being a minute early, which makes sense with a human doing it. Galobtter (pingó mió) 01:05, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

• @Explicit: Is that the problem? Using "mass delete?" Could the solution be as simple as not using mass delete anymore? Hell-lloo-o! (In my unsolicited opinion, mass delete is a dangerous tool to use.) And the response so far to these queries has not been confidence inspiring. Please?-- Deepfriedokra (talk) 20:34, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Response

Umm wow, talk about spiraling out of control. I will try to address to the concerns made above instead of replying to each individual, so please let me know if I've missed anything.

As I stated above, I do not consider myself active "to the extent I was prior to 2023". I performed 500–1,500 administrative actions per day last year. I do not consider my current situation active; this is relative, as it seems 500 actions in a week is considered a lot here. Over the past three or so months, my administrative actions have mostly dealt with the daily categories at {{CSD backlogs}}. I use Twinkle's batch deletion function, which I do manually. I am (generally) simply online at that time, as it is 9 AM for me at 00:00 UTC. I check every single file to make sure it is eligible for deletion and remove deletion tags when they are not, as evidenced in my contributions.

The issue seems to be, then, rooted in my lack of responses to queries on my talk page. I suppose this is a result in the decline of my activity. I live in South Korea, so my timezone is generally at odds with the general user. I receive a majority of my message while I'm asleep. So, pair that up with my decline of activity, the concerns were often addressed by the time I did check my talk page. While not an excuse, it appears that it did create a situation that led me to believe that a response from me specifically was necessarily required.

I am well aware of my obligations as an administrator. Moving forward, I will be more diligent in responding to talk page messages. The responses may not be the quickest, but I'll get one in within 24 hours.

Thank you to everyone for the baseless accusations alleging that I must be covertly running a script on my account and threatening me with ArbCom. This experience has truly been shit. ✗plicit 23:07, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the response, but two questions:

1. Why haven't you answered the more-than-a-dozen deletion-related questions on your talk page and archives?
2. You've really hit that button at 9AM, on the dot, every day, for years?

What I don't understand is that you have to be logged in to Misplaced Pages to press the Twinkle button (right?). And if you're logged in, then you see the big banner that says you have a new talk page message. So yesterday, when you logged in and pressed the Twinkle button at 9AM, you must have seen the notices about messages on your talk page about this, right? You didn't respond to those, but you did delet ~80 files. I think you can understand why folks are concerned about anyone deleting pages without responding to messages about deleting pages. Levivich (talk) 23:21, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

1. As I mentioned above, I fell into a false sense of security in my response specifically not being needed. I'll get to those now.
2. ...Yes. I'm not sure how much clearer I can get.

My first response to this thread was on March 24 at 8:49 AM, I performed batch deletions at 9:00 AM, the page history shows the next response to this thread at 9:19 AM, and my action was responding here was March 25 at 8:07 AM. I'm not sure what the issue is? Unless I'm expected to respond to the AN notice on my talk page acknowledging the message. I figured my response here did that. ✗plicit 23:36, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

OK, thanks for taking care of #1. #2 I find really extraordinary, not that it's impossible and I accept your explanation, but I do want to ask: for how many years have you been pressing a particular button on a computer at exactly the same time every day? More than five years? I don't know if there is a Guinness World Record for punctuality, but you might hold it! Levivich (talk) 23:50, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately the streak only goes back to the 18th, on March 17th the deletions started at 00:01 instead (quarry). (And if someone really wants a database report similar to Longest active user editing streaks, just ask :-)) Legoktm (talk) 01:34, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

I'll tell Guinness nevermind. :-) Levivich (talk) 01:39, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Hey, @Explicit, I'm sorry this has been unpleasant. I don't think anyone here is implying that the work you're doing isn't valuable, and the only person who was talking ArbCom was a very new editor who was basically shouted down and is now blocked from Misplaced Pages space for disruptive editing here. From my read, everyone else is just looking for the communication issue to be addressed. It sounds like you're saying you'll address the TP banners, plus the rare alert from noticeboards, when you log in each day. For me, that's all I wanted. Valereee (talk) 11:53, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Likewise. All I wanted to see was an assurance from Explict that he'll do better at responding to queries about his admin action in future. He's given that, so as far as I'm concerned this thread is resolved. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:08, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, I think there is a larger issue, for all admins, and that is to be cautious with batch delete or mass deletion tools. I've noticed that some types or criteria of articles, pages and files can be mass deleted without being properly checked. I know that I do batch deletions with some CSD G13s because I am familiar with the two editors who frequently tag expiring drafts and over time I've come to trust them to have checked out the drafts prior to tagging to make sure they are eligible. But not all article/page/file tagging by editors or even bots is accurate and I think most new editors who, for example, find their User pages deleted via CSD U5 will not complain, they just will leave and not come back. It hasn't happened lately but in the past, I've seen mass deletions of hundreds (thousands?) of User pages under the CSD U5 criteria that seemed questionable to me. But I should probably raise that question in a different discussion thread.

But I agree that it is almost always thoroughly unpleasant to be brought to AN/ANI. Liz 19:06, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

(Liz, I share your impression about U5 deletions, with WP:UPYES in mind.) ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:17, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Well, it's a problem with the page taggers as well as the admins who delete the User pages. I've seen User pages tagged as CSD U5s that just contained the editor's name! Nothing else, just their name! That's acceptable content for a User page. Sheesh. Liz 19:51, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

From my experience, that same level of overzealous aggression has applied to MfDs as well, with a lot of innocuous user subpages being taken to task because their contents "might confuse Misplaced Pages readers". I think we all need to take a long look at userspace deletion as a whole, and not just in the CSD sphere. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 14:02, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

• @Liz: I agree with you on the general point about lax application of CSD and undue haste. Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/RHaworth was one of the most prolific examples I've seen but not necessarily the worst. Nonetheless, Explicit has (very credibly) assured us that he checks files before deletion. Perhaps a discussion about CSD or U5 in particular is in order at VPP or WT:CSD? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:57, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
  • It's not in the least credible that he checked this image, which was at no time a valid speedy. The copyright holder was identified in the image name and the image itself, and the year of copyright in the image name and image description page, from the very first revision. While not quite in itself enough to satisfy WP:NFC#10a, it's more than enough to prevent a WP:F4, which is (ahem) explicit that there only needs to be enough "information to verify copyright status" and that "administrators should check the upload summary, file information page, and the image itself". We generally require administrators to look at and think about what they're deleting; that's why we don't just have a bot do it. —Cryptic 11:29, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Editing from the Brooklyn Public Library

