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Incivility, disruptive editing, and stalking-like behavior from Isarig

Isarig (talk · contribs) has been disruptively editing several pages, and his behavior seems to be a result of a dispute between he and I over the Juan Cole page, which is now in mediation. A couple of days ago, he showed up on the Qur'an desecration controversy of 2005 and began obsessively reverting an edit that I had made (I had deleted the reference to "piss christ" from the article). I thought my edit was reasonable, but it was strongly objected to by an anonymous user. Isarig, who has apparently never edited that page before, suddenly showed up to defend the anon editor and to revert my change. He was asked to stop disrupting by other editors including myself. I sent the page to RfC and I explained the main reasons why I thought the "piss christ" reference was both irrelevant and trivial. I also explained that it was better situated on a general article about desecration rather than the article about a specific incident of Quran desecration that occurred at Guantanamo Bay. He never bothered to add the link to the general desecration article, but insisted that it belongs on this more specific article, even though his main argument is that they are both forms of general desecration and/or religious intolerance. This suggests to me that the only reason he is making the change on that article is to "get back" at me by reverting a change I made rather than because he actually believes his own arguments. I feel that such behavior is disruptive and I asked him to stop. I stated that if he felt strongly that "piss christ" was something specifically related to the Qur'an desecration controversy of 2005 then he should be willing to write a couple of sentences indicating what the link is between the two and enter those sentences in the article, so that the reference does not seem to come out of nowhere. He refused to do so. It seems his only interest is in one-upping me, and indeed, in another dispute a few weeks ago, he admitted as much. Instead of allowing other editors to comment on the RfC, he has continued to repeat himself on that section of the page, without responding to the arguments I brought up. That section has become a long mess of tit-for-tat arguments, making it unlikely that many other editors will take the time to sort the arguments out there and actually move the dispute forward. It is alarming to me that such energy has been expended over something that seems to me utterly noncontroversial -- adding the words "piss christ" to a totally unrelated article.

While this dispute was ongoing, I made an edit to the article Qur'an desecration, another article that Isarig had never edited before. Again, he showed up out of the blue just to revert me, and has already reverted me three times in 24 hours. I asked him to stop stalking my edits and he threatened to report me (which to me was the final straw, leading to this report). This is a pattern in my interactions with this user -- he revert-wars over petty items; he refuses to acknowledge any POV other than his own, he accuses me of personal attacks while at the same time personally attacking me. He constantly threatens to report me over minor infractions while at the same time engaging in personal attacks that are often vicious (witness, for example, this comment and this comment, from a while back, where he specifically attacks me for my occupation, tells me that I am not fit for employment in my job. While those comments are from a while ago, he again brought up my occupation as a means of attacking me -- a direct violation of WP:NPA, which suggests that personal attacks include "Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views - regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream or extreme." Throughout the discussion on that page he charged me over and over with "insulting other editors" yet never cited a single example of where I had done so. I am tired of being sucked into arguments with him over petty reversions. I am here to improve the articles, not to get into shouting matches and ego battles with other editors. I don't like reporting people to WP:ANI because I prefer these matters be settled in discussion; however, when he threatened to report me for accusing him of stalking - which he has demonstrably been doing - I felt the time had come to make a report. I hope his disruptive editing, and previous blocks for incivility (in particular, a libelous comment made a while back about the subject of a WP:BLP) will be taken into account when determining how long of a block his behavior merits. csloat 22:29, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

This might have risen to a legitimate instance of Wikistalking, but you're harming your own case through forum shopping and selective presentation of evidence. You fail to mention that six weeks ago I responded to those same diffs at WP:PAIN and rebuked you for conduct unbecoming the dignity of the academic profession. If dispute resolution has failed so badly that you feel the need to post a biased plea for intervention here then I could open a request for arbitration - the duration and scope of the conflict make that a realistic option - yet I caution you that arbitration is slow, messy, painful, and embarrassing. Would you like to proceed? Durova 23:41, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Conduct unbecoming the dignity of the academic profession? I'm sorry, but this has absolutely nothing to do with my profession, that was my point. And if you have a complaint about my behavior in the classroom, or other aspects of my profession, please take it to my supervisor -- I will happily provide you with all the personal information you need about me to register your complaint. In the meantime I will ask that you, Isarig, and anyone else, refrain from using my profession to personally attack me.

In your "rebuke" you said neither side was above reproach, and I agreed with you. I did not cite the older incidents above to make the same complaint again -- I cited them to establish that Isarig's reference to my profession was out of line and followed from a historical context of such comments; that it was not just a single offhand reference. I most certainly did not expect to receive a similar insult from an administrator. I am not "forum shopping," and I resent the accusation. I cited the older incidents only to establish the history of the current dispute. Please note that when you "rebuked" me you removed your comment specifically directed at my "aggressiveness" and that I responded to you, explaining why I responded to Isarig the way I did. I have backed off of being so aggressive, as you recommended, but Isarig's abusive behavior continues. I feel the most recent wikistalking is something that cannot be resolved in WP:DR. I initiated mediation on the Juan Cole page, and we were asked by the mediator to avoid editing the article, but Isarig has continued to edit war with other users on that page even though I have backed off of it completely. Meanwhile, he stalks me on the Quran desecration pages, making arguments that seem tongue in cheek at best if not complete sophistry. I have opened an RfC on the Quran page, and presumably that will eventually reach some resolution, but what is to stop him from stalking me to another page and starting this whole mess over? I am trying to follow your advice from before and not get sucked into these wars, but he is pursuing me relentlessly. I feel that your approach is to reward the more abusive user by signalling that his abusive actions will be successful (and even joining in on the insults directed to my profession!) I don't know what you do for a living, but how would you like it if I started saying that your conduct on Misplaced Pages made you a disgrace to your profession? It doesn't matter if you are a teacher or a janitor; the insult is out of line. csloat 03:02, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

This has got to be one of the most blatant examples of bad faith and sheer Chutzpah I've seen on Misplaced Pages to date. csloat accusing me of incivility? After telling an editor to "grow up", and this and this (accusing other editors of not being in "their right mind") - all examples of incivility from just the past 24 hours! This from an editor whose user Talk page is full of warnings about personal attacks and incivility, from numerous editors.And the nerve of accusing me of "stalking" him, after he suddenly appeared on a page I had been editing, reverting an edit of mine and then accused me of stalking him on that page! I've warned him twice today to cease making false accusations of stalking, and I guess he believes that the best defense is an attack. Isarig 05:00, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

• Dispute resolution is over there, guys. Not here. --jpgordon 05:58, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

The problem, JP, is that I sent them to dispute resolution six weeks ago and they're back to square one. I'm one step away from giving the matter to ArbCom. Since this is here on the board anyway, does anyone have a softer alternative? Durova 06:38, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

All I'm asking for is the objectionable behavior to stop. I could go through and point out the distortions in his comment above (e.g., my first edit to the Said page was not a revert of anything Isarig did; in fact I had no idea he edited that page at all until he reverted me -- which is why I thought he was stalking me there ; or I could point out that the admonition to "grow up" - the one thing that I said that could be characterized as a personal attack in the recent disputes with him - is something I subsequently struck out and I asked Isarig to show good faith and strike out his accusation that I was a "liar", which he did not do). There is currently mediation on one of the pages we have a dispute over, and there is now an RfC on another page -- I think individual disputes will eventually be resolved but my problem with Isarig is that it has become personal and he is now following me to unrelated pages and reverting things out of what seems to be spite. If he is willing to back off, I am too. But someone besides me ought to tell him that this behavior is objectionable.csloat 07:50, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

You have wikistalked me to at least 3 pages (Edward Said, Middle East Media Research Institute, Efraim Karsh), you falsely accused me of stalking you on one of them when it was in fact you who were stalking; you falsely accused me of stalking you despite being warned not do to so; you repeatedly use uncivil language when addressing me and other editors, and have been called on it (the above 3 are merely the tip of the iceberg from the last day alone); you are continuing to misrepresent facts (i.e.: I struck out the description of your comment as a "lie" after you had struck out your own uncivil comment) - and have the gall to complain about my behavior? Isarig 15:59, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Please stop the false accusations Isarig. I did not stalk you on any of those pages, as you are well aware. You demonstrably stalked me on two pages about Quran desecration -- the only reason you showed up on those pages was to revert my changes and to pick a fight with me in talk. The above "3" only identifies one instance of actual incivility and it is one I struck out and apologized for. (I had not seen that you struck out the word "lie" as you never mentioned it in your comments; I thank you for that, and perhaps we have some basis from which to move forward). I have the "gall" to complain about your behavior because it is beyond the pale, and because you continually threaten to report me for nothing while at the same time relentlessly violating the very rules you accuse me of violating. As I said above, all I want is for this behavior to stop. I just don't have time for this. Misplaced Pages is something I find valuable and rewarding, but my interactions with you have soured me on the whole enterprise. csloat 18:49, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Every single one of those pages I have mentioned are pages where I had been editing, and you had not, and you suddenly showed up shortly after one of my edits there to either directly revert one of my edits, or introduce a change in a section I had been editing that is contradictory to what I was writing. By your own definitons, these constitute stalking. Each one of the 3 above constitute an instance of incivility, and if you don't think that saying that an editor who defends a certain position is "not in his right mind" is uncivil, then that is perhaps the root of the probelm - you have no concept of what civility means. Isarig 23:13, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I never showed up to a page that I had not been editing just to revert you. On the Said page I edited for the first time; I was reading student papers at the time that were about Said's work, and it occurred to me to take a look at his wikipedia page. As I stated above I had no idea you edited that page before me - I don't always examine the history page before editing a page - and as another editor has confirmed, I did not revert you -- it was you who immediately reverted me. Stalking does not mean editing the same page as someone else -- it goes to the motivation for the edits. When you are going to the page specifically to revert war against someone that you had another edit war with in the past, it is considered stalking. The MEMRI page, as you know, I first went to the talk page and engaged the discussion; I did not revert you until it became pretty clear that your position in the discussion was indefensible. And you are really distorting things on the Karsh page - my first edit there appears to have been fixing a name problem on the Juan Cole link that another user had created. My first edit that you objected to was a month later, and it was an edit that you immediately reverted without discussion. All of that was months ago; to say I stalked you there is absolutely untenable. However, your actions on the Quran pages are clear cut -- you appeared there out of the blue and focused all your energy there on reverting warring against me, and you got quite abusive in the talk section. Your claim that I "have no concept of what civility means" is rich; it is itself more uncivil than the comment by me you claim is uncivil! When I said I don't think anyone in their right mind would go to the Qur'an desecration controversy of 2005 looking for information about the Piss Christ, I was making a rather obvious point that the two have nothing to do with each other, not attacking a particular editor. Can you say with a straight face that if you wanted to know more about a controversial artist from the 1980s you would type in Qur'an desecration controversy of 2005? It seems to be a stretch, at best, to call that a personal attack. csloat 23:29, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what your motivations are (or were) when you appeared on the pages you had editied shortly after I did to introduce a different POV than mine. Perhaps it was all an inoccent coincidnce as you allege here - orperhaps you were wikistalking me. The point is - that the same is ture of my actions. You have no idea what motivated me to edit the Quran desecration page (and never bothered to ask), you just assume I was stalkign you given the same set of circumstance that apply to your own 3 cases of stalking. Either all of them are, or none of them are. The when I defed a certain edit (as I did), and you say that whoever defends such an edit is not in their right mind you are attacking me, and being uncivil. UIt is plain and obvious to anyone who reads yoru comments. If you want certain alleged behaviour to stop, you need to stop. Isarig 23:35, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I didn't say it was an "innocent coincidence" -- I said you were distorting the facts, and as I have shown, they are extremely different in the instances you cite. My POV was obviously quite different from yours long before we started editing any of this stuff, so POV difference is not evidence of any stalking. Specifically showing up to start revert wars is. I did not say you were not in your right mind; I said nobody in their right mind would come to the Qur'an desecration controversy of 2005 looking for information about the Piss Christ. It is plain and obvious that you are distorting my words. I am going to take a break from all of this for a while, so forgive me if I don't respond when Isarig repeats his comments. I think I've made my case. csloat 23:43, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Please stop this misrepresentation. What you wrote in the edit I linked to above was "I can't believe anyone in their right mind would defend the addition" - which is what I did . I am quoting you verbatim - there is no need todistort your words - they are damning in their own right. Misrepresentations will not get you anywhere. Isarig 00:33, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

You also linked to this edit above, where I wrote, "The fact is, nobody in their right mind would come to this article expecting to read about the Piss christ." It is amazing that you immediately accuse me of misrepresenting things when you know for a fact that I was not. You are right about the other link but it is not a personal attack -- I said "I cannot believe anyone in their right mind would defend the addition." I did not say that anyone who defends the addition is not in their right mind. You could infer that but you could also infer that I don't believe you; given our prior interactions that would be the more obvious conclusion. But in any case it is a ridiculously minor point - there is nothing "damning" about any of this. The real issue here is the aggressive edit warring, the smearing of other editors, and the wikistalking. On the first two of those charges at least, it is pretty clear that I am not the only editor who has found your actions unacceptable. csloat 01:51, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Isarig on some points and disagree on others, but his/her smearing and slander really has to stop. Isarig is far too eager to call other Wikipedians "liars" if they disagree with him and I am willing to pass on to an administrator proof that his similar past accusation against me (which remains unretracted) was false. Famousdog 19:01, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Isarig behaves like a pathalogical edit warrer, bringing the brutal methods of the Israeli Arab conflict to the pages of Wikipidea. Abu ali 20:28, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Abu Ali brought this to my attention, presumably since I was involved on the Said page. Obviously I don't know the full situation, but I can say a couple things: 1. Sloat's first edit on Said wasn't a revert of Isarig, but an edit of information put up by Jayjg.. 2. Isarig then reverted Sloat and has proceded to edit war against a number of editors on that page over several days, including Zero0000, Sloat, Filius Rosadis, and me. I'd note that Isarig's last comment in talk on that page is on Dec 29, which was responded to, while he has reverted the page four times since then. That's all I can really say about the situation. Mackan79 21:16, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't know about the stalking behavior, but I've certainly found Isarig to be obsessive and unreasonable on both MEMRI and Juan Cole. Also see this example of way over-the-top biting a newbie The newbie's sin was editing his own talk page. Sheesh. Time for a wiki-holiday, Isariq. --Lee Hunter 21:24, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I haven't been following these disputes, but I see little wrong with the 3RR warning Isarig left on Jgui's page, mentioned by Lee Hunter above. I also find Abu Ali's comment above to be way out of line, and possibly indicative of the kind of attitude that Isarig has been up against. There's an increasingly concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel, often involving violations of WP:V and WP:NOR and poor editing in general. Some of the criticism is perfectly legitimate, of course (when it comes to Israeli government policies), but some of it definitely isn't, and it often veers toward apparent hatred of Jews in general. In addition, there's often obvious sockpuppetry involved, and therefore a reminder not to bite the newbies misses the point.

It gets tiresome having to deal with it, but I don't know what the solution is. SlimVirgin 22:16, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

It wasn't the 3RR warning itself (although it was blunt to the point of rudeness) it was the strange hissy fit (see the edit comment) when the user removed the warning from his talk page. --Lee Hunter 23:55, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

The 3RR warning was a polite explanation of the 3RR rule, and a request for self-revert, as a gesture of courtesy for a newbie. There was nothing blunt nor rude about it, and it is probably much softer than WP's standard 3RR template. You come here to complain about uncivil behavior, and you call my edits a "hissy fit"? Have you no shame? Or at least, a decent mirror? The user removed the warning with an edit summary that called a valid warning for an acknowledged 3RR violation "a bogus threat". Isarig 00:12, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Excellent summary. Jayjg 23:00, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Excellent summary of what? Are you folks seriously suggesting that my dispute with Isarig is part of a vast antisemitic conspiracy? I don't think Abu Ali's comment was reasonable either, but it is hardly evidence that he or I are part of some kind of neo-Nazi conspiracy, and I find the accusation out of line. csloat 23:11, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

SlimVirgin's comment "There's an increasingly concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel" is a thinly veiled and attempt to accuse me of antisemitism. As SlimVirgin is an admin on WP, he should know better. Abu ali 22:41, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Turnabout is not really an answer, and Misplaced Pages is not a soapbox. There is no justifiable reason for posting that someone is bringing the brutal methods of the Israeli Arab conflict to the pages of Wikipidea. Jayjg 23:02, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Note that SlimVirgin has repeated his accusation of antisemitism against me below Editing Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Soliciting negative comments about an editor by User:Abu ali. Any examination of my edit log will show that this personal attack is baseless and defamatory. Abu ali 22:57, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Where exactly is this accusation of antisemitism? Tom Harrison 23:07, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

He wrote of "an increasingly concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel" and stated that "some of it definitely isn't, and it often veers toward apparent hatred of Jews in general." That seems pretty clear to me; what isn't clear, exactly, is who he's referring to.csloat 23:13, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

If it's not clear that he's refering to you, then don't go out of your way to take umbrage. There was no accusation that you or anyone else is part of a neo-Nazi conspiracy. Setting that up as some kind of strawman is at least as abusive as anything anyone has said to you. Tom Harrison 23:21, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm not setting up a strawman; the words he used were "increasingly concerted effort" that "often veers toward apparent hatred of Jews in general." I didn't take umbrage; I just asked who he was referring to. How is that abusive? csloat 23:33, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Abu Ali, my comments were deliberately not aimed at individuals — for obvious reasons, but also because my intention was simply to highlight the problem in general. Regarding your own edits, I'm not familiar with them. My only criticism of you is that your comment above was out of order ("Isarig behaves like a pathalogical edit warrer, bringing the brutal methods of the Israeli Arab conflict to the pages of Wikipidea"), and perhaps illustrative of the hostile atmosphere Isarig finds himself editing in. SlimVirgin 23:15, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

If your criticisms were not aimed at me, then who precisely are these editors who you refer to.

There's an increasingly concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel, often involving violations of WP:V and WP:NOR and poor editing in general. Some of the criticism is perfectly legitimate, of course (when it comes to Israeli government policies), but some of it definitely isn't, and it often veers toward apparent hatred of Jews in general.

You are making a serious accusation. So as a minimum you should be specific. Abu ali 23:31, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't know how more specific I can be. There are editors whose life's work seems to revolve around making all things connected to Israel look bad. Whether you're one of them, I have no idea, because I've never looked at your edits. It gets to be a bigger problem when it involves making all things connected to Jews look bad too. I'm not going to start giving lists of examples. I've given an example below of User:Kiyosaki, but the specifics don't matter. What matters is what we do about the general issue.

Misplaced Pages is not here to be used as a platform for pro- or anti-Israel editing. Or do you disagree with that? SlimVirgin 23:56, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

User:Kiyosaki has been banned. The specifics do matter. If there are other editors who have behaved in an antisemitic manner, name them so that the can be investigated and dealt with. If there are no others then please be so kind as to withdraw the accusation. Abu ali 10:25, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Please note that SlimVirgin has still not withdrawn his accusations of antisemitism. Neither has he substantiated them. Is this conduct acceptable from a admin? I also note that Arbitration Committe member Jayjg describes SlimVirigins accusations as an "Excellent summary". Is this the same Arbitration Committe which is supposed to discuss the issues at hand? Abu ali 10:38, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Comment - There is occasional anti Semitism on WP. And homophobia. And racism and prejudice of all kinds, as well as appalling incivility etc. SlimVirgin as someone who is easily identified with Jewish and Israeli topics is better placed than most to notice an increase. It's our jobs to find the incidents, remove them and deal appropriately with the malfeasants, not to slap down the editor who brings the problem to our attention. --Dweller 10:51, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm staggered that you can actually condense this whole thing down to "a bunch of editors out to get the Jews". Where the heck is that coming from? One of Isarig's (and his "teammates"') most egregious rv wars is his belligerent insistence that the Juan Cole article include a defamatory insinuation that Cole is literally a protocols-of-scion anti-semite and that the article must not include Cole's response to the charge. I'm offended by your remarks. --Lee Hunter 00:09, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I am sorry you feel offended. I can only repeat: I'm not familiar with this dispute, or with your edits or Abu Ali's, and I keep repeating that the individual accounts don't matter anyway. What matters is that there is an extremely hostile editing environment around some of these articles, as Abu Ali's comment to Isarig amply demonstrates. It's this general problem that we need to take seriously. Perhaps you could address that substantive point — but not with reference to any particular article or editor. SlimVirgin 00:17, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Please do not engage in misrepresentations in order to make a point. The dispute you are referring to on the Juan Cole article is currently in mediation, and I have proposed and accepted several compromises there, and explictly wrote both that the specific quote you object to is not one I am insisting on, as well as stating that Cole's response to the accusations against him (from serious academics published in reliable sources) should appear in the article. Isarig 00:25, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

My opinion on this was solicited. I personally have not had any problems with Isarig. There were some disputes between Isarig and others on the talk page for Al-Aqsa Intifada. There were disputes between many people on that talk page. But it seems like the disputes have been resolved in the last few days. I think, though, that part of the problem I am feeling from reading the incident noticeboard, and various talk pages, is that people are taking sides, instead of attempting to maintain NPOV wikipedia pages. I urge people who have strong viewpoints about the issues on such highly-charged topics dealing with the Arab-Israeli conflicts to set them aside while editing wikipedia pages. I hope people from all sides of these issues sign on to Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Arab-Israeli conflict and pledge to work on related wikipedia pages in an NPOV way. NPOV does not favor or block viewpoints on the Arab-Israeli conflict pages. NPOV allows all significant sourced viewpoints to be put on those pages. Some people from all sides have been favoring particular POVs by selectively censoring or diminishing other sourced viewpoints. And some of the discussion on those pages has been really over-the-top instead of being focussed on the article content and meeting wikipedia guidelines. People have been making too many reversions without discussion. Resulting in slow-motion edit wars. --Timeshifter 00:26, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I do not understand why a complaint about "bringing the brutal methods of the Israeli Arab conflict to the pages of Wikipidea" is considered out of line but a complaint about "an increasingly concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel" is not. I would say we'd do well to avoid both. I would add, however, that I've seen relatively few statements like the former, and when they do appear it's usually from some short-lived crank like Kiyosaki. Statements like the latter, on the other hand, are routine on articles related to Israel/Palestine, and they are quite common even from influential editors with administrative powers.

As for Isarig, he and I have had our share of encounters. I think he can be a wilfully obstinate, baldly ideological revert-warrior (in the current Juan Cole dispute, he is claiming that Cole's dismissal of charges of antisemitism as "outrageous" constitutes an ad hominem rebuttal, and therefore cannot be included alongside the article's coverage of said charges). Beyond that, however, I've never once even suspected that he might be stalking me, and as regards personal remarks I've never found him to give worse than he got, and I'd know. I think csloat is a good and reasonable editor, and we share a position in the Cole dispute, but I don't think the stuff about Isarig's personal attacks amount to much. Csloat says hey you'd fail my class, Isarig replies hey maybe you're not qualified to teach - this is all just rhetoric. Who says talk pages can't have a little verve and color.

I don't know what policy on this is, but temperamentally I'm inclined to agree with Jayjg that going around user pages gathering up a posse seems like harassment. --G-Dett 00:36, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I wrote "harassment" above, where I should have said something like "bad form." Harassment has a technical meaning, and I have no idea if the action in question qualifies.--G-Dett 14:53, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Seems to me there was full transparency to what he did, which is what we should want. Mackan79 16:01, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Point taken, Mackan79.--G-Dett 20:53, 4 January 2007 (UTC)--

Soliciting negative comments about an editor by User:Abu ali

After a WP:ANI report about my conduct was filed, User:Abu ali, with whom I have had several content disputes recently, has been soliciting negative input about me from any editor I have been engaged with. Today alone, he as solicited more than a dozen such editors to partcipate in the report. I find this to be a severe vioaltion of numerous WP policies, including WP:CIVIL, WP:AGF and WP:NPA. -The preceding unsigned comment was added by Isarig (talk o contribs).

If you examine my contibutions, you can see that I informed other users of Isarig's WP:ANI, and did so openly and onwiki. I did not tell people to contibute to the ANI report or tell them what to say. The charge that I was "soliciting negative input" is false. The comment to the effect that this is a "severe vioaltion of numerous WP policies, including WP:CIVIL, WP:AGF and WP:NPA" is baseless, and coming from Isarig, hypocritical. Salam/Peace/Shalom Abu ali 22:25, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

This is silly. Abu Ali asked me what I thought, since I was involved in the incident. This report wasn't even filed by Abu Ali, was it? So, on behalf of Sloat, Abu Ali solicits comments on an ongoing ANI. This is inappropriate? Mackan79 22:32, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm copying my comment from the thread above, as it seems to be relevant here.

I haven't been following these disputes, but I see little wrong with the 3RR warning Isarig left on Jgui's page, mentioned by Lee Hunter above. I also find Abu Ali's comment above to be way out of line, and possibly indicative of the kind of attitude that Isarig has been up against. There's an increasingly concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel, often involving violations of WP:V and WP:NOR and poor editing in general. Some of the criticism is perfectly legitimate, of course (when it comes to Israeli government policies), but some of it definitely isn't, and it often veers toward apparent hatred of Jews in general. In addition, there's often obvious sockpuppetry involved, and therefore a reminder not to bite the newbies misses the point.

It gets tiresome having to deal with it, but I don't know what the solution is. SlimVirgin 22:16, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Are you accusing these users of anti-semitic editing? If not, I'm not sure why you think this is relevant. Mackan79 22:59, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm inclined to partially agree with Isarig here. Based on the strong phrasing and large number of these messages, they appear to constitute canvassing for support and near-harassment of a particular user. I would strongly advice Abu ali to stop. You don't explicitly tell people what to say, but a message like "Have a look at ... disruptive editing, and stalking-like behavior from Isarig. What do you think?" give the recipient a pretty damn strong hint of the response you want. Daveydweeb (/_review!) 22:34, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Strong phrasing? Abu Ali wrote "Have a look at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Incivility, disruptive editing, and stalking-like behavior from Isarig. What do you think?" on each page. What else was he supposed to write? If someone has been edit-warring inappropriately, how else do you uncover this other than through the comment of those who were invovled? You can point out that Abu Ali brought this to others' attention, but to act like it was some sort of breach of the peace seems pretty out there. Mackan79 22:59, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Daveyweeb, Ali's quoting the actual title of the section on this page there, not writing those words himself, so it's a little unfair to say he's leading people on with that comment. I also don't know of any wikipedia policy against letting other users know about WP/ANI reports about users that they have had negative (or positive) interactions with in the past. Finally, Slimvirgin, can you explain what any of this has to do with antisemitism? I found your comment only tangentially related at best to the earlier dispute when you posted it the first time, but I fail to see any connection at all to the dispute here. csloat 23:04, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Looking around for people who you think have been in conflict with someone you don't like, then canvassing them to go beat up on him on AN/I, is harassment. Jayjg 23:05, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree. That doesn't appear to have occurred here. csloat 23:35, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't appear to have occured here? What do you call the selective solicitation of 14 different editors who have been in conflict with me, to come and comment on a complaint against me? Isarig 00:16, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that editors who have been abused by you in the past are perfectly entitled to have their say here. Abu ali 10:11, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Well at least Abu ali admits it. <<-armon->> 10:47, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, but what is Abu Ali admitting here?--G-Dett 14:56, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Canvassing. <<-armon->> 15:41, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Csloat, my concern is that there's an increasingly hostile editing environment around articles to do with Jews, Judaism, and Israel. I've been editing for over two years, and while we've always had that problem, it's clearly getting worse, and the lines between legitimate criticism of Israeli government policy and antisemitism are becoming ever more blurred. A good example of that was User:Kiyosaki who turned up a few weeks ago to disrupt Allegations of Israeli apartheid. It was obvious to many of the editors used to editing these pages that Kiyosaki was a bigot, pure and simple, but it wasn't obvious to some of the anti-Israel editors on the page. It took us some weeks to work out whose sockpuppet he was, but he was finally exposed as the account of an old-time, well-known antisemitic editor. During the time he was editing that article, however, he caused a lot of disruption and bad feeling.

