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Treating German Misplaced Pages as a reliable source

timestamping this as it's an ongoing concern. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 20:34, 27 October 2012 (UTC)

User:Martinvl insists upon citing the German Misplaced Pages as if it were a reliable source at the Foot (unit) article. See line 156 in this edit. I don't think anyone who has read WP:V and WP:IRS can seriously think this is acceptable, even so, the policy was acknowledged at Talk:Foot (unit)#Circular references and Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#References to non-English Wikipedias. I view this as deliberate defiance of the Verifiability policy and enforcement of the policy is in order. Jc3s5h (talk) 21:48, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

No way is the German wikipedia a WP:RS. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:51, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, it's fairly clear that user edited sites in general are rarely (if ever) RS. That being said, couldn't one just use the source used in the German WP here as well?--Yaksar (let's chat) 21:59, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I note that the article is also citing the Dutch, Spanish, Swedish, Norwegian and Danish Wikipedias as sources. All are violations of WP:RS. Yes, as Yaksar says, the correct approach is to verify that the article being cited on German (etc) Misplaced Pages is WP:RS, and states what it is being cited for, and then cite it directly. AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:04, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

One can do that, of course, but citations enable users to verify content. As this is an English-language Misplaced Pages, English-language sources seem preferable. Unless no English RS is available to cover the topic, which seems unlikely in this case. Haploidavey (talk) 22:08, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Simple, straight answer: the German wikipedia is not a reliable source. If he continues to insist that it is, action should be taken. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 23:22, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

• No source that anyone can edit is a reliable source.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 23:27, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I've gone through the article in question and stripped out all the Wikipedian referencing. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 23:31, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Martin's argument, which I've seen by other users elsewhere (and which I once made myself), is that the referenced article is cited. He doesn't understand that that's not good enough - he needs to place a direct cite, directly into the article in question. It may seem redundant, but in the long run it's better that way. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 00:31, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I think we just need to put a banner in WP:RS to the effect of if it has "wiki" anywhere in the name, assume it is not a reliable source, even if it's Misplaced Pages. Ian.thomson (talk) 00:35, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I suspect you said that half in jest, but it's actually a good idea. LadyofShalott 02:19, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Saying something in half-jest doesn't mean I'm not wholly earnest. Ian.thomson (talk) 18:40, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Added wording. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 02:52, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

In the last few days I have been working through the various entries getting reliable sources. May I draw to attention that when various people went around stripping out various references, orphaned refs were left behind. If they are going to do the job, then please do it properly. Martinvl (talk) 21:04, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I accept that criticism. I should also have removed the unreferenced material on each occasion that I removed the unacceptable "references". I will be sure to do so next time. There's nothing to stop people replacing stuff in the article once references have been found. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 08:25, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

When an apparently reliable source is cited in a nonEnglish Misplaced Pages or even in a different article in the English Misplaced Pages, is verifiability satisfied just by copying the information and listing the cited work as the reference, if the present editor has not seen the source himself, to verify that it supports the statement? Is there any way of citing it as having been copied but not accessed by the present editor? Many print references have little or no content viewable online, and many newspaper and journals are behind paywall and not readily accessible to the present editor who needs it as a reference for some statement. Can Misplaced Pages editors legitimately translate foreign Misplaced Pages articles and just copy the references, without having checked the content of the references? Misplaced Pages:Citing sources#Say where you read it says "Don't cite a source unless you've seen it for yourself. Where you want to cite John Smith, but you've only read Paul Jones who cites Smith, write it like this (this formatting is just an example): Smith, John. Name of Book I Haven't Seen, Cambridge University Press, 2009, p. 1, cited in Paul Jones (ed.). Name of Encyclopedia I Have Seen. Oxford University Press, 2010, p. 2." Is it legit to do this and say "German Misplaced Pages, article XXX" where the example says "Name of encyclopedia I have seen?" Edison (talk) 20:14, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

A short and sweet answer: no. A Misplaced Pages (any Misplaced Pages, including this one) isn't a reliable source. What you are proposing is a route to circular referencing. If you haven't seen something, you shouldn't cite it, full stop. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:31, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Verifiability

Discussion moved to /WP:V RFC. Timestamp changed to future until the discussion is over. Alexandria (talk) 15:50, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

• Well, this move was made just after I made a comment that I intended to be on ANI. I hope, at least, that those who are paying attention will continue to watch the new page. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:58, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

New user repeatedly analyzes primary sources

User Gyanvigyan1 insists repeatedly on examination of primary sources despite being told by two separate and much more experienced editors that this is WP:OR. He is displaying a serious case of WP:IDHT. This is in the context of one of the many Indian caste disputes.

Gyanvigyan1 asserts that the secondary sources misrepresent the primary sources. Links:

Gyanvigyan1 insists on analyzing primary sources. Links:

Gyanvigyan1 is told repeatedly by both Sitush and Qwyrxian that this is WP:OR and WP:SYNTH and that if he wants to pursue the matter, to take it to WP:RSN, WP:NPOVN or WP:DRN, as appropriate. Links:

Gyanvigyan1 has not taken this matter to any of those boards but continues to argue the point on the article talk page. He is a fairly new use and has edited almost exclusively on Kayastha and Talk:Kayastha. Can he either get a mentor, or perhaps a short vacation in which he will not be distracted from reading policies? JanetteDoe (talk) 16:39, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I have said that I am not going to respond further to the thread in question, and I intend to stick to that in the hope that Gyanvigyan1 will either escalate the matter as an appropriate part of the dispute resolution process or else comes to realise that their arguments in fact are for the most part WP:OR etc. They have been asking around about policy - eg: at User_talk:MangoWong#Can_you_advise_me_on_where_I.27m_going_wrong - but there certainly does seem to be a big chunk of IDHT going on. I could of course escalate the matter myself, but it would be quite difficult for me to even summarise Gyanvigyan1's points because they have become pretty convoluted & self-referencing/self-supporting - best that they do it themselves in this situation. - Sitush (talk) 17:30, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I see one comment about a High Court decision. I don't know the specifics, but such decisions are often interpreted in a way that fits best one's opinion. The rule about primary sources is not absolute, I believe; when there is disagreement about a courts verdict, maybe the ruling itself should be quoted verbatim. Not saying that's practical in all or most cases, but a claim that secondary sources misrepresent a judicial decision shouldn't be discarded a priori on the basis of WP:NOR; again I stress that this is my personal opinion. This does not mean that his objections necessarily have any merit of course.DS Belgium (talk) 18:45, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Has anyone thought to, in a better suited venue (such as his talk page), go into detail about the specific policies and guidelines and how they interact? It may seem a little less confrontational, minimize or eliminate the IDHT issues, be a bit more educational and point a very new editor in the correct direction. Or perhaps suggest mentorship so he's got someone to turn to with questions about what's going wrong? May not work, but it's a thought. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 18:58, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Here's hoping no one minds my taking an interest: I won't claim to have read even 1/2 the talk page and have read none of the article or the sources. What I have seen is what I think might be a good example of the problem. See: User:Gyanvigyan1 say "I don't want to come down to any specifics, right now. What I do want is an agreement in principle that..." and User:Qwyrxian say "You will never get an agreement on such principle from me. Anyone who agreed to that would be, frankly, irrelevant, because they would be violating Misplaced Pages's most important policies. Why can't you understand that?". The former seems to enjoy the discussion too much to want to resolve it and the later reacts quite sharply (is there a something that would equate to WP:DTFOTF (Don't throw fuel on the fire)? Perhaps something in WP:DIVA about not encouraging them). I'll mind my own business if told to do so. fg_c 20:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I think that was an atypical message from Qwyrxian, born out of frustration. I wouldn't read too much into one comment without reading the entire discussion which, as you intimate, is lengthy. I stand far more likely to be accused of inappropriate comments than Qwyrxian, and in some instances the accusations would be correct. As much as the "regulars" try to deal reasonably with newcomers to this sort of article, the scale of the abuse received, the certain knowledge of off-wiki campaigning, the constant socking etc does tend to wear them down from time to time. Gyanvigyan1 has receivedd many explanations of policy, many explanations of where they are not compliant with those policies, and many offers to reinvestigate the points being made by them. And still, the mantra goes on. That is why WP:DRN or similar is to my mind the most appropriate forum if they wish to pursue the matter further. - Sitush (talk) 20:35, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't see the problem. Almost all of his edits are on the talk page. There's no rule against discussing primary sources, or their interpretation, and in fact it sounds like a good idea, as long as controversial interpretations aren't put into the article. Is there a behavior problem that needs attention? Dicklyon (talk) 20:56, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

There is no problem, per se. They can raise the issue on the talk page and discuss for as long as they wish, provided that any edits to the article itself are compliant. Whether they will continue to get a response on the TP to their raised points is moot, and that has now become a part of the problem. I suppose that if the talk page situation persists then it might move into the sphere of WP:TE, and especially so if it effectively becomes a repetitious monologue. But I think that the point being raised by the originator of this thread was that things are not moving on and the reason for this is that Gyanvigyan1 is unwilling to progress the matter via the dispute resolution process and that others (including myself) are of the opinion that the DR process, in one form or another, is the only way to move forward. I certainly cannot adequately summarise the points that Gyanvigyan1 is raising: they have become so complex etc that starting over in a forum that has most likely a more broad range of input seems to be the most sensible thing to do. Stalemate, I suppose, but I am concerned that a fairly new contributor is becoming frustrated, and it seems only right that the issue is examined on a wider basis. I do thank JanetteDoe for raising this issue here because it does need extra eyes from somewhere. - Sitush (talk) 00:11, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not exactly sure what admin action is requested here. For my part, my position in that discussion is already stated: Gyanvigan1 is engaging in OR. Yes, OR is allowed on talk pages, but Gyanvigan1 wants to take the results of that OR and thereby rule out certain sources as not reliable, because they do not agree with one other source which he considers definitive, despite that article being a primary source, and only an incomplete summary of a relatively involved event (a court case). Xe says that because another source says something about the trial that is not contained in the final judgment (despite the judgment clearly stating that there was a lot of evidence that is not explicitly covered/reported in the judgment), that other source is necessarily suspect and likely non-RS. Now, if Gyanvigan1 merely wants to push that idea on the talk page, I have no problem ignoring it. If xe edits the article in accordance with that agenda, I'll revert it. If xe disagrees, it's xyr problem to take it to the relevant noticeboard or RfC, since currently a consensus does not support xyr position. In other words, as with so so many of the editors on these caste pages, they can make whatever statements of bias and unfairness they want on the talk pages (though if they're particularly egregious, we remove them per WP:SOAPBOX and WP:FORUM), but editing against policy is where the line is drawn. JanetteDoe, do you think any particular admin action is needed here? Qwyrxian (talk) 09:33, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I am mind-reading, but it seems to be that admin attention might be necessary with regard to either seeking a mentorship solution or a short-term block to give some space for reading of policy. Gyanvigyan1 seems to me to be an intelligent person and one whom, despite their relatively new status as a registered contributor, has spent some time familiarising themself with procedural issues etc. A block would probably not be the solution, but some sort of guidance might be appropriate or, as I said above, just some uninvolved/additional eyes on the specific points in question. Whatever the outcome, there is an issue here that has the potential to run and run, or to cause frustration to a new contributor because those whom are already involved basically give up responding to what is perceived as repetition. This is quite a narrow field of contributions & comments: it should hopefully not be too difficult to resolve. - Sitush (talk) 01:11, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I'd favor either mentorship, or a short term block, or both. Sitush has summarized my concerns very well. I'd add that Gyanvigyan1 has tried at least once to claim a variation of silence equaling consent which is also not going to end well, and probably lead to a cycle of reverts and more frustration on each side at perceived obtuseness. Is there something we can do to get him on the right track, given that we are trying to attract and retain new editors, especially for less covered subject areas? JanetteDoe (talk) 03:57, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Dicklyon has it wrong. There is something wrong with discussing novel interpretations of original sources on article talk pages, and that is WP:NOTFORUM. causa sui (talk) 16:22, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
• Talk pages are meant to improve the article. OR SYNTH and analysis of primary sources on a talk page does not (and cannot) improve the article; it amounts to disruption. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:41, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
• Concur with both of the above, although in fairness to Dicklyon, that isn't exactly what he said. Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Monty_Hall_problem#Use_of_article_talk_pages is relevant here - "Article talk pages should not be used by editors as platforms for their personal views on a subject, nor for proposing unpublished solutions, forwarding original ideas, redefining terms, or so forth." Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:37, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Responding to JanetteDoe's points above, I personally don't think a block is quite warranted yet. In my opinion, talk page behavior has to be quite egregious before it gets to the blocking level, even though I support blocking people who are disruptive in articles quickly. However, I do think it would be great if Gyanvigan1 were to agree to mentorship from someone currently outside of the topic area (and, of course, that we could find a willing person). He clearly has a lot of knowledge about the sources and the subject. He has the potential to be extraordinarily useful in this topic area (especially since he's gotten quite a bit better in the last month on the civility issue). I don't suppose there are any volunteers? I also don't know if Gyanvigan1 is interested; he hasn't edited WP since before this thread was opened (possibly related to Diwali, which just ended yesterday or the day before). Qwyrxian (talk) 00:32, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm surprised at this thread, and I see this as a kind of politics to suppress a voice of reason. I am being accused of discussing OR on the talk page, when what I am doing is pointing out the OR being pushed by certain editors on the article page. Is OR allowed by "older editors." I would welcome a mentor, however, I don't think an understanding of rules is the problem here, rather, the abuse of those rules to push a POV by the other side.

I do believe that the ultimate goal of all of us is to see that only the published facts find space on Misplaced Pages. What is happening here is wrong information is being thrust in the article by some editors who are pushing an OR, but refuse to discuss it, when challenged (only on the talk page, mind you). I am keeping myself off the main article unless an agreement is made, but to put any kind of censor on me at this point, while giving a free hand to those who are pushing a POV in the article would kill the purpose of Misplaced Pages. I'm referring to Sitush and Qrwyxian.

Don't go by the long discussions. I'm no more interested in discussing the primary sources. Here's my current position in one sentence -- I am asking for a secondary source that specifically says that "the caste status of Kayasthas is debated (the controversial sentence in the article, which is not even indirectly supported by the reference provided)." And if that cannot be found then the sentence should be held to be an OR. Is that too much to ask for? The other party has formed a particular opinion about the caste situation in India and wants to push that in the article without having to provide a secondary source or to discuss it on the talk page, and is unnecessarily politicising the issue here. I really think its awful that one has to resort to blocking or some other such method, as a way of suppressing opposition that one cannot tackle through the straight channel. Please remember, that Kayasthas are not guinea pigs but living people, and any irresponsible reporting will have a negative impact on their lives, and if Misplaced Pages cannot do justice to the topic based on valid secondary sources, then it would be better to shelve the topic altogether -- rather than penalising those who try to talk reason.(Gyanvigyan1 (talk) 13:32, 2 November 2011 (UTC))

Also, JanetteDoe, is wrong when she accuses me of continuing the discussion after being advised to refer to WP:DRN. Although, I'm not obliged to, I have not discussed the issue after that advise (actually, there is nobody to discuss it with, right now, as both Sitush and Qyrwixian refused to answer my objections), and I'm right now trying to learn more about these processes, but the discussion is no more in progress as anyone can see. I wonder, why such baseless accusations are being used against me by certain editors, bent upon seeing me censored. She's also wrong in accusing me of 'exclusively' editing on the Kayastha page. I have just edited once, after four months of discussion, after showing on the talk page, specifically, that the statement "caste status of Kayasthas is debated" is not supported by the reference provided, and after giving adequate time for people to respond. Sitush immediately reverted my edit, without even bothering to discuss the issue on the talk page, yet, I didn't not re-revert, because I'm aware of the intense politics on Misplaced Pages, and that some editors are more "equal" than the others.The non-western ones seem to be the less equal ones.(Gyanvigyan1 (talk) 16:23, 2 November 2011 (UTC))

Ah, so all the stuff about law reports etc was completely irrelevant. One point from the lead of WP:V is that "all material added to articles must be attributable to a reliable, published source appropriate for the content in question, but in practice you do not need to attribute everything. This policy requires that all quotations and anything challenged or likely to be challenged". I accept that you are challenging, and I accept that if the statement is attributed then the citation should support it. A request for confirmation has been made. However, even if uncited it remains a valid statement: there is a whole paragraph subsequent to it which clearly demonstrates that there are numerous opinions. Treat the statement as an introduction to the paragraph, rather as the lead is an introduction to the article: it makes it clear that we have not lost our minds and just dumped a whole load of contradictory opinions in there. We could take it out but that is a content issue best discussed at the talk page (where we have done, interminably). It is your behaviour which has caused the issue to be raised here, not the statement itself. You have spent a very long time putting forward a very complex, very repetitive argument that relies on OR of court cases etc ... and you had shown no inclination to stop, indeed saying that you would take silence from others to mean agreement with your POV. This is such a shame as it appears that you do have a lot to offer if only you could let this issue drop. - Sitush (talk) 17:56, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I can see that it is your bias against me, combined by a firm belief in the POV that you are pushing, that stops you from seeing the issue clearly. If you had indeed participated in the discussion and looked at what I have been saying, it would be clear to you that I had stopped focussing on the court case eversince Qrwxyian said she is uncomfortable with it, and instead been focussing on the citations being provided to further your and Qyrwixian's POV.

For quite sometime now, my focus has been the secondary sources provided. If I challenge a secondary source, and you fail to answer that challenge, then I have all the right to change that statement, whether or not I'm new is irrelevant here. How else would you change a wrong information included in the article? Are you saying this method is against the spirit of Misplaced Pages? Or, is what you are doing against the spirit of Misplaced Pages?

It was your duty to put forward the arguments you are putting forward here about the citation/ statement in question, in the Kayastha talk page, rather than seeking to censor me with this politics. Just because I am new, and don't fully know my way around doesn't give you a right to lead me into a pitfall, just because you can't win in the regular way.

I don't concurr with your arguments about the disputed statement, but that is an issue, I'd like to discuss on the Kayastha talk page. You seem to be saying here, that if you and some other editors do OR (maybe because, right now you are the majority, for whatever reasons) in order to push your POV, its alright, but everything else that doesn't go with your POV needs an exact citation to prove itself.

If you really think I know something on this issue, then, you should pay heed to what I am saying, that the "caste status of Kayasthas, per se, is not debated." At least, it should help you look at your own biases and reexamine the secondary sources with an unbiased approach, and not reject it summarily with a hollow haughtiness which is not backed up by enough knowledge about the issue.(Gyanvigyan1 (talk) 17:57, 3 November 2011 (UTC))

And as far as behaviour is concerned, let's talk about your behaviour in this case. You are thrusting a POV, which is supported only by OR and you refuse to discuss the issue -- like its blasphemy. You misrepresent the issue here, and instead seek to paint me as the problem and try to 'censor' me, using your 'contacts' on Misplaced Pages.

Also, there are clearly differences of opinion about what a valid source is (although, I've not touched this issue for quite sometime now, seeing your opposition to it). Apart from me, a "senior" editor also concurs that OR by an author should also make a source invalid. Now, there are two people who interpret such source as invalid and two (you and Qyrxian) as valid. The best way to deal is to throw this question around and have a wider debate. What you and Qyrwixian are doing here amounts to claiming that your interpretation of the rules is the only one.

You have also been guilty of reverting bona fide editing by me, which was conducted after due discussions on the talk page and after giving enough time asking for objections (and lest you should misguide others here, there was no question of using any primary source here, the edit and discussion on it was based only on secondary sources). I guess, I am too new here, to really ask for punitive action against you.(Gyanvigyan1 (talk) 18:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC))

You say "The best way to deal is to throw this question around and have a wider debate." Great! The place to debate the validity of sources is the reliable sources noticeboard. In fact, there is an ongoing discussion there now about the reliability of the Volumes of the Anthropological Survey of India . If you want to completely short circuit this ANI thread and stop it in its tracks, then formulate a short, coherent argument, with links, and open a new thread on WP:RSN. JanetteDoe (talk) 20:41, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Extensive copyright violations by User:Night w

I've got some serious concerns about the editing of Night w (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) that I'd like to raise with the community.

This issue first came to my attention when I was directed towards a template that the user had created. Given that I was a major contributor to a nearly identical template, it was immediately obvious that the editor had copied the template's code without any attribution (diff).

I left a note on the users talk page explaining that copying content requires attribution, but the user described this as "silliness". I also tagged the source and destination template to indicate attribution, after which the user complained to an admin that this was unwarranted (while being sure to briefly log out of his main account Night w (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and into his WP:SOCK Night w2 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) to avoid WP:SCRUTINY).

About two weeks later the editor added some content to Palestine 194. I've just noticed some very striking similarities between the content added and provided sources:

Upon further investigation, this seems to be a very systematic behaviour of the editor. Most of the prose in Palestine 194 and International recognition of Palestine appears to be blatant copyright violations with a few minor word changes:

There are plenty more examples of this in the article. This is only the tip of the iceberg. I've perused some other articles that the user has recently created and found identical issues. For instance, in Al-Nurayn Mosque:

This issue is as fresh as yesterday:

and seems to go all the way back to the editor's first few edits in Americas:

I've raised the issue with the user again, though he doesn't seem to feel it's a problem. I think it's clear that a WP:CCI needs to be commenced immediately to review the entire history of this editors contributions. Given that the user has made >12,000 edits, it's going to be a huge mess to clean up.