I'm writing for anyone to look into the block of the IP range 208.87.232.0/21. The editor blocked this on suspicion it was an open proxy. As a result, many people whose only access to the internet from the library computers are unable to contribute even when they're able to get an account. Given there's no way for anyone to access the library's network outside their buildings can someone with IP address experience review this. We have many meetups at the central library and I don't want anyone complain or getting discouraged because of someone mistaking this for an open proxy. Indy208 (talk) 20:31, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

@Indy208: The range is registered to what looks like a VPN-type service, the sort of thing that remote workers use to connect to company networks. Is the entire /21 used by the library and only the library do you know? Courtesy ping for @ST47:, the blocking admin. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:38, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

We might also want to ping Blablubbs for an opinion. I've had reason to look at this range a number of times, so I can add my opinion. It's a Forcepoint range, which is a filtering service used by various legitimate institutions. Just like Zscaler I believe we shouldn't be blocking these as open proxies. I have seen evidence that at least parts of this /21 range are used by the Brooklyn library system. I believe they're mainly on 208.87.236.201 and 208.87.236.202 (IIRC). You can see a different institution mentioned at User_talk:208.87.234.202, and that appears to be a likely typical example. Brooklyn Library has a number of ranges available to them, and I don't really understand how they do their filtering, but there's some obvious local collateral from this library. I should note that at least one LTA likes to also use it (presumably by visiting in person), and this might part-explain why there's been no hurry to lift the block. Frankly some of the other account activity from the library is just weird. My own view on balance is that the range can probably be soft-blocked, though you'll undoubtedly get another socker on it. I think an unblock might be asking for trouble, though I wouldn't particularly object at this time. -- zzuuzz 21:31, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

@Zzuuzz: My thoughts pretty much align with yours. I'm not super thrilled by some of the activity on the range, but I think dropping down to anon only is unlikely to blow up in our faces, so it's probably worth a shot. --Blablubbs (talk) 12:24, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@Blablubbs, Zzuuzz, Indy208, and ST47: I've dropped it down to anon only with account creation allowed. The three CUs among you might want to monitor account creations on the range and act as necessary. No need to defer to me if the block needs to be changed again. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:47, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

User:Mariamla/monobook.js

User:Mariamla/monobook.js needs deletion per U5/G11 but I am not able to tag it for technical reasons. Someone who's wrong on the internet (talk) 18:59, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

deleted by RiB-- Deepfriedokra (talk) 19:51, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! Someone who's wrong on the internet (talk) 19:53, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Sure thing! RickinBaltimore (talk) 20:04, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Eyferth study - Inappropriate RFC Closure

I notified both user:LokiTheLiar and user:Generalrelative about the issue below:

This is my first visit to AN, so bear with me. I believe I am in the right place, but if I am wrong, please tell me the appropriate venue for filing something like this. With that said..

Recently there was an RFC at the Eyferth study article. For multiple reasons, I believe the close of the RFC was improper and against procedure. I'll list the reasons first and then go into greater detail:

1.) The editor who closed the RFC, User: LokiTheLiar was WP:INVOLVED, and therefore should not have performed the close

2.) In his closing, user User:LokiTheLiar stated that he discounted !votes of users who were either WP:MEATPUPPETS or WP:SPA's or users with "very few edits". This normally would not be a problem, however there were a large number of users who were labeled as SPA's (by another editor), who were neither meatpuppets, nor SPA's as I shall show below.

In regards to Loki being WP:INVOLVED, in his close, Loki uses a past RFC regarding Race and Intelligence as part of his reasoning. However, Loki himself was involved in the RFC in question. According to WP:INVOLVED, editors should never close a discussion where they created or non-trivially contributed to the object under discussion. I realize this may be a judgement call, however there certainly is an appearance of impropriety.

In regards to Loki discounting !votes from SPA's and MEATPUPPETS, the problem is much more serious. Roughly 15 minutes before the close of the RFC, another editor, user:Generalrelative, incorrectly labeled several accounts as SPA's. Loki took this labeling into account when making his vote count. Every !vote that was removed/discounted by user:LokiTheLiar was an !include vote. None of the !exclude votes were discounted. Now, I am not accusing user:Generalrelative of bad faith, this is more a WP:CIR problem. I attempted - several times - to explain to Generalrelative that by adding a "/64" to the URL for IP user contributions, he could then see all the contributions for that particular user. Unfortunately, he didn't seem to understand what I was getting at, and continued to revert me. Eventually I gave up and allowed him to leave the SPA tag, even though the accounts were NOT SPAs. They all either had well over `100 edits in multiple topic areas, or had been around for several years with few or one edit to the topic area in question. This would not be a problem, except for the fact that Loki used Generalrelative's SPA labels in determining his vote count.

Bottom line, this is a potentially important RFC. I feel it could be better served by a closer who is not even tangentially involved in the topic area. I also feel that numerous votes were discounted when they absolutely should have been considered. Hence, the close was not in keeping with policy, and I ask that the RFC is reopened and a different user/admin perform the close. I also ask that someone take the time to explain to user:Generalrelative what an SPA is, and how to properly view the contributions for an IP editor.

Thank you 2600:1700:1250:6D80:947A:51E4:EB45:1FB4 (talk) 22:15, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I’ll respond to the points regarding SPA tags and leave others to comment on the issue of whether Loki should be considered INVOLVED:

1) AndewNguyen reverted his SPA tag before the RfC was closed , and no one restored it. That's the first diff of my SPA tagging provided by the OP. It seems odd that they would then claim Loki took this labeling into account when making his vote count. I see no evidence of that.

2) I reverted four attempts by the 2600:1012:B068:8277:0:0:0:0 and 2600:1012:B043:216D:0:0:0:0 ranges to remove another SPA tag only after the RfC was closed: . My understanding is that these reversions are within process since closed discussions should not be altered. If I'm incorrect on that point I will be happy to be corrected. I requested page protection so that I wouldn’t have to keep reverting and then removed the request when the IP agreed to self-revert . In any case Loki stated in their close: I count only two (maybe three counting an IP) include !votes from users with more than 100 edits. So it's clear that they made their own assessment regardless of the tag.