That example isn't isolated. We see antisemitic editors all the time trying to take advantage of anti-Israel POV to cause ill feeling and problems for editors they perceive as Jewish. Usually they out themselves over time, because they get more and more extreme, but not always. It's a problem I would hope all editors of goodwill would help to look out for, because it affects both "sides" of the Israel debate equally. It makes editors who tend toward support for Israel feel stressed and under constant attack, and it makes editors more critical of Israel look bad when they find themselves supported by antisemites. It makes Misplaced Pages look bad to have these articles veer back and forth between POVs, with bad-faith sockpuppets gleefully holding sway on talk pages and threatening regular editors with the ArbCom. The same problems crop up, for the same reason, on pages to do with Jews and Judaism. I see it as a problem we should all work on together. SlimVirgin 23:34, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree that antisemitic editors should not be welcomed here, but I just don't see how it's relevant to this particular discussion. I'm not anti-semitic or anti-Israel myself, and I haven't seen any evidence that anyone else in this discussion is. True, Abu Ali's comment comparing Isarig to the Israeli military was over the top, but it wasn't anti-semitic. I think we could all stand to take a deep breath and relax here, and I'm going to volunteer to be the first to do so.csloat 23:39, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

It was Abu Ali who has tried to switch the focus to antisemitism, but it's not only a question of that. It's that there are concerted efforts to make Israel and Jews look bad, for whatever reason. The motive is sometimes antisemitism and sometimes an unexplained obsession with making sure that Israel looks evil. The motivations don't really matter just as the individual accounts don't. What matters is how we deal with it, because Misplaced Pages isn't here to make Israel or Jews look good or bad, and that was the discussion that I was trying to open up. I see the complaint against Isarig as possibly an example of the problem, given Abu Ali's inappropriate comment. SlimVirgin 23:50, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Excuse me, but it was you who brought up the false accusation of antisemitism. And I note that you have not apologised or retracted your accusation, on the grounds that you are not familiar with my edits. (look here Special:Contributions/Abu_ali) Several edit wars with Isarig and his friends from WP:Israel concern their insistence on inserting libelous accusations of anti-semitism or association with anti-semites to discredit authors who are critical of Israeli government policy. Any accusation of antisemitic behaviour should be thoroughly investigated and dealth with. But accusations of antisemitism (or of any other form of racism) should not be thrown around in a light minded manner. Abu ali 10:11, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Personally I have seen a great deal of hostility coming from all sides of these debates. Mackan79 00:10, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Agree with csloat, Abu Ali and Mackan79 on these last points. I'd add that if "the lines between legitimate criticism of Israeli government policy and antisemitism are becoming ever more blurred," it is in large part because editors like Slim are tenaciously blurring them. Indeed the whole point of alluding to "an increasingly hostile editing environment around articles to do with Jews, Judaism, and Israel" is precisely to blur those lines. I have been involved in a lot of contentious pages related to Israeli-Palestinian issues, where Isarig and Slim have also been heavily involved, and with the exception of a couple of sideshows produced by cranks like Kiyosaki, I have never seen this "concerted effort by a number of editors to blacken anything to do with Jews, Judaism, or Israel." On the other hand, on any of these pages one can find a concerted effort to blacken anything to do with individuals - Jewish, Arab, or other - who are prominently critical of Israeli occupation policies. Isarig is involved in one such blackening effort right now at the very article that precipitated the present discussion (he's arguing that the article on Juan Cole should include an accusation that Cole's writings "resonate powerfully" with the central argument of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, but should exclude Cole's dismissal of the attack as "outrageous"). Slim has tended to either condone or actively participate in blackening efforts of this kind, often by "blurring" lines as she has done on this page, and creating an incredibly specious spectrum of guilt by association, beginning at one end with anyone who disagrees with her about the root causes of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and extending all the way out to the antisemitic fringe.--G-Dett 15:28, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I think the allegations of antisemitism are actually irrelevant and beside the point here. I am an anti-Zionist Jew, and I am being stalked and harassed over the pages of Misplaced Pages by a series of one-off accounts and sockpuppets who do not like my edits to articles on Israel-related subjects. Every day, I have to search to find which articles have been vandalised with derogatory comments about me. Today, it was Gilad Atzmon, Roberto Rosselini, Pig and Camel. Yesterday it was Faisal-Weizmann Agreement, Folke Bernadotte/temp, Israel Shahak, David Raziel, Convoy of 35, Al-Khisas massacre, Roberto Rossellini, Farouk Kaddoumi, Great White Records and Gilad Atzmon. And there have been dozens more. The person responsible (and I'm definitely not pointing the finger at Isarig) is not making antisemitic attacks on me, but is certainly making a concerted effort to make me -- a forthright critic of Israel and Zionism -- look bad. So when SlimVirgin notes "an increasingly hostile editing environment around articles to do with Jews, Judaism, and Israel", she should recognise that it is not only supporters of Israel who face this hostility and abuse. RolandR 00:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry you've had to put up with that. I've blocked the latest account that was attacking you, and you should feel free to let me know if it happens again. You're right that the hostile environment affects everyone. The problem is not only antisemitism. It's also that some editors feel that using Misplaced Pages to paint Israel black is a legitimate way to use the encyclopedia, and of course it isn't. We end up with toxic talk pages, terrible articles, and editors who feel victimized and bullied. It would be good if good-faith editors on all sides could try to come up with a solution together. SlimVirgin 00:26, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the second part of this entirely; I just wish people could acknowledge the extreme partisanship on all sides of these issues. In my view, there's simply an extreme shortage on the assumption of good faith. People immediately revert edits without making any attempt to follow the guidelines in WP:Revert. If they've seen something generally similar before, they simply assume its included for the same dumb reason. All in all, many seem to have stopped caring, if they ever did, about the spirit of editing on WP. I think this failure to be civil and assume good faith, much more than any latent bigotry of WP editors, is the source of hostility. Mackan79 03:07, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Abu Ali was simply performing a useful service in alerting me and others to this complaint. Isariq has been relentlessly belligerent and the displeasure of his fellow editors should be addressed. The fact that he has offended such a wide swath of the WP community is evidence of the disruption he has caused. There are many other editors who share Isarig's POV and sometimes his stubborn streak, but they don't create nearly the unpleasantness. --Lee Hunter 01:23, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

This "useful service" has already been described by several editors here as harassment. And here you are applauding it. No more needs to be said about you or your contributions to this debate. Isarig 01:30, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Lee even if you got the "alert", showing up here to to put the boot in regarding Isarig's belligerence, is a bad look when one could arguably call you even less civil at times and note your own hair-trigger rv button. Isarig has little patience for weak arguments and off-topic soapboxing on talk pages. If his opponents refuse to "stay down" and keep coming back with more of the same, usually peppered with personal attacks, instead of staying on point and forming better arguments, he won't let up and will keep knocking them down. The problem for them is that most of the time he's right. True, perhaps not the paragon of civility, but on the other hand, I've not seen him attempt to suppress anything contrary to his POV so long as it was reliably sourced and written according to policy. This can not be said of the editor who filed this ANI, and the "wide swath of the WP community" you refer to, are for the most part, composed of trolls like User:Will314159 who you didn't see fit to comment on. I don't expect you to like the guy, but I had expected more grudging respect. <<-armon->> 12:00, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Please note Armon (who has supported) Isarig in various disputes used the phrase "he won't let up and will keep knocking them down" (my emphasis). I think that this acurately descrives Isarig's style of editing and discussion, a style which Armon oviously approves of. Abu ali 10:26, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

If I approve of anything, it's that from what I've seen, Isarig generally stays on point and makes better arguments than his opponents. The problem is that most people, when they lose an argument, especially when it's shown to be weak, turn their embarrassment into anger at whoever "beat" them. This in my view explains a lot of the hostility for Isarig here. I believe that, like Felix-felix below, "I don't think he ever gave worse than he got" and I've also seen cases of him giving a lot less. Should he be more civil -sure. <<-armon->> 12:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Well call me Isarig the Second, because I didn't see that as an example of being uncivil so much as firmly pointing out to Elizmr the absurdity of asking for "respect" for her suggestion that Cole was, as she put it, "internalizing" the themes of the protocols of Zion. I don't mind saying that anyone who proposes such an appalling and incendiary idea will lose my respect immediately. Regarding Will314159, I don't know anything about him and I don't know why you bring him up. --Lee Hunter 15:55, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

She was making a general comment in response your protests (or sloats) that Cole objectively couldn't have "internalized the themes" because his is a prof. The inability to respect anybody who doesn't share one's POV is likely an insoluble problem for a lot of editors, but it's not something to be proud of.

As for Will314159, we edited the same pages with him for months and you didn't notice how out of line his behavior was? OK, but it amazes me. <<-armon->> 12:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, that is incorrect. The only person who talked about "internalizing the themes" was Elizmr and her comment came completely from left field and out of context with the previous discussion. She wrote: "And to throw my 2 cents in, like it or not, it is a well known fact that (very unfortunately), the protocols are very prominent in the ME media. It is not suprising that ME historians and scholars would have internalized some of these themes." This after demanding that we respect her opinion. Respect is earned, it's not a God-given right. --Lee Hunter 20:05, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Armon, calling most of the people who commented here "trolls" is uncivil at best. Your claim that Isarig has not tried to suppress anything contrary to his POV is incorrect; as you know, you and he are involved in mediation on that very issue on the Juan Cole page. Your claim that I have done so is also totally inaccurate; that has not occurred.csloat 01:57, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The mediation is public. It seems I'm more opposed to using a particular post from Cole's blog as a source to reframe criticism into a Cole/Karsh fight than he is -and I've also submitted 2 alternatives which I believe are better and from RSs to use instead. Poor evidence for "suppression". <<-armon->> 12:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't know where the podium is but well i can speak throughout the window. It's a pitty that the discussion has taken this way. In brief, i have to say that SlimVirgin's statements are not helpful and harm the community IMO. I read that and feel that there's much bias when you say there exist some antisemitic editors. I feel bad because the scope of the accusation is so large. Please give us names Slim. Abu Ali was clear on his accusation though i don't agree with the brutal ways of Isarig. That accusation was directed to one user who could of course reply or rebute that. Yes, true that Abu Ali started it but let's not forget that it was directed to someone who can easily respond to it and not to a group of phantoms. The problem w/ Slim's accusations is that nobody can reply. It is a kind of unsourced edits in wiki jargon. But i will do reply and say that whether there are an orchestra made of anti-semitic editors and their fans or not over here, remains irrelevant. I will ask about names indeed especially when Slim uses the term obvious.

It should also be noted that i've heard the same accusations re anti-arab and anti-islam editors for more than a dozen of months. Have we reached a solution to catch those anti-x (in case there are) wherever they are here in wikipedia? Unfortunately No! Why? Because established editors and concerned admins think the phenomenon got only one side and is only limited to the side admins think they are victims. That's wrong, anti-x editing is well-spread around wikipedia but i don't believe there's infamous orchestras. There are individuals who carry much POV and fight for that and don't risk banning as account recreation is made easy. So let's stop making vague accusations and be concrete to try to get rid of these problems. At least, let's try it. Cheers -- Szvest - 11:57, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

For the record, I've had recent and fairly brusque encounters with Isarig, who, as outlined above is an obsessive, ideological, and pretty rude edit warrior.(on the Oliver Kamm page) However, much like G Dett, I don't think he ever gave worse than he got, but I haven't experienced stalking by him, to my knowledge.Felix-felix 16:56, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I find this comment by Isarig to be offensive: "This 'useful service' has already been described by several editors here as harassment. And here you are applauding it. No more needs to be said about you or your contributions to this debate."

I was one of those editors solicited. I had not had any negative interactions with Isarig, and I so noted that here. I noted that I thought some disputes had been resolved at Al-Aqsa Intifada. Boy was I wrong. Today, there have been 2 mass reversions. One by an admin. I would appreciate if this utterly toxic atmosphere would end. If it keeps up I will be making an incident report here , and I will be soliciting comments from others who have had interactions with these 2 editors. --Timeshifter 02:48, 6 January 2007 (UTC)(->)

I've been recently stalked and harassed by user Isarig, so i'm not surprised that he is doing this for a long time, going through user contributions and reverting, stalking and harassing. In my observation he does not assume good faith, really rude, and leaves false edit summaries. I'm really surprised that after assaulting, stalking so many users nothing was done to prevent this kind of behaviour, which seems like his signiture move. Mnemonic2 05:18, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Mnemonic2 has been a user here for two days who has made some questionable edits; don't give that opinion too much weight. -- Kendrick7 05:27, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

User Kendrick7 was recently blocked for 3RR violations. He seems to take wikipedia too seriously constantly attacking other editors, edit warring, making baseless accusations, and in an effor to make a personal attack he lies about when i made my first edit. Also one can read all articles without registering an account. Mnemonic2 05:56, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

You made your first edit a week ago, my mistake. I would love to meet some of these editors I constantly attack. -- Kendrick7 10:01, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Durova blows the referee whistle

This particular dispute has always been tough to adjudicate. The main participants are well informed and highly articulate, yet some of their methods violate policy in ways I rarely see among editors who know how to spell. The mediation looks like it may indeed succeed at its own narrow aim. Yet the dispute is larger and spreading. I find it oddly appropriate that the Edward Said biography has joined the affected pages: during his years at Columbia University that English department had a reputation as street brawling for Ph.D.s.

In specific reply to csloat, my rebuke spoke to that dichotomy. The debate about libel and slander touched an area I studied in graduate school and your knowledge of that subject does appear to be professorial as does your articulate writing style. Topically these are high level discussions. That contrasts with forum-shopping, personalizing disputes, bad faith assumptions, incivility, edit warring, and deceptive complaints - behaviors more characteristic of a weak undergraduate. My criticism has nothing to do with how you conduct a classroom and everything to do with this website where expert contributors in the humanities are uncommon and too many of the weak undergraduates I normally referee are eager to assume the worst of any authority figure. If the opinion hurts your feelings I am sorry; I know of no milder way to express this earnest evaluation.

This does not, however, vindicate the other parties. Normally I would wait for mediation to work but this particular conflict has seeped onto too many pages and accumulated new disputants as it spreads. The main question I confront now is not whether but how to open an arbitration request: who and what are involved? Durova 06:21, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Are you canvassing opinions here? <<-armon->> 10:43, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

For the record I think both SlimVirgin's veiled insinuation and Abu Ali's outrageous rhetoric are damaging to this whole enterprise. For me, this issue boils down to the speed with which Isarig assumes bad faith, makes and then repeats baseless allegations. From my own experience: A secondary issue is the fact that the Wiki guidelines on reliable sources are frankly open to interpretation, for example, terms like "expert" are weasley worm-can openers and the massive "previously published work" loophole doesn't help the issue. Finally, I, for one, was not "rounded up" by anybody. Cheers! Famousdog 15:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I think arbitration is premature here. Most of the issues being discussed stem from the Juan Cole article, which is in mediation, and good progress is being made there due to the efforts of User:Martinp23. The broader issues brought up by User:SlimVirgin - the hostile editing environment surrounding Israel and Jewish-related articles may warrant a a differnt approach, but agian, I'm not sure Arbitration is the solution there. Isarig 18:06, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Then I'll hold off for now. I'll also caution you about disruption, Isarig. The only reason I haven't blocked you for the Quran desecration controversy/Piss Christ quarrel is because the waters are muddy. Everybody, please slow down and disengage. And try not to graft the Arab/Israeli conflict onto this already messy dispute. Durova 02:03, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Isarig is one of a small group of editors (the others are Amoruso and Shamir1) who endlessly push a particular pov into mid-east-related articles. A large fraction of their edits are reverts, usually to reinstert the junk they have copied from worthless propagandistic sources. It would be a tough assignment to find any substantial improvement to any article due to their efforts over months. The proper place for this discussion is before the arb ctte. --Zero 09:24, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The remark above is a personal attack against three editors and should be removed by the editor who wrote it. Elizmr 10:05, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The remark is not a personal attack, it is a complaint. I don't know Amoruso and Shamir1, but it is a valid comment on Isariq's work. --Lee Hunter 20:09, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Zero's remarks are based on evidence that has cited many times in talk pages and in this Request for Assistance. Isarig has become particularly disruptive. As well as removing well-sourced information, for example here, he posts abusive fake "warnings" on talk pages and refuses polite requests that he restore WP:RS-compliant material. If action is not taken Isarig should at least be warned that he must abide by policy in future. Misplaced Pages simply doesn't need editing of this standard. --Ian Pitchford 11:41, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The disputed remark looks like a comment on behavior, not character or personality, and I accept it as such. I have cautioned Isarig in this thread. I'm not going to open an arbitration request right now, although I would probably do so if petitioned in the future, and any editor in good standing can initiate a request themselves at WP:RFAR. If someone chooses to do so now and seeks my advice in crafting the request I will provide it. Durova 03:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I have just checked Isarig's edit log and it looks like this discussion and the threat of arbitration has brought an impovement in Isarig's conduct. Long may it contnue. I agree that there is no need for arbitration right now. But someone should keep an eye on the Israel related pages to ensure that the truce is maintained. Abu ali 11:45, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I've been recently stalked and harassed by user Isarig, so i'm not surprised that he is doing this for a long time, going through user contributions and reverting, stalking and harassing. In my observation he does not assume good faith, really rude, and leaves false edit summaries. I'm really surprised that after assaulting, stalking so many users nothing was done to prevent this kind of behaviour, which seems like his signiture move. Sorry i first posted this at the wrong place. Mnemonic2 05:49, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I can't be the only one who finds it ironic that we have a message complaining about Isarig going through a user's contributions list right below a message by another user admitting to going through Isarig's contributions list. Both sides need to gain perspective and disengage. - Merzbow 06:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Meatpuppetry and tag-team edit-warring

User:Siddiqui has persistently gone against consensus in several articles relating to Pakistan, most notably Pakistani nationalism and History of Pakistan, where he has been repeatedly adding unreliable sources (random unverifiable geocities links) and steering the tone in favor of fringe sectarian views. His edit-warring, as evidenced here and , , do not involve discussions or debates but simply persistent reverts over long periods of time. This user has expressed such disruptive behaviour before, advancing narrow, nationalistic and politically inflammatory minority views (see this). Then, when it was clear that reasonable people fixed his edits, he decided to recruit tag-team meatpuppets. He started to post to a certain group of ideologically biased users, such as User:Nadirali, User:szhaider (who considers India a threat to world peace - look at his userpage) and User:Unre4L(who is on a mission to "reclaim Pakistan's stolen heritage") to try to revert-war there, which they did. In addition, he solicited a meatpuppet from off wiki, a user named User:AliHussain. This is evident from the fact that this user, a new user, immediately posted to Siddiqui's page upon logging in for the first time about "seeing what he can do" and proceeded to revert-war again . The users Nadirali and Unre4L were involved in some ridiculous debate over the nonexistent concept of "Ancient Pakistan" (based not on scholarly sources but Pakistani historical revisionism) in Talk:History of India Talk:History of Pakistan and Talk:Panini.They have been resoundedly refuted by several knowledgeable users like User:Dbachmann, User:DaGizza, User:Deeptrivia and User:Fowler&fowler but they continue to prowl the pages. There have been RfC posts by other users concerning their narrow fringe views. in turn they tried to create a bogus article about an underground Islamic Fundamentalist/Pakistani nationalist website started by this group of singleminded editors that which got speedily deleted . This problem is becoming increasingly difficult to contain and these users are rapidly getting disruptive.Bakaman 01:28, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

More instances of such behaviour:Rumpelstiltskin223 01:44, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

What an accusation ! The Indian contributors have been tag-teaminig on these Pakistani articles for many months before I got 3RR and the History of Pakistan was "protected" for more than three months. Now that I have some Pakistani contributors involved to represent the Pakistani perspective they have started this accusation. One can simply look at the history of these articles to see tag-teaming by Indian contributors before Pakistani contributors. I have invited many of my friends to wikipedia that does not mean that this "puppetry". One can accuse the Indians of the same regarding these Pakistan related articles.

Siddiqui 02:02, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Especially when I live thousands of miles from every other Indian user.Bakaman 03:14, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

User:Bakasuprman is a Hindu nationalist who is constantly adding Devangari texts to Pakistan related articles and tagging their talk pages with Indian banners claiming them for India. He was quick to welcome a user who abused me on my user page. And look at his choice of words. Welcoming my abuser is a clear indication of his own behavior. I personally do not (->)accept any consensus which is developed by a bunch of like-minded Hindu-biased users (->)who are always aggressively scaring away whoever tries to interfere their propaganda (->)based intentions. Most of their citations are from those websites which promote (->)Hindutwa. They never accept any input from any user who does not agree with them. They insist on adding Indian script to Pakistan and Islam related articles and have been indianizing all such articles with twisted words and dubious citations. They force other users into accepting their citations no matter how questionable they are. Just look at their talk pages and you'll clearly see their unity in promoting Hinduism in Pakistan and Islam related articles, and Indianizing all such articles. They have literally occupied Pakistan related articles and won't let anybody other than members of their lobby make any major changes. If someone resists their propaganda agendas they persecute that user with full force and unity. Szhaider 03:16, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Several pages got protected due to the edits of this group (History of Pakistan and Pakistani nationalism to name 2). In retaliation, Siddiqui has been editing tendentiously, using inflammatory section titles and other acts of disruption across wikipedia articles, such as & . User User:HamzaOmar most definitely the same user as Siddiqui is helping him revert-warRumpelstiltskin223 06:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Szhaider and Siddiqui are absolutely right.Bakman and other Indian users play edit wars by editing in groups,therefor being careful not to break the 3RR.Nothing but a clear form of meatpuppetry.Bakaman and his fellow imperialists have made racist remarks towards Pakistani users as seen on the history of Pakistan talk page. If Bakaman and his fellow indian imperialists can't get have their own way around,they then go running to Indian administrators to assist them in their crusade against Pakistani wikipedians. Right now Bakaman and fellow imperialist user:deeptrivia plan on writing an article on "Pakistani textbooks"(to be specific textbooks used by a small group of religious fanatics in Pakistan) to stereotype us and brand us as extremists.This can be seen .They had done this before when they created an unsourced article on Christians in Pakistan which had been deleted yesterday upon my request. Unfortunately they clearly outnumber Pakistani wikipedians and are able to edit war in groups to keep all Pakistani items categorized as "Indian" despite my efforts to make it "SOuth Asian" to keep it neutral. I tried to revert the article on ,but they keep changing it to "Indian" and keeping all refferences to Pakistan out including consistantly vandalizing the Pakistani tag I place on the talkpage. And due to the lack of diversity among administrators,they have a clear advantage over us. The alligations Bakaman states are false.Bakaman is racist towards Pakistanis(particularly Muslim). His fellow imperialists(and possibly him)are part of a racist site called .They make disruptive edits to Pakistani articles such as Pakistani nationalism by sticking their POV into them.They consistantly edit war on Pakistani history articles and try to keep out all refferences to Pakistan,again in large numbers to keep from violating the 3RR.And for your information,Pakhub is not Islamaist.This is another part of Bakaman's propaganda.Any attempts to revive Pakistani history is automatically claimed as "Islamist" by Bakaman and his fellow imperialists.Please read the articles on Pakhub to decide for yourself. They have also unleashed nationalistic bots and tagged Pakistani and Iranian related articles to Indian categories.Their consistant efforts to keep all consensus out(with the assistance of biased admnistrators) is a clear violation of wikipedia's neutral and no propaganda policies.Nadirali 05:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Your paranoia amazes me... hope you understand accusing admins is not the best way to present your case here. They were made admins precisely becasue they HAVE made productive contributions to the project unlike you who seems to be interested in removing project tags from talk pages. As for Panini call him a Pakistani before any non-Indian historian and see how they'll laugh at you. ************ *************** DaBrood 08:45, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

This after Siddiqui spammed talk pages , proving Bakaman's point totally. Rumpelstiltskin223 06:10, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I am getting Pakistani editors to protect the Pakistan related pages being filled with Indian propaganda. I am also urging my friends to join wikipedia and contribute to Pakistan related pages. The Indians have been team-tagging and reverting any changes to Pakistan related articles. The new Pakistani contributors will soon be able to give balanced view of Pakistan-India disputes. Indian have the right to give thier side of opinion so Pakistanis also have the same right. The Indians have filled Pakistani articles with Indias propaganda. Any change to reflect Pakistan view point is reverted and the Indian contributors team tag to defeat smaller number of Pakistani contributors. Hopefully this will change as I have been trying hard to convince many Pakistanis to join wikipedia and contributue to the articles that interests them.

Siddiqui 07:04, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages is not a battle ground. You by your own admitance are guilty of meatuppetry. ************ *************** DaBrood 08:45, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages is not a blog, where you can put down any information, and because you have a few admins on your side, nobody can question your actions. The Pak tag belongs anywhere, where there are Pakistani ancestors involved. The fact is, Panini had nothing to do with modern Indians. If it hadnt been for some users here, the article would still have a ROI flag. (check history). So maybe you guys should pull yourselves together and stop defending biased information, backed up my some Indian written sources. If you dont want to call people of Pakistan, Pakistanis, what else do you want to call them? Indians. I see...makes no sense, but since you have admins on your side, who are we to question? Unre4L 13:45, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

P.s I provided 5 .edu sources of Ancient Pakistan being a valid term. Even then you question this. This obviously shows you have no regard for correct information being put on Misplaced Pages, but only information where you can cram the word "India" in as many places as you can. Unre4L 15:54, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Of course the fact tha google uses Ancient India 880 times to one compared to the fictitious "ancient Pakistan" seems to be lost on you, as well as nadirali's hallucinations of me being female, when I am obviously male. You're right WP isnt a blog where one can discuss fairy-tales like the "ancient history of Pakistan".Bakaman 23:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

First I thought Google was the only argument you could come up with. Now I know it. Ok...let me make it very simple. Why do you think we are arguing about this? Because people are misinformed, and since they are misinformed, they use it more often. If Ancient Pakistan came up with as many Google results, then this argument wouldnt be taking place, now would it? And your Google argument is not going to cancel out any official educational sources. Unre4L 23:39, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually here is one for you.
Islam gives 94 million google results.
Hinduism gives 8.7 million results.
Wait a minute. That must mean...
Unre4L 23:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh my god. christian gives 318 million, muslim gets 58 million. Official educational sources? Pul-leez. I have 800 "official educational sources" to each geocities site and university of oregon blog you have.While were at it, do look at misinformed.Bakaman 01:55, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

May be google is not the right place. We need papers :)

Now make an informed decision.--aen-vthaeussP:-t/--c- 13:07, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Or and .Bakaman 16:23, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Might have something to do with, Christian being a name, and the search for Christian and Christianity is integrated. But you failed to see my point. Google cannot be used to prove anything. I provided .edu sources for Ancient Pakistan being valid, unless you can provide .edu sources quoting Ancient Pakistan is Not valid, till then, please dont mention google again. Unre4LITY 13:58, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Islam is a name as well. see Islam Karimov.Bakaman 16:23, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Of interest to this discussion would be the edits at Partition of India by a "group" (for reasons unknown) where a third individual "AMbroodEY" has surfaced on third consecutive day, after "Rumpelstiltskin223" (on 4 Jan) and "Dangerous-Boy" (on 5 Jan), continuing the edit war, reverting exactly the same cit. (i.e. Time Magazine!) and adding completely irrelevant and extremely POV links, while disregarding mediation attempts. --IsleScape 15:02, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

There Is No Cabal! Partition of India has been in my watchlist for over two years. I didnt revert your stuff, i was building upon D-Boy's version. Whats more dont game ANI, this is not the forum really to discuss this... ************ *************** DaBrood 17:58, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Not correct. Look at your reverts plus challenge to my edits. Three people (all appearing above) reverting the same reference in three days is no conincidence, but perfect example of tag-team if not meatpuppetry.--IsleScape 18:41, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Its called reverting vandalism.Bakaman 19:00, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Welcome to the fourth editor--IsleScape 19:56, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh no a troll thinks there is a cabal.Bakaman 21:13, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Correction, four trolls in three days!--IsleScape 00:00, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I edited the page much before three days ago, and added quite a bit in the way of references. Calling me a troll lol. Looks like noone but banned users, "restrorers of Pakistan's ancient heritage" and their SIMI friends agree with that.Bakaman 01:00, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

This is certanly a case of (anti)Pakistani and/or (anti)Islamic phobia and memory loss for which I don't no cure but to hope for improvement.--IsleScape 01:45, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Why did so many articles all of the sudden get protected by the same admin?--D-Boy 18:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Mhm Islescape, POV links. Do tell us about unicorns and East Dakota while you're at it. Zora is no mediator, she's the one calling for the article to become "Pakistani POV" and whining about "Indian Imperialist bots" and "Hindutva kooks".Bakaman 18:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

This is the kind of Admins I have to put up with, who are on a clear mission to ruin just about everything I post.
User:DaGizza This is what he posted at first (about my PakHub article):
"Has 36 Google hits! AFD or Prod it and it will be deleted very soon. Might even get away if you put a speedy notice"
"Regarding Pakhub, I don't understand your "evil glee" comment, but I can assure you if you place a speedy tag, someone will delete it without hesitation. And thanks for your christmas greeting. I wish you likewise and a happy new year."
"As you see, I've deleted it. If they complain, I may revive and send it to AfD. Then everyone (not just Indians) will vote speedy delete and they'll realise that it doesn't deserve to be on Misplaced Pages. Have a good day."