Since I'm involved in a content dispute with this editor, and the editor has made it quite clear that they don't think very highly of me (, ), WP:CCI recommends seeking community input before launching an investigation. I'll allow others to decide on how to proceed and what administrative actions are required to prevent further disruption to the encyclopedia, but I've got plenty more diffs that can be provided on request if more evidence is required. Unfortunately, Palestine 194 is currently featured on WP:ITN so something probably needs to be done with that ASAP.

Sorry for the extremely long post! TDL (talk) 04:28, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I've just left a post at WT:ITN asking that it be pulled from the template. Your examples here are abundantly obvious--this is at best plagiarism/overly close paraphrasing, and at worst major copyright violations. I want to comb over your examples once more, but then I will probably open a CCI. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:45, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I have asked that Nightw temporarily stop adding information to articles while we start sorting this out, and also asked that they comment here. From xyr talk page, it looks like there's some bad blood between Nightw and Danlaycock, but that doesn't alter what appears to me to pretty clear problems with overly-close paraphrasing. I've checked out a few of the examples above, and I can at least confirm that TDL has reported the problem accurately, though I cannot (yet) speak to how extensive the problem is. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:58, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll concede that these particular examples are overly close paraphrasing that I submitted probably without really thinking. I recognise that this is not acceptable, so I'm perfectly happy to cooperate in any way required. I'll restrict myself to talk pages and superficial edits for now. However, I refute the claims by Danlaycock (TDL) on how extensive such errors are, and hopefully a CCI will show this. Nightw 06:20, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I popped in on one article at random: Al-Nurayn Mosque. This is the first passage I checked:

I do not know how extensive problems may be or if there are other problems in the article, but it does raise concerns that the first article and first passage I checked were that closely paraphrased. I did not find it by looking at the cited source, but by a google check. The fact that the source is cited suggests no intentional plagiarism, but if this is a pattern, then cleanup is likely to be necessary as this doesn't constitute writing from scratch. I have blanked this article, as I do not have time to evaluate it fully for additional concerns and can't just yank this section in case there are, and will list it at WP:CP. :/ --Moonriddengirl 10:56, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

A CCI has been opened (you can find it at the bottom of WP:CCI#Requests). So far, Night w's responses have been extremely positive, and xe has committed to helping fix the problem, as well as agreed to stay clear of potentially damaging edits on mainspace for the moment. I've offered to help monitor re-writes of the affected articles/sections. Since the problem is likely to not be ongoing, I think this thread can probably be closed by someone not involved. If for some reason the problem persists, we can always re-raise the issue. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:20, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Opened Misplaced Pages:Contributor copyright investigations/Night w. MER-C 07:03, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Kiefer.Wolfowitz continues to make allegations of slander

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

In the course of discussions around Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Kiefer.Wolfowitz, recently closed, it was noted that the userpage of User:Lihaas contains not only a userbox stating that he is a National Socialist but also contains a number of userboxen supporting various political views and individuals in politics . Kiefer.Wolfowitz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) repeatedly made allegations during the RfC/U that myself and another editor were slandering Lihaas by saying that it appeared from his userboxen that he might espouse some right wing views - to which he is entitled if that is the case, the discussion did not cover the merits of such views. Apparently, to Kiefer.Wolfowitz, it is absolutely beyond imagination that anyone should support a political position to the right of Nick Clegg, and to say so is the worst insult imaginable. I hoped this quasi-legal allegation would cease now the RfC is over, but he has started the whole thing up again . KW is entitled to hold any opinion of me he wishes, but can someone please explain to him that it is not acceptable to continually repeat on wiki that I am guilty of slander (which would in any case be libel, as I wrote it down).--Elen of the Roads (talk) 15:03, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Pot, kettle, black... —Ruud 15:16, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

OK, so where have I said that Kiefer.Wolfowitz has slandered anyone (or libelled them even). Renmember, I'm not complaining because he's being rude - I wouldn't even bother. It is the specific legal accusation that is objected to. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 15:19, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Would it be helpful to the heated relationship between you and Kiefer if he would agree to refrain from charged words such as "slandering" when referring to you (or in general)?--v/r - TP 15:36, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I am unfamiliar with British libel law, and I do not use slander in a legal sense. I used "slander" in the sense of a "despicable smear", despite the patient and naive explanations of myself and Geometry guy. Most civilized politics takes place to the right of Savuka, and all takes place in opposition to National Socialism.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 15:51, 2 November 2011 (UTC) Further, if Elen must continue this, she should learn avoid the sarcasm/hyperbole that has disrupted WP business before. Alleging that somebody is a Nazi is so despicable that it deserves ostracism. I am sorry that I am the only one who has suggested that she have be removed immediately from ArbComm and being an administrator.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 16:21, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Let's see. User:Lihaas has a user box that says "This user is a National Socialist". With that link. Which goes to Nazism. Added by the user. You know, in general, I'd agree that alleging that somebody is a Nazi would be pretty despicable and a smear. But in this case, I'd say Elen seems to have some fairly firm grounds. What am I missing? --GRuban (talk) 16:36, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I mostly agree. One thing you and Elen may have missed is that the user has an awful lot of userboxes, with some apparent inconsistencies. While there is a clear pattern of userboxes supporting extreme rightwing ideology, there is also a small number of userboxes that are surprising in this context, such as one supporting non-violent anarchism and one supporting the very short-lived (essentially just April 1919) Bavarian Soviet Republic. Overall I am getting the impression of a Nazi with at least some Third Position affinities.

But in any case, if anything is so despicable that it deserves ostracism then it's definitely the posting of pro-Nazism userboxes on one's user page, not taking them seriously. Hans Adler 16:56, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

For the record, I never said he was a Nazi. KW eventually modified his previous attacks to say - apparently without any irony at all - that I had accused Lihaas of being a National Socialist. I did say that some of his userboxen suggested his views could be similar to the BNP, but he put the boxes on his page. I didn't. Elen of the Roads (talk) 17:10, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

There is a strong argument to be made that modern adherents of National Socialism aren't that bothered by inconsistency, and mostly just want to shock their parents. (Or onlookers, etc.) --GRuban (talk) 18:33, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• @TParis - I'm not sure that the language with which Kiefer.Wolfowitz responded you your suggestion is much better. Elen of the Roads (talk) 17:02, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Alright, I think this is getting to the point that we may need to enact a 6 month interaction ban. I see from both sides an unwillingness to back away, backup, or simply turn the other cheek. No office to either of you, you know I've got nothing but respect for you both, but it's time to separate you. I think 6 months with no interaction, broadly construed to include discussions where the other is already involved even if the context of your discussion does not address the other, are in order.--v/r - TP 18:03, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

TomParis, I believe that's an outrageous suggestion. What have I done wrong here? I don't want to interact with KW - I have no reason to. We don't edit in the same places. All I want KW to do is stop saying what he said above, because there is no justification for it. As you can see from the rest of the conversation, other editors are also noting that Lihaas has a variety of right wing userboxen on his talkpage. I am sure that if we wait for a little, KW will come back and say exactly the same things about them. Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:42, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Please do explain how pointing out that someone has a userbox which says "This user is a National Socialist is a personal attack on that user.Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:47, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

You may not be a Christian, but I'd like to point to the Bible for some great words of wisdom here. Mathew 5:39 "If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." It goes along the same lines of WP:DGAF, if you ignored him it would stop. Let Kiefer do his worst and show him it doesn't matter. It's like I say in WP:MYPRIDE, my pride will not be hurt by what is said about me. I know I mention the parts about reports, but just forget that. Kiefer is smart and he uses charged words that he knows will get to you. I'm not implying bad faith on his part, I am sure he considers what he is doing to be to the benefit of the encyclopedia. But I am saying that if you turn him the other cheek and let him know it doesn't phase you, he wouldn't have a pedastool to stand on. Should you have to ignore him? No, it's your choice and I'm only making a suggestion.--v/r - TP 19:01, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh for fuck's sake. No I definitely am not a Christian, so let's put that one to bed now. Why should I have to put up with him endlessly wandering round the project accusing me of slander and demanding that I be removed from the project. For the record, here are some of the things I HAVE let go. All I want him to do is stop.

Here are a few of the things KW has said so far that I *have* turned the other cheek to. (edit summary) an ArbCom member who defends a sociopath's smearing a valuable editor as a Nazi, (edit summary) non-writers smear leading writers as national socialists, (edit summary) your WP:NPA violation of unsubstantiated allegations about politics, (edit summary) Calling L a national socialist was outrageous. A lack of indignation is a sign of a lack of knowledge or a character defect, (edit summary) the "editor" smeared a valuable WP writer as a national socialist, and earned his rebuke, on Lihaas's talkpage, (edit summary) the "barbaric pride of a Hunnish and Norwegian stateliness" of an ArbComm member abusing her power and disgracing her office, from SandyGeorgia's talkpage. All of those I ignored. I thought he would stop when the RfC finished. I am not the one who cannot let this drop. Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:07, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I wasn't trying to appeal to a Christian who puts stock in the bible, I am just pointing to some wise words in a book. The fact is that the RFC/U didn't come to any actual tangible/actionable consensus to prevent Kiefer using charged words. I can't think of anywhere else for this to go besides Arbcom. I had intended to take my time closing the RFC to prevent this from going there by trying to find something firm we all could agree to and stick to but the RFC was degenerating into mudslinging and I didn't want it to spiral out of control. I don't think ANI can help you here other than an interaction ban. I can't imagine what else you expect to happen. If an RFC/U didn't result in a ban or block, what do you expect to get out of ANI. So unless you are intending to bring this to Arbcom, and I really hope for my sanity sake you don't, there isn't anything else to do but ignore each other. An interaction ban could, and I would intend it to, prevent Kiefer from slinging mud your way.--v/r - TP 19:16, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, exactly how many interaction bans does this guy need? One with Elen. One with Worm, apparently, that he's "long sought" - or so he says. One with me, since I'm apparently the "sociopath" mentioned above. One with Pedro? One with Peter Werner, judging by the RfC/U. One with any editor who admits to having been a member of certain fringe U.S. political groups in the 1970s. Also one with Hans Adler and with GRuban, since they've dared to question the Official View of what the userbox means. Isn't this getting a little silly now? --Demiurge1000 (talk) 19:59, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Comment - Why are we hashing out this little drama? Certainly if a user were to put up a box implicitly endorsing National Socialism, there would be nothing libelous about asserting they are a Nazi. So why are we here? Turn the other cheek. K-Wolf is free to associate with whomever he wants and if he feels a friend's honor has been sullied, he's free to commiserate with him. There's no need to start a new chapter in an episode that has already been mooted and decided at RFC. Move along, folks, nothing to see here. Carrite (talk) 19:27, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

• Well, Lihaas didn't put up a box implicitly endorsing National Socialism, he put up a box explicitly endorsing it. That being so, why do you feel that KW's behaviour during the RfC/U (for which he still hasn't apologised) was acceptable?

• Also, who suggested that KW is not free to associate with whomever he wants? --Demiurge1000 (talk) 19:48, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

For heaven's sake, Kiefer.Wolfowitz is clearly in the wrong here. It is not slander to say that someone who self-identifies as a National Socialist is a National Socialist. There is no justification for Kiefer.Wolfowitz's attacks. Period. Ellen does not need to be informed about Christian Forgiveness, the Eternal Calm of the Buddha, or the Stoic Ideal. That's pure distraction. Paul B (talk) 20:20, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

And? What do you expect to happen at ANI that an RFC/U couldn't do? Please enlighten me since my words of advice are pure distraction. What have I missed? Personally, I see things as less stressful for Elen if she just ignore Kiefer.--v/r - TP 20:29, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I see things as less stressful for Elen if Kiefer would cease his baseless accusations. It does seem to say in WP:NPA that unfounded allegations are a form of personal attack, and I think it's fairly clear that Kiefer's commentary has well and truly crossed the NPA border. Are you suggesting that administrators are powerless to enforce this policy, and that the solution isn't for Kiefer to follow our policies, but rather for the recipient to effectively 'suck it up'? If true, that is very disheartening for the project. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 23:14, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

TechnoSymbiosis,

What is disheartening for the project is that you write junk which has already been rebutted by Geometry guy.

Lihaas collects and displays hundreds of wildly contradictory user boxes.

You should brush up on WP:NPA, particularly its prohibition on unsubstantiated allegations about a user's politics. Picking one n.s. user-box from hundreds, almost all opposed to nazism, and then putting in an aside that Lihaas displays a n.s. user box is a smear, and violates WP:NPA and decency.

 Kiefer.Wolfowitz 08:34, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I believe you are wrong. I have gone through all of Lihaas' userboxes, and most of them are consistent with Lihaas being a Nazi. In particular:

• Numerous userboxes supporting various parties ranging from just populist right-wing to openly fascist (Jobbik, National Union Attack, Popular Orthodox Rally, Front National (France), Alliance for the Future of Austria -- founded by Jörg Haider, New Flemish Alliance, Vlaams Belang, Estonian Independence Party, ). The user claims to be a member of the "Pedophilia Article Watch Project" (nothing wrong with that, but it's a topic that Nazis traditionally use to gain mainstream sympathies), supports the anti-globalization movement (a well known point of agreement between extreme left and extreme right), opposes NATO (ditto), opposes Imperialism (ditto), wants the UN dissolved (a right-wing only concern), opposes the EU, supports self-determination in general and the independence of various countries, parts of countries or minorities in particular (fully consistent with, e.g. Horst Mahler's ideology, as expressed in his plans for a 4th Reich with separate cantons for the various German tribes, where self-determination is a key aspect).
• Five user boxes having the letters "NS" instead of an icon, all in the same style. The first of them explicitly supports national socialism. The others support various causes consistent with a certain flavour of Nazi ideology.
• Also a (smaller) number of libertarian, anarchist of pacifist userboxes. There are flavours of Nazi ideology which embrace these.
• And a very small number of userboxes that appear to be tongue-in-cheek, such as the one supporting annexation of Canada by the US. Hans Adler 21:22, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Ugh. Can we please get a grip and move on folks? The RfC/U was closed 3 days ago. It is over. What "started the whole thing up again" today was User:Lihaas catching up on messages and asking KW to explain what the matter was. KW replied to Lihaas with evident feelings about the RfC/U: the segment causing (most) offence here linked Lihaas to discussion about "a very selective discussion of a few of your user-boxes, which shamed the editors slandering you and shamed Misplaced Pages, in the judgment of honorable men". Opinionated, judgmental and grandiose, perhaps, but this was a reply to another user on KW's user talk page, and it names no names. Is such user chat worth reigniting this incident? Should the whole of Misplaced Pages be up in arms that KW called it "shamed"?

Well, no. Elen overreacted by posting this ANI notice, and now KW is overreacting in return. So, is it "here we go again", or shall we stop this now? Geometry guy 20:57, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Geometry guy, I did not raise this during the RfC, because I thought Kiefer would stop when the RfC is over. My concern now is that he is going to spend the next year repeating this allegation - he appears to be obsessed with it. If he agrees not to mention it again, that would be an end of it - he can think what he likes, I have no control over that. Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:45, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Can I get him to stop? Alas I have no mind control abilities :) and can only offer to reason with you both. However, one of the main points of my comment here was that KW was prompted to refer to the incident again by Lihaas. That doesn't (in itself) amount to the appearance of obsession. Lets see. Geometry guy 00:15, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

PS. In case anyone here has further general comments on the appropriateness or otherwise of discussing an editor's worldview, based on their userboxes, in a public forum such as article talk, ANI or an RfC/U of a different editor, I'd be happy to discuss the matter on my talk page.

Acknowledging the valuable contributions of both editors, I encourage both to voluntarily disengage, drop the subject, and move on to more pleasant and useful things. I also encourage their friends and associates here on Misplaced Pages to do nothing that might escalate the situation. Cullen Let's discuss it 00:22, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. If no more is said, then no more needs to be said. Let us await the response of Kiefer.Wolfowitz. Elen of the Roads (talk) 00:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Reply by KW

As Geometry guy explained, I responded to Lihaas's question; in responding, I had forgotten that I had described the "national socialist" smear already on his talk page. Had I remembered, I should not have mentioned it explicitly again, to save myself some measure of renewed disgust.

Geometry guy and I explained that Lihaas has huge numbers of political user-boxes, whose contradictions strike me as Dada. I have explained to Elen that her assertion that Lihaas has a coherent political position, combining libertarianism, national socialism, and support of (conservative Catholic Supreme Court Justices) Scalia & Thomas was unwarranted. Nonetheless, Hans Adler wrote instead of reading and informed writing. Would that an Adlerian retraction, recognizing the importance of the ban on unfounded political charges in NPA, be forthcoming!

WTT/David again violates WP:AGF again by speculating about that I was manipulating the RfC by "making a stink" . Would that he correct his AGF/NPA violation about my editing of Penn Kemble, in which he accused me of removing content because of my personal political objections, an accusation made after I had restored the salvageable content!

Shame, shame, shame!

 Kiefer.Wolfowitz 05:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Noting that Kiefer.Wolfowitz has again (since we started here) accused me of a "despicable smear" in this remarkable piece of canvassing. He's also referred to it on Volunteer Marek's talkpage, in another piece of canvassing.

It's obvious he's not going to let this drop unless told to do so, and this diff explains why - (edit summary) you picked one from those hundreds, to smear him and by association me. It is as I said, he perceives this as an insult to him, to suggest that he might be associating with someone whose politics he would disagree with. The administrator action I am therefore requesting is that one or more administrators tell him firmly that it is not a personal attack, "despicable smear", "slander", "deserving of ostracism" or warranting my immediate removal, to point out that someone has a userbox stating that the user is a National Socialist - or indeed that a user has a whole set of userboxen relating to right wing positions, left wing positions, sex positions, positions of blue plaques or indeed anything that the user themself has chosen to proclaim on their userpage. In fact, simply telling KW that it's not an attack on KW would help. As said before, he can think what he likes, and I also make no complaint if he chooses to make more general insults. But he has got to stop saying that I am making false and unfounded claims that another editor is a Nazi in an attempt to smear either the other editor or KW. As someone pointed out above, accusing an opponent of being a Nazi is usually the point in an argument where a block swiftly follows, because it *is* beyond the pale. Falsely alleging that this is what I did, and demanding that I be punished for it, should also be beyond the pale. Elen of the Roads (talk) 10:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I quite agree that KW has overreacted. "Nazi" is one of those words that can cause otherwise sensible people to lose their capacity for rational discourse. However, if you wish to pursue the matter further, it is worth remember exactly what he was overreacting to. Here are some key comments.
  • Demiurge (at RfC/U): The last is particularly interesting; a much more subtle request for attention, to a user whose userpage states that they are a National Socialist (wikilinked).
  • Elen (at RfC/U): Lihaas's statements that he supports National Socialism, Self Determination and the British Empire neatly positions him between the British National Party and the English Defence League - both of which I am regrettably familiar with in my neck of West Yorkshire (Political parties wikilinked).
  • Elen (KW talk): I fear you cannot tell the difference between irony and political statement - lihaas's statements that he supports National Socialism, Self Determination and the British Empire neatly positions him ...<as before>... I'm sorry, I think you've been had.
  • Elen (KW talk): If he's using some clever definition of National Socialism that separates it from Nazism, point me to the edits where he does it.
• I further agree that it is not necessarily a personal attack to point out that someone has userboxes stating a particular viewpoint. It all depends on where you do it, how you do it, why you do it, and what you intend to be inferred. Try substituting: "whose userpage states they are a communist", "a paedophile", "muslim" or "gay" into the first statement. If the purpose was not to discredit another editor in a discussion where they had not even contributed, then what was it? We focus on the edit, not the editor on Misplaced Pages. The whole discussion was unseemly. Geometry guy 11:34, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• In at least one of those examples that you suggest "substituting", the editor with such a userbox would not be permitted to edit Misplaced Pages in any case. And yes, in a discussion about canvassing, if the matter at issue were a religious topic, then it may sometimes be of tangential relevance to note that the editor being discussed had directed their requests for support to professed adherents of a particular religion. Just as it is relevant to note that KW has more recently raised this at WikiProject Jewish History in what appears to be a bizarre and misguided attempt to cause others to "lose their capacity for rational discourse" as well. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 11:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

  "At least one"? Which others would you proscribe: communists, muslims or gays? I deliberately included one that would lead to a ban - feel free to substitute it with something as objectionable and emotive (Zoophile, for example?). The elements of the list can all be applied as labels and the particular choice is not relevant (although I was curious to see whether it would be picked up). What is relevant is that among the hundreds of userboxes at User:Lihaas, you decided that one was particularly relevant to him being contacted by KW. Why? Well, you now note that KW has not only been contacting National Socialists, but also WikiProject Jewish History (hmmm, that's a wide demographic!). Your comment there may hold the answer: your "pal" Lihaas has a userbox identifying himself as a National Socialist, and you consider it a smear for others to point this out and to draw the obvious negative conclusions from it. Negative conclusions about KW by association, perhaps? Geometry guy 20:11, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

"We focus on the edit, not the editor on Misplaced Pages." That really only applies to WP:NPA. Otherwise, we focus on editors frequently. A person's intentions are very important when trying to determine such things as vandalism or conflicts of interest. We do need to strive to avoid prejudice, but discussion of a person's beliefs or background can sometimes be useful or necessary at times. -- Atama頭 16:51, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Interesting point of view. I agree it can be useful or necessary to focus on the editor, but we need a good reason to do so. Please check the history in this case. In a public discussion to which an editor never contributed, why was it "useful" or "necessary" to draw attention to one userbox among many on his/her userpage? As I noted earlier in this thread, you are welcome to discuss with me the general principles on my user page. Geometry guy 20:11, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

For the love of god WP is no t to discuss political positions. If ive made a baltantly biased anywhere then discuss that. My opinion of natsoc is (and its NOT Nazi alone, i was the one to (at least at some pont) move that link AWAY from nazism because it s much broader and not euro-centirc in definition). the whole discussion here seems to stem from my userpage and political views and libel against me. In that case, drop the conversation and lets get back to businmess.