3) I added these SPA tags almost four hours before Loki’s close ( versus ), not Roughly 15 minutes before as the IP states. This hardly matters; it’s just an odd assertion.

4) For a bit of context, this discussion and RfC were targeted by significant off-Wiki canvassing on Twitter and 4chan, and involved concerted disruption from two LTA sockmasters (Mikemikev and Tristan albatross). There was very good reason to be wary of meatpuppetry here.

Generalrelative (talk) 23:04, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Generalrelative, I didn't realize that AndewNguyen had removed the tag prior to the RFC close - my bad. However, you still have not answered the question as to why you were labeling IP editors as SPAs when I demonstrated to you several times how to view their complete contributions. I even went to your TALK page, but you promptly ashcanned my message. 2600:1700:1250:6D80:947A:51E4:EB45:1FB4 (talk) 23:09, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

My understanding was that a /64 is not necessarily a unique user. After doing some googling just now it seems that I may have been mistaken, but I invite input from anyone who knows definitively. In any case, we're talking about two SPA tags where I labeled an IP, and one of them is still very obviously an SPA when running the /64: 2601:581:C180:1980:0:0:0:0. So it's really only your IP that I may have mistakenly tagged (at least the one you're editing on now, though you're evidently also the user who edits in the /64 ranges 2600:1012:B068:8277:0:0:0:0 and 2600:1012:B043:216D:0:0:0:0). The "include" side was still massively outweighed, even without considering the policy aspects of the close relating to WP:FRIND and WP:ONEWAY. Generalrelative (talk) 23:53, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I also wouldn't call a single Tweet with 4 responses "significant off-Wiki canvassing". Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 23:16, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Hard to think of a more clear long-term SPA than AndewNguyen. (And I see that they've been blocked as such at long last by Moneytrees two days ago -- well deserved and overdue, thanks.) --JBL (talk) 23:40, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

user:AndewNguyen is about the farthest thing from an SPA. His last edits were in September 2022, and he has contributed to everything from Pentecostalism in Norway to Forensic anthropology. So I have no idea how you would think he is a single-purpose account. In fact, AndewNguyen rarely contributes to article mainspace, he almost always first discusses his edits on TALK so as not to run afoul of policy and procedure. Calling him an SPA makes literally zero sense, and there is no evidence for such an accusation. 2600:1700:1250:6D80:947A:51E4:EB45:1FB4 (talk) 23:47, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Well over 300 of his < 500 edits concern the single subject. --JBL (talk) 00:11, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Right. And most of those edits were made to TALK. So as I said, not a single-purpose account. By any measure. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1012:B014:8929:9C2E:1D53:CEA1:B912 (talk) 00:21, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

An account that makes edits primarily on Talk pages related to one single topic (in this case, a CT domain) strikes me as a paradigmatic single purpose account. And the idea that an account can only be SPA if it engages primarily in article-space edits seems to me to be both implausible and perplexing. Newimpartial (talk) 00:29, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Yeah AndrewNguyen seems to clearly be an SPA in the race and intelligence area. I'd add that even many of their contributions in other areas seem to relate to linked stuff like demographics statics or immigration or (non intelligence) aspects of race or ancestry e.g. or their sole contribution to the article Norway . And some of them may be in their SPA area even if it isn't obvious from the article e.g. . (The edit summary of the second one makes it clear. The edit summary of the first one less so except based on knowledge of the editor's interest.) Nil Einne (talk) 12:36, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I should note here explicitly that AndrewNguyen was one of the two (maybe three counting an IP) include !votes from users with more than 100 edits I mentioned. The other two were Tickle_me and possibly 12.31.71.58. (Honestly, I was a little unsure how to count the IPs, but none of them other than possibly that one seemed like they were long-standing users to me.) Loki (talk) 01:30, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

It has 144 likes which seems a more important metric than responses. Also 25 retweets and 19 bookmarks. I'm guessing some of those retweets also got unique likes. While by no means is that a lot, it's not insignificant considering also that this is RfC with not that many participants, it's a highly problematic area, and any canvassing which is likely to have inspired people to take part in the RfC is a problem in terms of assessing numbers. While RfCs aren't votes, ultimately unless those discarded editors actually had some strong arguments that no one else thought of, they don't contribute much. Nil Einne (talk) 12:25, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

So, in order:

1) I was not WP:INVOLVED. I never edited Eyferth study or its talk page even once before I closed that discussion. Voting in an RFC in the same topic area does not make me WP:INVOLVED, especially one that just affirmed an existing consensus, and which was WP:SNOW closed in under half the time such an RFC normally takes. This is true even if the result of the RFC happens to be relevant to the entire topic area.

To put it another way, someone who has previously expressed an opinion that perpetual motion is WP:FRINGE doesn't suddenly give up the ability to close discussions about thermodynamics.

2) In addition to the general rule that the result of an RfC is based on the strength of the argument and not the raw numbers of votes, WP:MEATPUPPET explicitly says In votes or vote-like discussions, new users may be disregarded or given significantly less weight, especially if there are many of them expressing the same opinion. I didn't have to have concrete evidence that meatpuppetry was going on to do this, but I did have such evidence anyway: editors linked specific discussions on Twitter where other Twitter users had been explicitly canvassed to that RfC.

The fact that all the !votes I deemed to be suspicious (using the criteria of fewer than 100 edits) were "include" voters is, by WP:MEATPUPPET, evidence in favor of excluding them. Again, it applies especially if there are many expressing the same opinion. The whole point of the policy is to prevent canvassed users using sheer weight of numbers to sway a discussion to their preferred side, which was by the evidence provided "include".