Even his buddy admitted this (Dboy) "why do i sense an small little evil glee from your words?"
And just to inform everyone. He deleted my article without telling me a word. The article was deleted twice, and I still had no idea who deleted it and why it was being deleted.

Unre4LITY 19:20, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

You article was a freaking ad! It was nothing but shameless promotion.--D-Boy 14:17, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Bottom line is Bakaman and his army of meatpuppets are loosing control of the articles due to Siddiqui's good efforts.As pointed out,they won't allow anyone but members of their (ultra-right wing) lobby to edit the articles. That seems to be changing and now Bakaman's freaked out.Nadirali 16:06, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Lol, freaked out. I am quite used to dealing with national mystics and religious fundamentalists now. Do you fancy BhaiSaab (talk · contribs) ? I enjoy the "ultra-right wing" and "fascist" adjectives as well. Keep in mind there were more creative adjectives so I hope to see a better effort in that realm. Applying tags on my political views (which you have no idea of, I dont live in India) and groups I allegedly belong to ("ultra-light lobbby", "fascist" wtf?) are personal attacks. O and btw, Dboy is no meatpuppet, hes been on wiki for 2 years, ambroodey is no meatpupet either hes been on wiki for over 2 years, neither is rumpelstiltskin223. Unlike you I dont need to spam for/on meat forums to get my point across, I let the reliable sources do the speaking. Also unlike you, my time on wiki is not limited to "reclaiming the hijacked history" of my country.Bakaman 16:18, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

"personal attacks"....hmmm....let's see now..."you reffer to some (madrassa) textbooks for your sources" Yes! Now I remember thanks for reminding me Bakaman.Nadirali 17:10, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Mhm especially because i was commenting on the content. O and btw, no one is going to believe you unless you use diffs because you seem to be editing my text anyways, in a poor attempt to malign me.Bakaman 17:26, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Bakasuprmnan was instrumental in supporting HKelkar and succeeded in having two editors who brought into focus misuse of Misplaced Pages space by him by having them banned along with HKelkar even even though they were hardly uncivil

JzG's personal attack

Revision as of 15:54, January 4, 2007 (edit) JzG (Talk | contribs) (->Deep breaths :) - Um, right.) <- Older edit Revision as of 19:20, January 4, 2007 (edit) (undo) JzG (Talk | contribs) (->Deep breaths :) - update) Newer edit -> Line 26: Line 26:

--> Also, you are not hated; everyone is welcome on Misplaced Pages, and so long as you go about it civilly, we can have these users answer for their actions. Anthonycfc 13:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)  :--> Also, you are not hated; everyone is welcome on Misplaced Pages, and so long as you go about it civilly, we can have these users answer for their actions. Anthonycfc 13:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

- * Your hysterical outpourings on WP:PAIN are likely to achieve very little other than to ensure that you are dismissed as a crank. Would you like to go back and try again, citing diffs and without the capitalisation? Guy (Help!) 15:54, 4 January 2007 (UTC) + * I removed your reports from WP:PAIN since there is no evidence of attacks provided. In future please bear in mind that we need, at the very least, information as to where the supposed attacks occurred. I did spend some time looking into it but the only aggression I could find was from you. Guy (Help!) 19:20, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

-The preceding unsigned comment was added by Yrgh (talk o contribs).

...Are you asking a question, or what? --Masamage 00:00, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that Yrgh believes that JzG's comments above are a personal attack and he wants to rant about it! Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 00:04, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Uh yeah. The top of this page says "This is not the Misplaced Pages complaints department" for a reason. Apparently you know about WP:PAIN to report personal attacks, you can take this there but if all he did was call you a crank, I seriously doubt any uninvolved admins will care enough to block him or whatever. --W.marsh 00:05, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

For the record, this user has made a habit out of accusing... everyone... of personally attacking him (and in a rather disruptive way at that) after he was confronted by multiple editors about a series of dubious edits. He has previously been mentioned on AN/I here. -bbatsell ?? 00:08, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

And why wasn't anything done about it then? D: And at what point is the community's patience exhausted with Mr. Yrgh?-Ryulong (******) 00:22, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

This is also wonderful.-Ryulong (******) 00:25, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I was just marvelling at that myself. --Masamage 00:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Blocked indef per that latest ... marvel. Can't say I've ever seen anything quite like that. --Cyde Weys 00:49, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Strong, 100% speedy endorse blocking this worthless twat. I wasted Actual Time checking out his baseless report. Guy (Help!) 01:20, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Calm down. Of course, I support blocking this user, but it is a personal attack to call someone a "worthless twat". There's no need to start calling people names, even though they are incredibly frustrating. Yuser31415 02:08, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
    • I've already posted to Guy's user talk page. It seems out of character and I hope that was a typo for twit. Durova 02:17, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
      • But in reality, it's not out of character at all. ATren 02:32, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
        • Yup. --Masamage 02:36, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Hell freezes over

I'd better put this under a new section. Based on Guy's post above and the subsequent diffs, which do check out, I've left him an imminent block warning for incivility. It's the dead of night in his part of the world right now and he hasn't edited since, so I'll wait for him to log on and respond, but basically what I've said is that I'll block him for uncivil statements he's already posted unless he strikes through certain comments or pledges to clean up his language. I've never blocked an admin before - much less one I respect as much as him - but it would be a double standard if I overlooked this evidence. I welcome the feedback of other users regarding this decision. Durova 03:41, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll support that even, though I feel sheepish doing so. Guy seems like a very good editor, but I read the above evidence the same way you do, especially in light of this. Can't be allowed, even (especially?) from a respected admin. --Masamage 03:51, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I can't support such an action. While I am strongly opposed to editors (especially admins) making uncivil comments, I don't think that blocking is the right way to go about this; all it's going to do is create bad feelings. In this case, an apology from Guy would be suffice, provided he does not repeat his behavior. Yuser31415 03:58, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree, but I interpreted Durova's actions as asking for apology and change in behavior first and foremost. The block would only be if he refuses, which would be kind of surprising. --Masamage 04:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I'd certainly accept an apology. Durova 04:02, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I am strongly opposed to an admin blocking another admin. Always have been opposed to this, always will. It's just not ... done. Take it to RfC, even ArbCom, but don't directly block another fellow admin. Yuser31415 04:07, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I don't see how a civility block would be anything other than punitive in Guy's case. Guy has had a sharp tongue as long as I've known him, and (1) he isn't particularly more likely to be uncivil in the next x hours than he is in the n hours after that, and (2) I seriously doubt that a block will cause him to change his manner of interaction. IMHO, if people are really concerned about his behavior, engaging on his talk page or an RFC would be the way to go. TheronJ 04:12, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

If you can gather consensus at WP:CIV for the exception if you're uncivil and get away with it this policy doesn't apply anymore then I'll strikethrough my warning. The problem editors habitually claim that sysops are a clubby little bunch who violate policy with impunity. Well if none of us get blocked except by ArbCom, then to quote George Orwell All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. If I ever make the same mistake then by all means give me a block warning too, and an actual block if I don't back down. Durova 04:20, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Who are these editors? I've seen people complain that a few admins get away with too much, but I've never heard anyone but User:Cplot style conspiracy theorists claim admins as a whole are a priveleged elite. -Amarkov _edits 04:32, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Cplot never made any such claims about administrators being a privileged elite. Cplot complained about federal propagandists on the wiki, many of whom are not admins (for example, MONGO thankfully). Why not try to provide a diff showing something Cplot did wrong. That would be an interesting exercise. --SeePlot 11:08, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh good, a WP:SOCK.--Isotope23 18:57, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Admins has no special authority or exemption. The blocking policy applies to them too. HighInBC 04:35, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

WTF? Someone has a bit of a meltdown from dealing with crap, and you threaten to block him? Instead of saying "what's going on, can I help", you threaten him? Instead of providing a support system for the people who end up having to deal with the flood of bullshit that comes their way, we use ultimatums? Sounds great - when someone is buckling under the strain, let's kick them? Durova, I must say, I am deeply disappointed in you. I most certainly oppose your use of ultimatums and threats against one of our hardest-working admins. Guettarda 04:34, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Ahem ... calm down, please. Yuser31415 04:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

When I saw it in one post I presumed it was a typing error. After I saw it in six more over several different days and conversations I acted. An eighth example has surfaced since then. Durova 04:42, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) That's an insane thought process, and one that has caused major problems. "I'm dealing with trolls, so I'm above policies!" is the worst thing an admin can possibly say, short of maybe "**** off you ****ing ****er I'm ****ing blocking everyone because I ****ing feel like it". Nothing, at all, should cause you to be placed above policies. -Amarkov _edits 04:38, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Really. If "inability to deal with stress without calling people names and swearing at them" came up in an RFA, most of us would vote "oppose". And I don't think that of Guy; I think he's a lot saner than the wacko you're describing. --Masamage 04:41, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Hi all. Not sure if I'm even allowed to post here but I found ANI to be a reasonable place so far. From the purely linguistic perspective - twit twat and twot are about the same in the context of heated discussion and certainly in common usage. But I learned English in Northumbria if you can call it English:) I do have to apologise for that in daily life quite often. Whether heated discussion or common usage are allowed from anyone on Misplaced Pages is still uncertain to me. I deal with it by trying to write really flat and boring in discussion. AlanBarnet 04:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Howay, man, it's nee big deal, like :o) Guy (Help!) 09:48, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't agree with JzG's comments, but ... haven't we learned recently that blocks aren't a good way to deal with personal attacks made by established users? --Cyde Weys 04:47, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Ugh, we're you're in a little pickle here. We You get blasted for admin cabaling if we don't, and we get into that situation if we do. I'd also like to say that I am utterly confused as to why "twat" is offensive; that's a nickname my mom uses for my sister, and I don't see any offensiveness. -Amarkov _edits 04:52, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

It's anatomical slang. According to its article it can also be a form of twit, but I've never heard it used that way. --Masamage 04:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Um... okay, that was more than I really needed to know. Just keep in mind that he may very well be using my definition, not an obscene one. -Amarkov _edits 04:59, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yikes. I expected you to just mouse over that link; it didn't occur to me until just now that you might just click the thing. That's really embarrassing and I'm sorry. --Masamage 05:05, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh, oops, I didn't make it clear that I didn't actually click it. I actually caught it in the diff. But I still know what the word means. Don't be embarassd. Have a smiley face. -Amarkov _edits 05:12, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it doesn't include me, because I'm not an admin, meaning I'm somewhat insulated from whatever happens. Yay. -Amarkov _edits 04:53, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Guettarda has it right. I realise that it is now all the rage for admins to be the manners police, but while we're going through this phase, it would be nice to remember that blocking people who are not a threat to the project hasn't always been something we expected admins to do, and especially to do casually. I really do appreciate the fact that we're a lot quicker to block trolls and lunatics these days, but we do have a whole dispute resolution process designed for facilitating community input on the behaviour of valued contributors. Jkelly 04:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

It's more than that. Most of us don't spend much time dealing with troublesome editors. Dealing with them on the scale that Guy (and many others) do is very stressful. If someone has a few meltdowns over a couple months, then maybe it's a sign that we, as a community should be more supportive of them; seeing stuff like that the correct reaction is to say "what's wrong, how can we help" or maybe "take a break from that stuff and concentrate on what's fun". As long as our aim is to retain hardworking volunteers, the correct action is never to approach a good editor like a disruptive troll. If they are feeling the strain, all it does is say to them "your contribution isn't worth shit". It's most likely to exacerbate the problem. The last thing you want to do is come at someone with threats and ultimatums. It will almost certainly fail to produce the desired result. In addition, in general we cut trolls more slack than Durova cut Guy. Blocks are not meant to be punitive. The threats were totally out of line. Guettarda 05:13, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

He violated WP:CIVIL, and if most of the words I've never heard are similar in definition to his word "twat" (assuming he meant them that way, of course) , he violated it pretty badly. Even then, if I told people to "fuck off", I would most certainly be told to stop in a heartbeat. While admins should not be approached like trolls, they should also not get preferential treatment over everyone else in that respect. And dealing with trolls does NOT justify swearing at people. -Amarkov _edits 05:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

No, he didn't. You violated AGF - maybe you should be blocked for that?? There are seven links provided above. The first one shows no incivility - he says to someone "you have the brass neck to come here making demands? The short answer is: go away". No one says we have to suffer fools. In the second case, there's nothing there that isn't calling a spade a spade. In the third he says "what the fuck"...oooh, my ears are burning, he used a swear word. Hmm - maybe I need to be threatened with a block for my "WFT" higher up the page. In the fourth case, he says to Fys "and I want you to fuck off". Fys has been behaving like an idiot ever since he played chicken with the arbcomm and got them to blink. He's saying "quit bugging me". Not incivil, and it's totally wrong to take it out of context. In the fifth case, again, he is using "fuck off", but seriously, calling that incivil is nothing but prudery about "the f-word". Did you miss the bit about Misplaced Pages not being censored for minors? And the sixth example isn't incivil, and it isn't aimed at anyone in particular so how can it be taken as anything serious? As for the word "twat" - that tempest in a teapot is nothing more than a collective failure to assume good faith. Maybe you should just block yourselves for violating AGF and be done with it. Guettarda 05:47, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Um... In case you didn't notice, I'm the first one who brought up that "twat" might mean something else. And you are not in any way explaining why what he did was civil, you're explaining why it was justified. Which is good, except that glosses over what I said, that incivility isn't justified, just by the fact that the point of the incivil comment is correct. You can say things which are right in an incivil way. -Amarkov _edits 05:51, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Check the edit summary of the first diff. Anchoress 05:56, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Guys and gals, we are not policing words (Misplaced Pages is not censored) we are policing personal attacks having significant venom to hurt people. For the Fuck's sake it is absolutely fuckingly acceptable to use the bloody old-English word fuck to emphasize an idea or an emotion. On the other hand it is absolutely unacceptable for an admin to engineer a phrase that would unnecessary hurt people even if the phrase has no colorful words and even if it does not formally violate the principle to comment on contributions not the contributors. I would dare say that in the phrase "useless twat" I am much more concerned with the word useless than with the word twat. Most of the Guy's replies here are examples of using colorful words but not personal attacks. Some might be (although I guess calling a person who delibeartely choose to behave as troll useless should not hurt his emotions. I guess we are better off by examining the situation more careful with Guy present rather than issuing blocks. I trust Durova to discuss it with Guy and to make a right decision. Alex Bakharev 05:53, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Personal attacks are different from incivility. For instance, while dismissing all ideas someone comes up with saying "**** those ideas" is not a personal attack, it's certainly incivil. Similarly, I wouldn't quite say anything he did constitutes a personal attack, but it does constitute incivility. Enough to block? I don't know. But personal attacks should be cause for aggressive blocking, period. -Amarkov _edits 06:00, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

There's space between "friendly and polite" and block-worthy incivility. If we couldn't tell someone "leave me alone" (viz., "fuck off") without the thought police breathing down our necks, then I for one would be out of here long ago. Guettarda 06:09, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

"Leave me alone" is substantially different from "**** off". Just because Misplaced Pages isn't censored doesn't mean swearing at someone is less offensive. -Amarkov _edits 06:11, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

No, they aren't "substantially different". Guettarda 06:17, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

WP:CIV's "Serious examples" includes "Profanity directed at another contributor." --Masamage 06:49, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, which would be "fuck you", not "fuck off". Quit Wiki-Lawyering. This is nonsense. Guettarda 07:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Seems to me some folks need to get a fucking life. Wiki isn't a fucking haven for the fucking language Nazi's and this fucking inane proccupation with "so and so huwt my poow widdle feelings" just shows how utterly divorced from fucking reality Wiki is. Personally, I think Wiki could use a nice case of occassional whoop-ass rather than concern over whether a troll's feelings are hurt, and a nice case of reality when ideas are simply baltently fucking stupid. So, that being said, I suppose Durova will want to block me next for actually speaking my mind. Go for it, I really don't care. Wiki at its worst is simply a nattering bunch of officious, pietistic (Wiki as religion) people worried far less about the declining content of the encylopedia and worried far more about creating the equivalent of a Utopian dictatorship. Just remember, Utopia means "nowhere" and Wiki in many cases exists in a netherworld far removed from the real world. &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 14:31, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the aggression, but I'm not wiki-lawyering. I was offering a piece of information to see whether it had any bearing on the discussion; I think your point about the meaning of "directed at" is a good one, so now I'm satisfied. Go back to insulting people who don't agree with you. --Masamage 18:29, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

To whom are you responding? &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 10:56, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Guettarda. --Masamage 19:09, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

WP:CIVIL is the most useless policy on wikipedia. A little incivility doesnt hurt Misplaced Pages. Guy's comments were just an outburst of anger, and I've seen good users blocked for even less by the thought police. I myself deal with trolls on a daily basis. On my first month on wiki I was booked by the thought police four times in cases all brought by banned users (arbcom ruling "Hkelkar"). Admins that spend all day threatening wikipedians instead of trolls are usually hated by users that deal with trolls and shouldn't have the "holier than thou" attitude when looking at a situation.Bakaman 21:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Arbitrary section break

If admins are to have any authority in preventing the increasing coarseness of discourse here, we must begin with ourselves. However, as much as I respect Durova's opinion on nearly everything else, it's far too early to think about blocking. Some supportive conversation would be very nice, as would offering to shoulder some of Guy's burdens. I'd guess most admins become experts in recognizing and dealing with one or two particular trolls and/or disruptive editors (I have my share for sure). Eventually it wears you down, and I think Guy has taken on more than his share already, so maybe we should let Guy pass the baton on some of his least favorite. We should support him and lighten his load, as we should have done for MONGO months ago. Thatcher131 06:13, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I think we can all agree admins should not be blocked as they have been chosen by the community to be above Misplaced Pages's policies. This is the universal view. KazakhPol 06:23, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Nobody likes a smartass. As a matter of interest, I started an admin misconduct RFC a while ago over violations of block policy that resulted in the admin voluntarily desysopping himself after a wave of negative responses to his behavior. I'm perfectly willing to take strong action at the appropriate time. This is not yet the time for strong action. Thatcher131 06:26, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Okay, so the result of the long, drawn out, and heated (Template:Emot) debate is that we will wait to see how Guy reacts, and I am 99.999% sure he will make an apology. And then, let's just drop the whole matter, hmmm? (BTW, for the record, this is my 3000th edit.) Yuser31415 06:31, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Amen. --Masamage 06:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Heh, "Nobody likes a smartass." If I had a dollar for every time my dad said that to me... anyway, It's a pretty simple thing, really:

1. Does ZisGuy sometimes shoot his mouth off? Well, prety much yes.
2. Does ZisGuy also work his arse off? Definately yes.
3. Does #2 make #1 ok? Anyone wanting to come right out and say that the rules are different for admins/hard workers/FAC writers? No, I thought not.

I've not seen the bordeline tetchyness JZ has demonstrated amount to any serious problem. Yet. Durova's heavy-handedcomments had the correct idea but were woefully handled. Can we all get back to work now, and deal with this iff it turns into a problem?

brenneman 06:39, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll say it. The rules are different for established contributors, not because they have a license to offend, but because we expect them to revert to form and because we know they're worth investing effort in.

Congrats to Durova for being bold, and for coming here for a san-check before acting. And agree with most of the above, blocks should be preventative, not punative. JDZ made a mistake. I'm confident he'll realise that and lower the temperature in future. If not, then maybe he should hand back his bit. But a punative block is the wrong way to express an opinion. Regards, Ben Aveling 06:52, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• If I understand what you're saying, does that mean that we don't accept bad behavior from these contributors, just that we (perhaps) handle it differently? - brenneman 07:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, well put. Where a user's only contributions are negative, a perma-block solves the problem and doesn't cost us anything. Where a user is mostly good with some bad, a perma-block solves the problem, at great cost. A temporary block applied to halt a rampage is a thing of beauty. But a punative block doesn't solve anything, and probably costs us dearly. In this case, I expect him to be sensible. If not, well, there are other options. Regards, Ben Aveling 07:25, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I'm also one of the admins who puts myself on the front line in terms of dealing with difficult editors. I wouldn't retain much credibility in asking them to be civil if I were uncivil myself or if I countenanced obscene put-downs from another administrator. The strongest thing I have going for me when I handle a hard case isn't the sysop tools: it's integrity. The central question I asked myself is If I saw exactly these words from an editor of equal value to the project who wasn't a sysop, what would I do? It's a tough call - some of you may disagree with it - and I trust that when Guy logs on he will quickly demonstrate through his inherent good sense that most of our worries are needless. And I have to add that the accusation I've acted punitively is a bit of an AGF foul. I thought people knew me better than that. Durova 06:44, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I am loving the argument that it's not really rude to tell someone to fuck off. I'll remember that next time someone gets on my nerves. And by the way, Guy is southern English, as I am, and we don't really use "twat" for "vulva" much. It would translate into American as a slightly milder "asshole", I suppose. It wouldn't be very offensive. It has more of a flavour of silliness.

Durova should though be supported here (although no surprises that there is practically a queue forming not to). It's not acceptable for admins to display behaviour that others would be blocked for. They're not above the law. And if you can't deal with twats without telling them to fuck off, maybe giving up dealing with twats would be the best approach. Grace Note 06:56, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Are punative blocks a useful way to deal with past incivility by anyone, admin or otherwise? I suspect it's like rubbing a puppies nose in 'it', useful if you can do it at the time but harmful if you do it long after the event. The message we want to send is "what you did was not acceptable." A bonus block doesn't help get that message through, IMHO, it distracts. Regards, Ben Aveling 07:11, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Absolitely. Did anyone notice the earlier discussion here and the open case at WP:PAIN? How many times are we going to discuss these issues? Double Jeopardy anyone? If we do it again and again maybe we can make a case for an indefinate block! Sheesh, Guy is clearly feeling it - he was highly active over the holidays and needs some support. Should he swear? No. Will Blocking him after he has left when the diffs have already been raised discussed and dismissed help? Hell no. Does he need some more support from his colleagues? Hell Yes. --Spartaz 07:17, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

How is it that the bit of bad faith mud slung at me about punitive blocking still sticks after I already disavowed it? In the unlikely event that Guy logs on and claims he's perfectly right about telling people to fuck off and intends to continue...well then wouldn't it fall within the bounds of reason to impose a block preventatively before he actually does so again? Durova 07:30, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Exactly what in my edit was slinging mud? Do you really think that we need to discuss this three times? Would it be fair for a start? There are plenty of dispute resolution options available if Guy doesn't heed the request to cool the language down. But a block hours after the event when he isn't even logged in? Will that really help? I doubt it and I don't think that it would calm the situation down. Quite the opposite - we would have carnage if we went down that route without trying our very best to discuss the situation. You know how it works - wheelwarring, RFCs, RFArs everywhere. *Shudder* Spartaz 07:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The diffs date as far back as December 1 and happened mostly within the last week or so. Most of them either use the word fuck or call some specific editor an idiot. If anyone other than an administrator had posted the statements it would be uncontroversial to characterize this as an escalating pattern of incivility. Normally in such cases I would block shortly after verifying the evidence. I have not done so in this instance, nor is it appropriate to introduce wheel warring to this very hypothetical discussion. Your participation in this thread and at my user page has demonstrated very persistent bad faith against me and mischaracterized my actions to the extent that yes I do think it amounts to mudslinging. WP:AGF does not mean that my motives and methods are bad until proven legitimate. I made a tough call tonight regarding a sysop I admire and like, couched it in the most respectful terms I could muster, and disclosed the situation here immediately. Durova 08:04, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I have never posted on your talk page as far as I can remember and its not on my watchlist. Since you are throwing TLAs at me can I ask you where you have AGF with me? Making unfounded allegations of persistant bad faith against you by an editor is far more of a personal attack than what you charactarise as my mudslinging. Please review your post and check you have the right editor. You are completely overeacting to a comment that I don't think is wholly out of line with a significant pov posted in this thread. Blocking anyone without discussing the problem with them is inappropriate in pretty much every circumstance. If you asked Guy to tone it down and he told you fuck off then fair enough but not this so far. I think you are taking this far too personally. Its allowed to disagree - there is no need to get all offended. --Spartaz 08:18, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Mea culpa. I posted that shortly before I went to bed and must have been more tired than I realized by that point. Durova 23:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Enough! This is completely out of line. Not only do we have a huge section of people now trying to get even with Guy but he hasn't yet had a chance to defend himself. Also, before all this biting at Guy began did you for one second consider the rampant bad faith of bringing this issue forward and the blatant disruption that this has caused by now? Those comments that Guy reacted to were completely out of line and he did the right thing. Showing up at WP:PAIN and launching a personal attack of the magnitude that this editor did should be more than enough reason for a good long block at least. End of story, nothing more to see here people. MartinDK 07:48, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

My God... JzG remarked that someone may be "dismissed as a crank" and it spawned a giant thread started by a mildly offensive body part of a user that turned into a hunt through Guy's contributions for any other past transgressions. Amazing. Somebody has to deal with our twats. Wouldn't a message on JzG's talkpage to tone it down a little have sufficed? I find him quite reasonable. Grandmasterka 07:44, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. I am appaled at the way things seem to be working here lately. As soon as a grup of disgruntled editors smell blood they hurl accusations and threats at an admin that works his fucking ass off around here. WP:JERRYSPRINGER MartinDK 07:56, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Sorry everyone, I know that learning to deal with people you consider to be idiots is not optional but somewhere between the nth deletion of tenorically and fielding my fourth angry email from a spammer DEMANDING that he be allowed to continue adding links and articles about his company WHICH IS NOT SPAMMING AT ALL, I think I went over my personal threshold for the number of people-I-consider-to-be-idiots that I can handle simultaneously. My own fault for visiting the firehose of crap. Mind you, I'm not sure I can or should bowdlerise things - if someone does something as stupid as slapping a warning on an admin's talk page not do disrupt Misplaced Pages by disrupting their disruption of Misplaced Pages to prove a point to prove a point, I am almost certainly going to continue to say what I think. As anybody who knows me personally will readily tell you, that's my standard response to crass idiocy, even from my friends. Perhaps I should start ROT13ing things, like they do on Ye Shedde (uk.rec.sheds). I'm not going to address the diffs posted above, because I suspect that anybody who cares is not going to accept my version anyway. What was it that Cryptic said? Deals badly with trolls. Plus c,a change, I guess.