For the record: "Geometry guy and I explained that Lihaas has huge numbers of political user-boxes,..." by KW does show that he is not guilty

sdome WP:BOOMERANG on "Demiurge (at RfC/U): The last is particularly interesting; a much more subtle request for attention, to a user whose userpage states that they are a National Socialist (wikilinked)." the issue of individual politics is nothing to do with discussion on hand and then an NPA on demiurge. + on the contrary its Elen thats been "had" per "]\" its not up to her to make judgement calls on where one stands, she could write that on her weblog not WP. Lord forbid theres an opinion in the world that people dont agree with! the wolrd is not neatly packaged into an anglo-worldviewLihaas (talk) 18:03, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

So Lihaas, are you saying that you are a supporter of National Socialism broadly defined? As I've said repeatedly, you are entitled to your political opinions, whether I disagree with them or not. Kiefer.Wolfowitz is the one saying that you put these userboxen on your page for some other reason than to show approval of or support for the statements made in the box or the article linked to. According to him, they are ironic and show your disapproval of things like nationalism, libertarianism etc etc. If that's the case, perhaps you need to make it a little clearer. Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:24, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Lihaas is correct that it is improper to discuss any editor's politics, unless the editor has been editing in a way that violates WP's policies. I have never seen Lihaas violate NPOV, certainly not in a POV-pushing fashion, so it is improper to question him about his politics.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 19:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

My, that was a quick leap to his defence. Afraid of what he might say? After all, this whole 'smear' nonsense depends on him NOT being a National Socialist (broadly defined, since Lihaas says that it has other significance than merely its association with the Nazi Party). The only one who actually knows what he means by that userbox is Lihaas. Elen of the Roads (talk) 20:16, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Elen, can I encourage you to read the above: the question of smearing does not depend only on the information, but on how it is used. If you still think that Lihaas userboxes "neatly position him between the British National Party and the English Defence League", and that it was appropriate to make that comment at the RfC, then please say so. If not, then please step back a bit. Escalating this conflict is utterly pointless. Geometry guy 20:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

It is of course relevant. Yourself and Kiefer are convinced that Lihaas puts those userboxen up for any reason other than that he actually hearts the causes in the boxen. Kiefer's whole rant that this is an outrageous smear depends on Lihaas having that box on his page for some other reason than supporting the cause. Part of your reasoning is that the boxes are random, they don't make a pattern. All I was doing was pointing out - as Hans Adler has done above as well I note - that actually the political boxes are not random. You can put them together and they do actually make a workable philosophy. I have no idea if Lihaas adheres to this philosophy - maybe he just likes the pretty colours - but it's not true at all to say that one cannot see a pattern in the political statements. Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:09, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Ex-ArbComm member and Ex-administrator Elen,

Since you cannot abide by the prohibition on unwarranted allegations on politics, it is time for you to make your resignation official, as you have made it in principle.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 21:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

What prohibition where? I make no unwarranted allegations. I don't care what a wikipedia editor's politics are, as long as they stay neutral within the project. You are the one insisting that it is a slanderous smear to point out that a user says on his userpage that he supports certain right wing positions. That is the heart of this whole argument. You insisting that the political views stated on Lihaas's userpage are so unacceptable that not only can they not be true, he must be saying it for some other reason, but also that it is libellous even to refer to them. Elen of the Roads (talk) 21:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If I put a userbox on my page that says "This user is a Milli Vanilli fan", it is not a smear for someone to say "28bytes is a Milli Vanilli fan", and it certainly not a smear to say "28bytes has a userbox that says he is a Milli Vanilli fan." It does not matter if I put that box there sincerely, ironically, or as a tribute to my inner Dadaist, or whether I put it there alone or among 100 other (possibly contradictory) userboxes. Kiefer.Wolfowitz, I am not going to defend everything Elen has said to you or about you, but she is certainly within her rights to ask you to stop accusing her of "smearing" and "slandering" people based on this userbox, and I sincerely hope you will do so. 28bytes (talk) 20:35, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

CueCat article

I'm asking here because of a block and un-block that I've done on the most recent user that appears to be a sock. Before proceeding, I wanted to get additional input from other editors.

On the CueCat article, there has been some strange activity over the past week. I've never edited the article myself (that I can recall), but placed it on my watchlist due to some 3RR activity, which has since lead to some likely quacking sounds. Note: prior to this activity, the article hadn't received much editing in several months.

The first edits were by Ran kurosawa (talk · contribs), whose edits were reversed with the reason "revert extensive whitewash". They restored their edits and made claims of working on a book and having several thousand pages of supporting documents they could provide to Misplaced Pages. After restoring the content, they then stopped editing for a while.

Next, within two hours, Factiod (talk · contribs) began editing the article and edit-warred with multiple editors over the same material - eventually being blocked by me for 3RR violation. On their talk page, they claimed to be writing a book and having several thousand pages available to supply to Misplaced Pages.

Now, today, the new account Proofplus (talk · contribs) posted to the talk page with the same material. Initially I blocked this account as I thought it was block evasion then corrected to a sock-block ... however, as the accounts hadn't (as yet) been used in attempts to game the system nor used abusively, I've undone the block for now. (Note: The user is making unblock requests on their talk page ... perhaps the auto-block is still there? It didn't appear to be in place, but perhaps I missed it?)

I believe it highly likely that these three accounts are either sockpuppets or meatpuppets, but would appreciate having some additional reviews. To me, the quacking is so loud that I doubt an SPI would be accepted (behavioural evidence is pretty strong here, to me). But, I would like additional eyes to take a review. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:12, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Note: there had been an autoblock, now lifted by User:Steven Walling (thanks). --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 19:15, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Update: The most recent editor is making a good-faith effort to discuss and not edit war over the content. While I still believe there is sock and/or meat-puppetry taking place, the most recent account is attempting to follow normal DR processes to gain consensus. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 20:22, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Proofplus has been posting to everyone's Talk page who's been involved in the brouhaha about the article and inviting them to respond to his comments. Despite his apparent efforts to be "good", I'm not convinced that his account isn't related to the others. He, like the others, calls himself a researcher. He also talks about IP sets and other issues related to patents. His English, like the others, is poor. Still, trying very hard to assume good faith, I have replied on the article's Talk page to his comments, as best as I could understand them.--Bbb23 (talk) 20:34, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Hello, ProofPlus here, female first, grammer is not the topic. Next, I see a continual recurring theme, but I am not really sure about what you are talking about - "same group". But first, since I am from Israel, maybe you are detecting a diffence in language syntax. But, I can see your need to point out others flaws. My understanding is - notify everyone that comments are being made, share ones research and then ask for comments. Did I miss something? My message was vey clear. Posted facts. Gave links. Made suggestions for corrections to the record. I understand the submission issues and have followed them and submitted the links for review. So, maybe that you can understand? If you are having a hard time understanding and reading (I used to tell my Profs that too to bluff them) then I suggest you seek some help and maybe others here can understand my post. I will happily answer any questions, but won't egnage in the sexist stuff trying to say one is incompotent due to language barriers. Hope this is clearer for you now Barek - which is in fact a good Hebrew name!(64.134.28.233 (talk) 21:16, 2 November 2011 (UTC))

Better for you to log into your account when posting. Thanks for the gender correction, but nothing I said was sexist, nor did I say you were incompetent. Also, you didn't really provide sources for your statements on the CueCat Talk page. In any event, what I did in response was I restated what I interpreted you to say so you would understand what I was responding to. It also permits you to correct my interpretation if you think I got it wrong.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:24, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

maybe a clarification here. IS Meatpuppet some insult to me being a woman posting in what is so strongly a mans enviroment? Is this ok? Please stop, I find that term very offensive. I have checked my talk page and do not have multiple replies, but Barek states "everyone's talk page". I would asume then Barek is posting to and from multiple accounts? Is this possible? Please help me understand this when possible. Many thanks.(ProofPlus Professional Researcher 21:23, 2 November 2011 (UTC)) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Proofplus (talk • contribs)

As far as I know, the term meat puppet is not gender-based. See WP:MEAT.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:27, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Please verify who signed the comment to which you are replying. It appears that the comment "everyone's talk page" was made by Bbb23, not by me. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 21:34, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Barek, happy to know meat puppet was not an attack on me. I just provided the following information to Andythegrump and it may be relevant here. But, to confuse me with someone else is not okay and I am sure you can verify such through computers and connections. This may help explain the renewed interest in the cuecat device. Hope reposting it here is fine. (ProofPlus Professional Researcher 21:50, 2 November 2011 (UTC))

SNIP>>Here is my interest in Cue cat. RPX Corp is a public company. One of the old Paul Allen and groups guys collecting IP. They actually own the patents on the technology that was cuecat. Their stock is down 50%, but the cuecat stuff is their largest grouping. Microsoft, Google and others have licensed the former cuecat patents at $6.6 million each company and there seems to be 60 plus companies who have done the same. Supposedly these patents read heavily on G4 and other stuff and since I read the public filings I am very interested. The research I do is FINANCIAL in nature in Middle Eastern markets and seems this stock in RPX will take off and I want to know the facts. While investigating the facts of cuecat, I came across the wiki reference for cue cat and the record is just wrong and factually incorrect and I took it upon myself to add what I found out. Hope this helps. But there is big stuff in the financial markets going on relating to this OLD technology as you call it, but the patents are not old and are the next big thing. Comments? and you can find this is all public record, so I am not saying anything out of line or such. I own no stock in RPX corp, nor am I an investor, I am a researcher doing my required homework for getting to the heart of this technology (ProofPlus Professional Researcher 21:50, 2 November 2011 (UTC)) (ProofPlus Professional Researcher 21:50, 2 November 2011 (UTC)) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Proofplus (talk • contribs)

I'm even more confused now. What's the connection between CueCat and RPX Corporation? Nil Einne (talk) Edit: It seems not only do they share a similarity of interest in CueCat but both ProofPlus and User talk:Factiod#whats all the blocking and hub bub about? came to CueCat while investigating patents. Nil Einne (talk) 18:05, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

It seems User:Ran kurosawa was trying to create Misplaced Pages talk:Articles for creation/J. Hutton Pulitzer. But parts of that seem a lot like the source so it's likely a copyvio unless Ran kurosawa is actually the author of the website which raises further implications. In any case, another reason to look out for their work. Nil Einne (talk) 17:31, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Proofplus continues her odd behavior. After I responded to her comment on the Talk page here, she "responded" by opening another section here as if no one had responded. I might also add that she has not provided any links on the Talk page, despite her statement that she has. The various editors involved in these articles - to the extent they are different individuals - are eating up a lot of other editors' time for pretty much nothing.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:21, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Community Discussion of Topic Ban and Interaction Ban

A bit of background can be found here, amongst many other troublesome interactions between User:Chesdovi and User:Debresser found throughout ANI and Misplaced Pages.

In the link above, there was pretty consistent belief that both a topic ban and a interaction ban would be needed between these two editors. Both edit in highly provocative areas that are subject to closely border AE enforcement. Due to an WP:AN/3RR report, I have blocked both for a 2 week period (matching blocks).

At this point, I think it is important to formalize the rather informally-closed (it faded off the page) discussion of topic ban/interaction ban.

Proposal User:Chesdovi and User:Debresser are topic banned from all Israeli/Palestinian topics, broadly construed, for a period of 6 months. User:Chesdovi and User:Debresser are also indefinitely banned from interaction with each other on Misplaced Pages. Violations will be met with escalating blocks as per the blocking policy

Note: Both parties have been advised of this thread, and how to make their comments to this thread even though they are blocked (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 18:19, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support as proposer (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 18:07, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I dont think this is related to "Israeli/Palestinian topics", at least what that phrase is commonly understood to mean. It is in motivation, at least I think so, but not in execution. Whether a 12th century rabbi in Safed should be called a "Palestinian" is not in the scope of the "Israeli-Palestinian conflict". nableezy - 18:38, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• My impression of the long running conflict between these two is that it is theological in nature within the realm of Judaism, and not directly related to the IP conflict. It may be best to have an interaction ban alone. Either can edit whatever they want, but neither should approach, follow, or engage the other. Any sort of provocation or gaming should be met with a block to enforce the prohibition that Misplaced Pages not be used as an ideological battlefield. Jehochman 19:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I agree it's not IP related; I am concerned with just an interaction ban alone, as that gives first-mover advantage in areas they both already participate in. I don't know what the best solution is off the top of my head, though. I think that pausing the specific proposal while some thought goes into how to pose it in a most constructive and effective manner is a good idea, personally. This is not a rejection of the basis for the proposal (I support doing something at this time), just fine-tuning what we try to do... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:39, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm up for some fine-tuning. We have two weeks while they're both blocked :-) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 20:17, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• (Copying across from talk page) I think this block should be reconsidered, for the reason mention on my talkpage. As for a permanent solution, I don't know. The community has not been able to convince Chesdovi to stop his disruptive edits until he can show consensus. And I am getting blocked for trying to stop him. Makes me feel very appreciated by the community. Also in view of my other over 60,000 edits over a period of many years. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs) copied by Steven Zhang 21:46, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Debresser was advised more than once to leave Chesdovi alone, and an interaction ban should have been implemented the last time this was at ANI. Debresser knew he would be blocked if further conflict between the 2 of them occurred. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:08, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• There are 343 articles (not including talkpages, categories, etc) that both have edited - someone is clearly following someone - indeed, probably both are following each other, which they were both told to stop (hence the blocks) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:14, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
  • (Copying across from Debresser's talk page)Dwilkins, you have not addressed the concerns I mentioned on my talkpage. (in random order) 1. There was no WP:AE edit restriction involved. 2. A block is overkill and counterproductive. A topic ban, or even a mutual promise of a far more restricted nature would be enough here. 3. You do not distinguish between the aggressor and the defender. 4. Many editors have stated in a previous discussion that they would not like to see us blocked.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs) copied by Steven Zhang 22:54, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Debresser, if you're trying to paint yourself as the "defender" in your point 3 above, contrary to even a cursory look at your edits and your interaction with other editors, good luck getting anyone to swallow it. pablo 15:30, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Cool though the intersect tool is, since both editors are active in the same area, assuming that "following" is going in is a slight leap. Moreover we know that historically (WP timeframe, not South Levant) category deletions were involved in this dispute, so we should not be surprised to see this overlap per se. Rich Farmbrough, 13:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
    
• I've been involved here before as well. Whilst both editors are productive and a block is unfortunate, we do need to sort the issue out. The problem is that you can't have an interaction ban without a topic ban, as mentioned above that would just give the first person to edit an IP (or any other) article the immediate advantage; also it's too messy and vague - what would be the delay between both editors editing an article that would be acceptable? Black Kite (t) (c) 23:30, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
• Can't this be resolved by them agreeing to refer disagreements to WikiProject Judaism? Rich Farmbrough, 01:53, 28 October 2011 (UTC).
  
• (copied from usertalk) I'd agree to an arrangement where both of us voluntarily abstain from making the problematic edits (adding nationality and locality to any of the Jewish sages and anything closely related to this according to either one of us), till such time as the issue is resolved on WP:CENTRAL or WP:JUDAISM (where we could participate, of course, perhaps with a limit of one post per day) (but Rfc's on article pages are not the venue to solve project wide issues). That would be something like a topic-ban until the issue is resolved. But this two-week block I find unjust, and I ask Bwilkins and other admins to reconsider in view of the compelling arguments above (which he yet has to reply to) (see at length my unblock request on my talkpage). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs)
  • I think Debresser has made a very good suggestion here. As far as I can tell, the entire dispute stems from a single issue. Chesdovi's previous attempt to solve the problem was an RfC at Talk:Palestine, which I believe was undertaken in good faith. I agree with Debresser that this issue needs a centralized discussion. (I offer no opinion about lifting the block.) — Malik Shabazz /_Stalk 21:35, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the entire dispute runs for months (if not years) ... a simple search above for Debresser or Chesdovi on either AN or ANI provides a wide range of issues, accusations, concerns, problems, poor interactions all brought forward by both sides. I'm not saying that any of the editors is worse or better than the other, it has to be resolved so that future BS does not occur. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:15, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

(Copied from user talk page) BWilkins, unbeknowst to yourself, I am currently topic banned from I/P for a year (on some spurious basis), and I have a self-imposed interaction ban with the "other" annoying, arrogant and despicable editor, as I indcated to you a while back. So your proposal in in fact truly ineffective. This will never be resolved until some willing Admin actually involves themsleves in the knitty-gritty issue at hand, instead of implementing useless blocks. I have tried everything possible, two RFCs, two DRNs, appeals at wikiprojects, etc. etc. So don't blame any of this on me. While consensus to keep Palestinain rabbis has been reached umpteen times, Debresser will not accept it. It is further just not possible to concrete that "consensus" while Debresser reverts each time! Debresser thinks he is right. I know I am right. Now you sort it out. Threatening us we blocks and sanctions will not get the project, or your reputation as an effective and fair Admin, anywhere. Chesdovi (talk) 22:23, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• For well over 24 hours nobody has looked into my unblock request. Where I think I make a strong case that my block is based upon a misunderstanding, unjust and overkill. I am quite unpleasantly surprised that nobody, including the blocking admin has yet replied to the arguments I mention> Just saying that the situation is problematic, is not a reason to block me. In reaction to Pablo: if you'd care to do some research, you'd find that I am indeed the defender. I have, with very rare exceptions done nothing but protect this project from the aggression of Chesdovi, who has been trying to push his opinion with hundreds of edits throughout all namespaces. Just check all those 349 pages that Bwilkins mentions, and see for yourself, who made the first edit on them. Debresser (talk) 23:29, 29 October 2011 (UTC) copied by Jab7842 (talk) 00:44, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Your unblock request was declined two days ago by a wholly uninvolved admin. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 09:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I can see that, in general, (ie not just in relation to Chesdovi), you probably do see yourself as defending articles. The problem is, that you appear to be displaying ownership of these articles. pablo 12:56, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I think unblocks with broad six month AI topic bans along with an interaction ban for both of them would be the next step. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:37, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Interaction bans—by all means. But the problem isn't related to the Arab–Israeli conflict. It has to do with whether to refer to ancient and medieval rabbis as Palestinians. — Malik Shabazz /_Stalk 05:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Wouldn't ancient rabbis just be Israelites? - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 05:08, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think they'd have haggled over this for so long if not for the IP/AI conflict. Only as an aside, Jewish and Palestinian folks lived side by side and mostly peacefully in Palestine for more than two thousand years. I understand why someone might want to call the rabbis Palestinians and I understand why someone might want to call them Israelites, let the sources have sway and if there are sources which say either or, let the editorial content echo that too, it's not hard. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The problem with letting the sources have sway is that the word "Palestinian" changed meaning considerably in 1948. Before that time, it was frequently used to refer to Jews who lived in Palestine. Today the word is used almost exclusively to refer to Palestinian Arabs.

