Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 17:07, 5 January 2008

In order to remain listed at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment, at least two people need to show that they tried to resolve a dispute with this sysop and have failed. This must involve the same dispute, not different disputes. The persons complaining must provide evidence of their efforts, and each of them must certify it by signing this page with ~~~~. If this does not happen within 48 hours of the creation of this dispute page (which was: 03:28, 5 January 2008 (UTC)), the page will be deleted. The current date and time is: 18:07, 27 December 2024 (UTC).

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• (R. fiend (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA))

Statement of the dispute

This is being filed per this discussion on WP:ANI.

User:R. fiend, an administrator, has been repeatedly misusing his administrator tools to gain advantage on articles in which he is in dispute. Furthermore, he is being uncivil in the extreme, both in his edit summaries and his talk page comments, as well as showing disregard for his fellow editors and the community by not responding appropriately when his actions are questioned.

Desired outcome

This is a summary written by users who have initiated the request for comment. It should spell out exactly what the changes they'd like to see in the user, or what questions of behavior should be the focus.

1. R. fiend needs to completely refrain from using his administrative tools on articles in which he is involved, even tangentially. This particularly applies to article protection. Instead, he should apply to Misplaced Pages:Requests for page protection as any other editor should so that a neutral administrator can review the situation and act accordingly. This is how other administrators operate. He needs to understand the protection policy and what it covers.
2. R. fiend should also pay particularly close attention to the policy on civility, as administrators are obliged to follow this in the same way as any other editor. In ways, administrators should also be exemplars when it comes to civility, politeness and respect for their fellow-editors.
3. If R. fiend performs an administrative action for whatever reason and is requested to comment on it, he should do so rather than simply ignoring it.

Description

Add summary here, but you must use the section below to certify or endorse it.

Article protection

• R. fiend was in an edit-war over addition of "Popular culture references" to the Black Irish article, and chose to lock out the anonymous editors by reverting to his own version and immediately semi-protecting the article without specifying any protect rationale.. This was in May; the article remained semi-protected and untagged until I discovered it today (Prot. log).

• He was involved in a content dispute with an anonymous editor on the Patrick Pearse article, regarding additions relating to Ruth Dudley Edwards. the anonymous editor had been removing largely unsourced commentary regarding the subject's sexuality and had been using good edit summaries to justify the changes, whereas R. fiend had been using none. R. fiend then indefinitely semi-protected the article without specifying any protect rationale.. The anonymous editor made a request to unprotect on WP:RPP. I was on RPP patrol at the time and handled the request. Rather than simply undo the rather blatantly inappropriate protect, I left a polite message on his talk page requesting clarification. Another regular RPP patrolling admin, User:Steel359 weighed in on his talk page to concur R. fiend replied on my talk page here stating consensus was achieved on the talk page. When I checked, I could not find it and when I asked where, he never replied. Nor did he reply to my question, "This sounds from what you are saying that you semi-protected the page to block out an anon editor who is involved in a content dispute, and is in dialog. Is this the case here?". The article was subsequently unprotected by User:Steel359 with the comment, "Inappropriate use of semi-protection". A second unprotect request had been made on WP:RPP and Steel had gone to investigate. He also requested of R. fiend to point to talk page consensus, but he could/did not. (Prot. log). Today, R. fiend still remains active on this article.

• R. fiend was involved in reverting the Shaun Glass by changing it to a redirect. He changed the article to a redir, whereupon another editor reverted and began adding detail to the article. A few days later he returned, reverted to his redirect and straight away semi-protected it indefinitely without commentary whatsoever; neither on his edits, on talk pages, nor in the protection summary, even though the article had been significantly updated in the interim. The protect is still in place today. (Prot. log)

• Similarly, on the article As I Lay Dying, R fiend redirected this to As I Lay Dying (novel) without comment in what was a dispute between the significance of the redirect to the novel or to As I Lay Dying (band). Another editor reverted his changes whereupon R. fiend reverted again and immediately fully protected the article indefinitely without any comments whatsoever, even though a number of editors had disagreed. The protect is still in place, almost two months later (Prot. log)