All of which brings me back to a comment I made some days ago: we need, I think, a place where we can get peer support without the intervention of people trying to escalate or resurrect thier own disputes. Barberio, for example, had absolutely no call to stick his oar in to the situation with SlamDiego, all that did was to make a tense situation worse and distract people away from helping with that problem (where I could have used a bit of help, and fortunately Hipocrite came along to provide it) and into yet more low-grade Wikidrama. Guy (Help!) 10:25, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

You bring up an interesting point about past disputes. What is the correct procedure for handling things when you see an admin (not you in this case) several times over a few months step over the line, generating complaints, but each time managing to avoid showing genuine contrition, but responding in an aggressive "move on" style that discourages people from actually starting proceedings ("oh, it's not worth the hassle"-sort of thing), leading to things going quiet again until the next time?

There will always be a tension between letting sleeping dogs lie (not bringing up past disputes) and wanting to express concerns about a long-term pattern of behaviour that shows no signs of changing. What do you think is the best thing to do in cases like this? Carcharoth 11:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• I suppose RFC would be the correct procedure. ANI threads such as this are far too easily abused by people with an axe to grind, who simply repeat earlier disputes with the person in question even if they have nothing to do with the issue at hand. >Radiant< 11:49, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Interesting and well said. I love these kind of summaries which use no citations as they are cristal clear. -- Szvest - 14:06, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I understand your reaction to SlamDiego, as I had an encounter with him in which I was sorely tempted to block him. I think it is ridiculous that all this fuss is being made about how you handled a troll combative and disruptive editor. -- Donald Albury 14:52, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I would, in fact, be perfectly happy to accept an apology for bad behaviour and a promise not to do it again. I have no vendetta against JzG, and he does do fine work, but he needs to know when to back off and go have a cup of tea. If you're worked up into a state where you're using foul language and ranting, you need to put down the keyboard. Unfortunately, comments to such were ignored, and my only recourse left was to file it on WP:PAIN and bring it to general attention.

I'm upset that he (And some others) seems to have decided I'm his enemy, I'm not. I was trying to get him to stop attacking people and escalating issues that could be resolved calmly. I'm sure he can so, and just needs to find that admin zen again.

I'm sure that it's all been impressed on JzG now, and if we can settle this with a simple agreement not to use foul language against editors, it's something we can all drop and walk away from. I mean JzG no harm, and don't want any putative actions taken on him, I just want us to be able to get on with editing the wiki in a calm civil way. --Barberio 14:14, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Thatcher131 nails it. This is MONGO all over again. The clear message is: take the crap, deal with the trolls and cranks, and if you ever, ever, speak out bluntly or profanely at the shit being shoveled, someone will scream "foul" and either block you or threaten to do so as a punitive measure - or in the case of MONGO, desysop you as a reward for having done so much, so long for Misplaced Pages that you are at the breaking point. Here's the bottom line: I call a troll a troll. I call a POV pusher a POV pusher. Accuracy is not incivility. Incredibly hard working admins who fight these idiots (Yes, I said idiots, I stand by that) who (the admins, not the idiots) occasionally slip under the strain should have a weighted response. If they have a ratio of 2,000 edits and actions which are civil and helpful to the encyclopedia, and 1 or 2 which are uncivil, to people who are of no or extremely little value to the encyclopedia, then reacting to that as though it were some kind of horror movie scene is Undue Weight. Hear me clearly: between the Giano situation, which is a case of one of the best writers here being driven to what appears to be a defensive running battle, by ADMINS no less - and the MONGO and now JzG situations, where admins have been driven to minor incivility by the sheer volume of crap they have to fight, and the response of a large portion of the community to respond with torches and stakes to the people who are driven to that point not the people who drove them there, I am beginning to doubt the basic common sense of some of the general Misplaced Pages population. What are you people thinking? Oh My God, someone said a BAD WORD to a vandal, troll, or POV pusher. Well, fuck, I guess we'll all have to go to Time Out and not get cookies. Apparently it is more important to Be Civil at all times than to work your ass off completely uncompensated and have the random moment where it gets to you. Focus, anyone? Perspective? I am not here to promote "Wiki-Love". I am not here to get my narrow, judgmental mind in a tizzy because someone used a Naughty Word. I am here to help with the enormous, challanging, exceptionally special group effort of creating the most amazing knowledge resouce since the Library of Alexandria. Ask yourself, Why the hell are you here? Perhaps you'd be happier on some online community preaching some kind of feel-good pretend pablum than here. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. KillerChihuahua 15:22, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Then let's make it official and put this into policy. If there truly is an exemption for valued users, it should be documented on the WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA policy pages. I'm being totally serious here - those policy pages are unambiguous in their condemnation of incivility, but the reality is: incivility is justified for certain editors, and that fact should be properly represented in policy. ATren 15:36, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Are you responding to me? Then either you need to read again, or I was unclear. Punitive blocks for incivility are bullshit, and discussing matters with the editor is always preferred. Consistant crap will get one indef blocked, but occiasional crap does not. This is not a "special rule" this is applying the rules as they are currently written. What is so hard to understand about that? KillerChihuahua 15:44, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

...and if that editor continues to act incivilly, then what? ATren 15:51, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Then there's still no call for someone to loudly and repeatedly pointing out the incivility, and spend an order of magnitude more text on that than the size of the actual incivility itself. We shouldn't go around blocking people who are beneficial to the 'pedia. >Radiant< 16:17, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

But this is my point exactly: this sentiment (that some users should not be blocked for incivility) should be expressed in policy. The current uncompromising text of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA does not allow for exceptions, but that doesn't reflect the reality - which is that a casual editor would be indef blocked for habitual incivility, whereas valued contributors are given a pass. Note: I am not arguing for or against the practice here, only that the practice is in conflict with the stated policy. If the consensus is that there are exceptions to these policies, then those exceptions should be documented somewhere. ATren 16:39, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• I actually find very little reference to blocking on either page. NPA refers to blocking for legal/death threats, and "in extreme cases" it is "controversial" for users to be blocked for disruption. CIV lists a few suggestions to prevent incivility, several of which are widely impractical and several of which involve blocking (now reworded). I'm not sure where the idea comes from that incivility/personal attacks must in all or most cases be dealt with by blocking, because neither page says so. >Radiant< 16:47, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Anyway, it's covered by ignore all rules. If the rules hamper the work of building the encyclopaedia (for example by preventing Giano from contributing good content), then we can safely ignore them. Guy (Help!) 17:22, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
• Anyway, it's covered by ignore all rules. If the rules hamper the work of building the encyclopaedia (for example by preventing Giano from contributing good content), then we can safely ignore them. Guy (Help!) 17:23, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't like your way of thinking because it seems to presume that Guy and MONGO are somehow incapable of self-restraint. Granted they do a lot of good work dealing with editors who frustrate and annoy and attack them. Why does this cause them to use pointlessly inflammatory language like "fuck off" and "useless twat"? If you've ever worked retail then you've stood at a similar "firehose of crap" and probably not told anyone to "fuck off" (which would get you fired). In my view any normal person is capable of this sort of self-restraint. And it would be nice to see everyone use it. Christopher Parham (talk) 20:07, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Just a minor point here to all the people getting upset about "idiots" and "trolls". Why let "idiots" and "trolls" upset you so much? They are, as you say, idiots and trolls. Trolls will be pleased that you are getting upset, and idiots will, well, not really care or understand. Pity the idiots and trolls and dispassionately and calmly block them, rather than ranting and raving at them. POV pushers are another matter, and, in my opinion, a greater threat to Misplaced Pages, but they are being serious, so treat them seriously and civilly and defend balanced, well-written articles. Carcharoth 16:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Disruption is disruption and is just as detrimental to writing an encyclopedia as POV pushers are. Everyone should remain civil as much as possible but we are only human, and if someone is being trolled to death, Misplaced Pages then becomes just a battleground for them. I am not aware of all JzG has been dealing with, but no doubt, it is not very difficult to understand how disruptive editors can make almost anyone become a bit off center in their remarks. If one doesn't experience it firsthand, they don't really know how crappy this place can be, but the only way to defeat it without laying down the law and sometimes being rude, is to walk away...and that is what the trolls want. I don't condone incivility, but in examining it should be noted that, Misplaced Pages users, especially administrators, will not permit a user under attack to be isolated, but will support them. This may include reverting harassing edits, protecting or deleting pages, blocking users, or taking other appropriate action. Now, again, what JzG needs is polite reminders to remain civil...and he also needs opur support if he is indeed dealing with a constant barrage of harassment...or even if he is simply dealing with a little harassment.--MONGO 23:33, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Good in theory, difficult in practice. People screaming at you, taunting, mocking...the reason people do it is because it works. Guettarda 17:21, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I just have to say something here (speaking in general and not in direct response to this thread), I don't see what place swearing at someone has in a serious effort to write and maintain an encyclopedia. Swearing at someone (even someone whose sole purpose is to troll) just enflames the person and gives at least some onlookers the impression that that's an acceptable way to interact with people. It's unproductive all the way around. Blockable? No, but admins have all the tools they need to deal with disruptive editors, how is being aggressively hostile to a disruptive editor going to make them less disruptive? And in the meantime, borderline editors and newcomers will see that there's a place for hostile incivility here, which is a message I don't think we want to send. Rx StrangeLove 18:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I said it as a reviewer on PAIN, and I'll say it here: JzG's conduct was unacceptable for a sysop, and he needs to be reminded to maintain the decorum expected of the Misplaced Pages administration. If he cannot conduct himself appropriately, he is negatively affecting the environment here on Misplaced Pages, and should surrender his status. If he can, well then all's well that ends well. Cheers, * Peter M Dodge ( Talk to Me • Neutrality Project ) 18:29, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

And I'll say it plainly - people who are discussing blocking, or desysoping JzG for calling a disruptive and worthless contributor a twat are busybodies who should review Matthew 7:5. Hipocrite - «Talk» 18:36, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

How about being part of the problem, you try being part of the solution? Incivility, especially towards those trying to resolve a situation, is divisive and unnecessary. Cheers, * Peter M Dodge ( Talk to Me • Neutrality Project ) 19:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Strangely enough, that was where we came in. Do you honestly think I react like that when not provoked? It takes a fair bit of effort to get me angry, but one or two individuals seem to have made it a project to see how rude and aggressive they can be before I bite back. As games go it's not a particularly constructive one. Guy (Help!) 20:49, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Try to decrease the "temperature" of a situation - not increase it. Sysops should be examples of expected conduct on Misplaced Pages, and as such, breaches of policy by a sysop are more concerning than those of a normal editor. As such, I feel that you should be reminded to keep such decorum. Do I think you should be desysopped or blocked, or, oh I don't know, tarred and feathered? No. You made a mistake when provoked, all I'm asking is you learn from it :) Cheers, * Peter M Dodge ( Talk to Me • Neutrality Project ) 22:06, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I want to respond to Chihuahua. If an editor, any editor, is taking shit from another, there are means to deal with it. There is always a cavalry. You don't have to feel you are fighting a lone battle against a "twat". Someone else can come along and knock some sense into them, or help you conclude that said "twat" and sense can never be on speaking terms. No one gets "driven" to it. You don't have to fight a crusade against people who don't get it. You have the machinery to deal with it.

And yes, sorry, if there are punitive blocks for ordinary users who feel put upon by admins and snap, there are punitive blocks for admins who feel put upon by ordinary users and snap. It's better to have the rule of law than the law of the jungle. It's better in my view not to block punitively unless it is a matter of giving someone a bit of thinking space to correct how they see things though. If Guy thinks that the pressure is so much that he needs to abuse other people, maybe a day off to think about it wouldn't hurt. Maybe Guy needs some time away from areas in which he feels pressured. A bit of low-grade typochasing might help him get back on an even keel (I almost wrote "evil kin", which is a worry). He doesn't need blocking to give himself a bit of chilling-out time though. He just needs to figure out that he's let things get on top of him a bit, which I think he's probably well aware of.

And I think Peter also has it right. It doesn't actually resolve the problem with "twats" if you yell at them to fuck off! A bit of fuckoffery could probably be more readily forgiven if it didn't seem to be the first line of defence against editors who upset you but yes, I think we do need stakes and torches for those who aren't willing to try other methods of managing conflicts than simply escalating them. Grace Note 02:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

First there was "Pity the idiots and trolls", now there's the Spanish Inquisition with its stakes and torches. Bah. Like Guy, I have a very limited capacity for suffering fools, and like KC I believe in accuracy. A troll is a troll, an idiot is an idiot, a POV pusher is a POV pusher. Period. In fact this motley collection of trolls, idiots and POV pushers that so many are defending in the guise of "civility" are hurting Misplaced Pages's reputation. Several of my wife's friends have contacted me asking if there wasn't something that could be done about the banal and inane objections raised by the trolls, idiots and POV pushers, as reading their comments on the discussion pages has turned them against using Misplaced Pages as a reliable source. None of them, however, had any gripes about trolls, idiots and POV pushers being treated in an uncivil manner, in fact they noted that these clowns are tolerated far more than they should be. &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 11:21, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

And that kind of attitude just gives them an excuse to act the way they do. Just H 02:43, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Guy Chapman needs to get gone from Misplaced Pages. He has a distinct anti-Catholic animus, inserts his opinions into matters he shouldn't as ad admin (matters about which he knows nothing in the first place), and has trashed the Fish Eaters website, getting it blacklisted for no good reason, and treating its owner like crap in the process. He is rude, illogical, arrogant, unreasonably punitive, hypocritical, unforgiving, and mean. He makes editing Wiki pages a little bit like touring Hell. 75.46.79.200 03:53, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah, a Fish Eaters troll. Very nice. Was wondering when they were going to pop up. -bbatsell ?? 03:57, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Mmm-hmm... and you think this because of what Chapman says, right? Right. Someone defending her website against accusations of "spamming" isn't "trolling." 75.46.69.90 21:01, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Regarding Atren

So, as I read this thread, it seems there is consensus that a certain amount of incivility is permitted as long as (a) you have a lot of edits to your credit and (b) you were provoked. Can we make it more clear in policy that incivility is permitted under these circumstances? Because the policy pages seem very clear that it is not permitted under any circumstances, and the reality seems to be not so clear cut. All I'm saying is when an editor visits WP:NPA and WP:CIVIL and sees these idealistic, uncompromising statements about personal attacks and civility, they get the impression that these are inviolable rules that can never be broken, when it's clear that WP:IAR applies to civility. I think we should qualify those policies to soften the stance somewhat (especially WP:NPA which is especially uncompromising) to reflect the reality not promote the false ideal. ATren 21:18, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I have told ATren in no uncertain terms that he was to stop needling JzG over this issue. As you may or may not know, ATren is in a protracted dispute with JzG over the article on Personal Rapid Transit, and is transparently using this time of high Wikistress for JzG to attempt to make his experience here worse. I told ATren in no uncertain terms to stop this reprehensible behavior twice -> , and . As demonstrated directly above, he has decided to ignore my strongly worded advice. I suggest an adminstrator take appropriate corrective action to protect one of our most valuable editors and adminstrators in his time of need from ATren's desire to hurt people he has had disputes with. Hipocrite - «Talk» 21:29, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I have no desire to hurt anybody. I simply presented evidence on a user with which I have a contentious history. Durova clearly stated that she thought this was an isolated incident, and I replied that it was not, with diffs. Is that stalking?

And now I've made comments that the policy is at odds with consensus here. Policy is unswerving in condemning incivility, but consensus is obviously not so clear. It's clear that a certain amount of incivility is permitted for valuble contributors. So the policy is at odds with practice, and that should be resolved. That's it.

Frankly, I would find it quite ironic if I were blocked for simply reporting incivility here. I'm sure if I were involved in a conflict with another editor, JzG would not hesitate to chime in with his views. Why am I called a stalker for simply presenting evidence? I should point out that I'm not the first to question JzG's incivility, and in fact I didn't even start any of the recent threads. Why am I being singled out? ATren 21:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

May I address that? In general, the more positive an editor's contribution history is the less intervention is necessary to get them to self-correct. I don't construe that as a license to be rude. Durova 04:04, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Incivility isn't permissable. But it is forgivable. Regards, Ben Aveling 10:09, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

2nd arbitrary section break

If your history consists mostly of vandalism or disruption, then calling someone a "twat" or telling them to "fuck off" should earn a well-deserved block. On the other hand, if you're a hard-working, productive contributor who makes the same comment in a moment of weakness when the Wikistress level hits DefCon 1, then a gentle word-to-the-wise should suffice. Actions should be viewed in context - why else are edit histories public? This is not a "double standard"; it's common sense. Policies actually reflect this - neither WP:NPA nor WP:CIVIL specify a punishment (except for egregious cases), but leave that to the discretion of the community. By the same token, Durova is a valued, hard-working, and scrupulously fair editor who's trying to do what s/he thinks is right, by bringing the issue here; going after Durova is also uncalled for. Let's give Guy a chance to cool off; based on his history here, he's earned it, and will learn from this incident. Just my 2-c-. MastCell 20:42, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Meh. I'm cool enough now, although I nearly went ballistic after reading Barbiero's sanctimonious bullshit about me having decided he's my enemy - I don't think I'm the one following someone around and stirring up trouble in his interactions with others. He's attacked Nick, Dmcdevit, me and now Radiant - if that carries on he's set to attack one admin too many, and we know where that will end up. I updated the disclaimer on my Talk page anyway. Guy (Help!) 21:05, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

*shrug* I'm not attacking you, Nick, Dmcdevit or Radiant. I'm asking for some civil behaviour and responsibility, and I hope we can try to get along. I'm trying not to act in a hostile way to you, but making accusations of stalking and using phrases like "sanctimonious bull" make it hard to.

It should not be such a big thing for a well intentioned established editor to ask an admin to moderate their language, or check potentially controversial actions with others before proceeding. Constant review by others is the way the wiki works, this includes admin actions and behaviours. Frankly, I'm confused by some of the admin who are professing otherwise. --Barberio 22:08, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Reads to me like JzG has decided to ignore you and you're desperate for acceptance. I reccomended you walk away before - I triple reccomend that now. Trust me, you are earning nothing but poop. Hipocrite - «Talk» 22:42, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yesterday I made a tough decision. Guy doesn't hold it against me so I'll respond to the people who do. Quite a few of the negative comments appear to reflect unfamiliarity with my contributions. My respect for longstanding contributors is demonstrated at Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Piotrus-Ghirla/Evidence#Evidence_presented_by_Durova and ArbCom has deferred its case to User:Durova/Mediation. Yet I ask the people who wax about Guy's value at this project to consider this and this and this and this. Guy hasn't threatened to leave the site but I'm beginning to worry about Ghirla whose contributions are about equally valuable but Ghirla's not a sysop and considerably less popular. Down in the trenches I'm also struggling to retain another good editor. His frustration might not have reached the breaking point if other admins had responded to either of the two reports that got filed here about a very persistent vandal.

I happen to believe in Misplaced Pages:What_adminship_is_not#Adminship_is_not_diplomatic_immunity and I walk the walk. Over at another arbitration case I apologized and struck through one very mild statement to a troublesome editor I had presented evidence against. Look at how much goodwill that simple action purchased: the same editor is branching out from a single purpose account to become more of a productive Wikipedian and I've offered to give the Barnstar of Resilience when one of her pages gets onto Template:Did you know. I get hounded too (see Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Gundagai editors) and some editors try to exploit my goodwill. Yet I don't deliver a kick in the pants when I show someone the door. That kind of action validates the folks at Misplaced Pages Review. I shouldn't have to state this matter a third time, but my block warning to Guy was not punitive: it would have prevented him from dropping more f-bombs in the unlikely event he thought that was a-okay. I handled the situation exactly the same way I would have handled habitual profanity from an unsysopped editor of equal merit. Maybe that was wrong, but so many of the criticisms have misrepresented the basic facts of my actions that I find it hard to weigh the resulting analysis. I hope the administrators who want to ease the burden on folks like Guy and MONGO (and me!) will help out with more tough cases and investigations - not just pile onto stuff that's already high profile but look around the way I do for messes where no other mop is anywhere in sight. Durova 01:42, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

For the record, Durova was right to speak up about incivility here. All the people 'jumping to the defense of JzG' have it exactly backwards... Durova was the one helping JzG. The stuff about, 'we do not block for occasional incivility', is half right... we generally don't block admins and other 'high profile' users for such. Regular users, on the other hand, sometimes get blocked for saying a single word out of line. The philosophy that 'we look at the whole picture' inherently means that longstanding and/or popular users are held to lower standards of behaviour... which we have seen become a self-defeating trap over and over and over again. That 'occaisional incivility' adds up, and when people see users being incivil and getting away with it they respond in kind. If they then are then blocked/strongly warned for it while the other person isn't they get pissed off at the imbalance and the spiral of deterioration continues. It is obviously bad for Misplaced Pages and if it isn't stopped sooner or later it always catches up to people. There was a time when Karmafist was well loved and his 'occaisional incivility' let pass... until it got to be too much. There was a time when Kelly Martin was well loved and her 'occaisional incivility' not a big deal... until it alienated too many people. You want to 'protect' good users? Stop them from being uncivil, don't violate policies yourself and attack those who are pointing out problems, and do what you can to take on some of their burdens... kinda like Durova was doing. --CBD 10:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Look at this and tell me then who was out of line! Not only had this editor posted this "crank" on WP:PAIN, he had posted the exact same paragraph on WP:RFC/USER twice and been reverted. He knew he was out of line and Guy was being overly nice by not beating him with the blockhammer. MartinDK 11:17, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Let's see... Yrgh got upset about TAnthony calling him an idiot, he acted out, he got blocked and insulted again by JzG. Who was "out of line"? All of the above. Obviously. It's not an 'either / or' equation. Incivility breeds more incivility breeds more incivility. Everyone who contributes to the problem is part of the problem. --CBD 12:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

OK, CBD. I'll be clear here. Guy was out-of-line; and I don't think he'd do it again. He is one of the most hard-working administrators on Misplaced Pages and exercises good judgment most of the times. But do you realise there are users who assume bad faith with everyone and are regularly uncivil and disruptive themselves; Guy was provoked here, and he did not react nicely. Do you realise the user who posted the civility warning on JzG's talk was being uncivil and disruptive himself? Strings and threads of warnings on his talk page. The same user posts a {{npa}} template on Guy's talk; and when Guy reverts him he takes it to WP:PAIN, citing the words "fuck off" again and again and again, despite being uncivil, assuming bad faith – disregarding comments with regard to policies and guidelines with an holier than thou approach. That is "sanctimonious bullshit". I know where you are coming from, and you have the best intentions for Guy and Misplaced Pages as a whole, however a block warning by another administrator is frankly, out-of-line in itself. Would it help the situation get better? Definitely not. So, instead of giving more leverage to the arguments of such ... uh... over-assertive users, and rapping the knuckles of established administrators, we can all get back to editing articles. — Nearly Headless Nick 15:11, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

The way to 'avoid giving more leverage' is to not violate the behaviour standards in the first place and not 'turn a blind eye' when it happens. If 'knuckles get rapped' in a fair and consistent manner they have nothing to complain about. If people are attacked for daring to suggest that the civility policies apply to everyone... THAT 'gives them leverage'. --CBD 17:11, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I'd like to see the approach covered by "I happen to believe in Misplaced Pages:What_adminship_is_not#Adminship_is_not_diplomatic_immunity and I walk the walk." tempered by an eye for context. I wish the first question that went through an administrator's mind before intervention would be: what effect does this infraction have on the encyclopedia? The next questions could be: is there a hurry? and: will this cause a debate-fest, with the inevitable escalation that produces? And I'd like to suggest some slack be cut for administrators letting their guard down in non-article space like this page. The atmosphere gets a bit newsgroupy, so I'm saddened to see what is said offhandedly by good, hard-working users being policed just because they happen to say it in a room full of police, or to see one user's opportunistic stirrring being given the time of day: let complaints go through procedure, giving everyone time to think.

Despite dissimilarities with the Giano situation, I do notice one similarity. In both cases, a relatively harmless discussion on this page got out of control when diffs were suddenly bandied about and chased up. It seems to me that nothing administrators say here should lead to disciplinary procedures in the absence of a formal complaint (say to diff conjurors something like: "if you are bothered, make a formal complaint with a new heading, preferably after giving it a day or two's thought"). From what I can see, this started with one chap saying something a bit sharp, followed by someone telling him to tone it down: that should have been the end of it. In my opinion, another user pulled the triangle trap which I've seen on Supernanny, and I wish one of our best and most diligent administrators hadn't walked into it in all good faith. I'd also like to see administrators asking themselves whether speed is required for any particular block: in this case the various diffs, which were not fresh, could have been mulled over for a day or two (during which it would have been found that a certain word was relatively innocuous), because the only urgent reason to block someone, in my opinion, is to stop them damaging Misplaced Pages: in this case, that didn't apply.qp10qp 19:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree with what CBD is saying here. My philosophy is summed up at User:Carcharoth/Philosophy. This can be a hard thing to stick to, but no-one said this was going to be easy. In the long-term, breeding incivility is a very bad thing. I see too much of people seeing themselves as aggressive defenders of the project, and being attackers of trolls, and being firemen (and women) dealing with huge amounts of crap. I don't dispute that there are huge amounts of crap being added, but bringing yourself down to that level doesn't actually help. Constantly try to rise above it. Help others involved in this. If they are getting dragged down to the breaking point, point this out to them. Be a role model for others. Carcharoth 19:01, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Now I see how Misplaced Pages got to be a Top 10 website. It's all you knuckleheads resorting to vulgar epithets to dismiss those with conflicting views, then the victims signing in sixteen times an hour to cry and whine about it. Great encyclopedia, guys. --JossBuckle Swami 04:28, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

i can see why Guy would be angry, if the person wasted his time. However is an indef block warranted? Geo. 06:29, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't really get the whole 'wasted time' bit. Yrgh complained that TAnthony had made personal attacks on him. TAnthony HAD made personal attacks on him. I haven't reviewed it in detail, but I saw that in just a cursory review. If Guy didn't see that and blew it off that's probably what led to Yrgh's complete meltdown... which sadly WAS extreme and worthy of a serious block. As he hasn't made any effort at communication since (that I know of) it is difficult to see if there would be any way to get him to calm down. -CBD 08:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Guy calling someone a twat was definately not ok. He apologized for that too. What should have happened at that point was that someone should have said to Guy "Look, you are getting too worked up now. Take a break, Misplaced Pages won't collapse if you are not here. Go watch some TV or something." Instead what happened was that everyone who felt a need to get even with Guy came running and started to fuel the fire hoping that they could get Guy blocked because he finally got too stressed and made a mistake. This is what upsets me greatly because Guy wasn't on at the time so the only people left to defend him were his friends who, granted, were equally eager to get even with those who fueled the fire to begin with. At that point all hell broke loose and I don't think any of us are proud of that. Hopefully what we have learned from this is that these situations are much better resolved by giving the stressed out editor (in this case Guy) a friendly "warning" telling him that he needs to take a break for a few hours or so and let others deal with spammers and the firehose of crap. MartinDK 08:51, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

May I humbly point out a remarkable coincidence about this episode, considering that it's JzG who's involved. The case, where a casual remark which is almost a jovial term of endearment in the UK comes across as a deadly and unforgivable insult in another time zone, parallels the G'Gugvuntts and Vl'hurgs case. From what I've read all have been acting with the best of intentions, and while Guy will no doubt have washed his mouth out with soap, it's worth remembering that Zaphod's ship is The Heart of Gold. And in all cases, not just with admins, I'd hope that previous good behaviour is always taken into account when handing down sentences. I rest my case, m'lud.... dave souza, talk 12:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

After reading through all this, I think brenneman said it the best. To paraphrase him, we don't accept bad behaviour from established contributors, we just handle it differently. In my view, having an admin flag should be totally irrelevant. Setting up an "admins don't block admins" guideline will just give ammunition to those who suggest admins are too tightly knit. Also, WP:IAR shouldn't be used as an excuse to sidestep this question. Obviously, when dealing with other admins, an admin will take a different approach than when dealing with a known vandal. But at the end of the day, either an admin has the authority to block another admin or they don't - and this needs to be in writing somewhere.