(Oh, also, to be clear, I did not take the labeling 15 minutes before the RfC closed into account. Like I said in the close, my actual criteria for deweighting !votes was less than 100 edits. I felt that matched better both with which votes felt intuitively suspicious to me and the text of WP:MEATPUPPET than trying to parse account histories. I started the close more than 15 minutes before I submitted it and so didn't even see those labels until after I closed.) Loki (talk) 23:39, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

There was only one way this RFC could have been closed. Lets not continue to waste community time with this, particularly in an area so infested with sockpuppets of LTAs. One last pass to check for sockpuppets (including the account who started the RFC as their first-ever edit) wouldn't be amiss, though. - MrOllie (talk) 00:08, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

+1. --JBL (talk) 00:15, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. The argument that Loki is WP:INVOLVED in the dispute seems tenuous at best, their de-weighting of potentially canvassed votes seems perfectly appropriate, and I can't see that any reasonable closer could find consensus to include the disputed content in that discussion. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 11:37, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

• Endorse close. Not only do I think the closure was a valid reading of the discussion (the normal standard to review closures), I do not think a reasonable closer could have come to the opposite conclusion. Courcelles (talk) 12:52, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

• Endorse close. Having participated in a previous related discussion does not make someone involved, but even an involved editor can close a discussion that has no other reasonable outcome. Given that almost all !votes to include were from new/inexperienced editors, it's pretty clear there was canvassing somewhere, looks like in this case it wasn't just twitter but also 4chan. I don't see how else someone experienced and well-intentioned could have reasonably closed this discussion. Valereee (talk) 12:07, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• A reasonable closer would not close. The discussion has not run its course, and there is no consensus.

All the ink spilled about SPAs is beside the point. Misplaced Pages is an encyclopedia anyone can edit, and a user who edits appropriately and makes good points that align with Misplaced Pages's communal norms, policies and guidelines should have their comments be given full weight regardless of any tag placed on them.

According to WP:DETCON, Consensus is ascertained by the quality of the arguments given on the various sides of an issue, as viewed through the lens of Misplaced Pages policy. It's striking that the close by Loki mentions none of the arguments presented during the RfC — only vote counts, the putative SPA status of contributors, and the results of a previous RfC on a different question. Additionally, Loki states that they disregarded the input of editors that expressed disagreement with that prior RfC, which puts the cart before the horse. WP:CCC and the point of an RfC is determining that.

The close and much of the subsequent discussion of the close is based in "Avoiding substative discussion because of who is involved", one of the characteristics of Misplaced Pages:Status quo stonewalling.

As for those arguments in discussion, raised by AndrewNguyen, myself, BonaparteIII, Mr Butterbur, and tickle_me, they center on the broader campaign of mass removal of high-quality academic sources by Generalrelative and others. The difference between fringe and minority scientific viewpoints is murky. However, the evaluation is supposed to be guided by quality peer-reviewed articles. If any RfC or interpretation of an RfC leads to removals of sources like it is time to pause and reflect on whether something has gone wrong. These are the kinds of sources that should be used in the first place to determine what is or isn't fringe. The fact that WP:FRINGE guidelines are being used to remove them points to deep dysfunction in the policy.

Sennalen (talk) 13:52, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

That discussion looks to me (on a brief glance) like it had gone on for a week, then petered out with zero participation for two weeks, and then suddenly two weeks ago a new batch of likely canvassed-in !voters started coming in. IMO at that point it's reasonable to close. Valereee (talk) 15:14, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

That doesn't conform procedurally with the guidance of WP:WHENCLOSE or WP:RFCEND, but especially does not justify a finding of "strong consensus" when there is in fact no consensus. Sennalen (talk) 15:37, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Sennalen, you personally may agree with the now-indeffed editor and the unknown number of IPs participating in the discussion, but the clear, policy-based consensus of the discussion does not (fortunately) depend on whether or not you accede to it. You disagree with community consensus about the Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory; you disagree with community consensus about the COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis, and yet in both cases the consensus stands perfectly well without your support. So also does the contentious topic of "Race and intelligence". Whatever your issues might be with the WP:FRINGE guideline, you have not yet been able to articulate (to my knowledge) any issue with or necessary clarification of the guideline that might generate community support for your concerns. Newimpartial (talk) 15:49, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Not coincedentally, these are all areas where there is a Americentric politically-motivated local consensus to disregard or undermine WP:BESTSOURCES. I go where I'm needed. Sennalen (talk) 16:20, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Don't forget GENSEX and Gamergate. Those are spicy ones, too. Sennalen (talk) 16:23, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

WP:RfPP backlog

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Hi moppers! There are currently 26 pages, dating back to 7am yesterday morning, awaiting action at Misplaced Pages:Requests for page protection if anyone has got a moment. Thanks! — Trey Maturin™ 23:52, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

List of international goals scored by Harry Kane

I am not sure, but I've had a couple of pings over this article, but it seems to be a bit of a battleground at the moment from looking at the editing history, people seem to be directly copying over the Draft:List of international goals scored by Harry Kane, (instead of the appropriate move) to the page already on wikipedia which was previously a redirect I had set. I did submitted the draft earlier to be moved to the page as Harry Kane is now the top scorer for England national team. I was wondering if we could maybe lockdown the battle or a way to somehow sort out the issues at play? Regards. Govvy (talk) 21:06, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

If I understand the OP's concern, there are at least two issues. The first is whether the article should be an article or should be redirected. That isn't the OP's concern, but it should be a concern, because there is slow-motion edit-warring. The second is copy-pasting from the draft to the article, which is happening because copy-pasting is an easier way to edit-war. I have started Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/List of international goals scored by Harry Kane (2nd nomination) as the process to establish consensus on whether to keep or redirect the article. It appears at this time that the AFD will result in a Keep. I am aware that some editors think that the AFD is unnecessary, because it is obvious to them what the policy-based outcome is. What is usually unnecessary is edit-warring. After the AFD is closed as Keep, a history merge may be in order. Robert McClenon (talk) 15:32, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Page history cleanup request

• Kresling fold (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

In 2021 the author of Kresling fold, User:Huanggab, requested that it be deleted, outlining a number of problems with the article. A copy was preserved on EverybodyWiki, a Misplaced Pages mirror. (The site is blacklisted, so here's a modified link: https://en.everybody!DELETETHIS!wiki.com/Kresling_Fold) In 2023 User:Onlinetexts recreated the article by importing the mirrored copy. Could an administrator please a) undelete the history of Kresling fold to preserve attribution, and b) move the page to draftspace until the original author's concerns have been addressed? Cheers, gnu57 21:11, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

 Done ~ ONUnicornproblem solving 22:12, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Close review of Requests for comment/Rollback of Vector 2022

This close, while a significant effort and made in good faith, was flawed; it poorly reflected the results of the discussion and contained procedural errors.