The only topic ban that would make a dent here would be one that prohibits either editor from adding or removing the words "Palestine"/"Palestinian" or "Land of Israel", pending a centralized discussion. I think that's the only thing, short of banning one editor or the other, that's going to put an end to this. — Malik Shabazz /_Stalk 05:39, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, so let editorial content echo that too. A narrower ban on them making edits carrying any form of the words Palestinian or Israel, broadly construed, along with an indef interaction ban, may be enough. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:51, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• (copied from user's talk by User:Bwilkins) Malik is correct in saying that the meaning of "Palestinian" has changed to refer soley to non-Jews nowadays. But when discussing history, we use historic terms. The words Palestine still is used to refer to pre-1948 Israel. That will never change. It is therefore valid to term people from that period "Palestinian". The more I read on this subject, the more I see the term is used to refer to such people. The latest book I read was published in 1978 and was a collection of scientific discourses. It was editied by two leading Orthodox Jewish personalities, Aryeh Carmel and Cyril Domb, and ancient rabbis are called "Palestinian". Now Debresser may want to burn this book due to that offending word, but it is crystal clear that the term "Palestinian" is used by contemporary mainstream neutral Jewish RS, just as "Palestine" is used to describe the historic region. Who can claim to the contrary? Even the chief rabbi used to term to refer to Levi ibn Habib. But Debresser will just not accept these facts. As he so idiotically stated: To use such a word to describe a Jewish person is, wait for it: "anti-semitic". Can you now begin to understand his mindset? He said he would "fight will all his might" to stop the word being used. Is that normal expression for a wiki-editor or does it indicate a strong POV related to the I/P conflcit? For Debresser, this indeed is associated with the conflict, but for me, coming purley from a historical viewpont, this has little to do with it. Debresser's opposition to this is a clear case of politically inspired POV which has no place here and I find it very hard why other editors do not recognise this. Debresser can state as much, and as hard as he wants, that there was never a place called "Palestine", but any person with a grain of intellect will just smirk at such a stupid assumption. The Encylopedia Judaica calls Daniel ben Azariah "Palestinian", but God forbid for us to use it here. I find Debresser a disruptive, arrogant and foul-mouthed menace. He has lost any credibility in my mind. Misplaced Pages should not be pandering to the views of such people. Every fickle argument Debresser has forwarded on this subject, I have refuted. As far as I am concerned, the majority of the communtiy concede usage is valid, but Debresser continues to reject it and enforce his own opinion. There have been enough centralised discussions on the matter. The conclusion, believe it or not, is that "Palestinian" can indeed refer to people of historic Palestine, be they rabbis or christian monks. Any one who wants to help out here should try and convince Debresser of this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chesdovi (talk • contribs)

  Well, as far as I can see, within certain temporal boundaries, there may be synonyms (Palestine and Land of Israel, Palestinian and Israelite) which would be invalid outside those temporal boundaries. That doesn't mean that the choice of terms is arbitrary. If one term is clearer than the other then that should be used. If one term is more accurate than the other then that should be use. If those two edicts are in significant conflict then accuracy should be followed with appropriate explanatory text. We are not writing WP primarily for the historical scholars who will have their own sources, but for a far more general readership. This is not so hard to resolve, surely. Rich Farmbrough, 12:48, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
  

  Reading through Misplaced Pages:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_July_2#Category:16th-century_Palestinian_rabbis it appears that terms both more accurate and more clear exist. I also think that discussion will inform anyone trying to take a view on this situation, although of course it is only part of the wider context which is very TLDR. Rich Farmbrough, 13:07, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
  

• (Copied over from User talk:Debresser by User:Gwen Gale: Yes, adding the words "Palestine" and "Palestinian" or "Land of Israel" - in general not adding any ethnic or geographic description - to articles (main article namespace only, I mean) about Jewish sages - and more generally Jews - should do it. There simply is no reason for a broader ban, because Chesdovi is already topic banned under WP:ARBPIA, and I don't edit such articles, as my contributions show. The ban should last until centralized (really central, not like before) discussion has reached a consensus. I think that discussion should be opened by somebody other than us. Perhaps Malik Shabazz would agree to open it. In order to avoid that discussion turning into a debate between the two of us, I think we should be restricted to 1 edit a day in that discussion. In addition I'd ask for my (or our) block(s) to be lifted, because from that moment on the block(s) would be only punitive. (That is in addition to the arguments I have mentioned before. In all earnest, I would really like to know how editors like Bwilkins and Pablo think I should have acted to defend the project from Chesdovi's edits in a way that would not have lead to my being blocked here repeatedly. You are invited to write me on my talkpage about this.) into the discussion at WP:ANI. Debresser (talk) 20:13, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Well you might consider editing only subjects and articles in which you have less of an investment, and on which you able to work collegially with other editors, tather than feeling that you have to defend "your" articles quite so much. pablo 09:28, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
  • (copy/pasted from User talk:Debresser by User:Bwilkins Pablo, please be a little less hostile and accusing. The accusations of WP:OWN are strange in view of the fact that I hadn't edited almost any of those articles before Chesdovi came along and made his usual (read tendentious) edits on them. Did you do your homework? I recommended you to check all those articles and see who of the two of us made the first edit. Perhaps after that, you'll change your tune. Debresser (talk) 13:32, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Er...so, you're just admitting that you're following a user around, even though you have been told in the past to not do that? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

(copied by User:Bwilkins) No, Bwilkins. I ran into his edits in various places. Some of them he posted triumphantly on WT:JUDAISM, until people told him in no fine language that they had enough of that. Other articles I had on my watchlist. His talkpage was (and is) on my watchlist as well, since I posted there a few times. Sometimes I would notice an edit in one article, and check his contributions to see whether he made any more such edits. But I would not regularly check his edits, no. I have a distinct feeling there is a lack of assuming good faith from a few editors here... And in view of your lack of good faith and the unjustified block (you have not replied to any of my arguments), let me add. When will you understand I was (and am) only trying to protect the status quo on this project from the onslaught of one disruptive editor who has made many attempts to push his tendentious edits, but never gained consensus for them? Have you checked that such is indeed the case? Please do. Never in all the discussions he started (and I won't even go into his behavior in those discussions) has he gained consensus for his point of view. Always a majority of editors have preferred other expressions. So why did WP:ANI admins allow him to go unpunished when I posted here all those times before now. So in a way you yourself (including a few of the other admins who have partaken in this thread) are responsible for this escalation. So please be so kind, and do not turn me into your scapegoat. I have posted a fair proposition above. Let's go with it, and move things from their present unfortunate state — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs)

If I was a prosecuting attorney, I'd blink and say "wow, you proved everyone's case better than I could have myself" :-) Thank you for proving the block was necessary, valid, and just. WP:NOTTHEM might just be a good thing for you to read while you're blocked. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 16:19, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• (Copied over from User talk:Debresser by User:JohnCD: Have you checked what I asked you to check, or haven't you? Instead of asserting you did the right thing blocking me, perhaps you start looking into what happened. You have never defended your decision to block me, although I have been implored you to look into the facts, point you to the relevant places. After all, admins are supposed to give account of their actions as well, when asked to do so. Other admins are likewise invited to see the facts for themselves. Also I find it less than helpful that you do not reply to my proposal about how to get out of this mess. That is what I would expect an impartial and wise admin to have foremost among his priorities, rather than gloating about his blocks. Debresser (talk) 17:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
• (Copied over from User talk:Chesdovi by User:JohnCD: Why can we just not rely on RS to use the word "Palestinian" to describe medieval rabbis? Claiming that the term is confusing holds no credibility in the face of widespread contemporary usage in mainstream RS. Further, 3RR reports on Israel ben Meir di Curiel. He is described at Palestinian rabbis, as "a rabbi who lived in the region known as Palestine", yet the region he lived in is removed by Debresser because it is "controversial". What is that supposed to mean? Why is it "controversial." Is adding "Israel" not "controversial?", besides from being a absolute untruth. The AFD and rejection of two "potential renames" supports the fact that using such a classification for such rabbis has been accepted. It is now up to the community to impress upon Debresser that any removal of the word "Palestine/Palestinian" from any "Jewish" pages will be dealt with accordingly. Chesdovi (talk) 17:15, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

(de-archived (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:12, 2 November 2011 (UTC))

• (Copied over from User talk:Chesdovi by User:Excirial) : How unfortunate Dweller suggests we are "unsuitable for editing in a collaborative system like Misplaced Pages." Instead of castigating editors who are locked in a dispute over term usage, he should try suggesting a resolution to the dispute in the true spirit of Misplaced Pages. The community is marvellous at suggesting bans and implementing blocks very swiftly. There’s never a dearth of Admin input in those situations. But when it comes to sorting out sticky points to help the project move forward, that’s a different matter. DRN’s are closed without comment. RFCs are left “unclosed”. CFDs are closed with the wrong conclusions. Nevertheless, I can provide a list here of a majority of editors who have commented about this and have supported using “Palestinian” for rabbis. So what more is there to discuss? To gain consensus, one has to make edits and see if they stick. How can I go about doing if every time I do, Debresser comes along and reverts immediately? I cannot come to an agreement with him because his arguments are in my view irrational and I know very well indeed this this is not about “confusion” at all, but rather about not mentioning the supposedly offensive “Palestine” on “Jewish” pages. What clearer evidence is there that this is a thinly veiled “pro-Israel” manipulation? It is not “anti-Semitic” to call a rabbi “Palestinian”. Neither is it inaccurate or offensive. It is 100% correct and proper. That is why its use is so widespread in reliable sources, many of them written by contemporary Jewish academics. Now, unless there is a rule on wiki that we not use terms which are deemed offensive to certain individuals, I see no reason why unless those editors provide a convincing argument not to use such accepted terms, they cannot be used. Ed suggests: "Both editors should be banned for six months from any naming issues concerning 'Palestine' or 'Palestinian' in both articles and talk pages." Why is this necessary? I am quite capable of not using the word while the matter is "sorted out." On numerous articles, I purposefully blanked out the offending word, pending the outcome of the discussion on the matter: . When the outcome was clear that using the term was okay, I added it. There is similarly no reason why I cannot edit in pages such as Palestinian synagogues, Palestinian Patriarchate, Palestinian minhag and Palestinian Gaonate. An uninvolved editor should try explaining why we cannot use "Palestinian Rabbi" on bio pages even though Palestinian rabbi exists as a self-contained article. That is a very intriguing question, don’t you think? Chesdovi (talk) 12:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• (copied across from users talk by User:Steven Zhang) This post is very unfortunately belated because I made a typo in the adminhelp template. This is more or less what I proposed as well. With one exception. I see no reason to exclude us from talkpages. To the contrary, I think a centralized discussion about this subject should be started by some editor other than us. And after that discussion has come to a conclusion, the topic ban can be lifted. The only restriction I would think fair is that we should not be allowed to post more than one post a day in such a discussion, to avoid it becoming a discussion of two people only. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs)

Moving forward

So, are we going to enact an interaction ban or a topic ban or are we going to pass the buck? — Malik Shabazz /_Stalk 02:05, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Let's fine-tune the topic ban:

• Both editors should be banned for six months from any naming issues concerning 'Palestine' or 'Palestinian' in both articles and talk pages
• In general, they can make no edits that assume any particular answer to the following question:

  What term should be used to designate the country of people who were from the region of what is today called "Israel and the Palestinian territories" from Antiquity, thru to the Middle Ages and up to 1948?

• These editors may add no categories to articles that assume that either 'Palestinian' or 'Israeli' is the correct answer. They are allowed to pose neutral questions to others as to the tagging of articles that *they create themselves*. Except for that, they must be silent on the subject.
• If this ban is adopted either by consensus here or by voluntary agreement, the blocks on these two editors might be lifted at that point. EdJohnston (talk) 02:49, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to slightly disagree: this does need to be a combination of topic ban (or agreement as per above) plus an interaction ban. Debresser has admitted to following Chesdovi around. When that happens, stupidity (not people-wise, but action-wise) ensues. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:06, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That looks good to me. I'm tired of these WP:LAME edit warriors. But I do worry what they'll turn their attention to next, as both seem to me to be unsuitable for editing in a collaborative system like Misplaced Pages. I suggest that the threat of community ban be made explicit if they rescind or enter new fields of fray. --Dweller (talk) 11:32, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If others believe that a six-month interaction ban is also needed, I'd be OK with that. EdJohnston (talk) 20:04, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with this proposal; and also with Wilkins' suggestion that an interaction ban be proposed. Since the others are for six months; this one should be too Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 20:12, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support EdJohnston's topic ban proposal as well as the proposed WP:IBAN between these two editors. If these measures fail to be adopted by the community, the matter should probably be kicked upstairs to ArbCom. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 20:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support with interaction ban. — Malik Shabazz /_Stalk 20:46, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Offwiki canvassing alert: Chesdovi emailed me, alerting me to this thread and asking me to contribute to it. I've been generally supportive of Chesdovi's side of things at DRV in the past and he may see me as a sympathetic editor. No such luck, I'm afraid, Chesdovi: I'm a mean, nasty editor who doesn't approve of offwiki canvassing at all. But with that said, I don't think the answer will involve blocking either of these two otherwise-productive editors. I like Ed Johnston's idea.—S Marshall T/C 01:13, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User talk:Ludwigs2 on Talk:Muhammad/images

A little background: Talk:Muhammad/images is a special talk page created to deal with the large number of editors who come to complain about showing depictions of Muhammad on the Muhammad article, due mostly to religious considerations. Consensus has been decided on multiple occasions that images of Muhammad are acceptable on the page, this has been truly exhaustively discussed in the past as you can tell by the large disclaimer on the top of the talk page, and by reading the archives. This does not mean that consensus cannot change, but it's unlikely and doesn't seem to be happening now.

Furthermore, WP:NOTCENSORED is unambiguous when it states "Any rules that forbid members of a given organization, fraternity, or religion to show a name or image do not apply to Misplaced Pages because Misplaced Pages is not a member of those organizations."

User talk:Ludwigs2 has made it goal recently to strip the article of images of Muhammad on the basis that it offends Muslims. It is true that some sects of Islam consider it unethical to depict Muhammad as I'm sure most people here know.

It has been explained ad nauseum to Ludwig that policy does not allow us to consider religious beliefs when writing this encyclopedia and his response is that we should invoke WP:IAR. I explained to him that IAR still needs to be determined by a consensus and that he cannot unilaterally invoke it to force a POV into the article. His response was that other editors are abusing the rules by enforcing them and if we stop abusing the rules then he will stop IAR.

This conversation has been going back and forth with the same points being explained by several editors many times, and it has now crossed the WP:TE line - the entire page is one large WP:BATTLEGROUND at this point, with several WP:IDHT, WP:NPA and WP:AGF issues such as accusing all the other editors opposing removal (which as far as I can tell is all other editors, though there are editors who would like less images for various reasons) of WP:OWN and expressing disbelief that the people he's dealing with can think the way they do and still be normal adults.

I'm asking that an uninvolved admin assess the situation and determine if Lugwigs2 requires some kind of a warning or if I'm being overly dramatic, and I thank you in advance for reading the talk page thread because it is a bit long.

The relevant thread is here. I'm not posting diffs because the entire thread demonstrates the points I am attempting to illustrate, as it's not a single comment that is at issue here. There are other threads involved in this discussion, but this is the most recent and best highlights my complaint.

Nformation 01:11, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

This was bound to hit the AN/I fan sooner or later, just one massive Facepalm . If I may offer a pre-rebuttal to what Ludwigs2 is like about to touch on here, neither I nor IMO anyone else asserts ownership of the Muhammad article. I have said "images will not be removed this article" as a simple acknowledgement of the slim-to-none chance that it would ever actually happen. It's like saying "Ron Paul will never be President" or "the Bills will never win the Super Bowl". One is not staking out an aggressive posture against either scenario taking place, but is rather acknowledging the likelihood of occurrence, or lack thereof. It has also been endlessly frustrating to deal with a user who demands existing policy be bent in an absolutely wrong direction to accommodate someone's religious beliefs. And not even a specific someone, all of this is in defense of nebulous "some people out there don't like this article" sensibilities. Tarc (talk) 01:34, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I have said similar and have elaborated in the same way. The article can certainly change if a consensus to do so is formed, but it will not be done based on religious considerations and the chances of the article being depiction free are slim. This is not asserting ownership. Nformation 01:37, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I believe the term you're looking for is "Slim to none, and Slim left town". - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 01:43, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

A very very tiny portion of the diffs of behavior related to this can be found here (this was for an AN/I or RfC/U I planned on filing but am still working on organizing and moving the diffs over from an offline copy). Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 01:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Just noting that I am aware of this thread, and to clarify some misperceptions in Nofo's presentation. beyond that I will allow administrtors to review the material before commenting further.

comments on Nofo's summary:

• I am not trying to "strip the article of images of Muhammad on the basis that it offends Muslims." As I have said repeatedly on the talk page, I want to undertake a frank evaluation of the value of these images to the article to see if keeping them is worth all the immense amounts of trouble that they cause. as Nofo noted, there is a special subpage (with 16 archives) all focused on these images; one would expect the images to be of vital importance to the page for all of that conflict, yet as far as I can tell they are at best decorative illustrations. That struck me as nonsensical - why cause this much trouble over eye-candy?
• Nofo and Tarc have (understandably) downplayed the extent of wp:page ownership. I have had at least four editors (including one admin) tell me bald-face that the images will not be removed under any circumstances, and that any discussion of the matter is unacceptable (two most reacent examples ,, though there are dozens) I have consequently been forced to turn to wp:IAR simply to get any sort of discussion going.
  • The IAR justification, incidentally, is over the misuse of NOTCENSORED: the policy is being used to retain images that have no particular value to the article but are highly controversial - effectively offending a significant population of our readers and damaging the project's reputation without any overriding encyclopedic reason.

please review the talk page at your leisure; happy to answer any questions. Hopefully this can be resolved without further drama on the page. --Ludwigs2 01:44, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

P.s. this has been cast as being about me, but there are at least two other editors in the discussion making similar arguments to mine who have not been notified. I will leave notices in their talk (I don't want to involve them unless they choose to participate here). --Ludwigs2 01:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That is so very not true, and I can provide faaaar more diffs to prove it's not than the tiny handful in the link I posted above. Shall I? ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 01:49, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I very clearly said "without a consensus for your position, these images will not be removed" in that diff, I seriously doubt anyone will read that as ownership. Nformation 01:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages editors insist on calling the Bible stories fairy tales, without concern for offense to Jewish and Christian believers. What's so special about Muslims, that they should be catered to? ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 01:50, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Fairy tales? In mainspace? Do we? --FormerIP (talk) 01:55, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 02:19, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Example? I rather think we tolerate highly biased articles making out that Jesus' existence is uncontested historical fact and stuff like that. Not that this supports Ludwigs2's case. --FormerIP (talk) 02:23, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Bugs: when it comes right down to it, I don't really care who gets offended, so long as the project has a valid, encyclopedic reason to do the offending. If we need controversial material, we use controversial material, but do we really want to be throwing controversial material in our readers' faces for no reason whatsoever? see the recent foundation resolution on controversial content. --Ludwigs2 02:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Wow, at AN/I, you actually decided to make such a claim, even though diffs to prove your true motivations and feelings on this matter are right here for all to see? (to everyone else) This is why I think nothing short of a topic ban is going to stop the tendentiousness, disruptiveness and editing in bad faith (not to mention erroneous claims of being attacked while attacking others). In my opinion, that entire comment shows a bad faith response as can be noted from over a dozen diffs showing (in his own words) it is not his true motivations. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 05:47, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Considering that depictions of Muhammed are usually verboten, their mere presence is of major educational benefit here. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 02:19, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That's a ridiculous argument, Bugs. Here's a gratuitous and excessive counterexample of something that is offensive but we have no educational mission to include. The concept that we should include offensive material just because no one else will host it is jaw-droppingly silly. SDY (talk) 03:07, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

And that's a ridiculously, jaw-droppingly silly, and thoroughly bogus comparison. Unless you're aware of some American law restricting depictions of Muhammed. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 03:10, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

In other words, you think we should include kiddie porn if the laws of Florida didn't say no? Maybe we should include the goatse.cx image for its "educational value"? Including gratuitous offensive images is tasteless and crude: if they have clear educational value that should be easy to defend. Including them for the sake of some twisted sense of entitlement about freedom from censorship is not writing an encyclopedia. SDY (talk) 03:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

For quite some time we did include the goatse.cx image, first the image itself, and then a screenshot of the website with the image clearly visible. The arguments for the inclusion of that image were much better than those for the Muhammad images, and it didn't get finally removed before Jimbo got involved. Hans Adler 07:46, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If there's an alternate universe where kiddie porn isn't universally condemned as wrong and depraved, and is instead accepted, and if there's a wikipedia in that universe, they'd probably have kiddie porn in their article. The comparison is way too weak because of all the fundamentally unique issues that apply to child pornography that don't apply to almost anything else. Interestingly, I don't particularily think that a category exists whose members are "child porn, goatse.cx and the religious prophet Muhammad". Nformation 03:20, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Images that might be taken as extremely offensive, perhaps? The complete cultural blindness of this site is shocking sometimes. We have very different ideas about encyclopedias. Regardless, this isn't the place for this conversation. SDY (talk) 03:31, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Re: "cultural blindess" - good thing too, if it weren't culturally blind, it would be a very shitty encyclopedia, especially with all the various interests that have tried subverting article after article. My time here at RC has proven that to me. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 05:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Comment. There's no way I'm reading through all the material here, major case of tl;dr, but I would suggest to Ludwig that his reasoning is dubious when he argues that a possibly valid reason to remove images from said article is simply because they are causing more trouble than they are worth, when it is he who is causing most of the trouble. I agree with the original poster that an uninvolved admin might perhaps need to have a chat with Ludwig and possibly issue a warning. This discussion has truly been done to death at a variety of locations on wikipedia, and I really think it's time for Ludwig to let this issue go. Basalisk ⁄_berate 02:07, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I had a read through of the entire section myself to get to grips with the situation. Wrt to the point raised re ownership, I didn't see any particular signs of it. I read the various "these pictures will never be removed" comments as "these pictures will never be removed based on the position you are taking". Frankly speaking, all I read was the same argument repeated over and over again until it was escalated into heel digging and declarations of applying IAR ad nauseam until the pictures were removed for the sake of the sensibilities of religious hysterics. --Blackmane (talk) 02:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I cannot believe this was brought here. Ludwigs2 is not just repeating the same arguments over and over again. The most recent round of discussion was kicked off by the resolution recently passed by the WMF on controversial content. Raising the issue here on Misplaced Pages with what are very easily our most "controversial images" was fully acceptable. In response, Ludwigs has been met with abuse and vitriol. Ludwigs eventually decided to pursue an RfC (supported by myself, Anthonyhcole, and others); a number of regular editors (Tarc is the worst, but also Robertmfromli) have made strong attempts to stop the RfC. When a group of editors attempt to assert that their understanding of policy is so obviously correct and their opponents are so obviously wrong that we shouldn't even ask for the community's input, that is the very definition of ownership. Now, I will admit that Ludwigs2 is on the extreme end, and the chances of his preferred outcome (i.e., no pictorial images whatsoever) is essentially a no-go, but Anthonyhcole has done a very good job of pointing out that there is a middle ground here that needs to be considered (i.e., that by including so many images from a very narrow time period and fairly narrow interpretation of Islam we are in fact violating WP:UNDUE). WP:CENSORSHIP is fine, but it is being used as a bludgeon on that page, as if its very existence means that anyone who even considers removal of any images there is nothing other than a Sunni apologist. My opinion is, once we settle on a wording, we need to let the RfC run. If it turns out (as is likely) to support the extremist "all images are good position", then fine--of course, Ludwigs2 and any other editor must be free to pursue further dispute resolution. That has really been my position all along: that a group of editors are essentially trying to prevent dispute resolution due to their sense of their own unerring interpretation of policy. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:35, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Qwyrxian: Me? I tried stopping the RfC? Are you truly serious? I kindly ask you to review the page history. I was willing to give up because of Ludwigs2's actions, but I *NEVER* tried stopping it. The exact opposite is true. *I* restarted it THREE times and *I* made the only proposal that had any chance at getting any images removed (other than you tacking virtually the same proposal onto proposal #5). So, would you like to retract that claim that I tried stopping the RfC? And apologies for the bolded text, but your claim is so vastly different than what really happened. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 06:05, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Qwyrxian: Apologies for any tone you may read into that. That page is a massive mess, and I am sure you simply missed the things I pointed out above. I am upset about such a claim being made against me, but I know (from seeing you around for a long time) that it's nothing more than not having gotten a handle on that massive walls-o-text talk page. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 06:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

