Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 07:42, 18 October 2005

This page is intended for mentors and Cool Cat to communicate. Please help to keep it uncluttered by using the talk page for other communications related to this mentorship.

• Cool Cat (talk · contribs)

Mentors

• Mark (talk · contribs) (Mark Ryan)
• MacGyverMagic (talk · contribs)
• Tony Sidaway (talk · contribs)

Issues

Mentors and Cool Cat can raise a new issue here by starting a new subsection

Arbitrator clarification on remedies

The arbitrators have made the following comments when asked to clarify the decision:

• James F on Mediation:
  • On the first point, it refers to mediation, not Mediation. Cool Cat is prohibited from acting as an informal mediator. If the Mediation Committee is satisfied that he is sufficiently able to mediate that he can Mediate, if you see what I mean, then we defer to their judgement on that. James F. (talk) 11:13, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
• Fred Bauder on Mediation and on Refactoring:
  • Regarding mediation: you can take some classes in mediation, workshops, practice mediation outside the context of Misplaced Pages; get good at it. Learn how to do it well first, then approach the mediation committee. What you cannot do is set yourself up as The mediator with respect to an article when the other editors have neither asked nor accepted you as a mediator. Fred Bauder 12:28, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Regarding refactoring: voting in a poll is not refactoring. Other actions ought to be interpreted in light of the purpose of the restriction, avoiding re-arranging of talk pages to the point where by what you do you make others comments incomprehensible. Basically, don't move other folks' comments around. Fred Bauder 12:28, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Davenbelle's complaint about a personal attack

Cool Cat has place an edit that appears to be a crude personal attack on Davenbelle, Fadix and co:

• User_talk:Coolcat/User_History 02:46, 15 October 2005: (new diff) "Note: I haven't been making major edits for quite some time. I do not intend to do so for quite a while since several disturbed individuals have been actively annoying me. I am instead focusing on coding my vandal detection bot and managing the Counter Vandalism Unit. As User:RickK suggested Vandals, trolls and malactors are given respect, whereas those who are here to actually create an encyclopedia, and to do meaningful work, are slapped in the face and not given the support needed to do the work they need to do."

I've removed it for now. I'd like to ask Cool Cat to explain what he meant by the edit. I'm also asking the other mentors to review my actions and add their comments. --Tony Sidaway 06:42, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

It's the "disturbed individuals"-bit that's causing problems. If Cool Cat could reword it without the attack, there'd be no problem. So pending such a change, I support removal. Does this warrant some sort of penalty? - Mgm| 08:30, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

I think we're probably all agreed that the language was grossly inappropriate, whatever the motivation. I'm inclined to take a broad view of the mentorship; we're here to ensure that Cool Cat is able to work with the Misplaced Pages community in a productive way, and he will not be able to do that if he lashes out like this. Cool Cat cannot use the mentorship as a shelter from which to get back at those whom he views as his enemies.

A warning should be issued, I think, and displayed at the top of this mentorship page for as long we think it necessary. Further violations of No personal attacks are likely to result in penalties. Leave it at that for now, I'd say.

I agree with your view that it's the use of language that is the problem. Cool Cat should be able to express his frustration at feeling that he has been hounded--arbcom agreed with him on that. But he shouldn't refer to those who hounded him in derogatory terms such as "disturbed individuals". --Tony Sidaway 08:45, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

This is exactly what I am complaining about. Vandals are given respect (or likely this is a misunderstanding) :(. I will replace the word with another as you ask tho. I still think that statement "disturbed" was light in describing Marmots contributions. --Cool Cat 10:16, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

I'm not happy with this response. You've restored the offending wording, and I'm pretty sure everybody thinks you're being disingenuous by saying you were referring to MARMOT. No matter what you may have meant, it looks like you were attacking, and are still attacking, Davenbelle and co, but now doing so in an underhand way. So as to allay such nasty suspicions, please just remove the attack altogether. --Tony Sidaway 10:26, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Alternative wording

I have negotiated an alternative wording with Cool Cat. It goes into more detail and, while it does criticise some named individuals for their actions that were determined by the arbitration committee to be a breach of civility, dwells largely on the consequences of this activity for Cool Cat, and does not in my opinion come close to being a personal attack. Subject to the agreement of the other mentors, I'm happy with it.

Cool Cat is not on personal attack parole; his behavior in this regard was not singled out by arbcom in the recently concluded case. I'm still considering the appropriateness of placing a personal attack warning to Cool Cat on this page, and invite the comments of my fellow mentors on this. --Tony Sidaway 11:01, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

• Looks all right. While I was the first to suggest it, I'm leaning towards not blocking Cool Cat right now. Apparently Davenbelle still isn't letting others keeping an eye on Cool Cat as determined in the Arbcom decision. - Mgm| 20:37, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

I think Cool Cat is okay with the fact that he is allowed to criticise people for actions that are not in the interests of Misplaced Pages, as long as he doesn't step over the line of personal abuse.

We're not arbitrators, but we should use commonsense in distinguishing reasonable complaints from unreasonable ones. We have to balance the current involvement of Davenbelle with the fact that Cool Cat's edit would undoubtedly have been interpreted by nearly everyone familiar with the arbitration case as a personal attack on him. He wasn't intruding in any way, in my opinion, but rather responding to the provocation in an appropriate manner, by taking it to the mentors instead of letting it fester. It's what we're here for. Had he made a fuss about an edit by Cool Cat on the Turkey article, say, that would probably have been inappropriate in my opinion as a fellow editor, but we're not arbitrators and it isn't for us to tell him what he can and cannot do. We're not Davenbelle's mentors. --Tony Sidaway 21:16, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Thank you, Tony. Such personal attacks are unacceptable from any user and I agree that this mentorship is the appropriate place to raise such issues. I would urge User:Cool Cat to disengage from us; provocative edits such as this recent one only serve to exacerbate the situation instead of allowing him to "improve" himself. I would also like to ask him why he moved the user history page? It certainly seems like an attempt to hide this; it broke the link I gave to his edit... — Davenbelle 05:39, 16 October 2005 (UTC)