First, the closers failed to exclude the approximately 30 editors who were canvassed by a WMF employee and who opposed reverting to Vector 2010. This contravenes convention and sets a problematic precedent that canvassing can contribute to a consensus or to preventing one. (Including the canvassed !votes changes the support-oppose ratio from ~2:1 to ~3:2).

Second, they discounted arguments focusing on problems with Vector 2022, arguing that those issues either had been or would be addressed. While this argument was raised by a couple of editors regarding a couple of problems for most problems it was not and could not be, as the WMF has either no plans to resolve them or plans that many editors consider inadequate; already, the WMF has refused to implement unlimited width as default despite consensus. For the closers to conclude that solutions are forthcoming merely because Phabricator tickets exist for some of the problems is both novel and unsound, as Phabricator tickets often remain 'in progress' indefinitely, without any fixes being deployed.

Third, they scrutinized the arguments of supporters more heavily than opposers. For example, they considered the results of the user preference survey disputed, despite no editor arguing for any other position than that it showed opposition to deploying Vector2022. They also overestimated the number of editors who found the evidence the WMF presented for Vector 2022 compelling when they said that "many users found (the presented evidence) compelling"; only a small minority referenced the evidence at all, and a greater number argued that they didn't find the evidence compelling, typically on grounds that the evidence was not representative and that the WMF had already been proven to misrepresent the evidence it did choose to present.

Fourth, they discounted !votes based on user opinions, arguing that they were not based on policy and that the experiences of people who aren't UI designers are not concrete facts. There are three issues with this: first, we don't have policies on UI design, and where policy is silent we defer to editors' judgments; second, Misplaced Pages is built upon the belief that anyone can contribute valuably to discussions, not just experts; and third, this suggests that ordinary Misplaced Pages users cannot have valuable opinions about the interfaces they use.

Finally, they erred when they used their own opinion (Since we see the changes made by the WMF as compliance with the previous RfC, emphasis ours) to decide that the requirements of the previous close had been met. This was a decision that should have been deferred to the closers of the previous discussion, who believed that they had not been met, or to a consensus of the participants in this discussion, who also generally agreed that the requirements were not met.