Of course, someone who is an admin is much more likely to be contributing to the community than a random user, and those contributions should be taken into account. In this case, JzG is a clearly established contributor, who has done a lot of good work on Misplaced Pages (including use of his admin tools). So he earns a warning and a "please apologize", when a new user would have been blocked for posting the exact same things he did. But it's because of his contribution history, not just because he's an admin. It's a subtle difference, but I feel it's important to make the distinction.

On the swearing issue - Misplaced Pages isn't censored. However, that doesn't give people a licence to swear whenever they want. When writing an article about a CEO who was fired for having an affair with a secretary, there's no need to use a phrase like, "He got sacked for grabbing his hot-to-trot secretary and fucking her brains out". Swearing can be used, but when appropriate - both in main-space, and in talk-space. Can swearing be used in a conversation to make a point? Fuck, yeah! But it loses its point-making impact if every other post is an f-bomb. I'm particularly disturbed by the suggestion that "Fuck you" is a personal attack, but "Fuck off" and "Leave me alone" are both perfectly fine, and identical to each other. "Fuck off" can mean lots of different things when saying it to someone's face - but things are different on the net.

For the record, in Australia, twat's just a minor insult, like "silly twat". But we make sure to mention that to American visitors, just like we mention terms like "fanny". Come on, how can you not know what a fanny pack is? You silly - uh oh, I almost said twats. :-p Quack 688 18:55, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I heard of the American woman who told her New Zealander host family that she liked rooting for her home football team. One young man's reaction was, "What, the whole team?" -- Donald Albury 21:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Disputed indef block of User:Nkras

Nkras was indef blocked by Zscout370, and several editors are requesting a review of the block. The relevant talk pages are User talk:Nkras, User talk:Coredesat, and User talk:Zscout370. — coelacan talk — 02:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

To simplify, Nkras was asked not to repost content from an article called Traditional marriage, which was deleted via an AFD. While the deletions of the reposted content were by Coredesat, I was the one who did the block. I chose an indefinite block because of one of the summaries Nkras used to recreate the content. The summary, as repasted at User_talk:Zscout370#Nkras.27_block, felt like taunting and refuse to listen to consensus. He was blocked before, though it was retracted some time later by that same admin. I feel that it was his intent to disrupt Misplaced Pages by reposting the content, and with his recreation statement, I felt that he would have caused more harm than good. User:Zscout370 02:35, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

i've taken it to ArbCom. Zscout370 made very clear he wasn't changing his mind and i, for one, don't want to waste my breath with him. we don't need to kneel down and beg admins to just act like decent people. we don't need to beg them at all. they need to take their role as servants of the project more seriously than that. i dunno how long Zscout has been an admin, but i'll bet he likes power and tossing it around. r b-j 05:06, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Please see my comments on the requests for arbitration page. The Arbitration Committee will not consider this matter until earlier stages in dispute resolution are exhausted. This discussion is the appropriate place at which a consensus on this block should be reached. I will add that while the block appears harsh, personal attacks on the blocking administrator do not advance the discussion. Newyorkbrad 05:09, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Wow. That's quite a jump there, going from a block that you disagree with to complete assumption of bad faith and personal attacks. POV forks are bad. Immediately recreating them after they are rightfully deleted (AfD here) is bad and reeks of intentional disruption and violation of consensus. If the user has no history of this, then okay, shortening the block might be acceptable; however, my understanding is that is not the case here and in fact the user had been blocked for POV pushing before. Where is the evidence that they are here to build an encyclopedia consistent with our goals? I don't see it. -bbatsell ?? 05:24, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

My (now deleted) summary of the matter is at http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=User_talk:Nkras&oldid=98587038#Overreaction.3F — coelacan talk — 06:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

That + the responses from the blocked party pretty much sums up and ends the matter in my book. Unless there's something big I've missed in reviewing this, I firmly endorse the block. -bbatsell ?? 07:11, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm also of the opinion that the indefinate block is an excessive time period. User:Nkras has a strong opinion on the subject of marriage and what is the definition of marriage. I came to article when a WP:RFPP was placed granting full protection and later removed that same protection after discussions on the article talk page had taken place. During those discussions Nkras was an active participant but he was also able to agree to a IMHO reasonible compromise see this discussion. Whist a block for his actions were necessary IHMO is that a short term block to enable him to consider his actions would have been sufficient. Additionally Arbcom set a precedent of restricted editing to other editors who have strong opinions than Nkras which should also be considered like at Talk:Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy with User:Raphael1. Gnangarra 07:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I am Strongly Oppose this indefinite block. I was one of the users who was both affected by (and highly irritated by) his contentious edits. However, the fact remains that he was the principal author of the compromise reached about the opening section of the Marriage article. He drafted the text that now stands, with input of several other editors. It is a classic example of how Misplaced Pages is supposed to work. Yes, he has made several mistakes in his time at Misplaced Pages, but he has learned from them, and I have seen him grow. As to his recreation of the traditional marriage article, as has already been pointed out, it was substantially different from the article that was deleted. While the admins who acted against the recreation may not have known this, it goes a long way towards clarifying his intentions, and his frustration at seeing it deleted once again. I would like to add that this entire situation has been highly stressful for many editors here. One user has already left the project due to the block of Nkras, and I am considering leaving myself. I urge you to rescind this block, which is causing more damage than it was supposed to prevent. Jeffpw 10:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• While I fully endorse this block, its duration seems to me too harsh. Nkras has only one previous block, and it was lifted only one hour later. He's not a persistent troblemaker, and block no longer than a week is appropriate in this case, IMO. MaxSem 11:02, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
• Per Maxsem. While I fully endorse this block, an indef is a bit much. Give him a week off and make it absolutely clear to this fellow that "Consensus" is absolutely vital and that we must stick by it. What is more, also make it clear to him that DRV exists for a reason. Though an indef is a bit much, this editor's conduct sticks badly in the craw. Moreschi 11:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
  • The block was totally appropriate, especially given the edit summary for the recreation and the statement "I will not agree to any "consensus"". I fully endorse the block. Zscout should not be in any way sanctioned for what i deem to be a perfectly appropriate block of a user who specifically stated they will ignore concensus achieved and judged upon by a neutral administrator at AfD, and go and recreate an article after specifically being told not to (but rather to go to DRV) three times! However, I would agree to an unblock in a week's time or so, on the provision that if he recreates the content, or acts disruptively in any form related to Zscout, Cored. or any other editor involved, he is blocked indef. Daniel.Bryant 12:13, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I absolutely agree with you on two points: no sanctions against Zscout370 (it was one, isolated overreaction in good faith) should be taken, and that when an if Nkras will be unblocked, his next action against consensus should result in indef or something close to that. But even such incivil and stupid comment as the one you've quoted shouldn't result in indef with no serious violations in background. MaxSem 12:35, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I think this could be put down to a series of unfortunate events. I don't think Zscout's reaction could be accurately described as an "overreaction"; it was more the fact that he might have seen a bunch of edits that screamed "indef" at him, and missed all the good stuff. It's why we have WP:AGF, and I think Zscout is entitled to a lot of it, and Nkras a little bit as well :) Also, see Mangojuice's comment below - he sums up the distinction between "indefinite" and "infinte" quite nicely; this misunderstanding is probably cause for most angst. Daniel.Bryant 12:58, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I think Zscout acted correctly on the information available, whats happening here is an act of good faith from those that have interated with Nkras knowing that once the initial heat is removed from the action he's capable of reaching a consensus. With this knowledge the community wants to extend to Nkras the opportunity to again participate as such I think an appropriate warning to Nkras that further such actions wont be tolerated and that the indefinated block will be reimpossed if he repeats such actions. Gnangarra 13:14, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• I fully endorse Zscout's decision to indefinitely block. The user in question has disrupted Misplaced Pages and has made statements that he will continue to do so. Remember that an "indefinite" block is not an "infinite" one -- if Nkras changes his attitude the situation could change. But until then, I see no reason to allow him to return to editing after time off -- time seems unlikely to settle his behavior. Mangojuice 12:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Perfectly summed up - this distinction (indefinite != infinte) is probably the cause of all the angst in this dispute. Another perfect example, from 5mins ago, is here. Daniel.Bryant 13:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

How does Nkras demonstarte a change in attitude without being able to edit? Gnangarra 13:14, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Emails and talk page discussions (assuming his talk isn't protected) saying that he will not be disruptive would show a good faith attempt at a change in attitude. Oh and agree with Mangojuice and Daniel Bryant (and assumedly Zscout) that indef != ban. Its amazingly simple to shorten a block if assurances to stop disruptive actions are forthcoming. Syrthiss 13:23, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I have emailed Nkras, and urged him to email Zscout to discuss this block and how to have it removed. And to paraphrase what was stated above, if we as a community are to assume good faith on the part of administrators, I would hope that admins can extend the same courtesy to new users who are still learning how the Wiki process works. Jeffpw 13:34, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

While I fully respect the decision to block any user with repeated disruptive edits on "hot" topics that claim to "ignore consensus". However, I cannot help but feel that a few things were a little off with the way it happened. First, ZScout said at the RfA discussion that the user's eit summaries were "taunting the admins". I've got the feeling that Nkras's edits were not the main reason why ZScout blocked him, but more because he refused to respect the admin's "authority". Then, the "consensus" citation is off context, as Nkras was making a very good point, per WP:IAR. Furthermore, while I like the technicity and poetry of the infinite/indefinite disambiguation, it not fair to the blocked user (nor is it textually correct: "Infinite block" wouldn't apply to its duration, but to all its aspects, so it couldn't apply here): There is a reason why we have 24h, 1weekand 2 weeksblocks. Else we could just indefblock everyone and be done with it. An indefblock makes a user feel at the mercy of the first admin. That's good sometimes: some people need to understand that there is a regulation mechanism here; but right now it's a tad too much.

Now, I'd like everyone to understand me real good: I don't like that guy, and if after his 1 week block and some good explanations about why there are talk pages he went back to disruptive edits, commentsand summaries, and then was bloocked indefinitely, I'd be more than happy. But after a short block to let him browse the policies and guidelines, and make his own mind as to wether he wants to be a part of this or not. Not before. Thanks for reading.--SidiLemine 14:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

<< I've got the feeling that Nkras's edits were not the main reason why ZScout blocked him, but more because he refused to respect the admin's "authority". >>

That's assumption of bad faith without a shred of evidence. In fact, he wasn't going against the authority of administrators, he was going against the authority of the community. WP:IAR does not apply to violating consensus (<< I will not agree to any "consensus" >>), it applies to skipping unnecessary and inapplicable process. -bbatsell ?? 15:38, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• I endorse the indef block of Nkras. He is not a bumbling newbie. He appears to be an upholder of 'absolute truth', which explains his refusal to accept consensus. As such, he is unlikely to accomodate himself to the policies and guidelines of Misplaced Pages, where, after all, verifiability comes before 'truth'. -- Donald Albury 15:20, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
  • I disagree, Donald. Nkras has been here for exactly 2 months, and of his 289 edits, only 76 are to articles themselves. The vast majority are on various talk pages, which doesn't really give one experience in consensus building or constructive editing. In my eyes, he is relatively new, and deserves a chance to learn from his mistakes. Jeffpw 15:30, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
    • "Being unlikely to accomodate" doesn't mean he won't. Unblocking the guy after a week, and watching him closely won't cost much. If he really is the absolute truth upholder you say he is, it won't take two hours after that to ban him once and for good. Oh, and verifiability is not consensus. — Preceding unsigned comment added by $yD! (talk • contribs) SidiLemine (UTC)
      • I think part of the issue here is that some of you don't have the perspective admins have. I have had the experience in the past of giving a user the benefit of the doubt and trying to monitor their behavior. Several times, in fact. I've learned to be conservative because, let's face it, the upside to any one editor being honestly involved in the project is usually small, but there's a very big downside to disruptive ones. A couple examples that spring to mind are User:Hurricane Devon and User:Aquafish, that I was personally involved in. The truth is, one admin watching closely means that they have to divert a good portion of their attention, and be on-wiki 24/7, and spend a lot of time analyzing borderline behavior, agonizing aboud whether to reblock, possibly discussing with other admins, whereas that time could be spent much more productively if the user was simply blocked. Mangojuice 16:23, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
• I endorse this block. shows complete contempt for Wiki ways in the face of some very patient explanations of how to go about this the right way. No angry mastodons, thanks. Guy (Help!) 16:04, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

While I am the first to admit he was at times obstructive and contentiopus in his edits on the MArriage article, the diff above gives a distorted picture of events there. This diff and this one and last one here clearly show he was working quite collegially with other editors after tempers had died down. Please try to show a complete picture of his editing on Misplaced Pages, and not only negative examples. Jeffpw 16:19, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Comment on process. One of things that bothered me about this dispute and the reason for my limited involvement, was that User:Nkras was given no explanation by the blocking admin of the unblock procedure. I would hope that the subject of such sanction would always have it explained to them at the time how they can have the decision reviewed. I wonder if there are any thoughts on this point? As to the block itself- yes, an indef block does seem rather long. But given that Nkras has not in his later posts to his talk page expressed regret for his disruption or an undertaking not to disrupt in the same manner again, I recognise that he gives little reason to trust him. WJBscribe  16:29, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Didn't he change his ways even before being blocked? Anyway, I think I can say that we have reached a consensus that while a block is in order, an indefblock is too much. Now we probably should decide upon the reasonable length the block should have. I personally think one week is enough. --SidiLemine 16:41, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Support for SidiLemine's compromise block, with the proviso that Nkras is put on some sort of monitoring/mentoring restriction. Jeffpw 16:44, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

This isn't a vote. Theresa Knott has asked for Nkras to clarify his future behavior, let's start there. Mangojuice 16:48, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Mangojuice, we all know this is not a vote. This is a discussion of whether this indefinite block was appropriate or not, and an attempt to reach consensus about what should be done. As such, my support of SidiLemine's attempt at a solution was appropriate. Please don't be pedantic. Jeffpw 16:59, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Peace. Mangojuice does make a totally valid point. Until Nkras has clarified how he intends to conduct himself in future there really is no way of determining how long a block is appopriate. If he says, "I will do everything in my power to undermine this scocially left institution," he prob shouldn't be unblocked. If he says, "I am very sorry and promise to always work towards concensus constructively in future," a shorter block might be appropriate. Without his response the discussion is slightly hypothetical. WJBscribe  17:09, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely. Blocks are preventive, a credible commitment to no further disruption would likely be persuasive in an unblock request. That said, the block is warranted due to the statements made. So. See what happens, I think. Guy (Help!) 17:15, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Herein lies the problem with editors, editing articles they have strong personal feelings about... I agree with what Mangjuice said above. Based on Nkras's statments in some of the diffs provided above he appears ready to embark on some tenditious editing in regards to this topic. I'd like to see him submit a request for block review or comment on his userpage committing to working on a consensus instead of editing in a way that could be seen as disruptive or WP:POINT-making. the ArbCom is premature. I don't see any evidence RfM or RfC was ever pursued here. We have those for a reason.--Isotope23 17:28, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
  • OK. Is he aware that he should state that helearned, and won't do it again? And slightly off-topic, isn't therea risk in these kind of situations that the guy just understands he got banned, and doesn't even come back to check his talk page? Just asking. We also have block warning templates for a reason. --SidiLemine 17:43, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
    • He has edited numerous times since the block; in my opinion, the tone of those edits is not at all an improvement and more clearly delineates his role as a POV warrior. Check his contribs. Plus, he was blocked for POV pushing once before; that's about as big a block warning template as you can get. He apparently expressed enough regret to get CanadianCaesar to unblock him before the block was to expire, but he went right back to it only a few days later. -bbatsell ?? 17:50, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
      • Plus, there are pointers to this discussion and the WP:RFAR on his talk page. Just because he's blocked doesn't mean he can't read those discussions. Mangojuice 18:31, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
        • Nkras posted on his talk page, stating that during a block of two weeks, he will study up on policy. I am pretty much fine with that because it shows that Nkras has made error and is making some effort to fix it. I am not sure what policies that Nkras should read other than WP:NPOV and Misplaced Pages:Deletion policy, since those are the two core issues. What do yall think? User:Zscout370 23:40, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
          • • Discussion of the unblock by Nkras himself: User_talk:Nkras#Proposal_to_unblock_User:nkras. User:Zscout370 23:44, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

(losing indent) I am not happy with the last sentence. I will not agree to his terms so to speak. However I do think he should be unblocked. I propose this - we unblock for a different time period - say a week (or even straight away if you like) . We advise him to read up on the relavent policies. He can choose not if he likes, I don't care. When he comes back if he engages in further disruptive edits we block him indefinately - end of discussion. That way we don't have to negiotiate with a problematic editor or have to concede to him some power to be the arbiter of truth, and still give him a chance to learn to edit in cooperation with others. What do people think? Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 01:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I will probably let this ferment for a day or two, since you, myself and another person told him about the last sentence. While it is good he is addressing the block, I just do not see anything that convinces me yet of if the block should be shortened, let alone lifted. User:Zscout370 03:17, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I am very disappointed at Nkras' reaction. The last sentence he wrote in his "unblock proposal", User:nkras reserves the right to edit and discuss articles based upon objective truth and fact without retaliation by Admins or Editors. suggests that he will continue the same practices that led to the current situation we find ourselves in. Though I have been one of the most vocal proponents of having his block rescinded, I don't feel it is up to Nkras to dictate the terms of his reentry to the community. Nkras has been given a very thorough hearing, and I am now satisfied with whatever decision the administrators wish to return. <sigh> Jeffpw 05:44, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I am uninvolved, but after reading his skewed proposal, I will have to say I will vehemently reject it. His last sentence is an equivalent to upending not only his entire proposed "compromise," but also core Misplaced Pages policies with it with his "I'm-right-and-you-better-get-the-hell-out-of-my-face" attitude. Sorry, we're not here to mollycoddle one single editor that the community barely trusts anymore. We're not here to be forced onto a negotiating table with an editor who has blatantly and steadfastly refused to accept consensus as a benchmark for inclusion in Misplaced Pages, detailed ad nauseum in various pages spanning Misplaced Pages and beyond. --physicq (c) 06:09, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

"...and beyond"? — coelacan talk — 06:38, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

IRC. Oh yes, I forgot that that place is admin/editor cabal only. Never mind. --physicq (c) 23:00, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

As to the block itself, I have no comment; I'm just trying to clarify things. He considers "kosher" important as an example of language usage. To understand the point he's trying to make with the example currently on his talk page, one may need the context of the preceding discussion. It's referenced in several places at Talk:Marriage/Archive3, but gets detailed in the section preceding this diff with an addendum here. — coelacan talk — 03:24, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I've decided to try unblocking him. I feel generally that indefinate blocks are for hopeless cases and I don't (yet) feel he is one. Although my discussion with him hasn't been 100% what I asked for, it has gone well enough. He is not IMO the sort of nut that needs to be permenantly banned. What he does now will prove me right or wrong. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 01:04, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

NLP update - Some COI issues and reluctance of some editors to get along (and some positive points)

Hi all. Recent notifications concerning the NLP article have covered promotional obscuring of views (suppression of information ) and users of a known COI editing the article To be found under "Comaze" Under "NLP article specific examples of promotional obscuring of facts and relevant views" . An admin has already civilly explained the situation to those above editors . Also Cleanup taskforce has asked for a serious cleanup of the article - including reducing redundancy and making the debate more concise and contained . Efforts to balance views emphasizing the concept seem to be getting ignored -

"It is important that the various views and the subject as a whole are presented in a balanced manner and that each is summarized as if by its proponents to its best ability. This is because neutrality requires much more than simply citing verifiable sources or proving a point -- it requires using credible sources to accurately represent a broad range of views and a balanced overview."

Some editors have been persistently trying to suppress core information from the opening and these tend to be the ones reluctant to get along with those of a different view , ,

,,

There is still a misuse of argumentative words to avoid. There is no need at all for the argumentative or debate word "however" in the line yet they insist. . Their behaviour seems to me to be highly unconstructive considering the assessment of the CleanupTaskforce.

Editors have been ignoring efforts to make the article more concise (without obscuring views), by physically distancing the discussion on the article - and by removing it completely from discussion .

There is some evidence of editors with known COI making odd edits on other articles .

On the positive side - there are fewer edits per day (usually less than 40). A lot of the problem was caused by the plus 50 eds per day which has led to an oversized article. The CleanupTaskforce has given helpful instructions to make the article more concise and to clarify what NLP is about. I don't see any particular problem long term and I'm fairly sure editors will come round to the idea that editors of different views are supposed to try to get along. Once they properly discuss the suppression of information policy I'm sure a win-win can be achieved. Trolling - sockuppetry - and meatpuppetry don't seem to me to be an issue. I believe the main point is to encourage editors of various views to work together collaboratively and civilly in the long term. AlanBarnet 07:06, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

All other editors on the NLP page are in agreement that AlanBarnet (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is either a sockpuppet of long-term abuser HeadleyDown or he is equally bad. At least two more independent users on his talk page have identified him as a sockpuppet also. However, even in his own right, this new user has exhausted all patience with his disinformation, distortion, and lies (much of which continues above). This is his third WP:AN/I notice about content disagreement. A block has been requested before. 58.178.142.37 07:47, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Hello user 58.178.142.37. The editors you mention all seem to be keen on obscuring key views or at the very least they are all reluctant to make clear concise statements of each view. I've provided edits and discussion recently and on multiple prior occasions and encouraged discussion concerning getting along and making sure that each view is concisely summarized to the best of each view. Rather than discussing or adjusting my edits - others have tried to either marginalize the discussion or in your case - delete my edits altogether without discussion on a regular basis - call me a troll with venom - and restore argumentative debate into the article. I believe that most would see your actions as unreasonable. I havn't tried to cut away - reduce- or obscure any of the sourced NLP views. You and others seem to have obscured the views of science either by removing them from the lead - reduce them so they become obscure - add undue argument - or cover them with nonrelevant information. All the article needs is to present the subject of NLP with each view summarized so that it becomes clear to the reader. This can all be done without excess size and it can be done civilly. This is not a content disagreement. Its about COI - obscuring key views - getting along- and a simple enough NPOV solution. AlanBarnet 08:49, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Your diffs above clearly show several other editors consistently reverting you. Can't you see that only incriminates yourself as the editor that pushed an edit-war? 58.179.166.57 01:31, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• It has been asserted by others that AlanBarnett is HeadleyDown. I would not like to call that, since at least some of the motivation for the assertion seems to be that he is pushing the scientific mainstream view of NLP in that article. Previously the article was under mediation; maybe it needs to be again. My understanding is that HeadleyDown was less calm and less polite than AlanBarnett. I have no personal knowledge of HeadleyDown, though. There is abundant evidence of conflict of interest in the pro-NLP camp, and they definitely dominate editing of that article. Guy (Help!) 10:57, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Your view that editors are partly motivated out of their POV is unfounded and must necessarily be based on not having read the NLP talk page. Both User:Doc_pato and User:Fainites have been very extremely verbal in promoting the mainstream scientific view and nonetheless they both want AlanBarnet blocked . And quite frankly Guy, you are in personal conflict posting here as an admin; having previously labelled NLP pejoratively as a cultic , and with AlanBarnet saying he communicates with you privately . There is no consistent evidence that there is either a pro-NLP or anti-NLP camp. In fact, the NLP talk page clearly shows there is much healthy debate, except on one issue where all agree: User:AlanBarnet is an abusive sockpuppet of HeadleyDown. Users have had two months to determine this. AlanBarnet is just as antagonistic and disruptive as HeadleyDown and more and he has maliciously posted a users' personal information several times . Woohookitty? Voice-of-all? Can we please have an admin that is qualified to recognise this sockpuppet? 58.179.166.57 01:22, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• I am convinced that AlanBarnett is HeadleyDown not because of the views he/she pushes), but from his/her well-documented pattern of behaviour (btw, personally I would tend to be more on the anti-NLP side). Jbhood 12:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Hi user 58.179.166.57. I am cooperatively posting notices on ANI to solve a problem. I never said I communicated with Guy privately - only that I am keen on cooperating with admin. There have been over 80 edits on the NLP article per day at times and with no sufficient discussion. There are editors on the article who seem to have a COI and you seem to be encouraging them to edit. I've reiterated admin suggestions and assessments and you call it harassment. You seem to be dismissing key NPOV points about keeping the article summarized and you've been regularly marginalizing key science views as can be seen in the links above. When I make reasonable suggestions towards making sure all relevant views are presented as best as the proponent of each view can - you delete the suggestion. When helpful editors restore the suggestion you delete again . You and others seem to be refusing to balance views and refusing to make succinct concise statements about each view. I am talking about getting along. If you would like to start civilly discussing the Suppression of Information policy on the NLP talkpage I'm sure admin would be happy that editors of different views are trying to get along. AlanBarnet 03:40, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Utter baloney! AlanBarnet, if you are so wonderful how do you explain six separate editors thinking you are a manipulative sockpuppet and wanting you blocked? Coincidence? All editors are reverting you blindly now, quite obviously sick of your falsified article citations and talk page sugercoated baloney. Your own talk page confirms what I am saying. Clearly you should be blocked. 58.179.166.57 06:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Hi 58.179.166.57. Editors who have not shown a reluctance to presenting all views clearly seem to be reverting you (Editor MER-C at least). And rather than blind reversion - it seems to be a reversion based upon the need for collaborative and civil discussion. AlanBarnet 06:21, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Hi again; Just to help get the ball rolling towards collaborative editing and discussion - I'd like to present this for discussion on the NLP talkpage. Rather than just delete such a large piece of unsourced argumentative commentary - it seems more constructive to see if there is anything of any value in it by discussing with other editors. Thanks AlanBarnet 06:06, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Guy. You are being naive. Just because AlanBarnet says he's presenting mainstream scientific views and preventing them being obscured by others doesn't make it true. AlanBarnet has done virtually none of the work in sourcing, verifying and citing the mainstream scientific views which now have a full clear section. I know because I did alot of it myself in collaboration with other editors, including Comaze, but almost never AlanBarnet. He has no real interest in ascertaining genuine views from genuine sources, whether they're pro or anti NLP. Neither is he remotely interested in helping shorten, improve or clarify anything else. Mostly what AlanBarnet does is revert to older inaccurate versions without bothering to clear up the mess created with references, citations etc, put inaccurate or highly selective quotes in the introduction (over and over again), put in grossly POV statements, unverified and unsourced and refuse to provide verified sources on request, and then clutter up the talk page insultingly accusing everybody else of doing these things. If you believe any of that nonsense about wanting to collaborate or work constructively with others then you are the only one who does. Those of us who have had the pleasure of trying to work with him (and I tried very hard) know this protestation for what it is worth. Less than zilch. I also asked you some time ago that if you had any decent sources to back up your claim that it is a 'fact' NLP is a cult, to let us have them, because nearly all of the ones from the HeadleyDown/AlanBarnet camp, when somebody troubles to actually read the blasted things, don't support this. The only sources left are Protopriest Novopashin and you. In the circumstances I would support the request for somebody else from admin. Fainites 13:50, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

JzG/Guy. There is no pro-NLP camp. Firstly Fainites and 58.* tend to be on the side of skepticsm and scientific rigor. As far as I know they have no prior knowledge or personal experience in studying NLP. They are basing their edits on what is in the reputable / verifiable literature. It is a complex topic because there are so many different views with no black and white mainstream view. --Comaze 14:21, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Users Comaze and Fainites. Rather than repeatedly and dismissively delete the concise view of science from the lead section - you could discuss why you feel it does not quite capture the full view of science and we could go on with improving it . Also as yet - the Suppression of Information policy has not been discussed at all on the talk page. I presented it several times and my suggestion for civil discussion was met with dismissive deletion. So as a solution I present a concise lead again and I present the Suppression of Information policy on the talk page . Open for civil discussion. AlanBarnet 04:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Might I invite anybody reading this to go to the NLP article and read in particular the sections on Mental Health practice and Research Reviews and then state whether they think there is 'promotional obscuring of scientific views' as alleged (ad nauseam).Fainites 16:53, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Block for review - Cool maestro

I have indefinitely blocked User:Cool maestro, who has uploaded scads of obviously copyrighted images tagged with {{gfdl-self}}. He specifically claims to own the copyrights. I hadn't communicated with the user prior to blocking, but others (such as User:BigDT) had, and I noticed Cool maestro had blanked those messages off his talk page without responding and was continuing to upload more material. I invite review from the community on this; I've been deleting his image uploads that are clearly copyrighted (and ones that aren't, such as Image:Cool indian.jpg and Image:China dude.jpg) are probably copyrighted but not obviously so. It's my position that if I hadn't blocked him right away, he would continue to upload images he almost certainly doesn't own and create a huge mess that would need cleaning up. Whereas, if he somehow actually owns copyrights to all those movie posters, and yet uploads images with names like "Cool indian", it can be worked out through email, and permissions@wikimedia would need to get confirmation anyway. Mangojuice 19:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Ugh, what a mess. Sounds like a good move to me, given the amount of work the user would create if left unchecked. -- Merope 19:30, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, this was a very appropriate block. User:Cool maestro needs to understand and acknowledge the copyright issues here before continuing to edit.--Isotope23 19:45, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Endorse block. Take a look at the upload log for this user. Numerous copyright violations invalidly tagged with "GFDL self" descriptions. *sigh* Can't sleep, clown will eat me 19:49, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• I just blocked Alks (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) for precisely the same behaviour with precisely the same images. Guy (Help!) 10:26, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• I'm going to see if any more turn up. A RFCU may be in order. Geo. 06:33, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
• 203.101.184.211 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) This IP added content similar to Alks. if this is Coolmaestro's IP we may be able to see what other socks he has Geo. 06:45, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Canvassing for bot approval

Section moved to Misplaced Pages talk:Bots/Requests for approval/ProtectionBot#ANI

Art Dominique sockpuppet army

The banned user Art Dominique (talk · contribs) is a long-standing vandal with a huge number of socks, most of them currently blocked. A series of them were blocked, based on a checkuser report (see most recently archived case from 3 January, 2007) . A newer checkuser was filed for another bunch of socks of this user (4 January 2007), but that checkuser was declined as "impossibility to check". The declining checkuser didn't want to explain why it was impossible. I'm not really contesting that decision, but I still think someone should look at these socks and block them if they think there's a good reason. The connection to Art Dominique is here . As you can see, one of Art Dominique's socks was determined to be a subaccount of Love is all we need (talk · contribs).