This AN/I is about Ludwig's behavior, not the content discussion. There may be a middle ground and that's fine but in the meantime Ludwig has made personal attacks, assigned motives to other editors and yes, has repeated the same argument regarding offending Muslims over and over again to the point of WP:TE. He is yet to make a policy based argument against WP:NOTCENSORED, which specifically rules out using religious belief as a valid criteria of building the pedia. Instead he invokes IAR, which he would not need to do if policy was on his side. Yes there have been edits by editors who share my view on the images that made me cringe, I didn't find their behavior bad enough to take to AN/I, but if you do then by all means open up a case. However, in what you wrote above all you did was point to the behavior of others and not that of Ludwigs. Please see some of the diffs below. Nformation 04:44, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Just to add to this, I have absolutely no problem with an RFC nor do I oppose changes to the way images in the article are handled, and I don't think other editors do either. The problem people have is that we cannot make a case based on Ludwig's reasoning that it offends religious beliefs. Other arguments are fine. I brought this thread here so that an uninvolved admin can step in and calm the waters - not to stifle discussion or stop DR. Nformation 04:49, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I find Ludwigs2's arguments quite sensible, and am more inclined to the view that there are a number of editors opposing Ludwigs2 who are overinvolved on that page, and who are turning this into a battleground over principle. I am still trying to get up to speed with the subject matter, but as far as I can make out, pictorial representations of Muhammad have never been as common and widespread in Muslim traditions as pictorial representations of Christ in the Christian tradition, for example; so the basic situation is a completely different one. We should focus on the most common types of representation (calligraphy etc.), just as we focus on the most typical depictions of Jesus in his article. Even among such pictorial depictions of Muhammad as did exist, the majority showed him as a flame, or veiled; yet most of the pictures we feature are those of the rarer naturalistic type – so they are both unrepresentative and more likely to cause offence. If we keep in mind that we should balance educational value and potential offence, the only reasonable conclusion is that we have far too many naturalistic images of Muhammad in the article. Perhaps one veiled one, and one showing him as a flame, might be reasonable, because these are the common styles. It might also make sense to look at how other encyclopaedias are handling this; Britannica for example does not include any images of Muhammad at all, as far as I can see; neither in the Micropaedia and Macropaedia articles on Muhammad, nor in the Macropaedia article on Islamic art (which is mostly non-pictorial). We'll probably need an RfC on the content issue at some point, and that should be well-prepared, and underpinned by serious research. --JN466 05:07, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

There are many arguments to be made on the article's talk page, but one of them is not that it's against Islamic tradition. And again, this is about Ludwig's behavior, not the content dispute. Nformation 05:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, as someone who has only happened on this page this past week, I see lots of "I didn't hear that" and aspersions from the other side as well, rather than an effort to seek compromise and consensus. I think everybody on that page needs a cooling-off period. (By the way, note WP:NAUSEUM.) And to address the point of tradition, I think we can agree that naturalistic depictions of Muhammad are rare, and nowhere near representative of how Muhammad is represented in Islamic tradition. --JN466 05:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

A small portion of Ludwigs2 behavior and comments

• Engages community in attempt to remove images based on Foundation resolution
• Very next post, claims (in edit summary) "the astonishment is general, not a function or religion" yet the only known objection is religious beliefs.
• One justification repeatedly trumped out is "and since none of the images of the prophet presented on the page are factual" (one of many diffs) - yet refuses to believe that such would apply to pictures of Euro-Jesus - while admitting it is because people aren't (religiously) offended by such. thus indicating (again and again) the real issue is one of religious offense and not whether the images are "factual".
• Earlier admits his motivations are religious in nature - continues to do so, such as
• VERY early on, starts accusing those who he disagrees with of having a prejudicial tone - they cite policy and it's uniform use, he calls their tone "prejudicial"
• He suggests an RfC, which gets given actual attention and yet two days later tries end runs around an RfC that obviously won't remove every image of Muhammad by attempting to remove one editor using WQA, and an attempted an end run at ArbCom hinting at our behavior (with diffs) while claiming that isn't part of it (diff to final post on proposed ArbCom case so entire thread can be viewed). During this ArbCom end run attempt, he tries pointing out a "deep ideological divide in the community" by pointing out a Village Pump proposal that shows the exact opposite.
• (Also) DURING the attempt to formulate an RfC to address such concerns, those with opposing viewpoints and vastly different understanding of policy than him are labeled (by him) as showing or having a bias, not AGF, incivility, anti-Muslim sentiments, personal attacks (against him), etc,
• Advises he will continue to bring up what amounts to policy changes in the wrong venue. Advised he should go to the right venue. Obviously refuses by actions (see talk page) and again repeats (after being told by multiple editors that it's getting tendentious (and disruptive)) that he will continue to do so anyway, even after acknowledging the correct venue (and even responding with "tenacious" once in response to claims of his "tendentious"ness)

Added by ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 01:51, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

We need to limit this discussion to Ludwigs2's behavior. We *really* don't want to hash out the image controversy here as it's one that will never achieve consensus anyway. Rklawton (talk) 02:29, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

It achieved consensus long ago (that a few images stay) and has had it ever since. What it will never achieve is universal agreement, but that's not the same thing. Johnbod (talk) 04:25, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, I was just about to post the same thing. Nformation 02:33, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Agreed as well, but in fairness to Ludwigs, we need to limit it to everyone's behaviour, even if I echo others in believing that he himself is responsible for nearly all of the conflict. Now, onto the point, I won't repeat everything RobertM has said, but I have a collection of links myself that echos those. The one I will leave is typical of his behaviour on that talk page: "...the extravagant effort I see dumped into defending these trivial images is only explainable by deep-seated anti-Islamic prejudice." This was from last weekend, but he has made several similar accusations of bigotry and racism, the most recent of which I saw was from yesterday. That is pretty much his MO. We need to remove images of "the prophet" because some Muslims are offended, and therefore anyone who does not support his goal of censoring the article must be a bigot. He has been tendentious in the extreme and routinely makes bad-faith arguments against his opponents. Resolute 03:53, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Cannot but agree that Ludwigs has been speculating on the motives of editors at that page and he should stop. Ludwigs2 is by no means the only offender. I would very much appreciate it if all the editors on that page would apply WP:TALK. It is extremely tedious trying to engage in rational argument when every fifth paragraph seems to be about editor behaviour or speculations about motive, from every direction. It draws out the process and just makes people dig in their heels. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 04:29, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree. The whole recent discussion on that page seems to have degenerated into battleground mode. I would not want to lay the responsibility for that at any one individual editor's doorstep. --JN466 05:22, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I believe we are on our 5th attempt at an RfC (which ironically he proposed and tried to circumvent). I even proposed an RfC that actually had a chance of getting an image or three removed (the "all or none" ones we know wouldn't change anything, and Ludwigs' written or implied as "none or none" ones weren't going to happen). If that's not a compromise, I don't know what is. Worse yet, there isn't anything else that can be compromised on in that venue. The rest require policy changes or policy addendums - where, on well over a dozen occasions, Ludwigs2 was suggested to go. We can't change nor ignore WP:CENSOR. At least 4 times, a viable compromise in the form of an RfC that may have removed some images was proposed.

And finally, the rest of us don't really need to cool off. We just don't need tendentiousness and every RfC attempt turned into a circus of repeated IAR claims and repeated claims of (grossly paraphrased) "ooh, you attacked me again!" I disagree with various of your points, yet you and I are going back and forth in good faith with points and counter-points and listening to each other. Same with other editors.

Yes, it's been difficult for us to ignore Ludwigs2, and I think all of us have tried, and most of us have failed... but ignoring him doesn't work either. And I've got pages of history in the talk page archives - plus the current page - to prove that. Simply responding to each other (as you and I have been doing) results in walls of the "Policy Whack A Mole" game, accusations towards other editors, single purpose IAR rants, and so on. I'll gladly do no more than provide a link to the Village Pump each time from now on, so the rest of us can discuss... but, at this point, the number of accusations and attacks on editors from him has gotten ridiculous, as has the tendentiousness and disruptiveness. I personally think he's long overdue for a topic ban. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 05:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Rob, this is a complex issue. It will take time for calm rational discussion to arrive at an idea of the best way forward, if indeed anything needs to be done. There is no hurry. The only problem I see at that page is a tendency for many editors, of every persuasion, to allow themselves to be sidetracked into ad hominem. You can ignore ad hominem. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 05:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Anthony, you are correct. And my apologies, if my frustrations at others ever got misplaced and misdirected at you or anyone else. Best, Rob ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 06:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

My OPINION: Summary of this whole event

This was intended to be part of the AN/I I held off filing and was to go with the diffs I provided above and below. It has been modified to note the two locations of the diffs, as I never finished moving them from off-Wiki to my userspace)

(diffs representative of most or all of this are already posted here) When it comes to removal of the images, whether one or all or something inbetween, there are two camps involved:

1. One camp which wishes to discuss the merit (historic, educational and artistic value to the article) of each image (or the images as a whole).
2. One editor (Ludwigs2) who wishes to see them all removed based on religious objections to them. It seems that if those in "Camp #1" make what he perceives are compelling arguments, he tries that road for a short period of time. Everyone else starts discussing such with them in good faith, but as soon as it looks like there is pressure against any part of any such proposal, he tends to revert to various policy Whack A Mole type arguments based on religious objections to the images for summary removal of all of them, including suggesting an RfC that asked or implied (paraphrased) "remove all for this reason, or remove all for this reason".

It is at that point where things continue to spiral out of control. Multiple attempts have been made to restart discussions, but the end result is always the same. I can provide diffs to various such conversations where those at odds with Ludwigs2's actions were working in good faith with those in "Camp #1" - and where he sidetracked things for his single minded objective. Due to his preliminary support of some of these (before he reverts to his true objective), a person only giving the page a quick read may come to a grossly wrong conclusion about his objectives as he himself (diff below in response to Anthony, many more available) had admitted is his goal.

This is just my perceptions of the matter, with diffs in the section above I created, as well as below to support my interpretation. Your's may vary (or not). Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 08:20, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

My take on this whole thing is that Ludwigs2 wants a clear interpretation of the ArbCom resolution reflected in Misplaced Pages's existing policies. As a precisionist Wikipedian myself, this is something I agree with. The problem is that Ludwigs2 picked the wrong venue, perhaps to use as a test case, but nevertheless it's the wrong place to build a consensus regarding fundamental interpretations of policy.

At this point, after the same arguments have been stated over and over again, I would agree that Ludwigs2's persistence in the wrong venue has crossed the line into tendentiousness. ~Amatulić (talk) 14:08, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I took the fact that the resolution was already incorporated into WP:CENSOR with the religious censorship section left intact as the community's interpretation. I'd gladly see through such an endeavor for clarity, if you believe such is really needed. On the other side of the coin though, Ludwigs2 (I have the diffs, and can provide them later if you would like) started out at that article by removing images, caused drawn out debates about removing images, tried policy Whack-A-Mole to remove images, tried RfC attempts to remove images, tried a Village Pump proposal to remove images (was that one another end run attempt at an ongoing RfC?), and when pushed, repeatedly admits it's religious based objections at the core of his argument - hence my interpretation of his motives is different. Even with the very very unamibguous wording that was left in WP:CENSOR, it seemed more Policy-Whack-A-Mole time again. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 15:20, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

After re-reading much of the discussion (there's a good chunk of my life I'll sadly never get back), I have to concur with RobertMfromLI's summary--Ludwigs2 does keep reverting back to the same argument over and over. If Ludwigs2 wants to use that argument in the upcoming RfC, that is fine; however, there's no point in continuing to bring it up over and over again when xe knows that the current local consensus is opposed to that position. Right now, Ludwigs2 should be focused only on helping phrase the RfC itself, then xe can add whatever additional points xe wants to it. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:57, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Topic Ban Proposal

• Topic ban? Ludwigs2 seems to be behaving no differently on this article than he has on astrology, pregnancy and acupuncture. (On Men's rights, it seems that his presence provides a useful counterfoil to some of the newly arrived editor-activists.) Almost all his contributions to the discussion on the image subpage appear to be outside wikipedia policy; and he still has not succeeded in finding a way to engage with other users who do not share his opinions, without causing offense. In this case, he has been shifting between several different lines of argument in a way which makes it very hard to see whether he has any coherent objections beyond WP:IDONTLIKETHAT. My suggestion is that, since he seems intent on producing more heat than light and at the same time causing offense, his presence on that talk page is purely disruptive and not a net positive for the project. Perhaps the best way foward is for Ludwigs2 to be topic banned from all discussions of images on wikipedia for a preliminary period of six months. (On astrology, he was topic-banned for six months.) Mathsci (talk) 06:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Sadly, Support VERY VERY STRONG SUPPORT I tried avoiding going to this forum for quite some time (hence I never even finished adding diffs to the report I started in my userspace), but I think we are at the point this is the only viable option. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 06:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• After a bad faith RfC just created today, I am now inclined to change my "Sadly, Support" to "VERY STRONG SUPPORT" - as pointed out by another editor, the RfC is biased to the point it is worded similar to "When did you stop beating your wife?" This needs to stop. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 03:40, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. Ludwigs2 is needed to balance the POV of that article. It is striking how the illustrations of our article on Jesus are fully consistent with and celebratory of Christian tradition, while the illustrations in our article on Muhammad are not only inconsistent with Islamic tradition, but actually offensive to many muslim readers. That should give anyone just a moment's pause for thought about the neutrality that this project aspires to, and the extent to which we have achieved that lofty aim. --JN466 06:44, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• As a brief aside, I've paused for a moment, and come to the conclusion that we're not necessarily hearing from a representative portion of the Muslim community, since we tend not to hear from Muslims who actually like the images there; kind of a "planes that crash" problem. I won't try to bring the discussion at Talk:Muhammad/images here, but to briefly state; I know many Muslims personally who feel it's a personal choice whether or not to be offended by pictures of Muhammad, and that a secular encyclopedia should show depictions of him because that will lend itself to better understanding of the subject. To the topic at hand here, I'm not making a decision on whether I want to see an editor topic banned at 3 in the morning, so I'll weigh in later on. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 07:01, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Blade, the point is that we should pick typical, traditional representations of Muhammad, that a muslim would recognise as typical representations, just as we do in the article on Jesus. We simply don't do that. Ludwigs2 is aware of that, but he is being stonewalled, and unreasonably so. --JN466 07:30, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• • • Jayden, Ludwig wants to remove all images of Muhammad because some Muslims find them offensive. He doesn't want some, or one, he wants none. I don't think a single other editor is opposed to removing or changes images in general, it's just that we're not willing to have no images. Nformation 07:37, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
    • (edit conflict)Actually, Ludwigs has repeatedly stated his true intent is to get all the images removed - that is why various of us are working in good faith with those discussing what you are talking about above - they don't want summary removal. Big difference. Does he make a few good points? Yes, and I've given him credit for them. But he then returns each conversation to efforts to simply summarily remove all images. Would you like diffs? If so, how many? Five? A dozen? That page is a convoluted mess, but you'll see (if you spend an hour or four reading it) that the rest of us are discussing every such issue in good faith, whether for or against the images. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 07:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
    • Actually, he has signed up to this

1. No one would object to pictures of Muhammad illustrating Muhammad#Depictions of Muhammad (if it ever gets written)
2. No one objects to pictures of Muhammad illustrating Depictions of Muhammad
3. We believe the artists' impressions of historical events in this article have no educational value for the topic of this article - or, if they do, not enough to justify the space they take up.

so he's happy to have images that add real educational value. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 07:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• • • • Sorry, Anthony, that is not a true representation of events. He himself admits "as I have said several times, I currently believe all images should be removed" - but then follows that with "but I'm open minded". Though he proposes things to be discussed that have some merit, he keeps returning the conversation to one of removing ALL images (how many diffs would you like?) - and then admits he will continue to push the issue until it happens (buncha diffs above). That's editing in bad faith. One cannot say they are open minded (and even get off to a good start on some topics) then try to turn it back to that singular motivation. That is what numerous of us are upset about. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 08:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I think he agrees with me and many others that none of the images of Muhammad presently adorning the article are appropriate, due to their lack of relevant educational value, so they should all go, but is OK with images of Muhammad in a (yet-to-be-created) section on images of Muhammad. That's my reading. I know you and others read his position differently. I've been assuming you're misunderstanding his position. Time will tell. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 08:38, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• No Anthony, here is his reasons: religious offense, religious offense, religious offense, religious offense... (pretend I posted about 10 more - or I simply can if you like). Every time he is pushed for justifications, he reverts to the religious offense argument - with a massive dab of WP:IAR thrown on top to ignore WP:CENSOR's section on religious beliefs. You've had to have seen those arguments. That is when things fall apart again. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 08:49, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oh yes. He believes since they're offensive to many readers, we should withhold our usual tolerance for educationally valueless images in this case. We tolerate images that breach WP:IUP like that on articles like Jesus because they're pretty, but, if I understand him correctly, he argues that images that add nothing to the readers' understanding and offend many people should go. But he's open to using images of Muhammad where they have some didactic purpose. It's not contradictory to argue against gratuitous offensiveness but go along with offensiveness when it's the inevitable byproduct of a greater good. The doctrine of double effect applies here. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 09:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• This is not really the place to discuss content. The concern here is about conduct. An ArbCom case on images, proposed by Ludwigs2, was recently rejected by arbitrators. Ludwigs2 does not appear to have dropped the idea. Mathsci (talk) 07:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
  • It was rejected as a content rather than conduct issue, but I recall that several arbitrators went out of their way to state that a wider community discussion about the general topic of controversial content was necessary. --JN466 07:30, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• (correct venue) Suggested and ignored numerous times. Some of the diffs above, 10-15 more if you like. I'd even help with it. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 07:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose I haven't followed Ludwigs' behaviour at Astrology so can't speak to that. We are in different camps on Acupuncture, and his argument there could be better focused, but we certainly don't need to be protected from him there. At Pregnancy, he is arguing for a view that, the last time I looked, was in the ascendancy. At Muhammad, his behaviour would be fine if he could just learn to not speculate about others' motives or respond to ad hominem.

You're right, Mathsci, he does have several lines of argument, and one of them is that we should not use controversial images in an article when (a) they have little real educational value or (b) an uncontroversial picture would do just as well. I agree with this line, and believe that (a) applies in this case, but believe it represents a novel position, and is something that should win community approval elsewhere before it can sway a content decision. But he also argues that the images lack educational value, and so violate WP:IUP, and, on various grounds, that they violate WP:DUE. On these last two points of policy, there are many others, including me, who agree with him.