This appeal was drafted with input from multiple editors. BilledMammal (talk) 08:46, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Overturn close - I find all the reasons cited in the appeal above to be compelling. Together, the reasons adequately provide a basis to overturn the close. Disclosure: I participated in the RFC. starship.paint (exalt) 09:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
  • North8000's point, made below and in the Discussion section, is a sixth compelling reason. starship.paint (exalt) 12:56, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Keep closed. The horse has died, been buried, and has a tombstone engraved. This is like the US House Republicans who are investigating the investigators of the January 6 United States Capitol attack. When this is closed, is that going to be reviewed too? 331dot (talk) 09:41, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  So... keep closed because it's already closed? starship.paint (exalt) 12:48, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  If the close is blatantly defective and an utter misrepresentation of the discussion, contravening the will of a clear and decisive majority, then yes, it will likely be reviewed. Toa Nidhiki05 12:52, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  It's always the side that was not successful that feels it was "misrepresented" and that the process was "defective". See WP:NOTAVOTE. There was a discussion, a review of the discussion, and now we are reviewing the review of the discussion. Is the next step to review the review of the review of the discussion? We need to move forward, lets focus on fixing bugs(which I'm sure exist) and improvements. . 331dot (talk) 13:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  This is a review of the discussion. Please don't misrepresent this. Beyond that error, you're just making points that could apply to literally any close review. starship.paint (exalt) 13:05, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'm including the initial discussion before the launch of the skin. 331dot (talk) 13:25, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  And it’s always the side who was “successful” who will insist on keeping proceedings closed, no matter how inaccurate the close was. Want to go around in circles? Tvx1 15:19, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  That isn't correct. Often people who didn't participate in the RfC will endorse/not endorse the close. I'm one. Valereee (talk) 15:20, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Which does make 331dot's whole comment regarding the "side which was not successful" nonsensical as well, doesn't it? And that is exactly what my comment intended to highlight. Also, what you claim is certainly not true. There are already people here would !voted to keep it closed and admitted having comment in opposition to the rollback during the RFC!Tvx1 16:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  As noted, no, that isn't correct. And I'm skeptical that this will provide the result that you want. We have no more right to demand that this website appear a certain way than guests I invite into my home have to demand that I paint my wall a certain color or arrange the furniture a certain way. This is just a timesink at this point and the focus should be on fixing bugs and making improvements. Anyone who doesn't like the skin can use the old one just as some people still use Monobook. 331dot (talk) 15:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  See, these are exactly the circles I was talking about. You are person opposing rollback and you insist on keeping the close because you "won". You are the prime example of what I was talking. And no, anyone who wants cannot change. Only registered people can do that and our largest user base are pure readers.Tvx1 16:02, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  And you have surveyed all readers to know that they don't like it? You don't think that the Foundation considered that? 331dot (talk) 16:09, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Overturn close One thing I'd note is how massive the 30 canvassed editors are. That’s roughly 5% of all votes and 13% of all oppose votes - the fact the closers didn’t even address this is further proof the close was defective. This is such a blatant oversight, but it's indicative of the way the closers viewed the discussion: ignore or minimize any aspects that rejected the outcome they wanted. That's not the way closes should be done; I appreciate the effort they put, but the actual close simply doesn't make sense. Toa Nidhiki05 11:31, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Overturn close per my opinions expressed here, here and in the draft of this appeal.--Æo (talk) 11:32, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Reasonable close. Closes of discussions like this one are extremely difficult, and there are always going to be a lot of people who disagree with the closers' approach. I can see how the close could have gone differently, but that's a given in a discussion this complicated. I don't see any reason to believe this wasn't a reasonable close. Valereee (talk) 11:45, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I mean, five reasons are given above on why this wasn't a reasonable close. The outcome may have been possible, but the method can be objected to. starship.paint (exalt) 12:48, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Five reasons were given for why someone else might feel that way; as I said, there are always going to be a lot of people who disagree with the closers' approach in a discussion as complicated as this one. I feel it was reasonable. Note that I did not participate in the RfC, have tried the new skin, and am currently using the old one. At one point I considered closing, but the sheer length and vitriole and bludgeoning and uninformed comments just made the task look like it was going to be onerous, tedious, and ultimately quite likely thankless. Which is exactly what it's turned out to be, as we're seeing here. Valereee (talk) 13:50, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Overturn close For the reasons given. Also there were implicitly two choices on what would be the default (2010 and 2022), the close treated it as if there was only one. Such would mean that the minority (2022) choice "wins" unless the 2010 choice gets a "supermajority" of views. (quote marks because yes, I know it's not a vote) North8000 (talk) 12:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) Rewrite the close. While I think the outcome was reasonable, the reasons listed above are very valid on how the close messsage was pretty flawed. Aaron Liu (talk) 12:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Keep closed. I don't doubt the good faith of the RfC closers (Isabelle Belato and Ingenuity) nor that of those who opened this appeal (BilledMammal et al.) — I do truly believe each "side" of this is attempting to act in the best interests of the community. However, this has become an incredibly controversial topic, and there's no reason to believe that should this close be overturned, a more universally accepted close could realistically be achieved. (comment from involved editor) — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 12:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  The vote "overturn" means replacing the existing closure with a finding that something else is consensus, while a vote to "vacate" essentially deletes the existing closure and allows someone else to close as normal. In this case, there is a reason nobody has voted to vacate. —Compassionate727  16:18, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Keep closed and let's move forward. dwadieff ✉ 12:24, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  So, you linked to a discussion where the WMF ignored our editors' rough consensus to make unlimited width the default, that's what you want editors to move forward with? starship.paint (exalt) 13:02, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't think the proposal ignored the rough consensus, and I think it's good to contribute constructively in that discussion rather than flogging a dead horse here. dwadieff ✉ 13:10, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I believe that we made the right choice in the introduction of the limited width and that, for readers, we are continuing to make the right choice in the decision to keep it as the default BilledMammal (talk) 13:15, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, that's exactly it. dwadieff ✉ 13:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  @Starship.paint, this is beginning to look like bludgeoning. Please stop. Valereee (talk) 13:51, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  No, you please stop accusing everyone who does not post something in line of keeping the close of bad faith. Tvx1 15:26, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Overturn Close The reasoning given by BilledMammal above went through multiple revisions with a number of editors to properly summarize the myriad of ways in which the close was improperly done. It is quite blatant and obvious that multiple aspects of the close, including the consideration of arguments given, number of supporters and opposers, direct canvassing of oppose votes and involvement of SPAs by the WMF, and the closers inserting their own opinions as reasoning when those stances were not meaningfully presented by the oppose voters in question (making the close a form of a supervote). All of these combined make the close very clearly improper and not in line with what is appropriate, particularly for a discussion of this scope and impact. I note that the keep closed editors above do not appear to make any argument as to why the close was proper and instead are trying to push the idea that we should all move on and ignore an improper close just because it's a complicated topic (and likely because they were on the oppose side). Silverseren 12:55, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Overturn The closer's inability or unwillingness to actually read the discussion, preferring instead to cast a supervote, was painfully obvious. ValarianB (talk) 13:07, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Please try to assume good faith, @ValarianB. Both of the closers are experienced, well-intentioned editors. To assert without evidence that they didn't read the discussion and intentionally supervoted is a personal attack. Valereee (talk) 13:19, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  WP:SPADE. ValarianB (talk) 16:16, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Deep sigh. Keep closed on productivity/time sink grounds. And no, I'm not open to discussing my !vote. ⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:28, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• No consensus or consensus to disapprove of Vector 2022 are the most likely outcomes for question 1. For question 2, no consensus seems to be in line with the comments.As some participants noted, it's likely that very few of those commenting in this RfC have any experience with UI design and, as such, the opinions presented here are only that, opinions. - That seems most plausible for both questions.Another point of contention was the fact that, while it is trivial for registered users to change back to the old skin if they dislike the changes, unregistered users do not enjoy that option. Many of those supporting the rollback were sympathetic editors who saw this as problematic. The only refutation offered to this was that the new skin was shown to be, according to the aforementioned studies and surveys, an improvement for readers, especially due to the reduced text width. - The proper solution to this problem is to have logged out preferences. Persistent width is already in the works, if not already live.With regards to the second question presented in this RfC, arguments presented by both sides were very similar to the first question, in that some like the new limited width and others do not. Some of those supporting an unlimited width noted that many articles contain galleries, tables, etc., and were negatively affected by the new width. There was a lot of discussion on whether scientific papers reached any form of consensus on the best width, with both sides presenting studies with opposing views on the issue. The large amount of whitespace was one of the main concerns of those who supported the rollback of Vector 2022. Since the arguments are equal in strength, there is rough consensus to make unlimited width the default. - If the arguments are equal in strength, shouldn't that equate to "no consensus"? Anyway, since this is such a minor technicality I don't know if it is most productive to actually pursue this overturn.Note I was heavily WP:INVOLVED in the discussion, however, I am just applying the guidelines at WP:CLOSE to determine what the result should have been closed to. The closing statement appears to address all the arguments listed, it is not perfect, but it was applied with as neutral judgement as possible. Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis ❄️ 14:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Keep closed Let's avoid the timesink. MarioJump83 (talk) 14:40, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  It is not a good reason for keeping it closed and avoiding a review. It is not a timesink insofar as Misplaced Pages is governed by community discussion and consensus. Æo (talk) 15:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Keep Closed (Involved) I do notice that this is starting to become a re-litigation of the RFC itself than just a discussion of the close itself and whether it was reasonable. I also note that there are a number of !votes (this one included) that come from WP:involved editors, and should be heavily discounted when doing any analysis/close of this challenge.