• Love is all we need (talk · contribs)
• Eat your carrots (talk · contribs)
• Christmas almost here (talk · contribs)
• Eat apple a day (talk · contribs)
• The rolling rocks (talk · contribs)
• Good Afrodisiac (talk · contribs)
• Sticking to truth (talk · contribs)
• Recorded history (talk · contribs)
• Riksfo:restaandare (talk · contribs)
• Erroll Van Dyke (talk · contribs)
• Friendly request (talk · contribs)
• Let me add then (talk · contribs)
• Old lock smith (talk · contribs)

Hope someone will review these. TheQuandry 22:16, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

• Looks highly likely, blocking (even though most are inactive) for safety. Guy (Help!) 22:57, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

The checkuser declined per a technical reason, which for WP:BEANS sake, will not be explained further. Checkusers are under no obligation to explain why they delined - most declines aren't even given an explination at all, but rather "{{declined}}. ~~~~". Take it to SSP if you have to, in the future. Cheers, Daniel.Bryant 00:27, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Don't be shy about posting new suspects to the checkuser page, either. Just because these were declined doesn't mean future checks <insert> against new socks </insert> will be. There is a rather trivial technical reason why these were declined that has nothing to do with the merits of the request. Thatcher131 03:20, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Just don't post the exact same content again as a copy-paste; ie. the equivalent of a {{db-repost}} :) Daniel.Bryant 04:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Yep, I understand the reason why it was declined and I'm fine with it. I just figured this method would be quicker, before AD logs in and finds all his most recent socks banned, and decides to start using older ones. Thanks everyone. TheQuandry 02:25, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

3RR with myself?

Can you have a 3RR revert war with yourself? I've recently decided to edit a page. I couldn't decide on certain format. I would reformat every so often correcting typos and wikilinks. (You don't have to answer this if the answer NO.) obviously it would be rediculus to have an edit war with yourself... unless you have some split personality. Or what if an administrator thinks you edit something, back in the year 2004, then you revert it in 2005, and then you put it back in 2006? Is there a time lapse between 3RR? --CyclePat 03:31, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Re your first question: no; re your last: 24 hours. See WP:3RR. However, you might want to make more use of the "show preview" button. Chick Bowen 04:28, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It takes two to tango CyclePat. ---J.S (T/C/WRE) 04:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

WP:IAR. - Merzbow 07:31, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I can think of a case where you might get blocked for this. Say you edit under your registered name then also as an unregistered IP. If you then violated 3RR under your registered name (against your unregistered one) it would appear to Admins as if you were edit warring and you could indeed be blocked (IMO). THe moral of this story is: Dont argue with yourself. Or at least, if you do, do it under the same name! 8-)--Light current 22:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you everyone! 8-) If only every case here at AN/I had this "lighter current" of humour!!(Pun intended). A lecon though is that I will definatelly need to work on the "preview" button. Finally, though it's probably funny, I'd actually hate to see a real case of someone arguing with himself here on wikipedia! --CyclePat 02:28, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Dealing with Cplot edits

I happened to see one of Cplot's more recent edits before it was reverted. In it, the Cplot sock says that even though these edits are all being reverted, they are still worth making because they live on forever in the page histories and curious users look to see what has been reverted. I don't know whether that is right or not but I wonder if admins should begin the practice of deleting rather than merely reverting these edits. Newyorkbrad 03:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Hey, if you want to delete the entire WP:ANI and restore it all each time minus one edit each time he does it, be my guest. So, basically, it's impractical. Oversight would be an option though, however, I don't know if those with oversight permissions would consider this a proper use of their abilities. That'd be up to them to decide I'd imagine. Metros232 05:04, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

The way the user interface is set up, edits to pages with huge histories like this are much easier to oversight than to delete. On less traveled pages, deletion might be an option. Thatcher131 05:56, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, until the better revision deletion system for admins is created (rather than the hack we're doing now), it's nearly impossible to delete a ceratin revision from a page with many edits. Martinp23 14:22, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I was thinking more of responding new edits where it's the top one in the history, not of going back through all the old ones. I thought deletion was easier under that circumstance, but please disregard this if I'm wrong. Newyorkbrad 15:00, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Could the restore deleted edits page have a button that checks all the boxes? That way you'd only have to unclick the all the ones you want deleted. -- Samuel Wantman 23:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

No, but it works fine when using the shift key. Khoikhoi 06:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Deleting articles with large edit histories brings the servers to their knees. Remember what happened when AfD got deleted? User:Zoe|(talk) 00:22, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Uh, could someone explain this diff to me? -75.42.174.181 06:42, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Looks like an innocent error resulting from an edit conflict. Clumsy, perhaps, but I don't see a reason to assume it was malevolent. Could re-insert or ask the acting editor for clarification. Luna Santin 06:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Good explanation! (I wasn't presuming villainy.) Deletia follows. -75.42.174.181 06:49, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

It seems absolutly strange that such an edit conflict somehow managed to slip by, as I thought I used thew '+' to add a new section - I'll experiment in one of the sandboxes (later) to see if I can reproduce it. --Sigma 7 08:23, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I believe that Cplot would then just gloat about the workload that he was imposing on administrators. In any event, except when a particular version of cited in as somewhere with real importance, such diffs probably have even less importance than, say, comments to LiveJournal.com or to Usenet. Arguably, it's better for the world if Cplot wastes his time here. ;-D. -SlamDiego 04:02, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

ARYAN818's unacceptable comments on Talk:Dravidian_people and on my talk page User talk:Wiki Raja

• I took this to User talk:Wiki Raja/ARYAN818, and there it stays. This is not the forum for lengthy discourse whihc belongs in dispute resolution. Guy (Help!) 13:43, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Why are we allowing a User with an unacceptable User name to edit? User:Zoe|(talk) 00:32, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Aryan is a common name meaning "noble". Just because a bunch of nutjobs hijacked the use of the word, doesnt make it "unacceptable". Unacceptable would be like "aryan nation" or "white power" or "black panther".Bakaman 00:36, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

"818" is Nazi-speak for "Heil Adolf Hitler" (HAH). The combination of the two is not coincidental. User:Zoe|(talk) 01:05, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I have to agree with Zoel on this. The user name is not only offensive, but promotes an offensive POV. I don't think Misplaced Pages is the place for coded references to White Power. I note that a check of his user page history shows him as being blocked once already for it. Why it was reversed I have no idea. See here and here for just two examples of the use of 818. Jeffpw 23:12, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Reply - You call those reliable sources? A White supremacist site and urban dictionary hardly attest to some sort of racism.Bakaman 23:32, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Aryan may be a common name in India, but the user is behaving very intolerant and abusive of other people's ethnicities and heritage. Regardless of whether Dravidians and Ino-Aryans are from the same country or not, does not give one the right to put down the others ethnicity and harrass them. A combination of user:ARYAN818's user name and his attitude is not helping either. This is wikipedia, and we all should respect each other's culture, religous, and ethnic background. That's all I ask. Wiki Raja 23:04, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I have asked for an explanation of the 818 portion of the name on the User's Talk page. If the explanation is not forthcoming, or is not believable, he will be blocked. I personally think he should be blocked anyway for an unacceptable username even if he has a logical explanation, because the name is offensive to other people, whatever the reason he uses it. User:Zoe|(talk) 23:35, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm not an admin, but I follow this page. Maybe these will help Area code 818 . Prometheus 00:19, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I live in Southern California. I know the 818 area code. I am not asking you or any other person why the user is using 818, I am asking ARYAN818. Please stop giving this user a chance to come up with excuses. User:Zoe|(talk) 00:39, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

If you look at his talk page you will see that he has already stated that 818 is his area code. Now personally I don't believe him but there is no reason to be short with PrometheusX303 Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 00:53, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

user:CyberAnth at AfD

Probably nothing, but it's worth keeping an eye on... user:CyberAnth has, over the last day or so, been afdingg quite a large number of articles on sexual terminology, irrespective of whether they have sizable, well-written articles. In each case, the argument is WP:WINAD, which would bee all very well if his targets were more general or if the articles in question were all simply dictdefs - but neither is true. Quite a few of the votes have basically snowballed to keep, simply because the articles are clearly not what is being claimed. As I said, it's probably nothing, but - as I said in one of my afd comments - after the first dozen or so it becomes increasinggly difficult to assume good faith. Grutness...wha? 11:18, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Despite the use of apparently legitimate Misplaced Pages policies as reasons for deletion, information removal, etc the user clearly has an agenda related to deleting or sanitising Misplaced Pages articles related to sexual innuendo or terminology as can be seen here. This user's choice of going against the grain of opinion can probably be most clearly seen on the deletion nomination page for Wanker at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Wanker (2nd nomination) Jooler 11:27, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• I think it is serious - please see one section below. Johntex\ 11:36, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• Hm. I've also noticed a section three or four further up... Grutness...wha? 13:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• User:CyberAnth has been addressing these "well-written" articles on verifiability grounds, and as such xe has a point. However well written content is, if it is not verifiable it must go. It's a shame that so many other contributors have not made any effort to rebut the verifiability concerns with good sources, but have instead decided to turn the AFD discussions into discussions of the nominator, or have simply cut and pasted rationales with no attempt to address the article and the sources at hand whatsoever. That does not help AFD in the slightest (and I predict, given how often this pattern has occurred in the past, that those editors' failure to address verifiability concerns will result in the articles coming back to AFD again, weeks or months from now). If an editor raises a concern that an article, or even a succession of articles, is unverifiable from reliable sources, and goes to the effort of addressing each of the cited sources explaining individually why they are unreliable (as User:CyberAnth has done at length in several of the AFD discussions — example, example) it is those other editors making subsequent "speedy keep" cries whose behaviour should be censured.

  I also note that there are a lot of editors on this noticeboard that are not following our Misplaced Pages:Assume good faith directive. That one editor has nominated a set of articles, all with related topics, for deletion with a single rationale, is hardly unusual at AFD. This regularly happens when an editor discovers an article that xe thinks should be deleted and proceeds to discover other related articles. None of the editors complaining about User:CyberAnth's nomination of several related articles have assumed similar bad faith on the part of the nominator at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/All-Star Near Misses, for example, even though that is, similarly, a nomination with a single rationale of a group of articles from a single category. And this bad faith is being assumed on their part. Nowhere in this set of AFD discussions has User:CyberAnth given an actual bad faith rationale, such as a tit-for-tat rationale. Whether right or wrong, the rationales given are evidently good faith ones, attempting to hold Misplaced Pages to our policies.

  I am the only editor to have added any citations at all to Fingering (sexual act). I find it most disappointing that other editors address verifiability and source reliability concerns not by citing and evaluating sources but with edits such as this, this, and this. Praise where praise is due: There have been some editors, such as Fram (talk · contribs) who have attempted to address the actual issues of verifiability and reliability. But their positive and useful contributions to AFD have been almost drowned out by those whose quite useless contributions have been not to actually discuss the article or the sources at all. Uncle G 16:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• I've observed this as well. In the past he has attempted to remove article such as Wanker and Vanilla sex, and yesterday he created AfD's for a large number of additional items. While I think he did identify a couple of cases of poorly written, truly neologistic articles, he tends to cut-and-paste the same nomination statement across a large number of different AfDs. The user has already been told that WP is not censored, and has now been warned regarding WP:POINT. In the majority of cases, they are well-written and sourced articles for subjects that have almost obvious notability. This user should be counseled to invest more research in his nominations, and perhaps "practice" with the AfD's that are strongest before mass-nominating many items irregardless of their articles' current quality. Tarinth 16:00, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Sounds like good advice. Tom Harrison 16:04, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Your comment is a prime example of the assumption of bad faith that I just pointed out. You state "The user has already been told that WP is not censored.". But nowhere in any of these discussions has User:CyberAnth actually said that it should be censored. Xyr nominations have been based upon verifiability from reliable sources, elimination of original research, the policy that Misplaced Pages is not a dictionary, and the avoidance of neologisms. The assumption that this is an attempt to censor Misplaced Pages is an assumption of bad faith on your part. Please stop it. Uncle G 16:10, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
    • I am not assuming bad faith, but the fact that he has focused on articles that fit into only one category is patent; considering that all of them are sexual slang, a concerted effort to remove them meets the dictionary definition of censorship. He has also blanked large sections of certain articles without prior discussion. There's no evidence to suggest that he's interested in improving WP in general. I am willing to agree that the user is in fact acting in good faith, and that their intent is to improve WP: but that nevertheless does not contradict that their actions have the effect of being censorial and potentially disruptive. Tarinth 16:28, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
      • Tarinth, it is good editing to remove material from Misplaced Pages that cannot be supported by reliable sources (and some random webpage that mentions a slang term does not constitute a reliable source for an encyclopedia article). I suggest you focus your complaints on specific individual edits and discuss each one on its own merits. --JWSchmidt 16:57, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
        • Many if not most Misplaced Pages articles lack references other than Wikilinked terms. Do people look at random articles? I just looked at 10 random articles and found the following with no references: La gazzetta, Baltimore County Executive, Otilio Ulate Blanco, AGM-28 Hound Dog. Should I follow CyberAnth's lead, that others have endorsed, and blank the content, or just AfD them and 500,000 similarly unreferenced articles? Editors should not be allowed to selectively apply a policy of Afd or blanking unreferenced content of articles whose subject matter they find distasteful. That would be like a traffic cop selectively giving speeding tickets to only those cars displaying bumper stickers they disagree with and letting the others pass. Selective enforcement of Misplaced Pages policy to only articles in one category is disruptive and harms the project. Edison 18:14, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
          • Once again, editors are assuming that CyberAnth is finding this material distasteful and that is why he is nominating them for deletion--when he has stated nothing to that effect and instead have given solid policy reasons for his actions. Instead of countering his nominations and his application of those policies, we are seeing a continued strawman fallacy being proprogated and blatant assumption of bad faith. This is incredible. Agne 19:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
            • No assumptions made, no bad faith. He's stated it explicitly himself. — coelacan talk — 22:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
            • We are not required to check our brains and power of observation at the door. When a clear pattern is obvious, we are not compelled to ignore it. Edison 19:40, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
              • No, obvious is when a user states that they find such material distasteful or think that Misplaced Pages should be censor or something to that effect--nothing of which CyberAnth has proclaimed. OR synthesis, conjuncture, speculation and assumption is when you assume that motivation in the absence of the obvious. That is complete opposite of both the spirit and the letter of WP:AGF. The only "obvious" is CyberAnth's hardline stance on WP:V and citing sources. I respect Johntex's approach engage CyberAnth on those grounds and the differing views of those policies. I am appalled when bad faith assumptions are putting words and motivations into an editor's mouth. Agne 19:49, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
              • Some editors get very agitated while trying to defend short Misplaced Pages articles about non-notable topics.....articles for which editors struggle to find verifiable and reliable sources. Let's keep our eyes on the ball. Either improve these short articles, merge what little useful content there is into meaningful larger articles, or expect that there will be honest attempts to delete them.--JWSchmidt 20:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
                • One point to mention is that it seems there's a mass, indiscriminate nomination of articles, almost as if just hoping that some will stick. The nominations are word-for-word the same, regardless of whether they're appropriate to the specific article. An extreme example is the citation of WP:NEO in the AFD nomination for quim. The article specifically cites The Canterbury Tales. Would a thoughtful, discriminate nomination label a 14th-century term as a neologism? Fan-1967 20:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
                  • Please cite source to support the idea that it is a 14th-century term. --JWSchmidt 21:18, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

24 hour block requested

CyberAnth (talk · contribs) seems to be on a crusade to eliminate every-single uncited sentence from Misplaced Pages, along with every singe article (apparently including stubs and disambigution pages). I have no doubt that this began as a well-meaning effort. Who among us would not like to see Wikipeida improved through better sourcing?

However, we have to be reasonable. All stubs are not sourced. Even featured articles contain unsourced statements.

Rrequests for CyberAnth to slow down a bit have been made in the above thread heare at WP:ANI and on the user's talk page have yeilded no result. The user is continuing to propose articles for deletion that have little hope of succeeding. This is just clogging up AfD and wasting the time of good editors, CyberAnth included.

Furthermore, CyberAnth is becoming increasingly belligerent and is making wild accusations. As someone who has been involved in the debte, I am posting here with a request that an uninvolved admin issue a short block to encourage this user to slow down. CyberAnth needs to change this pattern of behavior rather than steaming ahead on a well-meaning yet ultimately harmful mission. Johntex\ 11:34, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if anyone has noticed this, but he's posting the AfDs in alphabetical order. He's clearly using a list on WIkipedia of some kind. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 11:45, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• With some reluctance, because I'm always reticent to support this sort of thing when I think the editor may be well-intentioned but misguided, I'm going to have to second this request. In the time since the efforts at communication listed above by Johntex occured, CyberAnth's contribution history is filled with things like this. This helps no one. Shortly before this block request hit AN/I, I'd posted my own summary of his other recent efforts above. Had I done so moments later, it would have been here instead. Serpent's Choice 11:48, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

The user appears to have stopped. Given this, any block would be punitive, not preventative, and this is not "allowed" per WP:BLOCK. On a side-note, and this is pure speculation, I presume this is a little WP:POINT-driven (although I'm sure CyberAnth was trying to improve the encyclopaedia by nominating them, however misguided or otherwise the nominations prove to be per the concensus), and I suspect further that Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Wanker (2nd nomination), User:CyberAnth/AfD/Original Research of Wanker and non Verfiability of claims, and the failure thereof, may have something to do with this little period of AfD-nominating. Daniel.Bryant 12:01, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

(lowered the indent jump a bit to make responding more legible) Based on the edit summary for this edit, it seems likely the editor called it a night. I suppose we'll learn tomorrow if the trend continues. Serpent's Choice 12:14, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Comment: I note that since this was posted, the editor has put forward Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Juicy girl, Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Rice queen, and Misplaced Pages:Articles_for_deletion/Bean_queen. Clearly the behavior has not stopped. Atom 12:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

As much as I support a continual effort at adding refences and sources to articles, I find this effort to be disruptive, rather than collaborative or consensus driven. See related (lengthy) discussion at Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Numerous_articles_blanked.2C_or_large_portion_of_article_content_removed. I think the editor, previously a fine contributor to Misplaced Pages, has gone overboard on a crusade to remove a set of terms that s/he finds unsavory or objectionable, largely sexuality related articles. If an effort, on an article by article basis had been made on many to gain consensus with the editors focusing on those articles to improve their quality, add better references and gain gain consensus with article contributors that would have been better. A wholesale listing of 40 or 50 articles for deletion, or removal of large chunks of an article without prior discussion, all within a few hours period is intended as an attack to make a point. There is a lengthy discussion by this editor at Misplaced Pages:Articles_for_deletion/Erotic_spanking (see referencing padding) that suggests one of the editors motivations. The editor is self-described as "a devoted Christian", a "bibliophile", and as such may view that sexual content of the type recommended by these many AfD's and article blanking would be a positive thing, and that others may feel similarly, not realizing that that view would not be a majority view by most editors. I believe that the editor is well intended, but there is a line between bold and aggressive editing, and intentional disruptive behavior to make a point. Despite the editors previous fine work, that line was clearly crossed here. Atom 12:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I oppose any block of CyberAnth at this time. I wonder what we have come to when applying existing policy in an attmept to improve Misplaced Pages becomes grounds for blocking. Unsourced information is being added to Misplaced Pages faster that it can be tagged with {{unsourced}} or {{fact}}, let alone sourced or removed. As Jimbo said, we need to be more agressive about either sourcing or removing unsourced information. The burden of sourcing information still lies with anyone who wants to keep the information in Misplaced Pages. -- Donald Albury 12:58, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• I agree with Donald. This is a good-faith attempt to improve the encyclopaedia, any problems can be solved by rational discourse. Guy (Help!) 13:26, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
  • This is not a good faith attempt to improve the encyclopedia, it is an ideologically-driven bowdlerizing purge, as CyberAnth has indicated himself. — coelacan talk — 22:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It is not the application of policy that is the issue. The attempt to disrupt articles without prior attempts with editors in those articles is the problem. Correct application of policy, as a tool to make a point and disrupt others is the issue. No one objects to a policeman doing their job. Many people object to policemen using excessive force. This wasn't bold action, it was excessively forceful action. Asked to stop, and participating in numerous exchanges here, and on the editors talk page don't appear to have been effective at communicating that lots of peoples toes are being stepped on. (so far discourse has not solved the problem.) Atom 13:36, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't think this is an attempt to disrupt, and I am not convinced that it is disruptive. People may reasonably disagree about what CyberAnth wants to do, but I think it's clear that he is working in good faith to improve the encyclopedia. If there is no consensus to delete, the pages will be kept. If other editors think the content is notable and the sourcing is adequete, it will be restored. Either way, this is an editorial dispute. Blocking would not be appropriate. Tom Harrison 15:05, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It most certainly is disruptive. This kind of edit by CyberAnth without any prior discusion look like disruption bordering on vandalism to me indeed this edit was automatically reverted by the anti-Vandal bot. Thse are just two of dozens of other similar edits. Jooler 15:13, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• You seem to have forgotten something. Guy (Help!) 17:40, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• • No JzG, I'm sorry but it is you who has forgotten something here. Assume good faith has limits, and it does not mean we should "have blind faith". We began with a good faith assumption and attempted dialog. That has not worked. The editor is unrepentent. Even the blocking request here takes pain to point out that the editor is probably well-intentioned, but they have lost their way. A block is needed to point out to them that this type of extremeist behavior, in violation of WP:POINT, will not be tolerated. Johntex\ 17:54, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Massive deletion is disruptive and hurtful to Misplaced Pages. This is extremeism. Too much of almost anything is a bad thing. CyberAnth needs to source more and delete less. Sourcing takes time. We build the encyclopedia by volunteers adding what they can when they can as best they can and no one elected CyberAnth to establish deadlines for when things are to be sourced or deleted. CyberAnth should be required to add as much material as he deletes. Balance is good. Extremeism is bad. WAS 4.250 15:25, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

If he is edit warring, we have a mechanism to deal with that. The pages he has proposed for deletion will be discussed, and kept unless there is a consensus to delete. Tom Harrison 16:00, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Cyberanth has also removed at least one person's opinion from one of the AfD's, apparently on the grounds that Cyberanth misformed the AfD in his/her haste to put so many of them up at once. Inexcusable. Johntex\ 18:07, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Where will the line be drawn? Removing unsourced information is not a difficult task. One user could easily clear out 500 articles per day. Is the line drawn at 1000 "blanked" articles? 10000? Can we let a small group of users take the problem of WP:V into their own hands? Systematic removal of content is not a good idea. The lack of communication between CyberAnth and the editors of the articles he has been blanking is strong evidence that good faith cannot be assumed. --- RockMFR 18:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Who is exhibiting bad faith here, Johntex?

Or at least incompetence or - lets provide a gracious option - making big mistakes? You appear to be merely retaliating, and are twisting the facts - because you do not like that I am actually attempting to follow policies.

Let's take a look at your vote at Misplaced Pages:Articles_for_deletion/Juicy_girl.

There, my nom was for "Violates WP:WINAD, does not establish notability per WP:N, has no references and violates WP:V, possibly violates WP:OR and WP:NEO."

Here is your "vote":

Speedy keep - nomination is dreadfully in error. There are multiple links from the article to supporting information. Johntex\talk 08:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Here is my reply to you, which you called "wild accusations":

Comment - I am amazed at how people vote "Keep" in such apparent blatant disregard or ignorance of WP policies. The above "Speedy keep" vote by Johntex is particularly troubling. His vote may be in bad faith and worthy of an incident report because it evidences such apparent disregard or ignorance of plain WP policies. Admins should know much better and are held to a higher standard.