• In November, he was revert-warring with User:Domer48 on Kevin Barry, yet another "Troubles"-related article. He had been in a content dispute and was reverting without discussion using Admin Rollback. He then immediately fully protected the article without edit summaries. This was subsequently unprotected an hour later by uninvolved admin User:Mercury with the comment, "note on administrators talk". Mercury's comment was, "Whats going on at Kevin Barry. It appears that you were edit warring, and have protected your version, or have I mistaken?". At that point, he had been repeatedly warned about edit-warring on that article by a number of people. R. fiend chose to blank most of the warning messages and walk away without responding to anyone, including User:Mercury. Mercury was left with no option but to leave a warning, "Please note that edit warring is disruptive and can lead to preventative blocks. Additionally, please do not apply protection to articles you are currently in dispute.", and unprotect (Prot. log)

• This week, R. fiend was involved in revert-warring with User:Domer48 and User:BigDunc on the Easter Rising article, another "Troubles" article. The article was then protected by uninvolved admin, User:Luna Santin with the statement, "edit warring". R. fiend then went on to make a revert to the article using his ability as an admin. When called on this, he self-reverted two hours later Later, the article was again fully protected due to the same edit-warriors. This time, R. fiend immediately made an (albeit trivial) edit to the article using his admin powers. (Prot. log). This led to the matter of this admin being brought up at WP:ANI, which led to this RfC.

Incivility / communication

• R. fiend has been extremely uncivil and dismissive in his edit summaries and talk page comments. For example, when informed that he was being discussed on WP:ANI, he replied, "Thanks, but I'm less than inclined to care about such inanity", eventually only participating when he was informed again that it could result in an RfC. Edit summaries such as "restoring FASCIST CENSORSHIP or REFERENCED MATERIAL. This has a FOOTNOTE. Therefore it CANNIT be removed or altered by ANYONE, ever. To do so would be ORIGINAL RESEARCH!!!!111!!11oneone1!!!", humourous as it may be intended, are highly inappropriate.

• Comments like "Good. Glad this needless discussion is over. I accept your surrender" are inappropriate and needlessly inflammatory, especially considering "surrender" carries certain well-known connotations on "Troubles"-related articles.

• User:Domer48 when unblocked (see below), left a message stating that R. fiend was reported to WP:AN3 for revert-warring. R. fiend then blanked it with the summary, "whoop-de-fucking-doo".

• R. fiend blocked User:Ed Poor in an apparent error in October, leaving no block summary. User:Jeffrey O. Gustafson unblocked Ed nine hours later in the absence of any communication. When questioned on it on his talk page by a three other admins,, he replied, "Hmmm. Looks like a mistake. Oh well. No harm done.". When it was suggested by User:WJBscribe that he apologize, R. fiend just walked away and never approached User:Ed Poor on the matter again. (Block log)

Blocking

• R. fiend has been involved in a content dispute with User:Domer48 yet again over the Segi article.. He then went on to block Domer48 for WP:3RR violation on the same article, even though he was in dispute and editing there. Nor had R. fiend approached Domer48 at any time before the block. While I agree that Domer48 was arguably in violation of WP:3RR, R. fiend should have absolutely not carried out the block. He should have taken the matter to WP:AN3 as any other editor. This issue ultimately spilled onto my talk page. After Domer48 was blocked, uninvolved admins, User:Luna Santin and User:Metros and other editors voiced their concerns. R. fiend replied with, "Funny, I have no POV on Segi, as I know almost nothing about them. My involvement in that article was to to re-insert the information of just who the hell Segi are (a Basque organization apparently, the article didn't say that) because for some insane reason it kept getting removed in the edit warring. Domer broke the 3 revert rule. It was a bit late for a warning at hat stage. Hell, I've been blocked without warning when I didn't even break that rule. I don't see the big deal. If I didn't block him someone else would have." Luna Santin then returned to take issue with that comment, saying "You shouldn't be blocking users with whom you are in a dispute; doing so is easily construed as an abuse of your admin priviledges. Aside from the obvious conflict of interest you have, it creates a chilling effect by implying that users disagreeing with you will find themselves blocked. Not the sort of climate we want to nurture. It's very easy to get a neutral admin's attention. Now, you're free to keep defending the block, in which case I'm willing to bet several of the concerned users commenting here will escalate matters, causing you much further annoyance and potential embarassment; wouldn't it be easier to just say, "My bad, I'll keep it in mind"?". R. fiend chose not to reply, instead refused to unblock and got more irate when questioned by User:SirFozzie.