I voted Oppose on the overturn, and found the close fair and an understandable conclusion. I also find the actions of a handful (but not a plurality) of those wishing to overturn, somewhere between badgering and borderline personal attacks. This is concerning. Soni (talk) 14:51, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Given the questions under contention, which include to what extent existing policy should actually govern the consensus resulting from this RfC, I think it is inevitable that editors will vote here along lines similar to those they had in the RfC. I am not convinced that this is ipso facto a flaw, although it is somewhat annoying. Close reviews normally do deteriorate into relitigating the underlying issue rather than litigating the closure, and this is something an experienced closer of these types of discussion will be comfortable navigating. I am sympathetic to all your concerns, though, and took a while to be convinced that this was worth bringing. —Compassionate727  15:09, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I would also expect the result to align fairly closely with the actual RfC, which had a fairly decisive numerical majority in favor of rollback. I don't find this especially surprising, especially given how lopsided the result was. Toa Nidhiki05 15:13, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I will note that this comment above (courtesy ping @Toa Nidhiki05:) is indicative of the same badgering I called distasteful in my !vote. You have made your opinions clear on the number/ratio of voters in the RFC. There's no need to re-iterate it over and over. (FWIW, my personal opinion on the numbers differs from you. I believe that there was not an "overwhelming majority" in favour of rollback, based off pure numbers/ratio alone). Soni (talk) 15:27, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• You're entitled to your own opinion, sure. Toa Nidhiki05 15:31, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Overturn close. For once, I actually agree with you BilledMammal. BeanieFan11 (talk) 15:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• Fix the problems that concerned the editors. No matter how this turns out the problems remain, and if WMF has stated that they will not be working on these problems, then that may be a bigger problem than keeping or reverting the skin. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:34, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  WMF has already said unlimited width as a default is not on the table, so strictly speaking it’s not possible to fix the problems editors have. Toa Nidhiki05 15:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Overturn close to Consensus for rollback to Vector 2010. The closers simply misrepresented the discussion. They put support comments through a rigorous scrutiny to reduce their weight as much as possible, while never doing the same for equal oppose comments. If you actually properly address similarly poor arguments on both sides, you still end up with an absolute decisive majority in favor of rollback both in numbers and in arguments.Tvx1 15:43, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• (involved) Endorse close. There's no basis for this; it was a reasonable reading of the consensus, and enough ink was spilt over it. But let's take a look at other case studies: Facebook and YouTube had several major redesigns, which generated huge online backlash, and every time, the backlash died within days, and the UI change didn't get reverted. If average users really were upset, these companies' sacrosaint "engagement" would have gone down, and the changes would have been reversed immediately to protect profit margins. But these changes never get reverted, because it's never average users that are upset; always just a very vocal minority. Also, it would be highly embarrassing (and pretty dysfunctional) for Misplaced Pages to revert V22 months after deployment, without very strong consensus that such a revert is warranted. And I share Mike Christie's concerns; this discussion is inherently non-representative, since "pro-revert" editors have a very strong incentive to show up, while others have long moved on. DFlhb (talk) 15:44, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  And here the backlash is still very much alive months later. So that clearly shows these situations are not comparable.Tvx1 15:55, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  It's alive because the vocal minority is keeping it alive. I see no evidence that new people are flooding Misplaced Pages to express newfound opposition. 331dot (talk) 16:03, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  The only vocal minority here are the people are the 36% who voted oppose. Toa Nidhiki05 16:21, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I second this(DFlhb), strongly. Thank you. 331dot (talk) 15:59, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Discussion

• I'm disappointed but not surprised to see this. Before I !vote above, I have a question about venue: why is this at AN? This was not an admin-only RfC; any discussion like this, if we have to have it, should have the same constituency as the original discussion. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 10:42, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  All RfC close reviews take place at AN. I have no objection to it being advertised more widely, or to the participants in the RfC being notified (perhaps through a MassMessage, given that IP's can't receive pings, and because pinging that many editors would be difficult). A list of editors who contributed to the discussion can be found here; I believe, but cannot guarantee, that it is complete. BilledMammal (talk) 10:53, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• Comment I'm unsure where I lie on the core question. But a number of the issues are valid considerations (and, at a minimum, should be answered in how they didn't affect the end-outcome, should any close-closer be reading this in the future). For clarity, I specifically rebut any editor who argues that the WMF's more recent CONEXCEPT use renders this discussion moot. Point 4, in particular, I think has some validity with substantive impact. A comparable example of a much smaller (if still well attended) discussion could be the update to the padlocks we use to show protection levels. That did factor them in. For a reclose to not occur, each point either has to have consensus that it just doesn't exist, or that it does exist, but together with the others didn't have significant net impact. Nosebagbear (talk) 11:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)
• @North8000: I'm not sure what you mean by the close treated it as if there was only one and your subsequent reasoning. Aaron Liu (talk) 12:05, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I'll use imaginary numbers to (over)simplify/illustrate and yes I know it's not a vote. Let's say that 65% is a consensus, and that 40% wanted 2022 and 60% wanted 2010. If you treated it as two choices, the finding would be that there was a preference for 2010. If you treat it as one choice (2010) and say that that a consensus is needed to pick 2010, then you are saying that the 40% wins by default because the 60% failed to achieve 65%.North8000 (talk) 12:18, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  If you exclude the canvassed votes - and you should - then the RfC either was a 62%-34% majority (including neutrals) or 64%-36% majority (excluding neutrals) in favor of rollback. Both of these results are decisive supermajorities. Toa Nidhiki05 12:54, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  So no one opposed to the new skin was canvassed to the discussion? 331dot (talk) 13:04, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  No evidence of such canvassing was found; there was no abnormal spikes in support !voters, and no disclosure of off-wiki outreach was provided. It's not impossible, but without any evidence we should not assume that it took place, and nor should we use the possibility that it took place as "both sides" argument to ignore the proven canvassing of oppose !voters. BilledMammal (talk) 13:10, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Misplaced Pages policy says we need to assume good faith. Like BilledMammal said: do you have any evidence that Support votes were canvassed? If not, there is no reason to assume they were. On the other hand, we know for a fact that votes for Oppose were canvassed, along with roughly how many that was. The number is large enough to have a statistically significant impact. Toa Nidhiki05 13:18, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, but the reason we know is that it was disclosed/discovered. Most canvassing isn't. Valereee (talk) 13:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Arguing we should ignore canvassing because maybe someone might have canvassed on the other side (even though there’s no evidence) is a novel argument. It’s also a terrible one that would set a terrible precedent. Toa Nidhiki05 14:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  It was identified prior to being disclosed; being disclosed, by one of the canvassed individuals to ArbCom, merely added additional evidence, and showed that a WMF employee was behind it.