He says, "There are multiple links from the article to supporting information" and is apparently content to let it go at that. But let's look at the links one by one:

• Bar Girl Love (also see its root URL at ) - violates Misplaced Pages:Verifiability#Sources because the site is clearly not one "with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". The site is a "community portal", primarily an Internet Forum. The article is an anonymously written "reader submission" (see here) and cannot be used per WP:Reliable_sources#Bulletin_boards.2C_wikis_and_posts_to_Usenet.

• description of a bar girl - an Internet Forum per WP:Reliable_sources#Bulletin_boards.2C_wikis_and_posts_to_Usenet "should not be used as sources" and fails because posts on Forums are clearly not one "with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy"!

• "Asia's sex trade is 'slavery'" - a BBC article that nowhere mentions the term "Juicy girl". Using it in the article is thus Synthesis. However, the article would be a great source in Trafficking in human beings.

• South Korea Pages by ClarkRB - A bulletin board post that clearly falls under WP:Reliable_sources#Bulletin_boards.2C_wikis_and_posts_to_Usenet that "should not be used as sources" and blatantly fails Misplaced Pages:Verifiability#Sources because the site is clearly not one "with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy".

Carefully go over the links above. Carefully look at the policies.

Now let's look again at your vote:

Speedy keep - nomination is dreadfully in error. There are multiple links from the article to supporting information. Johntex\talk 08:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

So here we have you voting "Keep" for a page - in clear, blatant violation of one of Misplaced Pages's foundational values, WP:V. The nomination was in error because of the links, so keep? Who is dreadfully in error here?

I too wonder what we have come to when applying existing policy in an attempt to improve Misplaced Pages becomes grounds for blocking.

CyberAnth 19:34, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

CyberAnth, you are the one attempting to twist facts, or else you are as misguided about this as you are about your attempts to delete content from Misplaced Pages.

I stand behind my comment above that the article had multiple sources at the time you nominated it. If you didn't like those sources, you should have worked on them or discussed them rather than nominating for deletion everything that doesn't fit your tastes.

When I said you were "making making wild accusations", I was correct in so saying. You act as though I didn't explain what consitituted wild accusations. I provided a link. I hid nothing. You were making a wild accusation that my "edits may have been in bad faith...apparent disregard or ignorance of plain WP policies". Yes, those are wild accusations you made. Yes, you are being incivil.

Also, you are misrepresenting my comment by adding in your own formatting. If you are going to quote me, please either quote me with my emphasis or acknowledge that the empahsis is yours. You are violating WP:POINT by exhibiting such extreme behavior. I'm not the only one who has said so.

I stand behind my comment above that the article had multiple sources at the time you nominated it. That is a simple fact, which you do not dispute. If you don't dispute the fact, then don't complain about me stating it as fact on AfD. If you didn't like those sources, you should have worked on them or discussed them rather than nominating for deletion everything that doesn't fit your tastes.

Furthermore, you continue today to be unrepententant and argumentative with other editors. Edison asked you very reasonably to either not delete his AfD comment or to at least have the courtesy to notify him on his talk page.

You need to settle down and play more nicely with others. Your disruption of wikipedia in violation of WP:POINT and your repeated violations of WP:Civil are more than grounds for blocking. Johntex\ 20:09, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Support blocking. CyberAnth hasn't apparently done any of the recommended prior tagging on any of these articles prior to AFDing them. As AFD's instructions rather clearly and forcefully recommend that you do so, this spree is in violation of AFD policy. Rampant deletionism in violation of AFD policy IS bad for the project. Georgewilliamherbert 20:40, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

In addition to the AfD instructions, the deletion policy likewise places verifiability issues in the category of problem articles where deletion may not be needed and prescribes steps to take before proposing deletion for articles that are truly unverifiable, not just unverified. Process is important to strike a balance between damaging the project by having unreferenced articles and damaging the project by mass-nominating such articles for deletion. --Ssbohio 20:55, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• No need to assume good faith after this, in which CyberAnth lays out his ideological motivations. — coelacan talk — 22:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

When there are literally a dozen AfDs submitted in a row from a user, and all dealing with the same topic (sexuality), it raises eyebrows. See here. Combined with the above statement, and various uncivil comments in AfD - Erotic Spanking it seems clear that CyberAnth is not acting in good faith, but attempting to enforce an idealogical agenda through abuse of Misplaced Pages policy. -- Kesh 23:07, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Can we refocus the converstation to talk about the line between when an article should be tagged as needing cites, and when it should be tagged for deletion. As practical consideration, it is much easier to tag something as needing citations. Consider all the effort by all the people arguing about deleting these articles, consider all the discussion here. If you simply tag something there is usually no argument, and hopefully it will lead to citations being added. So when should an article be tagged for deletion? When it seems blatantly obvious that there is no chance of a good article existing. Anything short of that and you are wasting everyone's time. -- Samuel Wantman 23:21, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It looks like the situation will not get any worse in the coming time, as CyberAnth has said to leave AfD for a while: . --Cpt. Morgan (Reinoutr) 00:09, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I suggest we drop discussion, as the request has failed, de-facto, as no admin has issued a 24-hour block (or any other block), and although opinion weighs heavily towards a block, no consensus was reached. As indicated above, the editor is no longer pursuing massive AfD's and removal of non-cited material en-masse. Atom 00:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• I concur with Atom. Let's let it rest for now and see what CyberAnth choses to do in the future. In the meantime, I call everyone's attention (for a second time) to a proposed wording change to WP:V that might help encourage people to improve first and delete as a secondary option. Looking forward to feedback, Johntex\ 00:39, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
• Agreed. I hope CyberAnth takes this to heart in the future, and I'm willing to AGF on his contributions in the future. -- Kesh

Another possibility

In situations like this, where it is not clear if there is any consensus developing here at WP:ANI, is there not an argument that a temporary injunction is needed? ie. Tell the editor in question to stop. If they do not stop, issue a block to prevent further disruption. Pass the case straight to ArbCom to seek a ruling on what sort of user conduct is acceptable in this case. The block would last as long as it takes to undo the disruption or for ArbCom to hand down a temporary injunction that would release the editor on 'bail' until the case was heard. An RfC would also seem to be in order, to get wider views on whether this sort of behaviour is acceptable. Carcharoth 07:59, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Eh, I'm not sure what the admins are making of all this. But he's deleted another user's comments in AFD again (I say "again"; I'm almost certain someone earlier said he had done this), in this diff. It has to be a mistake, since their votes are in agreement, but it appears he's just not paying attention to where his keystrokes go. A word of caution would be nice if he would hear it. — coelacan talk — 08:51, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• • Careful. What I discovered was going on is that when I submit a post but get the error message "Edit Conflict", I cannot just hit the Reload button on my browser, paste back in my post, and hit submit. Doing that deletes the message that caused the edit conflict. I have to reload the page from the edit link. CyberAnth 10:25, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Deletion review of Ass to mouth

It's too interesting to miss: Misplaced Pages:Deletion_review#Ass_to_mouth CyberAnth 11:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

CyberAnths latest AfD

Also of interest is that since CyberAnth said to give the AfDs a break for a while , the editor nominated at least one article for deletion, and retracted this nomination when sources where presented: Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Michael Goff. --Cpt. Morgan (Reinoutr) 21:17, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Block request

Raphael1 (talk · contribs) has been warned against readding Category:Anti-Islam Sentiment to Ann Coulter. He's once again reverted the page against consensus. Could someone please BLP3 him? Thank you. Kyaa the Catlord 15:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Why don't you change WP:NOT? Is Misplaced Pages a democracy or do arguments count? There have been no arguments voiced other than it could be regarded as defamatory.Raphael1 16:17, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Have you read WP:BLP, Raphael? – Chacor 16:20, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes I have and there are plenty of references, which confirm my addition. Raphael1 16:22, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

You've been warned by a neutral party about this already Raphael. I could have placed this request yesterday, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt and you continue to try to weasel yourself an excuse for ignoring the BLP warning.... Kyaa the Catlord 16:28, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I certainly have not ignored the BLP warning. Instead I've provided Will with references two days ago but haven't heard from him since then. Raphael1 16:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

This is a noticeboard, not a boxing ring, we have noticed you. No need to argue here, keep it on the talk page. Someone will look into it. HighInBC 16:39, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It looks like the article cites numerous references. There is a whole section on the subject at wikiquote:Ann_Coulter#Islam. The 'Council on American-Islamic Relations' calls her 'islamophobic' and 'bigoted'. If Coulter doesn't qualify for inclusion in an 'Anti <whatever> sentiment' category then nobody does. Either move to get them all deleted (good luck) or give up the ghost. --CBD 17:04, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

The article cites numerous references, but wikipedia itself does not meet WP:RS nor does pinning this category on a living person meet BLP. Kyaa the Catlord 17:13, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

La la la. Patstuart 17:17, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I shouldn't need to go through Mediation to correct the mistakes that are so bloody blatantly obvious. Kyaa the Catlord 17:20, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

What about the citations from outside wikipedia? HighInBC 17:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

ALL of the citations are from outside Misplaced Pages. The Washington Post, Chicago Sun Times, Editor and Publisher, CAIR, her own columns, et cetera. They are shown in Misplaced Pages, but they don't originate here. --CBD 17:24, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Drawing a conclusion is OR. Labelling someone in a defamatory manner is against BLP. These are hard and fast rules, why the debate? Kyaa the Catlord 17:28, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

By that logic Category:Anti-Islam sentiment (and 'Anti-semitism', and all the others) simply should not exist. Yet they do... because such 'labels' ARE allowed when they are properly sourced. As in this case. --CBD 17:52, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• I have left a note on Raphael1's Talk. Guy (Help!) 17:36, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Arbitration notice — This isn't the first time Raphael1 has been disruptive. According to the decisions of Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Raphael1, "Raphael1 is placed on Probation for one year. He may be banned by any administrator from any page which he disrupts by tendentious editing, edit warring, or incivility." and "Raphael1 is placed on general Probation. Any three administrators for good cause may ban him from Misplaced Pages for an appropriate period of time." I think he can easily be banned from these pages he's being disruptive over; if any three of you guys decide it warrants a block under the probation clause, that can happen too. --Cyde Weys 17:56, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Ok, I'm gonna have to disagree here. Guy, you said on Raphael1's page that WP:BLP requires consensus to include any negative comment about a person. That isn't my reading of the policy at all. Indeed, the word 'consensus' does not even APPEAR in the text of the policy. Our 'living persons' policy requires that negative comments be properly sourced. We DO have general policies against edit warring without consensus, but they'd apply to both 'sides' here and have nothing to do with BLP. So far as I can see... addition of the category IS properly sourced here. --CBD 18:15, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Per BLP, the subject of the article needs to pretty much state word for word that she is anti-islamic. She has not done so. So labelling her in this manner is subjective, POV and draws a conclusion based on her statements, which equals Original Research. BLP has a higher standard. Kyaa the Catlord 18:28, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Further, everyone else in the talk page has pretty much stated "we'd rather that category deleted than have it applied to this article". How much consensus do you need? Kyaa the Catlord 18:29, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Maybe the same amount of concensus which would be needed for Category:Terrorists. -- Szvest - 19:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Consensus does not include trolls and POV pushers. Disputed content should be reviewed by other editors and consensus reached. Cited content of unambiguous significance stated in neutral terms is unlikely to fail to gain consensus, I'd have thought. Guy (Help!) 22:57, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Heh. Things being accepted just because they are cited, significant, and neutrally worded... you funny man. :] --CBD 01:08, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Including a statement by the biased offshoot of a terrorist group. Very neutral. Kyaa the Catlord 03:12, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Such a description for an organization primarily funded by the ruling families of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (our allies BTW) proves the problem all by itself. --CBD 08:35, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

209.244.43.209

I unblocked 209.244.43.209 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) as per this conversation. The Showster (talk · contribs) was caught behind the autoblock on this one. This stems from Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/Bowser Koopa. However, I want to get input on this. I'm curious if I should reblock the IP address with the indefinite expiration time but make it for anonymous only (and disable account creation). Would this be more appropriate? Or should it just be the outright unblock? Thanks, Metros232 16:49, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Generally IP addresses should not be indef blocked, as they may be dynamic. To find out if any abuse is coming from this IP address, you will have ask a checkuser. Try crossposting this question to the Requests for IP check section of WP:RFCU. They won't disclose the names of users on the IP, but should be able to determine if any current or recent users of that IP have been vandalism. Thatcher131 02:33, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Well that's the thing. It was indefinitely blocked by a checkuser. Dmcdevit blocked it on December 10 as a result of the checkuser. My concern is that now that I unblocked the IP because of the autoblock effects on The Showster, a user who is possibly innocent and just got caught up in the checkuser somehow, other accoutns can be used on this IP for further vandalism. That's why I'm posting this here, to see if the block should be reinstated as a more soft block, allowing The Showster to use it without allowing new vandals to be created. Metros232 02:43, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, you should definitely ask Dmcdevit, then. Since he's on light duty for a couple more weeks, I would also ask Mackensen, who is pretty active. Thatcher131 12:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Anon user

Just see this anon user:

LOL, haha, you fuckin loser Wobbs, yeah maybe I am Epf......NOT. Although he shares some views with me on race, hes some dumb Italian-British mut from Canada that actually annoys me. I have used other accounts on here, but with other anon. accounts, not as a registered user (which is allowed by Misplaced Pages since IP #'s change all the time). Hahaha, Wobbs, you are a fool, especially with how you place so much emphasis on those books recently released by Sykes, etc. which are a minority opinion in the world of population geneticists and other researchers. For your information, Racial Reality isn't a "neo-nazi" site you anarchist loser with no hope because your life is meaningless and you don't know ANYTHING on what you read about with these issues. RR is a neutral point of view that seeks to refute neo-nazi, white supremacists, multi-racial, race-denier, assimilationist, biased opinions that influence works including the authors of those books you mentioned. Stick to being a pathetic lab assistant and get a life you fuckin tool and stop vandalizing pages and makin edits to suit your twisted opinons you fool. Hahaha, wow, do u accuse 'sock pupety" of everyone who gets under you skin you douchebag ??? 69.157.107.88 23:37, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

You can see him at: http://en.wikipedia.org/User_talk:Wobble#Anon_user_conduct

What shall we do about him? Veritas et Severitas 18:46, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Subsequernt edits seem less problematic and responded to warning . I say we watch and wait. Guy (Help!) 19:07, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, he reposted an even nastier version of the above again on Wobble's talk page (), so I blocked him for 24 hours for abusive behavior, personal attacks, and disruption. Antandrus (talk) 21:53, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

User:Eoganan repeated the latest set of personal attacks on my talk page and User:Wobble's and as a result has been indefinitely blocked. As I mentioned in my block notice to him, IP addresses used by the editor to evade this block and make further personal attacks should be blocked without notice. Gwernol 22:41, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

He's now being asked to be unblocked on the basis that if we don't he'll go on an IP rampage and disrupt Misplaced Pages. I'll leave it to another admin to respond to that... Gwernol 22:48, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I've done so. Jkelly 22:55, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Also, enjoy this. I wonder how he thinks he'll upload a virus onto the Misplaced Pages servers? Gwernol 23:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

"Misplaced Pages allows ignorant and nihilist opinions on its articles which are insulting and detrimental to many people, so I will take down the whole thing. Numerous new IP's and user accounts will be vandalized many articles as possible and I plan to insert my newest virus into the system by "next week".....Also, User:Wobble, User:Epf, User:Gwenrol and others will be located and assaulted."posted by 69.157.116.202 (talk · contribs)

Certainly there should be a block on sight policy for IP that vandalise the three named users. David D. (Talk) 23:22, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

The last part of that edit could be taken as a threat of physical violence. Given that the IP resolves to Ontario, Canada, which is also where one of the named targets, User:Epf, is (according to his user page) located, I believe it might be in order for someone to give the local police a call. Even though it's unlikely that the user is really planning to carry out his threat, just making it seems a serious enough matter to be brought to the attention of the authorities. The cops can then contant the abuse department of the user's ISP, being in a better position to sort out the matter with them than we are. Anyone in Canada want to do this, or do I have to make an international phone call? -Ilmari Karonen (talk) 02:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Shared Account

A groups of students is using a shared account to implement strategies developed off-wiki for intervening in a dispute about the New Way Forward article. . Editors of several popular blogs are aware for the situation, and are watching to see if a new precedent is set. As of late 2005, shared accounts were considered harmful, and have until now have been routinely blocked. So far, no edits have come from the account, but their stated intent is explicit. Umpteenages 20:13, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I see no harm done as of this time. Newcomers are welcome, and we do not prohibit anonymous editting. Is there something specific you are requesting? Johntex\ 20:38, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• I left a note (hey, it's a wiki!) about shared accounts. Guy (Help!) 21:39, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• I noticed they have posted the name of the account and the password, but I was not able to log into it. Perhaps they haven't finished the E-mail authorization. Should we block an account before it is created? I suggested that they redo the password as soon as they go into the account, and suggested abandoning it. -- Samuel Wantman
• I have blocked this account, as role accounts are not permitted without Foundation approval. I disabled autoblocking, so the students should have no problem creating their own accounts if they so desire (I left a note on the account's Talk page to that effect). --Slowking Man 12:23, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

flaw in anti-vandalism bot

I've already deleted twice an article I wrote. The bot has already undeleted it once. It's obvious that the bot can't tell when an author deletes his own work. The article is Analisis de imagenes=Imagery analysis. I made the mistake of writing the article in the wrong version of wikipedia, and have already started the process of translating and introducing the article into the spanish edition.Radical man 7 20:45, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• That's not a flaw. It's quite deliberate. You did not delete the article, you just blanked it, which leaves an empty shell. We do not want empty, blank articles left lying around. The proper method for what you want to do is add a tag at the top of the article that says {{db-author}}. This is the code for "Author requests deletion" so an admin can actually delete the article properly. Fan-1967 20:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• Just a quick comment - this sort of thing would be far less frequent if the current definition of G7 on WP:CSD were brought up to date. As it stands, it implies that an author only has to blank a page to request deletion. I feel that this needs to be changed to make it clear that authors must use {{db-author}} to get an article G7'd. Tevildo 21:14, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• Thats not always the way it is used though. Fairly reguarly an author blanks and someone else comes along and adds the speedy notice. Viridae 21:56, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• IME pages are usually blanked by new editors with no knowledge whatsoever of deletion criteria, like the one above who thought blanking and deleting were the same. The wording at WP:CSD#G7 does primarily say the author should request deletion. The note at the end simply says we can interpret blanking as a deletion request. Fan-1967 18:30, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

The bot reverted an Article that I feel was a legit edit. Lenzar 23:23, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Not quite. It might be better to discuss that further on that article's Talk page, but I suspect a "See also" directed to Indoor Soccer would be more appropriate than removing a large section of this article. I see you've already created a seperate article for Indoor American Football (note improper capitalization) as well. I would suggest putting a {{db-author}} tag on that article for now, and discuss the changes on the Talk page first. -- Kesh 23:59, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Javascript alert on blanking?

It shouldn't be too hard to add some code to MediaWiki:Common.js that would detect if a user is blanking an article and pop up a confirmation dialog saying something like:

"You are about to blank the whole page. If you created this page by mistake and want it deleted, please add the "{{db-author}}" tag to the page instead. Are you sure you want to blank the page anyway?"   (OK / Cancel)

Do you think this would be a good idea? -Ilmari Karonen (talk) 03:07, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

It will just get vandals to put the db-author tag on articles they didn't write, and force Recent Changes patrollers to have to dig thru the article history to find out how actually wrote it, and then you'll get somebody arguing, "I was logged in as User:XXX when I wrote it and I forgot to re-log in when I put the db-author tag on it as an anon", or even worse, "I wasn't logged in when I created it, now I have an account". User:Zoe|(talk) 22:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Worse: if you warn potential vandals against blanking articles, they may engage in less detectable vandalism. The vast majority of page blankings are vandalism, and dealing with the much smaller number of authors wanting deletion is manageable. Fan-1967 00:09, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Maybe more explanitory, such as "You are about to blank a page. Note that this is almost always considered Misplaced Pages:Vandalism. If you want it deleted, please see Misplaced Pages:Deletion." 68.39.174.238 00:05, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Some new linkspam sites

There's a medium-sized linkspam effort against Misplaced Pages underway from "gocurrency.com", "fxwords.com" , and "forextradingllc.com" (the parent organization of these.)

• fxwords.com Misplaced Pages references(48 links)
• GoCurrency.com Misplaced Pages references (5 links)

These sites have no real content; they exist to draw Google and Yahoo pay per click traffic. GoCurrency sales pitch: "Advertise with us! One of the fastest growing websites in its category, GoCurrency traffic has increased by twelve times the amount from May through October of 2006. Get on board to reach a unique global audience of 690,000 unique users with 2 Million page views per month!" http://www.gocurrency.com/advertise-with-us.htm Fxwords is a glossary of financial terms, which gives them an excuse to link from Misplaced Pages for many of the words in their vocabulary.

Some editors are cleaning out the links, per a discussion in Village Pump, but a link block might be in order. --John Nagle 21:33, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

• I suggest a trip to m:Talk:Spam blacklist to request blacklisting. Guy (Help!) 21:40, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
• Trip successful. Please don't give direct links to spammer sites, because every page with them becomes uneditable after blacklisting. I had to unlink 'em in your post, John. MaxSem 23:10, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I removed all of the linkspam and banned the account responsible. --Cyde Weys 23:19, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

In the future, it might be a better idea to have something added to Shadowbot's blacklist, rather than using the Meta blacklist. I'm not trying to spam my own bot, but I was under the impression that Meta is for more widespread, i.e cross-project, spam. Shadow1 (talk) 13:56, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• Well, one can <nowiki> the links. Geogre 13:59, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Revert vandal back

Admin SlimVirgin (talk · contribs · logs) removed protection on Universal Image Format (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) two days ago and apparently Uifan (talk · contribs · logs) has just noticed with his various IP edits. Admin FayssalF (talk · contribs · logs) has been involved in the past also and agreed that this was obnoxious vandalism. — RevRagnarok 23:17, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

huh? Viridae 02:17, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

What are you asking to be done? -Patstuart 22:25, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

It seems as though there is both an edit warr-er and a linkspammer on that articel, and it was unprotected. 68.39.174.238 00:30, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

VoABot II malfunctioning

VoABot II keeps reverting The Neptunes to a vandalized state.--Jonpro 00:14, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Appears to be an isolated incident, as far as I can tell. I've reverted the page. Chick Bowen 00:23, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

NO, there is a problem with this bot. I caught it today repeatedly reverting blankings on bios. The blankings were by the subject objecting to libels. (The anti-vandal bot was doing the same thing ont he same article). Can't we stop these bots reverting blankings on bios? --Doc 02:26, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Instead of bios specifically I'd prefer a whitelist of users to be implemented, which the bot would not revert whatsoever. That would still block out vandal blankings of properly-sourced information. – Chacor 06:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, a whitelist is easier for AVB, as (I think) it has all admins automatically whitelisted. I think that VoABotII is a lot more lightweight than AVB, so won't have these lists, and they would perhaps be difficult to implement - and the subjects of libel are unlikely to be on such a whitelist. The simple way to solve this is for an admin to protect a page which needs blanking, blank it and then unprotect it - this should stop VoABotII reverting, without the need for quite bulky lists. Of course, the difficulty is getting an issue of libel to an admin's attention, but then again, most subjects of libel seem to know that they can easily email info-en for help. If there are lots of people who don't know this, then we do need a prominent notice somewhere informing users affected by libel to either contact us or leave a message here (which will probably get quicker attention) - something on the article talk page of all bios, maybe? Perhaps an idea would be to have an IRC bot which will relay large changes to biography articles to a dedicated channel (not vandalism-en-wp), where people can sit and check what's happening and revert the bot (or bring it to an admin's attention) if neccesary. Martinp23 12:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC) If such a bot is needed, I've got some code for a similar task which is easily adaptable

Grossly offensive comment

I believe an immediate block or at least a strong final warning is warranted for this edit. I suppose it could go to AIV, but I don't think this user deserves four warnings. Newyorkbrad 02:36, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Blocked, 48 hours. If someone wishes to extend it I would be quite happy to see that happen. Viridae 02:38, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Probably a vandal account. See edit to Jimmy Wales. Grandad 02:40, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Damn, Jkelly already beat me to the indef-block. EVula // talk // ☯ // 02:42, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Boy it is fun to be an admin, all the wonderful people you meet! HighInBC 02:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Loooongcat is an internet meme associated with extreme stupidity. Banning is the best solution. --Cyde Weys 02:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I just had a look at the userpage with all the trolling including a "Vandal and proud of it" userbox and was going to extend to indef but someone beat me. Viridae 02:43, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I indef-blocked; it was a vandal account. Jkelly 02:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks all. Now who wants to check for all the username variations with different numbers of "o"s? Newyorkbrad 02:46, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh, that is easy. Use Special:Listusers. Entering "Longcat" gets this list. Though it seems they've all been blocked already. Actually, I see that this doesn't produce a list of all the "oooo" variants, as those are not sequential in an alphabetical list. I think there is a list if users by when created, so the "created users" log could be checked to see if accounts like this were created at the same time. Carcharoth 03:32, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I checked from Lo to Loooooooooooos, and only one Loooongcat. Incidentially, nothing has been done about User:Longcat, which appears to be an spa for voting on Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Longcat. NB. Longcat is now a redirect to 4chan, explained by a Longcat section in an old version of the article. Interesting what you can find in old versions of articles! :-) Carcharoth 03:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Street Fighter II

• I'm having a problem at Street Fighter II. An anonymous user (67.36.63.229) is constantly adding miniaturized pictures of the characters and flag images into the character list in this article. This could be characterized as a content dispute, except I believe the accepted method of handling things like this is discussing and reaching consensus on the talk page, and the user simply does not respond to messages I leave him on his user talk; he simply keeps reverting the page back to his version. While it is only one user, I feel the article should be semi-protected so he will at least be required to discuss the issue in some fashion before making his changes. By the way, he was previously blocked by User:Kukini for adding false information to Cammy; one of his first edits when the block expired was to add that false information back in. Danny Lilithborne 02:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Have sprotected the page for a while. Hopefully this will get some sort of response. If, when it is unprotected he continues then let me know and I will give him a short sharp block for disruption. Viridae 02:59, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Kishanjoshi (talk · contribs)

The user has appears to be POV pushing using personal attacks.

• Personal attack 1 in response to a test3
• Personal attack 2 in response to reversion
• User impersionation - and incorrect datestamp.
• Left a bogus "npa3" on my page after having his first personal attack reverted.

Looks like a standard procedure here. --Sigma 7 04:02, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I took a small leap here and blocked the user 24h for the third diff above - signing another user's name to any message is completely unacceptable, and I think obviously so even to a newish user. The user's other contribs do seem to indicate an intent to disrupt. | Mr. Darcy talk 05:33, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Very old copyvio

A user, Bm79, brought to my attention yesterday that most of the Azerbaijan (Iran) article was originally copied from The Columbia Encyclopedia. This apparently goes back to October 2005, when Surena (talk · contribs) created the Azarbaijan article. In January 2006, the content was merged into Azerbaijan (Iran), and has stayed there every since, although it has been greatly altered since then. Even though it's changed, is it still copyvio? If so, should the article then be rewrote, or reverted back to September 2005? I'd appreciate people's thoughts on this. Thanks, Khoikhoi 04:26, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Hum. My advice would be...

a) Leave Azarbaijan as redirect; knock Azerbaijan (Iran) back to just before the copyvio was merged in (), and work from there; then

b) see if you can find any other articles the user who pasted it in did this to.