Powers misused

• Protection (log):

1. Black Irish (log)
2. Patrick Pearse‎ (log)
3. Shaun Glass‎ (log)
4. As I Lay Dying (log)
5. Kevin Barry (log)
6. Easter Rising (log)

• Blocking (log):

1. User:Domer48 (log)
2. I don't believe the Ed Poor block should be added here as it was admittedly done in error. The issue was regarding communication.

Applicable policies

• Protection policy

• As detailed above

• Blocking policy

• As detailed above

• Civility policy

• As detailed above

Evidence of trying and failing to resolve the dispute

(provide diffs and links)

1. This discussion on WP:ANI shows repeated attempts to resolve issues with this administrator.
2. This thread on his talk page re. the Patrick Pearse protect, and the subsequent response here.
3. This discussion re. the Kevin Barry article by User:Mercury was ignored.
4. Blocking of Domer48 was brought up here but was left unresolved.
5. Link to original ANI discussion about R fiend using admin rights to edit a full-protected article
6. Further examples provided in the diffs in previous sections above.

Users certifying the basis for this dispute

(sign with ~~~~)

1. - Alison 21:36, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
2. For my (albeit small) part. – Steel 01:52, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
3. Rjd0060 (talk) 02:08, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Other users who endorse this statement

(sign with ~~~~)

1. SirFozzie (talk) 21:44, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
2. Rockpocket 02:17, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
3. – Steel 01:52, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
4. Rjd0060 (talk) 02:05, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
5. Actually, I remain unconvinced by his explantation of his block of Ed Poor. I think that incident was a serious misuse of his admin tools. WjBscribe 02:28, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
6. --John (talk) 02:31, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
7. Jehochman 02:33, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
8. Keilana_(recall) 02:49, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
9. 02:51, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
10. I almost never invoke WP:ROUGE, but this is one of the rare times where I feel it deserves to be. In particular, R. fiend's dismissive attitude to concerns from other editors to disputed admin actions he has performed is especially worrying; nobody can be expected to be perfect and to never make mistakes, but willingness to explain admin actions is the primary thing I would expect from any administrator. — Coren  03:15, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
11. Lawrence Cohen 03:21, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
12. Joe 03:25, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
13.   jj137 03:42, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
14. Looks like this could benefit from centralized discussion. MBisanz 04:05, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
15. R. fiend has behaved very poorly for a long time. Everyking (talk) 06:23, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
16. Alison did a great job outlining the problem. There is definitely cause for concern, and the tone of the response below doesn't generate a lot of hope that he has taken this to heart. RxS (talk) 07:12, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
17. I echo the concerns of Rx StrangeLove above. Sandstein (talk) 08:20, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
18. Alison has outlined the problem very well.--Padraig (talk) 08:31, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
19. As per RxS, and thanks to all the community. --Domer48 (talk) 09:31, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
20. BigDunc (talk) 12:49, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
21. Alison has done a lot of research to set out a long history of issues of concern, and none of R. fiend's recent replies show any interest in addressing the concerns of other editors. The caustic tone of the comments is wholly inappropriate for an admin, who should be willing to justify their actions politely. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:54, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Response

This is a summary written by the sysop whose actions are disputed, or by other users who think that the dispute is unjustified and that the sysop's actions did not violate policy. Users who edit or endorse this summary should not edit the other summaries.