  I don't understand your overall point here; we shouldn't care about this canvassing because it is possible other canvassing took place, even though we have no evidence of it? BilledMammal (talk) 14:02, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  No, sorry for not being clear. We shouldn't assume there wasn't canvassing simply because no one confessed or discovered it. That's all, face value, not an argument there was. Valereee (talk) 14:30, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  We absolutely should not assume there was canvassing, unless there is evidence. I am honestly baffled you are trying to argue this. "Let's ignore actual, mass off-wiki canvassing because of hypothetical canvassing I've imagined" is not a good argument. It comes off to me as a clear attempt to sweep an actual case of mass canvassing under the rug. There is evidence that around 30 users were canvassed off-wiki to oppose overturning; there is no evidence that any support votes were canvassed. Stop trying to equivocate the two. Toa Nidhiki05 14:47, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I literally said that it was not an argument that there was. Valereee (talk) 15:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, you can say what you want, but you simply cannot say "well we don't have any proof there wasn't canvassing". Can you at least agree that proving a negative in this case is impossible? Toa Nidhiki05 15:04, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Of course. Valereee (talk) 15:06, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  So the views of those that seem to have been canvassed must be totally discounted? 331dot (talk) 15:50, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Yes. Toa Nidhiki05 15:55, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Why? Why should their opinion not count at all? I can understand it counting less, but not totally discounted. That's utterly wrong. 331dot (talk) 16:05, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Because canvassing subverts consensus; it brings in a non-neutral group of editors whose presence will distort the result. The only way to correct this is to exclude their !votes. Further, failing to exclude them will encourage canvassing, as we will be permitting it to influence the result even when caught. BilledMammal (talk) 16:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Well, you are entitled to your views. 331dot (talk) 16:12, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Misplaced Pages:Sockpuppetry#Meatpuppetry: In votes or vote-like discussions, new users may be disregarded or given significantly less weight, especially if there are many of them expressing the same opinion. Both approaches are endorsed by policy. In practice, they are usually disregarded entirely when they would be a deciding factor. —Compassionate727  16:10, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• I'm curious: what is the outcome you're hoping will be achieved here, BilledMammal, such that it's worth advertising this more widely (following the thread with Mike Christie above), and potentially taking up another massive amount of time and energy? Is the idea that if only it were closed properly, the WMF would reverse course and apologize? Is it just to be on the record (yet another record) with "a lot of us don't like this"? The self-evident wikivirtue of an accurate summary, regardless of any other real outcome? — Rhododendrites \\ 15:11, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I don't necessarily support advertising this more widely, but I also don't oppose it if editors believe it is worth doing - I see Soni has already notified WP:VPP.

  My desired result is for the close to reflect what I believe the consensus of the discussion is, to rollback to Vector2010, and for the WMF to respect the result of that discussion. I don't know if they will but the fact that they respected the consensus at the banners RfC, despite the significant expense of doing so, gives me hope. BilledMammal (talk) 15:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• This discussion was created without actually informing the closers about it. I have rectified the same. Pinging @BilledMammal: so you remember policy in future. Soni (talk) 15:14, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  ? BilledMammal (talk) 15:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Seems like Soni owes an apology here. Toa Nidhiki05 15:19, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  There were two closers, and you are required to inform both. Soni (talk) 15:22, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  You're right, I forgot about Ingenuity, who has my apologies - thank you for notifying them. However, your comment suggests that I forgot to issue the notification in general, rather than forgetting that there were multiple closers. BilledMammal (talk) 15:24, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  We're now at semantics than policy, so I'm going to stop replying here. WP:AN has a policy (or is it a guideline? I'm actually uncertain) to inform everyone a discussion is about; that wasn't properly met. I wanted to rectify it and note accordingly, so I did that. I did not intend on implying anything more or less, apologies if my wording seems to do so. Soni (talk) 15:33, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

• A lot of !voters were in involved in the RfC. The participants in this discussion !voted as follows:
  • BilledMammal supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • starship.paint supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • 331dot opposed rollback (!voted endorse)
  • Toa Nidhiki05 supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • Æo supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • Valereee uninvolved (!voted endorse)
  • North8000 supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • Aaron Liu opposed rollback (!voted endorse & rewrite closure)
  • TheresNoTime involved (!voted endorse)
  • dwadieff opposed rollback (!voted endorse)
  • Silverseren uninvolved (!voted overturn)
  • ValarianB supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • WaltClipper opposed rollback (!voted endorse)
  • Aasim opposed rollback (!voted endorse)?
  • MarioJump83 uninvolved (!voted endorse)
  • Soni opposed rollback (!voted endorse)
  • BeanieFan11 supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • Randy Kryn supported rollback (!voted fix problems)
  • Tvx1 supported rollback (!voted overturn)
  • DFlhb opposed rollback (!voted endorse)
  I myself opposed rollback. — Qwerfjkltalk 15:57, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  And what are folks supposed to make of this list? dwadieff ✉ 16:01, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  @dwadieff, almost everyone who opposed rollback endorses the closure, and likewise almost everyone who supported rollback wants the closure overturned. — Qwerfjkltalk 16:04, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  ....and Oceania had always been at war with Eastasia. dwadieff ✉ 16:11, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  This discussion is really just a rehash of the RfC. — Qwerfjkltalk 16:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  WaltClipper was involved; they voted "Inhumanly strong oppose", and other conflicts beyond participating directly !voting exist with some of the other editors; TNT has appropriately declared theirs in this discussion. I largely agree with dwadieff's implication that lists like this are not, however, helpful. BilledMammal (talk) 16:06, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Meh, I wouldn't call it not helpful. Valereee (talk) 16:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  I feel like using this list to putting a "(this user voted Oppose/Support on the original RFC)" in small text just after any involved undeclared !votes would be helpful for following along the review. I do not know how contentious that would be, so will let someone else decide if they want to do that. Soni (talk) 16:12, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  And what's that supposed to achieve? dwadieff ✉ 16:14, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

  Easier parsing and following along the review, like I said. Involved !votes are supposed to be given lesser weightage in any discussion. Noting the involved comments would make that easier. Your mileage may vary though, but I found this list helpful enough to suggest that Soni (talk) 16:18, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Amarnath Vidyalankar

I semiprotected Amarnath_Vidyalankar Could someone check my work? Feel free to modify as needed. Thanks -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 15:35, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Nothing jumps out at me, DFO. Was there something in particular you thought needed more eyes? Valereee (talk) 15:45, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, Valereee. I was not sure that it did not need ECP. Started with minimum after being pinged back. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 16:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Ah! To me it looks like there may be some non-EC editors who are making valid edits, so I'd agree start with AC. I've put it on my watch, too. Valereee (talk) 16:06, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Oops, sorry, @Deepfriedokra, missed seeing the ping. Valereee (talk) 16:07, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

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