His failure to observe WP:TALK has been well and truly matched by many others who oppose him on that page. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 06:56, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support with reservation Outside of controversial pages Ludwigs is a great contributor, but he doesn't play nice with others and cannot accept when consensus is not in his favor. He acted this way on Astrology and was topic banned for six months so I don't know why it would be any different here. But long term what's the solution? Drama seems to follow him where he goes and simply topic banning every time he gets to this point is inefficient. Perhaps a third solution, such as mentorship, would be beneficial here. I don't want him topic banned, I just want him to accept that policy as written is not in his favor and to stop acting as though IAR will function without consensus, but if he is unwilling to stop then I reluctantly support he be topic banned from the Muhammad article in regards to images. I've seen other instances of him invoking IAR when consensus and interpretation of policy didn't agree with him and frankly it's annoying and unproductive. Honestly I jumped the gun in supporting a topic ban. Ludwigs' is a good editor and generally makes great contributes and it's not fair for me to condemn him so strongly. I think think admin intervention is necessary but this goes too far for the time being. Nformation 06:59, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

(to Noformation) Eh, it's only a topic ban (not a site ban). He can continue to be a great editor elsewhere. It's preventative (not punitive) in order to end the disruption to what are probably attempts at good faith proposals to review the images (and their value) one more time. I'm not sure what other administrator intervention is possible other than a topic ban? ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 19:38, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I just think it goes too far. If this AN/I was focused on behavior and not on content then I think Ludwigs behavior would have been more strongly rebuked and that he would back off from the WP:BATTLEGROUND and be willing to adjust. Unfortunately all the content is distracting from the issue. When I filed the report I made the mistake of asking people to read over the thread rather than providing diffs of specific NPA, AGF, etc, violations, which had the effect of getting people to take sides in the debate. I'm not sure where to go from here tbch. Nformation 19:54, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't particularly want to see a topic ban either, if it can be avoided (which is why I started and never completed my filing). But, perhaps like you, I cannot think of any remedy other than one. And rebukes don't seem to work well - I'm dealing with such an issue on two other articles, and multiple admins have stopped in with rebukes which end things for a few hours to maybe a day - then edit/revert warring begins anew. I think each article has passed six such edit/revert wars. Until it's made abundantly clear that such rebukes are serious by stopping one dead in its tracks with a temporary block, they are going to continue. I suspect the same will happen here. One of those editors (in my other "situation") is also involved in this article, btw. Though admirably not engaging in such behavior on it. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 20:01, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I imagine this will take a couple days to settle out and when it does I reserve the right to change back to support. I'm hoping that now that uninvolved editors are weighing in that it will be a bit of a wake up call. We'll see if anything changes on the talk page. Nformation 22:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. Ludwigs2 has done the right thing on that page, and has been behaving far better than most of his opponents. While Noformation's behaviour on the page is definitely not the worst, it's bad enough (especially the ridiculous interpretation of boiler-plate language in WP:CENSOR as a strict rule that we may not ever consider religious offence internally for editorial decisions except to prevent legal action against Misplaced Pages), and it's mind-boggling that this editor has the extremely poor sense of reporting Ludwigs2. Hans Adler 08:08, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Watch where you point your finger. I have done my very best to be civil and follow talk page guidelines. If I have done something outside of policy please provide a diff or don't label me as "not the worst." NOTCENSORED is unambiguous in regards to religious considerations, it clearly states that Misplaced Pages is not part of any religious groups and thus we do not follow their customs - that's about as boiler plate as it gets. Nformation 08:18, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

This is an absurd misreading of WP:CENSOR, and it can only be explained with your desire to insult or a severe reading comprehension problem. Misplaced Pages is an encyclopedia, not a playground for fighting your cultural war against Islam, or religion in general, or whatever it is. Hans Adler 09:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Please provide a diff where it's demonstrated that I was uncivil or violated any policy. You have painted my conduct in a negative light, so back it up or strike your comments please. You are now ascribing motives to me when you have zero idea what I believe about Islam. I have done nothing to deserve such accusation aside from disagree with you. Expressing my interpretation of policy and my take on an issue is not a behavioral issue and is not against any policy. And again, not considering religious belief is not the same as deliberately insulting religion. All gay people offend a portion of Christians by virtue of being gay, that does not mean that they are obligated to hide their sexuality. In the same way, we are not obligated to consider people's personal beliefs and that is why not censored specifically says "Any rules that forbid members of a given organization, fraternity, or religion to show a name or image do not apply to Misplaced Pages because Misplaced Pages is not a member of those organizations." and "Misplaced Pages cannot guarantee that articles or images will always be acceptable to all readers, or that they will adhere to general social or religious norms." Nformation 09:11, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Hans Adler's statements seem to be at odds with the history of Islamic art, as presented for example on the website of the Islamic collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Even in Vienna, Hans Adler had the opportunity to see the al-Sabah collection from Kuwait in the Kunsthistorisches Museum this year including a page from the manuscript of Nizami’s “Khamsa” depicting the Prophet Mohammed’s night journey to Jerusalem. Mathsci (talk) 23:09, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the that. I have found it odd that this has become such an issue when there hasn't exactly been a huge backlash against WP by the Muslim community - to me it seems like a solution in search of a problem. Personal experience wise, about half of my dad's side of the family is Muslim (the other half Hindu) and this subject never came up for me when I was growing up. I know the edict exists, but as far as I know it is not in the holy book, but it's rather a modern movement. In my personal opinion, I think that people in the mideast who flipped out about this a few years ago wrt the Danish cartoons were manipulated into doing so for political reasons. I also find that people in the west tend to misunderstand life in the East - I guarantee that this is a bigger deal to people on this talk page than it is to the majority of Muslims in my fatherland, but I suppose it's anecdotal and I could be wrong. Nformation 23:21, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Filling a page with undue weight images just because some Muslims are offended by them and you know you can get away with it is the really offensive thing here. This is what angers even the most liberal Muslims, who would not normally mind naturalistic depictions of Muhammad. In fact, it angers even me as an atheist living in a traditionally Christian country with many (mostly liberal) Muslims. It's absolutely despicable behaviour. Hans Adler 12:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

So now I'm not only anti-islamic but I also am the one who filled the page with images. Please provide diffs of me adding images to the article and please provide diffs substantiating your previous characterization of me as an editor - any WP:TALK, WP:NPA or WP:CIVIL diff will do. Never have I expressed a desire to offend anyone, I have only said that religious considerations should not be relevant, this is not the same thing and not everyone who disagrees with you is a bigot. Please stop attributing motives to me and strike your comments - you clearly do not have the diffs to back them up otherwise you would have posted them already. Your credibility goes down the drain when you make claims you cannot back and when you're unwilling to correct incorrect statements. Nformation 22:23, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Fully agree with Noformation. He's done nothing to warrant such claims. And I can provide over 4 dozen more diffs to show Ludwigs2's behavior that you think is "the right thing". Yes, I know you think my behavior is the worst (or is it Tarc's? someone else? who won?), but again.... dozens of diffs. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 08:30, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I haven't decided between you, Tarc and Kww. Hans Adler 09:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Hans, at no time has my behaviour been inappropriate or problematic. We disagree on things, but that doesn't provide reason for you to disparage my behaviour (or to refer to me as unethical and autistic, either). I don't bring up WP:NPA often, but you are getting there.—Kww(talk) 11:34, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Your massive IDHT behaviour and refusal to accept that there is a valid dispute has certainly been very inappropriate and problematic. Not sure if or when I referred to you personally as autistic, although there have been situations in this dispute where autism spectrum conditions are the only remaining explanation of an editor's behaviour that is compatible with good faith. Hans Adler 12:38, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Hans, you're as bad as he is with this repetitive IDHT quoting. I hear you both just fine, I just disagree. Strongly. The established consensus is that images of Mohammad are of encyclopedic value to the article, and that religious concerns cannot be taken into account when deciding to remove or retain images. Sooner or later, those who agitate for change again and again in the face of considerable opposition wind up like this. Ludwigs is heading down into ChildOfMidnight/Grundle2600 territory. Tarc (talk) 13:29, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I hear you, Hans. You believe that religious sensitivities should be taken into account in our editorial decisions. You are wrong, and no amount of listening to you will make you right. That doesn't mean that I don't hear you, it simply means that I believe that you are fundamentally and unalterably wrong. I assume that you can accept that someone can in good faith believe that you are wrong.—Kww(talk) 13:40, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Can I suggest that we, those of us involved on Muhammad, stop adding to this thread for a while. If we want uninvolved editors to offer their advice about this situation, the least we can do is cut down the amount of tangental reading. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 09:24, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support topic ban. A cursory glance at the scores or hundreds of posts by Ludwig on the image talk page indicates obsession with maintaining a minority position based upon IDONTLIKEITSOIGNOREALLRULES. This is a secular encyclopedia and we should not set the precedent of putting content into a fundamentalist religious straightjacket, as the majority have consistently argued. ArbCom has refused to hear the debate as a content dispute and at this point the disruption needs to be terminated. Ludwig on his User Talk page indicates he sees a ban as inevitable and thinks it's some sort of game. Time to end the distraction with a rapid topic ban. Carrite (talk) 18:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support, as there comes a time when you gotta stop beating the dead horse. PS- This goes for all the editors who continue this 'delete images' campaign. GoodDay (talk) 19:18, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support topic ban from Muhammad and and all Islam-related image discussions. I see no alternative. The user keeps advocating a position incompatible with the mission of Misplaced Pages. We're not talking about removing some gory or porn-y pics here. He advocates removal of all human-like images Muhammad and replacing them with a flame . (Note the bold font and all caps in the post, plus self-admittance that he's saying the same thing for about the 30th time.) ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 21:51, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - If Ludwigs is never going to drop the stick (and I don't see any sign that he is), someone will have to take it away from him. His continuous declarations of the majority view as invalid or not reasonably argued by his personal standard are hallmarks of the most disruptive kind of tendentious editing. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 22:39, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - L2's continuing his behavior pattern after multiple discussions that have pointed out its disruptiveness, and his POV-oriented editing in general, justifies a topic ban. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:08, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - Overall, this is a perennial topic that has never garnered wise support to change the status quo. Ludwigs2 tried and failed in March of this year, then came back to try again. Same result. He has said many many times that he will not stop bringing this up until he gets what he wants, so administrative action is necessary to do for Ludwigs what he is unable or unwilling to do for himself. Tarc (talk) 03:26, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support, sort of. A topic ban on article talk pages only might work best. I believe Ludwigs2 should be free to propose clarifications or changes to Misplaced Pages policy in more appropriate places such as the Village Pump. ~Amatulić (talk) 04:36, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - from what I can see, his editing on the subject is tendentious. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 05:16, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Guys, you need to appreciate that our present article fails to show the typical representations of Muhammad, while showing six examples of a very rare type of illustration that also happens to be offensive to many who have grown up in the Islamic tradition. Muhammad is normally portrayed abstractly, and there is a very rich tradition of calligraphy, symbols and pictograms to do that – which we don't show. Examples: The effect of our present article is not unlike the effect the Jesus article would have on the reader if you showed them just one cathedral painting, plus 6 shock images of Christ like Piss Christ and Jesus on the electric chair (also shown in a cathedral, but hardly representative). You could argue NOTCENSORED there, but no one would go for it, because editors would realise that it would just be completely undue to focus on such exceptional images, while neglecting the mainstream depictions of Christ. The problem with Islam, unfortunately, is that our editorship is generally less familiar with it and doesn't pick up on such subtleties. So I don't think Ludwigs2 is being tendentious here; it's his opponents who are, probably unwittingly so. --JN466 07:02, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose in the strongest possible way. As Anthony has pointed out at Talk:Pregnancy Ludwigs POV is increasingly gaining ground, and he was explicitly asking for compromise which seems to be happening now at last, despite the ideological absolutism of one or two editors. This Muhammad depiction issue is also astounding. I've known about it for some time but purposefully kept a distance. What I'm now reading is a sorry collection of some of the most ignorant arguments I've ever seen on Misplaced Pages. This is an area that could use some expert commentary because I see a lot of very confused arguments for keeping these images in the Muhammad article as general illustrations. You will find plenty Muslims in today's day and age who are not offended by these images, and plenty others who are. What you wont find are Muslims who find them normative in any way. You wont find Muslims with depictions like this hanging on their walls, filling pages of books in their libraries or hanging at their place of worship. Why? Because depictions of Muhammad are fringe within Islamic history. That's a very basic fact. Sure there are traditions within which he has been visually depicted, and we have an entire article to cover that fact Depictions of Muhammad. But in the main Muhammad entry these images are completely UNDUE and nonrepresentational of the mainstream tradition today and throughout history and across the globe. Outside of the offense issue this whole matter can be resolved by applying WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 12:27, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Expert commentary that has been provided disagrees with your assertions above. See the comments from Johnbod, for example, in the current debate as well as the one from last March, concerning the prevalence of such images throughout history. ~Amatulić (talk) 14:38, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

What exactly is Johnbod an expert in? I'm a scholar of religion and I have taught Western Religion courses. My assertions are based on that. Also, please do not confuse assertions about the art history of the Depictions of Muhammad with the history of Islam. For instance all the "scholarly" evidence I've seen Mathsci produce has been 100% irrelevant to this question. Relevant to the depictions entry yes, or to Islamic art but we are not talking about those entries. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 17:18, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Maybe that is where the divide stems from? This is not an article on religion. It is a biography on a person. Why are we treating it like it's a religious article? We don't treat the Edison article like it's an article on lightbulbs. Related to the religion he started, yes. Included in that category because it is relevant to that religion, yes. About that religion, no. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:31, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Robert you couldn't be more wrong. I assume you also think that Jesus and Abraham are not religious topics, they are just biographies? The primary sources we have on Muhammad are religious. The secondary and tertiary sources the article is based on are written by, scholars of religion. I wont deny that there is biography here, but clearly it is religious biography, and clearly it is much more than that. This topic falls within the field of religion and history of religion, and history of Islam most specifically and most importantly. I'm perfectly willing to believe you made that assertion out of a genuine confusion of some kind, but if so please understand that you are sorely out of your depth here, and seem to completely misunderstand how the academic study of this topic is organized. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 18:18, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Absolutely oppose... and I don't even want to repeat the reasons. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 13:09, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose The fact that Ludwig's position may be in the minority doesn't mean he shouldn't be allowed to it and wikipedia operates by consensus rather then majority rules anyway. The Muhammad image issue is clearly far from a simple one with plenty of people repeating themselves. (I took part in a long ago RFC and I think I said then as others have said now on both sides that the parallels with other figures isn't simply since unlike with many other figures like Jesus, Buddha, in the modern era even people familiar with the subject will often have seen few depictions and not really have much of any preconceived idea about depictions of the person. As I grew up as a Christian in Malaysia, I can definitely attest to that. Therefore the issue of undue weight, historic vs current practice, readers expectations, making sure our use of images is sufficiently educational rather then simply offensive form a complicated mix and simply yelling 'notcensored' doesn't go anywhere particularly since most people including Ludwings aren't arguing for removing the images completely from wikipedia but how many and where they should be in Muhammad as opposed to other articles like depictions of Muhammad.) Having looked at the discussion, I agree with Seb, Griswaldo and others, cutting out Ludwigs will harm the discussion by removing an important counter-POV and I do not believe Ludwigs is being tendentious. Nil Einne (talk) 14:00, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Please do not assign gross mischaracterizations to our motives as you appear to have (probably unintentionally) done in your first sentence. No one is asking for the removal of Wiqi55, Jayen, Anthonyhcole, Hans (yet), or various others who have similar views. It is the attacks against other editors, the bad faith proposals, the end runs around RfC attempts, the tendentiousness and disruptiveness (which he personally admits to continuing) and such that has dragged him here. A tiny handful of diffs are already included to support this. It would thus be greatly appreciated if you would correct or clarify your mischaracterization. Best, Rob ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:20, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support; mind you, it's not the fact that we fall on opposite sides of this argument that leads me to do this, nor is it the comments by the really involved editors in this dispute. However, I have a problem with being told I have some sort of prejudice against Islam by someone who's never met me based on one comment (it's in one of the numerous diffs above, I can bring it down if necessary; incidentally, people who know me know I've read Avicenna, Ibn Rushd, Ibn Taymiyya, and Malcolm X, to name just a few), which shows a serious lack of perspective on the issue (the fact that I don't agree on this issue doesn't make me anti-Muslim). Nor do I take kindly to the constant repetition of arguments that RobertMfromLI described a section above. And if anyone wants to get on me, I have PDD-NOS, so I stand guilty as charged of being on the spectrum; however, I don't see how that's germane to this particular topic. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 14:05, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support I am (as far as I can tell) totally uninvolved with this dispute, but after reading the associated talk pages, the horrendously worded RFC, and seeing the number of times this user has brought the same, somewhat disingenuous arguments about this issue, this seems like the appropriate step. Not to mention that, as gets pointed out repeatedly on the images talk page but has gone mostly unnoticed in the discussion of the images here: these images were created by Muslims, so the argument that these images are forbidden is on incredibly shaky ground. To keep using this argument warrants a suggestion that Ludwig drop the WP:STICK. eldamorie (talk) 16:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
  • The fact that these images were created by muslims to illustrate a certain type of book 500 or 800 years ago does not make them useful or obligatory illustrations in the Muhammad article. The fact is that if you want to show how Muhammad is portrayed in Islamic religious art, you need to be aware that "For practical purposes, representations are not found in religious art ... Instead there occurred very soon a replacement of imagery with calligraphy and the concomitant transformation of calligraphy into a major artistic medium." (Encyclopaedia Britannica, Islamic Arts, Macropaedia, Vol. 22, p. 76.) We are showing typical religious art in the article on Jesus, but you seem to be unaware of how untypical our illustrations in the article on Muhammad are. --JN466 17:48, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps a reasonable compromise?

All the participants in the talk page discussion have come here and are basically continuing the same sorts and styles of arguments, it's all just looping. Perhaps I might suggest a compromising position. Someone start an RFC and contact, neutrally mind you, some of the relevant wikiprojects to participate. To prevent a rehash of the talk page, the opposing sides in this debate should state their positions and refrain from substantially trying to sway other participants. Having re-read the discussion, and being totally uninvolved, I can see the arguments of both sides. Run the RCC< don't just talk about it. --Blackmane (talk) 09:39, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Ludwigs has been asked, many times, to follow the dispute resolution process if he thinks he has a case to make. This user tried out this argument that WP:NOTCENSORED does not protect the image usage in the article, a view that received little support in March of this year. Now he's back again, twisting a foundation resolution that has no applicability to the situation, an incessant 3-week drumbeat.

Those editors who support hosting a Misplaced Pages article free of religious censorship have no need to initiate an RfC, as the status quo is just fine. Ludwigs will get no relief and will make no headway in regurgitating the same arguments over and over at the article talk page. The ball is squarely in his court to follow dispute resolution if he will not accept the consensus at the article talk. Tarc (talk) 13:08, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Therein lies the rub. There is no consensus, nor will there ever be. There are two camps each with a large number of adherents. One camp favors no censorship, the other favors censorship as a special case. We hear from new members of the latter group almost daily on the main article's talk page generally representing Muslims around the world. Rklawton (talk) 13:30, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh, but there is consensus. Yes, we see periodic posts that inform us Islam forbids such images. Someone replies with the argument that we are not an Islamic project, often linking to the methods by which individuals can respect their own beliefs by hiding the images for themselves, and they move on. But the "remove all images" camp has no policy backed argument, only the complaint that "I am offended". Simple numbers do not create a no-consensus situation. Otherwise, there would be no consensus on the argument that many athletes are "gay" because fans of rival teams often edit to say so. Resolute 13:55, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. If you look at the overall commentary on the talk page, the status quo is generally favoured. There is one single regular editor there (Ludwigs2) who supports censorship on religious grounds, and another (Anthonyhcole) who has attempted in good faith to formulate an RfC proposal. Then there is Hans Adler, who shows up from time to time, accuses editors he disagrees with of bad faith (as he has above in this very discussion) then disappears. Pretty much everyone else supports the current situation. Ludwigs has been advised it is up to him to initiate DR, because the rest of us don't see a need. Instead, he chooses to waste a great deal of time for numerous editors by forcing discussion back into circular arguments. Granted, the rest of us keep responding, though I have tried to step back involvement overall. I won't vote on the topic ban proposal, but I will say this: the problem would disappear if Ludwigs were to be placed under one. The "dispute" is that one-sided. Resolute 13:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

No there are other editors, such as Wiki55. Unfortunately all these named editors persist in making grossly inaccurate statements about the images actually in the article, such as (above here) "..."that by including so many images from a very narrow time period and fairly narrow interpretation of Islam we are in fact violating WP:UNDUE)." by Qwyrxian. For the record (and yet again) the 5 Islamic images come from a period of over 500 years (and we don't have a contemporary one available), include at least 2 Sunni ones (possibly all 5 are actually Sunni) and come from Persia (2), Turkey (2), and Kashmir. A very similar spread, if not wider, to the sort of (almost always Catholic) old master painters we use to illustrate Jesus and other Christian articles, ignoring the many Protestants who still regard these as idolatrous. Some editors have been putting time in over a long period pushing the line that all the images are Persian and Shia, and by implication can therefore be dismissed. There is a considerable intra-Islamic component to this dispute, & its a pity that people who ought to know better, like Hans Adler and Anthonyhcole have accepted this line without much examination. Johnbod (talk) 14:30, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Blackmane: I'd agree that an RfC would be a good starting point, but even trying to determine the proper language for an RfC becomes a major point of strife. For instance, every RfC approach I've suggested starts from my perception of the problem - that the images have no appreciable value which justifies the offense they cause to our readers - but any such wording is instantly nixed by Tarc, Robert, and Resolute as being against NOTCENSORED. I could start an RfC on my own (and I will if that's what you suggest), but the RfC will most likely devolve into more of the same dispute as the editors opposed to change dispute its validity (in fact, at least a couple of threads currently on the page show exactly that devolution as we've tried to discuss proper wording for the RfC).