Okay, I'm not going to spend too much time on the older stuff, as it's not fresh in my mind and I'm not terribly inclined to delve into the past in great detail. As for semi-protection, it is a useful tool for thwarting vandals and the like (at least in the short term) without actually preventing regular editing of the article, and without a load of unnecessary red tape. Anyone can get around it in a couple of days, in any case. In terms of the Pearse article, I spent a great deal of time discussing the issues on the talk page, as will be evident with a short glance in that direction. I'm not going to apologize for my actions at such entries as As I Lay Dying, as I have little patience for people who want to promote their favorite band over infinitely more significant works of literature. I would have been willing to discuss it, had anyone cared to approach me about it, but no one ever brought it up until now.

I don't want to dwell too much into the interactions with Domer either. Suffice to say, as soon as I differed with him on an issue involving Irish Republicanism, he took personal offense, and engaged in an incessant string of puerile behavior. It's been downhill from there. Many other editors have made note of his behavior and personal attacks. (Following a short period when it seemed me was developing some maturity, I actually tried to intervene on his behalf following a block he was given for edit warring. For my efforts I was met with further hostility) In any case, I'll address the matter of the Kevin Barry article briefly. If I recall correctly, there was a series of reversions going on, mostly because Domer doesn't write very well. I temporarily protected the article to put the breaks on the edit warring and force the issue to the talk page, which I figured would be more productive than seeing Domer blocked for 3rr (which was imminent), and would have prevented discussion of the matter. The result of the discussion was improvement of the article.

The most recent "dispute" (the one that led to this RfC), fixing a typo and correcting some blatantly ridiculous link formatting, I'm not going to bother with. It's beyond petty. That some editors decided to make an issue out of some of the least disputable corrections demonstrates that people seem to be more concerned with whining than making Misplaced Pages a better encyclopedia. If anyone actually believes for a second that the two "controversial" edits did not improve the article, please say so. If they did benefit the article, don't complain.

That's all I have time for at the moment. I'll respond to the rest later. -R. fiend (talk) 05:57, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~~~~):

Statement by Scolaire

I am informed that it is in order for a statement by non-neutral party that is neither pro nor anti to be added here.
Clearly I cannot endorse R. fiend's response, because that would mean accepting that he can do as he pleases, but neither will I endorse the proposal, because of the way it has come about. Of the two parties in a dispute that ranges across several articles, R. fiend is by far the more reasonable: he argues every one of his points in a coherent and reasoned (if occasionally caustic) manner, and is receptive to any coherent or reasoned arguments that are put to him. In return he has been subjected to persistent bullying and abuse (as have I, whenever I have attempted to mediate). The opposing party knew well that if they taunted and goaded him enough he would do something stupid, and they would be able to bring him down. And that is how this RfC has arisen. Censuring R. fiend here will sent a message back to these people that bullying will work, that it is approved of by editors and admins alike, and that they are now free to OWN whatever articles they are working on. Diffs from Easter Rising alone: examples of aggressive behaviour are here, here, here, here, here, here (love the edit summary!), here, here, here and here. Examples of gratuitous taunting are here, here and here. Typical edit summaries are here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here. On the face of it, these edit summaries are a model of restraint compared to the "fascist censorship" summary of R. fiend, but used over and over in this way, without regard to the reasoned arguments put forward by the other editor, they are an insidious form of bullying aimed at the editor's self-esteem, and specifically designed to drive him over the edge. In my case its effect was to drive me out of WP altogether for six weeks – and if it's not addressed I won't be staying long on this occasion either – in R. fiend's case it has led directly to this RfC. And before you dismiss this as conspiracy theory, here it is in black and white, outlined to a fellow-editor in December. When the infamous Vintagekits arbitration was initiated in August 2007 I stated that "to come down hard on somebody who doesn't know where to draw the line, while those who know how to "play the game" get off scot-free, would be very unfair" That view was endorsed when the arbitration was re-named The Troubles and the behaviour of all the involved editors was examined. I am saying that this case is exactly the same and that exactly the same injustice is in danger of being done. I accept and respect that those who brought and endorsed this RfC did it for the best possible motives (with a couple of exceptions in the case of endorsers), but I ask every one of you to carefully consider the consequences of your actions. Scolaire (talk) 13:58, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

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Outside view

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Discussion

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