Sucks, I know, but the text we have is definitely derived from theirs, and we can't keep the copyvio around even though we've polished it. Shimgray | talk | 04:33, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Reverted and "back-merged". Shimgray | talk | 04:53, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

No, we actually can keep it. Ideas themselves cannot be copyrighted, only works. Reference articles are already not very unique, and if they're re-written, then you've basically used the original work as a reference, plain and simple. It's not the same thing as re-writing something like a poem, which would be a copyvio.

I think it's important to avoid copyright paranoia. It's also important to take into consideration Misplaced Pages's position as a non-profit entity and the use of this material for educational purposes vis-a-vis copyright law.--Beautiful Scars 04:55, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

It's derivative work. Copyright paranoia has nothing to do with this, it's clearly a copyright violation. Misplaced Pages's policies do not reflect any relaxation of copyright policy because it is controlled by a non-profit organization; since our material is licensed under the GFDL, anyone can use it, not just non-profits. -bbatsell ?? 05:01, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I did read it before posting those comments; it was clearly a ripped-off version of their text. The "rewriting" was re-ordering a couple of sentences and tidying it up; the "history" section read like a second draft of the original. If people had taken the source material and rephrased it in their own words we would have no problem - but they hadn't done this. We were reprinting Columbia's article and passing it off as a) our own and b) licensed under the GFDL, which is plain and simple copyright violation. This is not "copyright paranoia", it's a plain and simple fact.

Misplaced Pages's educational and non-profit use gives us much latitude wrt fair use, but it doesn't give us the ability to relicense other people's material as free content, which is what we were doing here. Shimgray | talk | 05:03, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Now that I look closer, I do notice now that it reads very much like the Columbia article. I admit that I was going off the summary presented above, rather than my own comparison, and I apologize for that. I withdraw my objections.--Beautiful Scars 05:11, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

No problem. Shimgray | talk | 05:20, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I've left a note for the original author (who was very new at the time, so probably an honest mistake rather than wilfulness) to see if they remember doing any others. Shimgray | talk | 05:20, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

{{mathworld}}

I have tried and tried to ask Linas to stop changing the author citation to "first name last name" but he continues to do so. The format we use on Misplaced Pages for references are "last name, first name", as can be seen by any of our citation templates. He refuses to listen, and won't answer my questions to him directly. See User_talk:Linas#.7B.7Bmathworld.7D.7D for our most recent discussion, although we have discussed this before at places including Template talk:Cite web, where it was made clear that on Misplaced Pages we use "last name, first name" and he should not change it, but he refuses to acknowledge that. Outside opinions would be greatly appreciated. -Mets501 (talk) 05:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I have left a note on his talk page. -bbatsell ?? 05:53, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Great! Should I revert the template again or wait a bit longer? -Mets501 (talk) 05:58, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Slightly conflicting opinion posted there. Sorry. As a general comment, 'it's in the WP:MOS this way' is weak; we can change the MOS. Opabinia regalis 07:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

To my knowledge, there is no "format used on Misplaced Pages" for references. Certainly the relevant style guide, WP:CITE doesn't mention anything of the sort. Any coherent and standard format within the given discipline is acceptable. And certainly some major style guides, e.g. Chicago, use "first last" as the format for inline citations, which is a common use of the citation templates. Christopher Parham (talk) 18:03, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

This shouldn't be here. It's a simple content dispute and doesn't require any administrator tools. I suggest you discuss it on WT:CITE, or file an RfC. --Tango 18:11, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Sock Puppetry, Vandalism & SPAM on Bharatanatyam page

Hello,

I would like to bring to your attention of the recent activity on the Bharatanatyam page. Some of the users once in a while will take off information from the site such as the origins of the dance from Tamil Nadu, also some of the historical mentionings of the dance in Tamil literature. There seems to be some kind of POV advocacy which pops up once in a while. Also, there are some users whom are posting links to advertisements. Furthermore, I have noticed that these users do not have their own user name page. Below are the following user names which have been involved in such activity:

• User:Jayajaya (note: possible sock puppetry)
• User:Anitaa (note: deletes information which has already been cited, adding POVs)
• User:61.247.253.102 (note: warned 3 times for spamming, and blacklisted on wikipedia)
• User:Sangeeeeta (note: possible sock puppetry)
• User:Sakthi24 (note: previously warned for spamming)
• User:Bluegurl0095 (note: possible sock puppetry)
• User:SadirAttam (note: this one actually admits avertizing on wikipedia - User talk:SadirAttam

I have also posted messages on the Talk:Bharatanatyam page after each incident. Much work has been put into this topic with cited sources. This continuous POV editing, deletions, and Spamming does not help the article one bit and is becoming a nuisance. Hopefully this will stop.

Wiki Raja 06:07, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Crazy wacky funtime

• User talk:SirChristdom
• User talk:Flintrock
• User talk:OpalPI
• User talk:WikiTitan

All four users were indefinitely blocked by yours truly for personal attacks (part of a long-standing effort against an editor I work with often, as well as a couple others now). Threats were met with "use {{unblock}}", which was met with more threats, which was met with a lockdown of their talk pages.

I'm only mentioning it here because I just want a thumbs-up that it is okay to do this (considering that I've completely removed their ability to request an unblock, which I see as an opportunity they squandered by threatening me).

For those that don't want to bother reading the talk pages, the highlights can be found at User:EVula#Collection of threats. :-) EVula // talk // ☯ // 06:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

—Cryptic 06:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Wow, I've never seen such artfully crafted death threats. No-brainer support. Grandmasterka 07:39, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah, hells yeah. I wholeheartedly endorse these blocks. -- Merope 07:51, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Sweet Fancy Moses. Danny Lilithborne 07:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I really have to give credit to the "murder you and hang your body from a oak tree for the piegons to eat" one. I mean, threatening someone with "I will sue" and "I will report you" is the equivalent to just phoning it in. Feeding me to pigeons? That is creative. EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:00, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• This one is not here to build an encyclopaedia. Well done. Guy (Help!) 10:07, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

User:Tro:del

This user and I got into a dispute over my nomination of Val42 to be an admin. This dispute was originally being discussed on Val42's user page, then Trodel decided to switch it to our personal user pages. I believed, today, that our dispute was finished, but then he left me a comment tonight that was a threat against both myself and Val42. Apparantly Trodel got so angry with me that he has threatened to block me for alleged trolling and he has threatened to oppose Val42's nomination for adminship simply because I was talking with him over this dispute. I do not believe my remarks were rude, but if they were I would apologize, but he would block me for trolling, which i quite simply am not doing. He has not actually done it yet, but This is the channel that the wp page about threats directed me to, so i am posting it here. If any other admin reads this, please help me out here, because I do not want to be blocked because of the power tripping of Trodel. Thank you.

TheGreenFaerae 08:35, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I just found out that he removed an addition to an article that was disputed and resolved some time ago. I believe this is a covert personal attack, as it was his first edit after threatening me, and he had no previous history on the page. the page in question is Chloe Sullivan. TheGreenFaerae 09:04, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Having read the arguments, I don't think you were trolling. However I do believe you turned friendly advice into a percieved personal attack and then beccame quite beligerant about it. It would do you both good to calm down. Incidentally, what Trodel was saying about the nominator needing to be of good standing IS a common requirement for people !voting on RfAs. That is not a reflwection on you, but on your experience of wikipedia and therefore how well you can judge a candidate. (havent looked at the second issue yet) Viridae 09:08, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree with that, and I did concede that point. I suppose it appeared as if I took it personal, although that was not the case, but that is not what this issue is about. He is threatening em at this point, after I conceded the dispute. After I said that he was right, he then threatened both myself and him. I'm worried that he is going to block me for something I did not do. I woudl even apologize for this misunderstanding but he would block me if I did. TheGreenFaerae 09:12, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I am going to contact Trodel and ask for his take on the situation. Viridae 09:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

::I have reviewed the article. The section that was removed was unsourced, speculation and smelled like original Research. If it makes you feel any better I have removed it. Spartaz 09:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC), In fact I appear to have lost the edit conflict but the result is the same. --Spartaz 09:20, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

My take on that (which I hope will be confirmed by Trodel) was that either, it was unrelated to the dispute or that he came across the article in your contributions (it is fairly common to look at someones contributions to see what you are dealing with) and decided that that section was as stated by Spartaz and removed it. Viridae 09:19, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Well i still disagree with that, but as part of my resolution regarding it, I will not say anything about it. However, as it was buried far back in my contributions, I do not see how he just came upon it, particualrly as it was the only such edit.TheGreenFaerae 09:33, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

There is multiple incidences of editing the actual article and even more of editing the talk page. And all your contributions can be brought onto one page (show 500) making it easy to scan and have a quick look at the articles. Viridae 09:37, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

You have less than 100 mainspace edits - which is only two pages of the usual (50) view. Hardly buried. I wouldn't feel so sensitive about it - we all get reverted all the time. Its a wiki after all. --Spartaz 09:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

BTW, my default on Special:Preferences (Recent changes) is 250 - so all his edits come up on one page. --Trödel 22:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

This user insulted me for responding to a request for my opinion and my observations - insisting that I prove it. Then when I wasted time finding references for my observation (how ridiculous is that), he still blamed me. I therefore began reviewing his edits, I deleted this text since it was, in my view, clearly unsourced fancruft. Then he couches his "report" on my alleged misbehaviour as "I would apologize but I can't." However,instead of finding a way to apologize (he could apologize on his own talk page, he could apologize by emailing me directly, he could even have apologized above (note that he did not - he only claimed he would). His actions show that he is more interested in wasting other peoples time than spending any of his own time. He wasted your time responding to his frivilous complaint, wasted your time looking through contribution screens (since he could not be bothered to include a link), wasted my time having to come here since one of the editors above asked me for comment. And, I suspect, he will respond to my comment by finding a way to waste other people's time instead of taking some of his own time to read through complaints on this page to get a feel for what is or is not a valid complaint. Finally, he characterizes me as "power tripping" which I view as a borderline personal attack.

In my view trolling is any person who "thrive on getting good people to fight...". In his last post on my talk page, he did not apologize, but continued to blame me for his own failure to listen to good advice, and in fact restated his personal attack in Nixon fashion. Therefore, I may continue to review his edits for unsourced claims and if he objects he can do so on the article's talk page; however, I will view further comments concerning this policy discussion on my talk page as trolling and will block accordingly. --Trödel 22:09, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I take this as he is personally going against me. He said, himself that he is going through my edits, so how am I to take it as anything but a personal attack? I did not mean to insult him. But why should someone be insulted by sourcing thier statements? As you see on the Chloe Sullivan page, I have been in disputes about sourcing additions before, so I know what the policy is regarding citing one's sources. It is my view that he took this request way too personally, and I'm sorry that it insulted him, but I just wanted to know where he was coming from in his statement. And he said not to contact him again. So why would I have emailed him? That would have been contacting him, and apparantly trolling. i was never trying to start a fight. I simply wanted to see evidence for his opinion, as it was not official policy, which I read several times. I object to the charge that I was wasting time by asking for WP:CITE. I feel he is trying to bully me out of Misplaced Pages, and I really need protection.TheGreenFaerae 00:01, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

CyberAnth Redux

While I am amongst those who felt that User:CyberAnth's selective mass-nominations of late were a bad idea (and possibly censorial, but let's not continue that here), I also find the recent focus on his articles by other editors to be a poor idea. I am sure that the editors involved only have the improvement of Misplaced Pages in mind, and therefore are acting in good faith; nevertheless these nominations may be perceived as a form of reprisal, and are likely to further polarize the issues. Tarinth 10:40, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Hear, hear. Sam Blacketer 11:55, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• Agreed. All that will do is escalate the dispute. If people want to make a note and come back to them in a month then that's fine, but I don't see how this is anything other than pointiness. This comment was added by JzG on 12:44, 7 January 2007 - Quack 688 16:35, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• We have to be consistent - if "mass-nominating articles solely because they deal with topic X" is considered to be poor form, then "mass-nominating articles solely because they were edited by user X" is just as bad. It certainly won't do anything to help resolve the situation. Quack 688 16:35, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

AfD on Michael Goff

The nominator has withdrawn his nomination of this article for deletion, but did so by blanking the page. Is it not better to have the discussion formally closed by an administrator? Sam Blacketer 12:42, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I just closed it as withdrawn by nom. Syrthiss 13:14, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Sam Blacketer 13:26, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Underage images posted to Erection

Last night I reverted changes in the pictures at Erection ] and explained why to the user who has made the changes (User:Djy9302). The user has since indicated on my TalkPage that they were photos of himself. I realise now that this may be a slightly more serious problem than the usual vanity postings in this sort of articles as the user identifies himself as being 16 years old on his UserPage. The photos thus constitute child pornograhpy in many jurisdictions. They were originally uploaded to Commons not here however, can an admin with sysop access on Commons delete them to prevent them reappearing in future? The images in question are: Image:100_0441.jpg Image:100_0442.jpg WJBscribe  14:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I was just comeing here to post that, myself. Even if the user is actually above 18, the caption of the photos states that the subject of the photo is a teenager. While the AOC in Europe is 16, in the USA, where Misplaced Pages is hosted, it is 18. Best to delete the images, in my mind. Jeffpw 15:09, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Oversight should be consulted for such images. This is just the kind of issue for which oversight was created. Cheers, * Peter M Dodge ( Talk to Me • Neutrality Project ) 16:22, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how oversight is especially important here. A Commons administrator should simple speedily delete the images. -- tariqabjotu 16:48, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I've zapped the images on Commons. Oversight is not needed here; there is no personal information in the deleted edits (which is what oversight is about).--Nilfanion (talk) 17:04, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Age of consent is immaterial to the law in the UK where it is unlawful to posess a naked and sexually explicit picture of a person under 18 years of age unless one is formally partnered with them. This included images downloaded from the internet. This is paraphrasing UK law. The images would be very much better deleted quickly even if they appear to be 18+ precisely because of the caption associated with them. One can argue that these pictures are not erotic wth some justification, but safety dictates that they should go. Fiddle Faddle 16:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

In fact the images are illegal in the UK if they even appear to be of someone under 18. This also includes pseudo-photographs and cartoons. -- zzuuzz 17:03, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Age of Consent is 16 in most places in the U.S., but AOC is not the issue here. Explicit images of teenagers under the age of 18 are considered child pornpgraphy in the U.K and in the U.S. No special oversight is required, the usual process of speedy delete is sufficient. Atom 16:56, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Are there still images in need of deletion on Commons? Which ones? Or uploaded by which Commons user? (Please give a link to the commons user by prefixing if you can). As a Commons admin I would be happy to work to do the right thing once it is clear what that is (seems pretty clear to me already.) However I note that Nilfanion has already perhaps taken care of this? ++Lar: t/c 17:27, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

TSLcrazier

User:TSLcrazier continuously adds pictures to the site which do not include copyright status. Numerous users have tried to contact him to ask him to add copyright status to his image but ignores all the message on his talk page. While looking through his contributions i have noticed he has removed warnings on images asking for copyright information, without providing the information (ex: .) I have also found a few things where he has removed deleted parts of articles with no reason why. (ex. ) It would be nice if an admin would step in and handle this problem. --Malevious Userpage o Talk Page o Contributions 17:56, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I have given the user a final warning / talk about the importance of the fair use policy, as well as rolling back all his image page blankings. If he persists, please drop me a line on my talk page so I can handle this. --Deskana (For Great Justice!) 18:01, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Year-long blatant vandalism never caught

I must say, I hope we can catch blatant vandalism faster than one year ago which no one found. Is there anyway to search for blatant vandalism other that by random chance of us finding it? semper fi68.211.96.214 18:49, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

This came up before. It was a mistake, not vandalism, and the page was redirected anyway, so no one saw it; hence, not a big deal ;) -Patstuart 22:16, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

If vandalism or unhelpful edits remain that long, it pretty much means no-one looked at the page for a year until you came along. Who visits talk page redirects regularly? Grandmasterka 22:46, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

False solicitation notices

Someone posted solicitation notices on a page. I removed them and asked them not to do it. However, they apparently were not the poster in question, who is now claiming he did not post them. As this is one of a number of accounts accused of vote stacking sock puppetry, maybe someone is using his account to falsely post these notices. I have asked him to stop using his acount until this matter can be settled. It's a holiday for me, so I won't be dealing with it much more, but maybe some administrator with some free time can handle this. I did apologize to the user for falsely accusing him of using his own account. KP Botany 18:48, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh, well, false alert, apparently the user did not understand that "Tax-deductible contributions may be made ... by checks made payable to" and "Checks should be made payable to ... and sent to ..." could possibly be construed by others as soliciting donations. Doing charitable solicitation for a living, I may have over-reacted to the use of professional catch-phrases for donations and misinterpreted them as seeking donations. My bad. KP Botany 18:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

No problem. New user who doesn't understand the rules here. Be polite, thank him for fessing up, and encourage him to continue edits. Misplaced Pages:Please do not bite the newcomers - jesup 18:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll be honest - this isn't just any new user; he's part of a group of editors who are trying to use Misplaced Pages as a PR outlet for this opera company and two related parties. They've all been warned that it's not appropriate, but they just keep switching tactics. I've already filed a checkuser, and I'm monitoring all the relevant articles. | Mr. Darcy talk 19:31, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Saint Mary's Catholic School redirecting post AFD

I am not sure if this is the right place for this, but here goes. Saint Mary's Catholic School just survived an AFD vote here. I did not participate in the vote in anyway; I just found the article afterwards while looking over recently closed AFDs. When I went to the article after the AFD I found that someone had made it a redirect, with the comment "Merge/redirect -- lack of independent sources, lack of info." This is after an admin had closed the AFD wih a keep. As far as I know, the article has not undergone a DRV. So it seems like Shimeru did not like the admin's decision when the AFD was closed and took matters into his own hands. I reverted and left a note that the article just survived the AFD, so in my opinion, it should not be blanked by redirecting. I rewrote some of the article, and left it at that intending to continue later. I come back today and find that it is once again a redirect with the comments by Shimeru of "redirect -- still no secondary sources, and manifestly no consensus to keep. Needs sources before it can stand alone as an article." I subsequently reverted again with a comment asking him to not redirect a page that just survived an AFD. As far as I know Shimeru is not an admin and this page survived the AFD. This is not the first time I have run into him following the redirecting of a page without consensus. See Desert_Ridge_Junior_High_School's edit history. I would appreciate it if someone would talk to him about this. KnightLago 18:58, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Left him a note on his talk page. Let us know if he continues to do do a de facto delete of the article. | Mr. Darcy talk 20:40, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Wait, there's nothing wrong with what this person did. Just because the SCHOOLs fanatics get a false consensus keep doesn't mean that a lack of sources has to be accepted as status quo. This is a perfectly legitimate edit. User:Zoe|(talk) 22:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/Special:Contributions/216.93.88.235

Can somone please rollback all of this? I was going to try with VandalProof, but I've just come back after a wikibreak, and it seems to not be working for me anymore. --After Midnight 19:25, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Done. Incidentally, you are using VP 1.3, right? Prodego 19:31, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Range block of 68.215.0.0/16

Had to block the range to prevent vandalism here. 24 hour block, anon only, account creation disabled. Hopefully this won't affect too many people. --Deskana (For Great Justice!) 20:27, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Now had to block 68.219.0.0/16 too. --Deskana (For Great Justice!) 20:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

All Roads Lead to Jacob Peters (talk · contribs)

I have blocked Jacob Peters (talk · contribs) indefinitely. This user has been given several warnings and blocks, but he persists to believe he thinks he can game the system. A fifth request for checkuser was made regarding this user last week, but it appears the people with checkuser have not been as active. So, after I was informed of some editing oddities at Vladimir Lenin, I decided to some sleuthing of my own...

• FBabeuf (talk · contribs) signs his comments in a unique manner, a manner I have only seen from one other user: Jacob Peters. They both sign with three tidles instead of four, and their signatures are both on their own lines (see FB and JP).
• FBabeuf (talk · contribs)'s account was just created today and appeared merely to continue 69.105.31.69 (talk · contribs)'s edits.
• 69.105.31.69 (talk · contribs)'s are a continuation of 207.151.38.178 (talk · contribs)'s edits.
• Moving onto another article, one can see that 207.151.38.178 (talk · contribs) unexplicably blanked part of the Collectivisation in the USSR article.
• Oddly enough Iskra1 (talk · contribs) did the same thing on December 27.
• And low and behold, Iskra1 (talk · contribs) has been declared a likely sockpuppet of JP (see Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Jacob_Peters#Jacob_Peters_4).

So, in conclusion, pending the conclusion of the WP:RCU hiatus, I have...

• Blocked Jacob Peters (talk · contribs) indefinitely, for extensive sockpuppety.
• Blocked FBabeuf (talk · contribs) indefinitely, as a sockpuppet of Jacob Peters.
• Blocked 69.105.31.69 (talk · contribs) for forty-eight hours, as a sockpuppet, with account creation blocked (avoiding some collateral damage).
• Unblocked then re-blocked 207.151.38.178 (talk · contribs) for forty-eight hours, as a sockpuppet, with account creation blocked (avoiding some collateral damage).
• Semi-protected User:69.105.31.69, to help prevent removal of the sockpuppet notice.
• Semi-protected User:207.151.38.178, to help prevent removal of the sockpuppet notice.

Any comments? -- tariqabjotu 20:30, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

The new socks look like a slam-dunk, especially FBabeuf. Good work. - Merzbow 20:56, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Holocaust site link

This may not require administrator attention but I think it requires a wiser person than I. I started reverting the edits of User:71.243.102.51, who has been adding entirely misplaced editorial comment on the lines of . But the history of Operation Reinhard (one of the articles) does show a low key edit war between competing domains death-camps.org and deathcamps.org. The sites look very similar, but the editorial comment is making claims of fakery. I have no real idea how to investigate further, but it does seem an area where sensitive attention to external links is required. It may be that someone is using Misplaced Pages in a very inappropriate way. Over to you good people. Notinasnaid 20:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I have removed the link and editorial remark. No one should add their own web sites as references. Ridiculous edit-war. MartinDK 21:20, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

User:Vhowells

I came across this user while dealing with some images with invalid copyright tags. The user appears to be a child, and they have their name and full address on their user page. Should this information be removed? --- RockMFR 20:55, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• I have taken a first step of dropping her a note and deleting the name and address from her talk page. But I think there is someway of doing this more permanently? --Slp1 21:28, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Isn't this what Oversight is for? MartinDK 21:33, 7 January 2007 (UTC)
    • Short of totally deleting the whole page and asking the user to start again, not much can be done. The address is in from the start so every single revision would need to be removed. I'm going to do it now, if this user is a child then we should take steps to protect her from harm. --Deskana (For Great Justice!) 21:37, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Admin abuse

I have a user who has been blocking users indefinitely for minor offenses without warning. The user is user:ohnoitsjamie He refuses to admit he did anything wrong at all. This has become completely out of hand. I am requesting this be investigated. You may contact me for more details. Thank You.

Albott 20:59, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps Ohnoitsjamie (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) is simply blocking sockpuppets of previously banned users who had much more major offenses. Yuser31415 21:53, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

This edit might seem to support that. Fan-1967 22:18, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

You still haven't provided any specifics (see note on my talk page. OhNoitsJamie 21:13, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Provide specific accounts and their edits, that will help the admins to look into the matter. Otherwise, they can't help you as there is no evidence to investigate. --Farix (Talk) 21:37, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I looked though Ohnoitsjamie's block log, which is available to registered user (not sure about anons) and I don't see anything that wasn't legitimate. All of the name blocks where vandals, clear sockpuppets, and one link spammer who was violating WP:EL and was pretty belligerent about it when s/he was blocked. --Farix (Talk) 23:45, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Many Personal attacks from User:Szhaider

He has been disruptive in his edits. Edit-warring with multiple users across multiple articles. There is a post involving him on this board . He has engaged in personal attack in his edit summary against User:Fowler&fowler (whose revert preceded his) and I warned him . He then made attack on me in my talk page .Rumpelstiltskin223 23:02, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I would like to add to this report - Szhaider has posted a comment on his userpage, which carries an offensive insinuation towards a religion and community - . This is in addition to revert-warring on Muhammad Iqbal and Muhammad Ali Jinnah and previously on Abrar ul Haq. Compound into this his avowal of "Pakistani nationalism" and strong religious and political POVs, I see a big-time POV pusher. I am involved in handling a dispute with this fellow, so I will not take any action. However, I recommend that this editor be blocked for at least 1 week, as he has had many prior requests and warnings for resolving these issues. Rama's arrow 00:00, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

As the named complaints were recently aggravated, I have blocked Szhaider for a duration of 1 week for revert-warring, WP:3RR violation on Iqbal, disruption and personal attacks. If I jumped the gun, I can accept that criticism but I do feel there is sufficient cause. Rama's arrow 00:45, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Autoblocked

I am using aol, and it states that my IP address is being blocked. My IP address is 207.200.122.44 . Please assist. CarmenBryan 23:21, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

You sure that's your IP? It isn't coming up in the block list or anything. —Mets501 (talk) 23:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I've tried unblocking you. You can try and edit now. —Mets501 (talk) 23:43, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Valve audio amplifiers dispute

I am bringing her a situation that may or may not require administrator assistance, as I don't have either the subject-matter background or the time tonight to determine whether it's a user conduct issue or a pure content dispute. Could someone with a science/technology background please take a look at Valve audio amplifiers and the archived talkpage, as well as User talk:Tubenutdave, which describes ongoing disagreement as to the contents of that page between Tubenutdave and User:Light current. As I say, this may be nothing other than an aggravated edit war, but we have a user ready to leave the project over it and I don't have enough expertise in the subject-matter to know how best to proceed, except to have advised him that the request for arbitration he filed earlier today is not going to be accepted. If someone could take a look at this it would be helpful as the real world is calling me AFK for awhile. Thanks. Newyorkbrad 23:22, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Troublesome IP range

I've been dealing with IP addresses of the form 207.62.105.x for a while (based out of California State University). Basically this IP goes into articles and does one of three things:

1. Inserts Portuguese POV and makes everything have a Portuguese perspective. For example, repeatedly making this type of edit to many articles or adding Portuguese-American, Portuguese-Canadian, etc into biographies, regardless of whether the claims are true or not.
2. WP:POINT edits like this one when the edits keep getting reverted
3. Eliminating references to Spanish

Every once in a while he just balatantly vandalizes and article. The IPs are socks of blocked user Uhy, and seem to strike Silva more than any other article. I've already warned several of the IPs, but it seems rather pointless seeing as any attempts to communicate have been completely ignored. The IP is dynamic, but it doesn't seem to change until several hours later usually. So far there haven't been any constructive edits from any of the IPs. --Wafulz 23:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Depleted Uranium incident(s)

User TDC reverted today my edits on Depleted Uranium on the grounds of me being a "James sockpuppet", without first discussing them on the relevant talk page, (and even after being invited to do so). Besides being extremely rude (I obviously am no sockpuppet, nor have any connection to "James"), I believe he violated his revert parole sentence in Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/Depleted_uranium which I found trying to understand why the talk page on Depleted Uranium looked so paranoid. Thank you in advance for your attention Massimamanno 00:07, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Question on editor disagreement about article discussion page content

I wasn't sure if I should ask this at RfC or here, but after reading what RfC is for, it appears that this forum is the more appropriate place to bring this issue. It doesn't necessarily require administrator intervention, but could use input from those who enforce policy which especially includes adminiatrators as well as the entire community. The issue is this...an editor complained about another editor's conduct on the discussion page for the the Michael Crichton article: . After some discussion (including input from me), a couple of other editors have deleted the discussion, with one calling it a personal attack. I restored it once, and the originator of the discussion has restored it once: . I truly don't know if the discussion should be left or was rightfully deleted and am respectfully asking for some input. Thanks in advance. Cla68 00:15, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

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