As far as I can see, the page is locked down in such a way that any discussion about removing the images is declared to be against policy. I don't know how to get past that obstruction except to keep trying to talk through it. --Ludwigs2 14:45, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I have posted what I am coming to believe is the only reasonable thing, which will show good faith on the parts of those who wish the images removed and properly adhere to policy uniformly instead of (yet again) special case for this article only. It's on the article's talk page in a new section. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 14:54, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The first item is the "gotcha", i.e. that there's no valid encyclopedic reason to remove the artists' conceptions of Muhammed if you're going to retain artists' conceptions of Jesus, etc. The second item is the "yeh, but" option, which opens a huge can of worms that would abolish the "I don't like it" barrier and turn wikipedia into even more of a free-for-all. So why does anyone think Muslim readers deserve special treatment, while Christian readers can go "freak" themselves? Well, there's no logical reason, so it must be driven by fear. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 15:03, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• In the current circumstances, I'm not sure that the recent extensive rewriting of WP:CONSENSUS by Ludwigs2 was timely. It now reads a bit like a personal essay.

• (Off-topic for ANI) In 2002 Yale University Press published the book "Peerless Images: Persian Painting and its Sources" by Eleanor Sims, Boris Marshak and Ernst Grube, academics who have curated the Islamic art collections in the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Hermitage, St Petersburg. It contains several images of the Prophet Muhammad. Looking at the book and its detailed commentary, it is hard to understand how images of this sort could be considered uninformative or without educational value. As the New York Times has reported just recently, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has just reopened its Islamic collection after 8 years of remodeling. On display are Persian illuminated manuscripts, including images of the Prophet Muhammad, visible in the NYT link and here on the Museum's own website (the short NYT audio link for "illuminated manuscripts" is interesting). It is also on commons here and has been used several times on fa.wikipedia.org. Mathsci (talk) 15:23, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) (to Bugs) Bingo. I treat EVERY article the same, regardless of my personal beliefs or feelings of offense. And there is not a single mainstream religion or irreligion or spirituality that is not on my WatchList (along with hundreds of sub topic articles).

Thus, all I ask is the same from everyone else - judge every article and article content equally. No more, no less. Which seems to fit with those weird things we have here called policies, guidelines and editing in good faith. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 15:26, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The importance of the Muhammed depictions is actually the same as the importance of the many Jesus images. Whether they look like their subject is not the issue, that's a red herring. What's important is that it reflects how the followers of those faiths saw their spiritual leader. It provides a window on styles of artistic portrayals in various times and places. If that ain't educational, I don't know what is. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 15:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Bugs: re your "What's important is that it reflects how the followers of those faiths saw their spiritual leader". This is precisely the problem: The followers of Islam do not generally depict their spiritual leader, and when they do it's usually symbolically, as a flame or a veiled figure. full-face images of muhammad are a rarity, mostly restricted to a couple of historical periods. I absolutely agree with your statement, but your statement implies we should remove images of the prophet and use the symbolic forms that Muslims themselves use. --Ludwigs2 15:58, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

"Saw", as in past tense. You're describing the present. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 16:07, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not just describing the present, but the most prevalent view, historically and currently. Full-face depictions are not common. It's funny: I even offered a compromise on the talk page where we would create a section specifically about the historical depiction of Muhammad in which to put images of this sort (they would be appropriate there, in a section that discusses the controversy of depictions of the prophet), but that got shot down for some reason I never understood. If we go by standards of common usage, full face images are excluded as a distinct minority style; if we go by conventional ethics full-face images are excluded because they offend people for no gain to the encyclopedia. There's no reason I can think of to keep the images (though I'm open to suggestions), so why are they on the article in the first place? Remember, these are simply works of art - there are no known depictions of what Muhammad actually looked like.--Ludwigs2 16:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, that proposal flies in the face of what has deemed to be the standard (per policy and guideline interpretation) on every other such article on Misplaced Pages. Thus, what you proposed is not a compromise, but a special case exception. Biographies have images or depictions of their subject (and their subject in historical event settings) prominently placed throughout the article. This article already is chock full of special case exceptions that are not warranted, such as (on the talk pages) the massive disclaimers, the FAQ, the instructions on how not to view the images, the removal of all images of Muhammad in the top 1/3 of the article, the explanations of policy on the talk page and so on. I am against adding one more special case exception. Doing so will eventually lead (as you desire) to there being no images of Muhammad on this or any other article. I would bet good money that if (by some remote chance) all images were removed from this article, that you would move on to the other articles next. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

(Besides the fact that each time you claim you are willing to travel this road, you still end up on your "remove all, they offend" road instead). ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:10, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

So you keep saying, but (again) I question this reasoning. It all comes back to the simple problem that Misplaced Pages is offending millions of people for no real reason. As I keep saying, If you show these images have non-trivial value to justify the problems they cause, then obviously they would be protected. However, every time I say that, you decline to show that they have value and instead asset that it's a violation of policy to consider that.

The arguments you've given in your post above break down as follows:

• my proposal - that we use the most common imagery used by muslims - "flies in the face of" policy (not true; that is actually exactly what NPOV asks of us)
• that other articles show images (irrelevant, since other articles do not have to consider a well-known religious proscription)
• that the ability for individuals to censor the images themselves justifies Misplaced Pages using the images (patently ridiculous)
• that removing images from this article will lead to removal of all images everywhere (hyperbolic and nonsensical)
• that I somehow personally desire the removal of all images everywhere (hyperbolic, nonsensical, contrary to what I've said in talk, and a bad-faith personal attack to boot)

Really, please… --Ludwigs2 17:38, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The claim that "Misplaced Pages is offending millions of people for no real reason" is your personally-held opinion that you repeatedly put there as some sort of immutable fact that us dumb heathens cannot understand. This is really the heart of your problem Ludwigs, and the reason why many are beginning to dismiss your actions as tendentious and disruptive. Tarc (talk) 17:44, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Uh… Tarc:

• it's a proscription in a faith with something like a billion followers. even if we only restrict ourselves to the most fundamentalist groups (the ones most likely to take offense) that's still millions or tens of millions of people
• There are 16 archives of heated debate solely over this issue on the article - really, you made a subpage just to handle the volume of complaints, and that subpage has 16 archives

That's a whoooole lot of evidence, Tarc: How do you justify calling this my 'personally held opinion'? --Ludwigs2 17:57, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• "it's a proscription in a faith with something like a billion followers". No it is not. You don't help your case by typing in false statements. It may be that a few current adherents of the religion believe there is such a proscription, but even if there is, it applies to the adherents, not to us. I think a fair number of people have been mislead into thinking there is a broad proscription, and I think they are wrong, but it is not useful to debate how many people (correctly or incorrectly) believe in the proscription, it is only relevant to ask whether a proscription of a religious group has any force on non members of the group. If you answer yes, please explain why, as that conclusion leads to madness.--SPhilbrickT 22:46, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh gosh, we're back to the "religious offense - must honor religious beliefs" rationale. That means WP:IAR is probably soon to follow. :-/ ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 18:06, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Ludwigs, another claim I attacked you? And then another false claim about my actions? I've posted, numerous times, multiple reasons the images have value. Here is a tiny sampling of diffs to prove it. It is not I who is ignoring anything. And this is exactly the type of thing you do on the article's image talk page. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 18:03, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Also I would like to point out that the neutral point of view doesn't argue your claim. "Editing from a neutral point of view (NPOV) means representing fairly, proportionately, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources" would be useful if you were also trying to include modern (what you describe as common) images of muhammad but isn't a basis to remove current pictures because they were a significant view of what the islamic community was allowed to do. And since the minority of the religion still believes its acceptable to view pictures (you know that 15% of the billion which also falls into millions and millions of people) it would be purposefully ignoring that POV as well. Tivanir2 (talk) 18:15, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Ludwigs, let's look at the phrase again, this time with crystal-clear highlighting; "Misplaced Pages is offending millions of people for no real reason" THAT part is your opinion, opinion you keep trying to pass off as fact. That a group of people are offended is fact, yes. That we are including the images in the article "for no real reason" is opinion. Are we settled now? Tarc (talk) 18:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The 'for no real reason' part is something that is open for discussion - as I keep saying, if you can demonstrate that the images have a reasonable value to offset the problems they cause, then the images can stay. However, using policy to prevent wp:Consensus discussion on this issue is the troubling point. --Ludwigs2 19:33, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That's the point; it was open for discussion, and your position was rejected. We don't need to demonstrate what you are asking for. End of story. Tarc (talk) 19:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

To Ludwigs2: did I need to provide more diffs to my own postings of reasons? Should I have included the numerous times other editors have posited reasons as well? You keep acting like we haven't stated reasons (reasons considered valid all across Misplaced Pages) - but we have. While perhaps seemingly numerous, the number of diffs above is probably in the 15-20% range of what I could provide to prove we have made such points. C'mon... the page is linked to in this AN/I, you know others are bound to figure out that you are incorrect in repeating your claims that we haven't done such. Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 20:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

This argument belongs elswhere, not at ANI. GoodDay (talk) 19:37, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh, how we've tried so many times to point that out to the one who has the biggest issue with this. Even some of those who support some level of image removal have suggested or leaned towards such. :-/ ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 19:51, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Small note: I've struck RobertMfromLI's name from my earlier post. Only one time did Robert ever imply an RfC wasn't necessary, and he did in fact try to restart the RfC several times. I don't know what made me think that he was one of the people trying to derail process in this case; my apologies. Qwyrxian (talk) 23:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Brass tacks straw poll

For anyone who wants a discussion of NOTCENSORED, I've just started one at Misplaced Pages talk:What Misplaced Pages is not#What WP:NOTCENSORED is not. Robofish (talk) 18:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

* Notice: I've decided I'm going to copy this RfC over to wp:NOT, and wait for a result to be reached there before re-entering the discussion at talk:Muhammad/Images. that should end the discussion there for for a while (at least as far as I'm concerned). It also likely resolves this thread, though I'll leave that up to you. I'll post the link to the RfC here after I've made it. --Ludwigs2 00:11, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

This thread is not resolved as long as there is an open question of a possible topic ban for Ludwigs2. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:12, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

suit yourself - If you want to spend your time trying to find a punishment in a non-current situation, that's your business. Here's the link to the RfC. --Ludwigs2 01:20, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Ludwigs has said on his talk page that for the time being he will stay away from the page, I think this is a good faith proposition and would say that we should give him a chance to make his case in the correct venue before topic banning him. Nformation 01:43, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of his comment. Still, this is not his first time on the merry-go-round, when this blows over it's likely he'll exhibit the same behavior elsewhere. AGF is often in conflict with common sense. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:46, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

What he said and what he is doing are counter to each other. He has proposed a very biased RfC that basically states the images are worthless, so shouldn't we remove them? He's simply using another venue to get the images removed and ignore countless consensus. Let's see now. RfC last Spring - runs to Village Pump: both RfC and end run fail (him). Proposes RfC this time around, not going the way he wants (removal of ALL images), tries end runs to WQA and ArbCom, disrupts attempts to create an UNBIASED RfC, gets dragged here and uses the distraction to file a BIASED RfC even in light of the fact that the rest of us were trying (through HIS disruptions) to create an unbiased one. (IMHO) This needs to stop. ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 03:59, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

ArbCom declined the case because it was formulated as a request to rule on content (policies). Perhaps a new case request focused on the behavior of the editors involved would be more appropriate? ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 13:09, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Proposed community ban of Crouch, Swale

This user is a massive sockpuppeteer and per the most recent actions, has no intent of quitting. Even impersonating banned user Scibaby. I therefore propose a full ban. Calabe1992 (talk) 01:58, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support for whatever good it will do. Rklawton (talk) 02:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support – He's banned in my book at least; I've already been reverting all his edits and deleting all his creations as of late, mainly because he knows he can. –MuZemike 02:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support. Doubt this will make much difference but they clearly deserved to be banned. Was involved in this at the beginning and then get distracted by writing a PhD thesis so hadn;t realised how bad this had got. Dpmuk (talk) 03:06, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support, his disruption is not limited to mainspace, for example this inane move request. Kid needs to find something better to do with his life. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 03:47, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support. We really shouldn't need the formal ban process, but since it's a good way officially to say "Goodbye" to a troublemaker, it's better that we do it. We definitely need to say "Goodbye". Nyttend (talk) 06:12, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support Ban is obvious but needed to assist removal of future disruption. Johnuniq (talk) 07:01, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support Banned in my book too, but for what it's formally worth... WilliamH (talk) 07:52, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support For gross incompetence and liberal servings of WP:IDHT, disruption and worst of all, rampant socking. -Blackmane (talk) 09:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• 'Support - Obviously. - Burpelson AFB ✈ 16:26, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support Obviously unconstructive, they deserve to be banned. HurricaneFan25 | talk 16:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support I actually feel quite disappointed to see this, as he has created several articles; but I assume that this new type of behaviour is not going to change, so I'll support. Minima© (talk) 20:15, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Most of those articles were from reading names off a map, so I don't think there's any loss. Polequant (talk) 15:54, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support Very little reason not to ban him. OIFA (talk) 03:45, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support; I'm disappointed that it had to go this way (having had some interaction with their earliest edits) but I think that by this point a community ban has net benefit to wikipedia. We've gone far beyond the point where mentoring &c might be viable. bobrayner (talk) 15:48, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support. Didn't realise they were still around, and I thought they were already banned. Not that it will make much difference really. Polequant (talk) 15:54, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

BLP violations and incivility by user Xizer

Xizer (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has reverted to their old block laden past behaviour and is edit-warring at William_Adams_(judge) overturning consensus reached at WP:BLPN and engaging in gross personal attacks: diff1. I request a block of this user to prevent further disruption. Dr.K.  02:35, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The edit summary "Haha. Do it, bitch." causes me an immediate high level of concern. Ks0stm 02:49, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Ks0stm. Please also look at the report below where Xizer alleges incivility on my part yet provides no examples. This is tendentious editing on top of gross incivility and violation of consensus arrived at WP:BLPN and edit-warring BLP violations as well. Dr.K.  02:56, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Are Keizers (talk · contribs) and Xizer related? Ks0stm 02:59, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't know. Dr.K.  03:01, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I have blocked Xizer 48 hours for the flagrant incivility in this edit summary. Ks0stm 03:07, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Thank you very much Ks0stm. Take care. Dr.K.  03:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Three-revert rule violations and incivility by user Dr.K.

Dr.K. (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is currently edit-warring at William_Adams_(judge) overturning valuable, well-sourced contributions to this article that are not in any violation of Misplaced Pages policy. As this is now Dr.K.'s third revert of the article today, this user is now in violation of Misplaced Pages's three-revert rule as the rule clearly states that:

1. Making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24-hour period is almost always grounds for an immediate block.

No consensus on WP:BLPN has been reached as to whether or not this article should contain information pertaining to current events surrounding the controversial Internet video that has surfaced and has now been mentioned numerous times by credible news outlets such as CNN and NBC.

Go read the discussion of the article on WP:BLPN. It's literally just four dudes discussing whether or not the article should even exist, not what content should be included in said article. Xizer (talk) 02:45, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

WP:3RRN is the best place to report edit warring. As far as the talk page is concerned, why not take it to AFD if people think it should be deleted? That would solve the problem for a while. Nformation 02:47, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

This report (by Xizer (talk · contribs)) is based on a severe misunderstanding of the purpose of Misplaced Pages (hint: this is an encyclopedia and not a place to shame people regardless of what vidoes may show), and a severe misunderstanding of WP:BLP. The most recent edit by Xizer at William Adams (judge) (diff) added an attack piece with edit summary "Haha. Do it, bitch." Dr.K. is urged to revert as many times as necessary to protect a BLP. If Xizer could indicate that they now understand proper procedures, no further action need be taken. If such edits are repeated, particularly without serious discussion, Xizer will need to be separated from the topic. Johnuniq (talk) 03:02, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I should also note that Xizer is actually misquoting the policy page. Nowhere at WP:3RR does it say the sentence he quotes above, nor is there any sentence or statement at WP:3RR which could be reasonably paraphrased or interpreted to mean what he says. No further statement on the substance of his complaint, but I am not made sympathetic to his argument when it contains such a deliberate and obvious mis-statement of policy. --Jayron32 03:09, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

A classic WP:BOOMERANG. I agree completely with the block. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 03:12, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That's quoted from Template:3RR. Nformation 03:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. So stricken. I should note that that particular wording should be changed, I'm not sure I like it much, but I will not discuss it here further, as this is not the venue. I'm headed to the template talk page to start a discussion... --Jayron32 03:19, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Note: (See also the thread above) I have blocked Xizer 48 hours for the flagrant incivility in this edit summary. Ks0stm 03:16, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the block, especially given his intention to continue to edit war. This is completely unacceptable here. –MuZemike 05:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Also agree. Given this, he should know a helluva lot better. WilliamH (talk) 07:55, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

William Adams (judge)

I need some independent eyes on this article. There is an edit war brewing with some editors wanting to introduce news articles (many of which are copies of each other) to the WP article while the AfD is going on. IMO, there's too much naming and shaming going on, and I'd block the article completely, without those links, but I guess I'm not neutral enough (also, I watched the video and I'm kind of sick to my stomach). Some quick and decisive action would be appreciated--or, if not action, a note at the AfD itself. Drmies (talk) 04:27, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oh, yeah, see also the section(s) above. Drmies (talk) 04:29, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I haven't watched the video, but even assuming it's sickening, I don't understand how User:Sceptre gets away with calling the judge a "reprehensible cunt". As I stated on the AfD page, it's remarkably uncivil and a BLP violation. Sceptre is, of course, entitled to his opinion, but it doesn't mean he can express it with impunity here. (As an aside, I don't know if "cunt" has a different meaning in British English, but in American English, it's one of the more offensive and vulgar words in the language.)--Bbb23 (talk) 23:01, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• And you just repeated it, tsk tsk. Yeah, I saw that too, and I don't know what to say. I'm on record as defending some of our regular uncivilians, so I shouldn't say anything. But it's rude, in any language, and while the person in the video is really doing disgusting things, it's not our place to comment on that. Sceptre really shouldn't have said that. How he gets away with that? I'm not blocking for civility, lots of admins aren't. I guess that's all there is to it. You're free to slap a warning on their talk page, of course. Just don't call him an asshole, cause I'd block you in a heartbeat. Drmies (talk) 01:28, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• I really don't know how to respond to this. He does something wrong. You acknowledge that. Yet, you seem to be more interested in taking a jab at me ("tsk, tsk") for my commenting on it and threatening me with a block for something I haven't done or even contemplated doing ("call him an asshole"). I suppose one day I'll learn my comments about this sort of thing almost never gain any traction. I suppose, too, I should be grateful (sort of) that you didn't ignore me. To quote you one more time: "I guess that's all there is to it." --Bbb23 (talk) 01:52, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Bbb23, lighten up ('tsk tsk' is a joke--I didn't know you were so humorless, and such a literal reader). You completely misread my comments--how you don't see that I agree with you (I acknowledged the rudeness!) while, at the same time, I am telling you that we simply don't usually act against such civility breaches is not clear to me. And yes, that is all there is to it: you will not find an admin who will block for a remark like that, and while that is sad, perhaps, that is the way it is. I don't go around calling people names like that, you don't, and Sceptre shouldn't either. Now what do you want me to do about it? I left them a warning--do you want me to hand out an instant block for a bad word? Until you understand the predicaments that go along with having ideas about civility, until you understand the difficulty of enforcing a policy on civility, and until you see that some people express themselves in ways different from yours, maybe you should ignore everything I say, including this. Drmies (talk) 16:35, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:174.51.189.153

Anonymous editor 174.51.189.153 (talk · contribs) continues to make edits at New World Translation that take one source out of context and ignore other available sources provided at Talk. The editor continues to revert, and refuses to engage in discussion at Talk or User Talk. The User has previously been blocked by User:Dougweller for 24 hours for this, but persists. I and User:BlackCab have both tried to engage the editor at Talk.

• Talk:New_World_Translation#Douay
• Editing history of NWT article

Because of the editor's persistence and refusal to discuss, I request that the editor be blocked permanently.--Jeffro77 (talk) 08:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The anonymous editor has been asked several times to discuss the issue but ignores the request. He or she has no interest in collaboration and despite being blocked for ignoring warnings has returned to the same behaviour. A longer block or a permanent block seems reasonable. BlackCab (talk) 09:08, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Waiting for a response from the IP, but I expect a block will be forthcoming. Dougweller (talk) 19:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Why won't an article semi-protect work? VanIsaac_WS 10:14, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Disruption: Users Jurriaan and Jurrian also multiple IPs

Notification of most rececent IP most recent user account

User Jurriaan (also User Jurrian, also multiple IPs) has a basic and fundamental problem with Primary and Original research policies, and repeatedly disrupts talk pages by engaging in primary research. diff demonstrating persistence example of conduct This recent version illustrates the depth of page disruption

This has been persistent, spread across 12 months, multiple articles in a constrained topic area, and spread across multiple IPs and their user account. A list of IP accounts from Jurriaan's user page lists:

• 212.64.48.162
• 212.182.183.8
• 82.136.223.40
• 82.169.203.147
• 82.170.245.157
• 82.169.203.180
• 85.144.162.215

Given that Jurriaan is unwilling to abide by basic encyclopaedic policy, I'd like them restricted from contributing to topics on Marx, Marx's works and political economy broadly construed until they're willing to abide by our sourcing policies and policies on disrupting talk pages by soapboxing. Fifelfoo (talk) 11:58, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) A quick look through the ISP list shows all of the listed addresses as being registered to the same upstream ISP, except the last one, which appears to be a static ADSL registration on a separate ISP. All of them, however, geolocate to the same area. I'd suggest opening a full WP:SPI report, because  Sounds like a duck quacking into a megaphone to me. Yes, I know, I promised never to use that template again. The shoe fits too well not to put it on here. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (User:N5iln) (talk) 16:11, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I strongly object to Fifelfoo's allegations and accusations. There is no evidence that I have disrupted anything. I have merely committed the sin of referencing some ideas by Karl Marx to Karl Marx's own text, whereas Fifelfoo feels that only a secondary source interpreting Karl Marx would be authoritative on Karl Marx. Actually, I am not interested in contributing my time to improving the article on commodity fetishism or anything else, if I get falsely accused of disruption. I have cited the IP numbers on my user page specifically so that my edits can be verified, it is not a big secret. I have no idea what your "megaphoneduck" is about. User:Jurriaan 3 Nov 2011 20:46 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.64.48.162 (talk)

SPI isn't the main issue as the User/IP isn't avoiding previous restrictions. The problem is, "I have merely committed the sin of referencing some ideas by Karl Marx to Karl Marx's own text" an unwillingness to abide by our policy on original research and the extensive (and abusively framed) discussions on talk pages on the same point. The User/IP has extensive access to the entire secondary literature on Marx, and is deeply aware of the masters—but do they turn to Mandel, or Lafargue, or Bukharin, or Cardan? To any of the heterodox or orthodox scholars? No the User/IP attempts to produce their own understanding from original texts. This behaviour has been continuous since 2010 on commodity fetishism at least. Fifelfoo (talk) 23:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Consider this diff of Surplus product over October where Jurriaan edits under the minor tag the following content into the article:

The translation of the German "Mehr" as "surplus" is in a sense unfortunate, because it might be taken to suggest "unused", "not needed" or "redundant", while literally it means "more" or "added" - thus, "Mehrprodukt" refers really to the additional or "excess" product produced. In German, the term "Mehrwert" simply and literally means value-added, a measure of net output, (though, in Marx's specialist usage, it means the surplus-value obtained from the use of capital).

This, and the paragraph "In modern economics…value of inputs." which is footnoted against an argument from first principles.

The User/IP clearly understands scholarly conventions; but, is unwilling to operate within the original research conventions of wikipedia. Fifelfoo (talk) 23:56, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Character mask is content almost entirely authored by the User/IP over 2+ years. It includes wonders such as:

One of the centrepieces of Marx's critique of political economy is that the juridical labour contract between the worker and his capitalist employer obscures the true economic relationship, which is (according to Marx) that the workers do not sell their labour, but their labour power, i.e. their capacity to work, making possible a profitable difference between what they are paid and the new value they create for the owners of capital (a form of economic exploitation). Thus, the very foundation of capitalist wealth creation involves a "mask".

: ^ "...the paid and unpaid portions of labour are inseparably mixed up with each other, and the nature of the whole transaction is completely masked by the intervention of a contract and the pay received at the end of the week." - Karl Marx, Value, Price and Profit, part 9. "Since Lassalle's death, there has asserted itself in our party the scientific understanding that wages are not what they appear to be - namely, the value, or price, of labor — but only a masked form for the value, or price, of labor power." - Karl Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme (1875), part 2 (emphases added). Cf. the Resultate manuscript in Capital, Volume I, Penguin edition, p. 1064, where Marx uses the word "vertuscht" ("covered up").

Which belong in journal articles or conference papers, and not on the encyclopaedia. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:02, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

IP editor 74.64.126.212 - persistent failure to source / incomplete sourcing

IP editor 74.64.126.212 periodically updates or edits information on pages relating (directly and indirectly) to the University of Michigan but consistently either 1) fails to provide proper sources for the edits, or, 2) provides a source but includes it only in the edit summary and not in the article to accompany the factual edit. This latter practice requires in each instance that another editor 1) notice the edit; 2) check the supplied source; and 3) edit the article to reflect the updated ref. If no one makes these corrections then after a while the article's assertions no longer match its cited refs and cleaning them up is likely to entail a laborious process of reconstruction. I make the necessary fixes on pages I have watchlisted, but otherwise have no appetite for following the editor around and cleaning up their incomplete edits. I've asked the editor several times to learn how to cite refs, see User talk:74.64.126.212 and following that effort, added relevant templates through level 4 on their Talk page, all to no effect. The editor does not respond in any fashion (indeed a review of the IP’s 200+ contributions reflect no contribution to any Talk page), and the practices continue. I have been reluctant to seek a block for what seem to be, essentially, sound factual edits but these changes requires the diligent attention of at least one other editor to ensure that the pages are not slowly degraded, and on the whole the practice is disruptive. Also I think that the editor’s failure to engage at all leaves few other options.

I previously sought advice on how to deal with this at WP:EAR, which discussion seems to have run its course. The advice there amounted to, “seek a short block”. I’d appreciate any assistance or advice that this group may offer. Thanks. JohnInDC (talk) 14:45, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If they've received multiple warnings and are not changing their practices I would report them at WP:AIV. Doniago (talk) 14:56, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, just checked out the IP's talk page. I'd say you could file at AIV now if they are still being disruptive. Doniago (talk) 14:58, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Doniago, AIV is not the appropriate venue as the IP has not edited since yesterday and their edits are not clear-cut vandalism. This is a long term issue with poor or incorrect sourcing over many months. That being said, JohnInDC's last message to the IP was a clear explanation as to why the edits are problematic; if they continue their behaviour when they begin editing again then a block will be necessary. I have watchlisted the IP's talk page and will monitor their edits moving forward. Jezebel'sPonyo 15:08, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm content to have another set of eyes (or two) here and unless someone has a different idea about how to proceed, I've got my answer. Thanks. JohnInDC (talk) 16:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Someone who makes work for others (by doing references incompetently) is not exactly a good-faith contributor. I suggest a short block to get this editor's attention if they will not participate in any discussion of what they are doing. If they continue to edit Misplaced Pages with the same practices (now or later) while ignoring the issue presented at ANI, then we have a problem worthy of admin attention. EdJohnston (talk) 02:16, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

IP and Mommie Dearest

Before List of films considered the worst descends further into edit-war territory, I would like someone to take a look and see if they can 'splain things to the IP in such a way that it gets his attention. Thank you. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 16:43, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Seems to have stopped for now, but I'll watchlist the page. 28bytes (talk) 17:12, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you. That's one of those articles that has always shown a tendency to expand or contract based on personal opinions, which is why we try to keep some good reins on it. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 17:25, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That's some fun reading. Reminds me of this book. 28bytes (talk) 17:51, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• He's back. Another edit showed up in recent changes. FYI, it is my opinion that the article will always tend to edits like that, is very subjective, and prob should not exist for those reasons (although I am aware that I am in the minority on that Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 23:24, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

FYI, vandal's IP is 50.74.225.194‎ Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 23:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)‎

Edit warring ≠ vandalism. Anyway, Carnildo has protected it for a week. 28bytes (talk) 23:33, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit-warring is bad faith, though; and the guy did essentially section-blank; so I think the term vandalism is appropriate Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 23:42, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

No, it's not. 28bytes (talk) 00:07, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

You're right, there's a difference between vandalism and good-faith but wrong-headed editing, and this is the latter. And refering to Purple's earlier comment, yes, the page attracts lots of editorial opinions, which is why strict sourcing to hopefully multiple "worst movies" sources is required. For example, if Roger Ebert says "I hated it!", that carries a lot more weight than if an editor says "I loved it!" It's never going to be an exhaustive list. If you look through the Maldin book, for example, you'll find hundreds of them labeled "BOMB". This particular article is intended to list just a few, widely discussed bad movies. The examples serve an educational purpose about what can go wrong in moviemaking. (In the case of Ed Wood, of course, you can say it's pretty much "everything".) ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 00:21, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User Boabkal

Could an Admin check the edits of this user:

User Boabkal is personally attacking me. He accuses me of being pan-Turkic even before I had a conversation with him.

See: Talk:Great_Seljuq_Empire The source for the Turkification of Iran and Azerbaijan

This user is pushing his POV and original research. I had sourced material explaining some sentences. But he doesn't like those sentences and then declares the whole book as: 'bad, misleading and false' and he deletes the sourced material. He is pushing his own POV and original research and accusing me the whole time and personally attacking me.

The source doesn't deny that Seljuks were under Persian influence, it just says that under their rule the Turkification of todays Iran and Azerbaijan started, because then Turkic peoples started to migrate towards those areas.

Thank You. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DragonTiger23 (talk • contribs) 16:45, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• BoAbkal (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Notified BoAbkal
• Advised DragonTiger23 to add diffs to comments perceived as attacks and reminded s/he should remember to notify other editors.

(to be helpful) ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 17:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Here he/she is already accusing me of spreading 'black pan-Turkic propaganda'

In the last sentence here he says: 'I can only conclude you're biased (i.e. pan turkic) and based on the other violations in your userpage history, I am certain of it.' — Preceding unsigned comment added by DragonTiger23 (talk • contribs) 17:58, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I have welcomed the editor (only 16 edits) and left a personalized uw-npa1 on BoAbkal's talk page, including hopefully helpful information on dealing with disputes which included other relevant links (undue, pov, balance, relevance, dr) - as well as a note to be careful on wording so comments are not misconstrued as a personal attack.

Does anyone deem any further actions are needed? Best, ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 18:39, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Can any admin tell user Boabkal not to delete the two sources that explain about the Turkification of Iran and Azerbaijan? DragonTiger23 (talk) 19:51, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If it's simply removing citations that support the article, let us know. If it's changing content to something you disagree with, you need to take that up on the article's talk page and engage BoAbkal there. A polite note on BoAbkal's talk page to meet you there may be a good start. Admnistrators (except as required by an ArbCom case or community decision or for policy violations or similar) will not engage in a content dispute in administrative capacity. Once they involve themselves in the content, they can no longer act in such capacity.

So, if the issue is the first one, please provide a few diffs - that can be addressed. If it is a content dispute, try working it out on the talk page, or engage in some form of dispute resolution. If you need help, let the community know here, or post a message on my talk page. Best, Rob ROBERTMFROMLI | /_CN 03:06, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

DragonTiger23, please do not pose yourself as a victim of personal attacks because it will not work with me, and you have no evidence of it. Furthermore, if you want to claim that I personally attacked you (which is false in that regard), then look no further than your claim of me vandalizing an article, when in fact it does not constitute as vandalism at all. That accusation you brushed on my name is, however, a form of personal attack, in which I think the admins should look into.

Judging by the series of violations you have committed, as seen in your user talk page, it is evidently clear that the Great Seljuk Empire article is not the only one you attempted to change in order to give a biased 'Turkic' point of view. There are loads of other articles in which you personally changed in order to give a biased Turkic view on, not least of which are articles such as the Latin Bridge.

On 23rd of August, you were blocked by an admin for "persistent revert-warring across multiple articles motivated by national POV agendas".

I have no doubt in my mind that the so called source you provided in your Great Seljuk Empire article on the so called 'turkification of Iran' was a bad one. Bad either because you made it up, and then provided anything as a source (to make it more believable), or because you used a source that is not academically qualified. The sentence you wrote, furthermore, went on to CONTRADICT what most academically qualified sources in that article were saying, i.e. that the Seljuks had no intentions on turkifying Iran. As I have clearly pointed out in that article's talk page.

You are in the wrong here and I will personally see to it that your attempts of spreading disinformation in Misplaced Pages articles does not succeed.

Wa Salamu Alaikum.BoAbkal (talk) 07:08, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Please could an admin explain to this person to stop his agressive attitude against me. He is making Misplaced Pages:No personal attacks here and when he edits here [[http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Great_Seljuq_Empire&diff=458935774&oldid=458854610 Misplaced Pages:No original research Seriously just because he doesn't like the sentence of the source he declares it as 'not academically qualified' Because first of all reed this who is BoAbkal to decide that this author and the other authors are 'not academically qualified'. And this is the other author: They are both academics, experts on history, that User boabkal personally attacks them just shows how pathetic biased he is. Are there no admins to stop this nonsense??

With a quick search on google books I found many more sources on (Seljuks Turkification) seriously this is written in so many history books, I didnt make this up. here ], ]

on the matter of the Turkification of Iran/Azerbaijan. Because this is already a fact. But there is no way discussing with Boabkal, who would equally name all of those sources as bad and the authors a not academical. This is simple because Boabkal is not neutral he is trying to push his point of view, deleting sources when he doesnt like them.

This is the online version of the source (so I didn't made it up, as he falsely claims)

Here

Can you believe this user boabkal?? Simply said, he is biased and insists on deleting the sources regarding the Turkification of Iran and Azerbaijan. He uses the most simple argument: The sources are bad. This user does not care anything about the source or wikipedia rules. He accuses me the whole time of spreading pan turkism, how did he come u with that I dont know, If I would write one time he was pan iranian, I would be blocked, I dont want to personally attack anyone but it seems he himself is describing himself actually, he seems to be ethnically biased and tries to push his pan persianism. I have learned from experience that for some reason many Persian have racism against all things related to Turkic/Turks. And they get away with it all the time on wikipedia. DragonTiger23 (talk) 10:42, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Chairman Information on Derwent College

An IP recently deleted information on Derwent College. The removed was Neil Chauhan, from the list of former chairman of the school. I reverted the deletion, but the IP udid my revert, sayinfg that Chauhan was not a former chair, but a current student of the school, stateing he was a student of the school. I am not sure whether to add the name back to the list or leave it. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox 17:18, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If it's unsourced, leave it out until it is sourced. 28bytes (talk) 17:23, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Will do. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox 17:25, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

...And it looks like he's vandalizing other pages, which I've warned him for. Still, we shouldn't restore unsourced material to the article if we have no idea it's true. 28bytes (talk) 17:29, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Having said above that you'd leave it out until it is sourced, your next edit was to to put it back in, unsourced. - David Biddulph (talk) 17:33, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Google does seem to indicate he's a current student there.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:35, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I've removed the entire section. I have no idea if any of it is/was true. 28bytes (talk) 17:36, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

All of the chairs until Neil were accurate according the list pasted in the JCR, however I can only say with certainty for the chairs post Oliver Lester. And more proof that Neil is a student http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=510463313 94.195.251.61 (talk) 17:38, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

You're slowly destroying the page on my college :( 94.195.251.61 (talk) 17:40, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Source, please? You'll understand I can't take your statement at face value given this edit. 28bytes (talk) 17:41, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

The fact that I made that edit to the Langwith College page would show I'm a true Derwentian, if you understood the latin I changed the motto to and the rivalry, you'd believe me. 94.195.251.61 (talk) 17:44, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I do indeed understand the Latin. But ain't nothing going back into the Derwent article until it's sourced. 28bytes (talk) 17:46, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Agree with 28bytes, the edit doesn't inspire confidence in the editor (or for that matter the universitycollege they're evidentally are or was a student of if that's how 'a true Derwentian' acts) Nil Einne (talk) 18:11, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I thought you meant the removal was unsourced. Whoops on my part. Trouts galore for me I guess. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox 18:31, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Kolins and nationality categories

Kolins (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) insists on removing valid categories relating to footballer nationality from numerous articles, despite community consensus stating that what he is doing is wrong. I have tried to talk to about it multiple times (check his talk page for a number of threads about it), yet he continues to make these edits, even after the consensus was re-affirmed. What is the best way forward? A topic ban? I don't really want to suggest a block, as he is otherwise a decent editor. GiantSnowman 18:35, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps WikiProbation would suffice? Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox 18:46, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

What on earth is that? 28bytes (talk) 18:47, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure. User:ChocolateWolf mentioned it to me, but I have no idea what it is. Maybe monitering him so that, if he makes such an edit again, ha shall be blocked. Ask Chocolatewolf. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox 18:50, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Olaf, I think you should leave your roommates and other imaginary entities out of it. If you want to contribute to ANI, bring something useful to the table--not this or the usual sock allegations. Drmies (talk) 00:18, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Yes, not a vandal per se. But is this behaviour decent, after the pertinent WP:FOOTY discussions, of which he has been notified by Snowman and myself? His subsequent response has been "yes yes, reach all the consensus you want - we HAVE - i don't care"! Not very decent is it? Attentively - --Vasco Amaral (talk) 21:09, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Snowman, I am sorry, but in looking at that discussion I do not see a real clear consensus on what to do, let alone a clear condemnation of the editor's actions. I will say that their unexplained removals are disruptive, there is no doubt about that, but given that you all aren't looking for a block that's really neither here nor there. I think you could try the following: in a subsection, below, lay out your case clearly and concisely with a proposed topic ban (even if that's not what you necessarily want--you kind of have to do something like that given that this is ANI, and so you're asking for admin intervention). Phrase it clearly and preciserly, though, since that discussion at FOOTY:TALK was far from clear. Drop a line to all the editors who participated there and maybe place a note on the FOOTY talk page, and see what comes out. (My guess is, unfortunately, not much--but if you want to accomplish anything you'll need editorial input and clarity on the categories.) Good luck. Drmies (talk) 00:26, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
    • Thanks for the advice Drmies, I am currently at work but when I have enough free time (tonight/tomorrow) I will do as you have suggested. GiantSnowman 13:04, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
      • Some disruptions just take more time to handle than others. This, unfortunately, is one of these, because we're not dealing with a simple vandal, because they're not communicating, and because the very terms of the discussion (see Eldumpo's comment below and your link to TALK:FOOTY) lack clarity. Sorry Snowman. There's just little anyone here can do (I mean, with our special admin tools.) Drmies (talk) 16:38, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• I think there needs to be some high-level guidance on what information should be included for nationality, including a definition of the word itself. I started a thread on this issue at although it has not had that much input. If matters were sorted at a higher level then we could start to deal with how 'footballing nationality' fits in. Eldumpo (talk) 15:14, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Possible block avoiding IP

An IP has indicated to me on my talk page that they are editing as an IP because of previous accusations of sockpuppetry.. They are currently on 75.21.156.42 but frequently change. I would be interested if anyone knows who the original account is and if they are currently blocked. This IP is adopting an argumentative approach on the talk pages of several other users and should be stopped if this is block evasion. SpinningSpark 19:39, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit warring at Professional wrestling throws

I am involved in the edit warring which has been going on at this article which it looks like has had citation concerns for four years. I am trying to avoid it getting out of hand by using edit summaries, the talk page, and posting about it here. Can we get more eyes on it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Folgertat (talk • contribs) 20:29, 3 November 2011 (UTC) --Shirt58 (talk) 12:29, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Edit warring on a wrestling article. I assume it's scripted. Drmies (talk) 00:01, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Dr "Professor Pain" Mies, you are seriously breaking Kayfabe here. All those throws are booked. No way, no how are they shoot like the Montreal screwjob. --The Shirt of Hurt... 58 (talk) 12:29, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Well, as far as the content of the issue is concerned, it's not clear to me why, in this edit some unverified things are removed and others aren't, but that's a matter for the talk page. Wile I don't want to count and do things with dates and times, it's clear that y'all are edit-warring, though some (User:Francis Marks) do it worse than others (you)--without edit summaries and explanations. Both of you should stop, right now, and edit only to the talk page and work it out.

  In the meantime, there is nothing here for an admin to do, and I don't rightly see why this report is here. Drmies (talk) 00:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• For the record, I've given both 3R warnings on their talk page. I consider this closed: any further disruption should be dealt with first on the 3R noticeboard, and such a report will probably be followed by a swift block. Drmies (talk) 00:13, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Closing the RfC at WP:V (a preemptive request)

OK... we are now at 30 days (remember, October had 31 days)... we don't have to close yet, but we could close today if we want to. I could close it myself (as the initiator of the RfC), except that I have certainly been heavily involved (far more than Sarek was) and I don't want give anyone (on either side of the debate) grounds to object to the closure when it happens and cause more unneeded drama. Given the tensions and general bad faith that has permeated the discussion recently, I think we need the closer to be someone who not only is neutral, but also has the appearance of neutrality. That means someone who has not commented at all. So... I thought I would ask...who is going to close it? I would like to announce who it will be, so we don't get a drama fest of closures and unclosures and counter closures when it happens. Blueboar (talk) 01:57, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• You need 3 closers to reach an agreed outcome to avoid further drama. Not me.. :-) Spartaz 07:34, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

  Valid idea... although I don't think anyone involved would insist on 3 closers. The point is, a) the closer(s) should be someone who has not yet commented, b) have the clout that comes with admin status so the decision (what ever it may be) is accepted, and c) we need to inform those who have commented who the closer(s) will be (along with a polite request that those involved not add to the drama by closing it themselves). So... could we get some volunteers please. Blueboar (talk) 12:59, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

  I assume you didn't read ANI recently, as we have an ANI subpage devoted to this now. Over there at least 3 admins have volunteered to close it: User:HJ Mitchell, User:Newyorkbrad and User:Black Kite. I personally think a triumvirate closure, like recently on the China RFC is a good idea, but I will leave it to the admins in question to work this out amongst themselfs. I am curious where you got the idea that the an iniator of an RFC should close it? The iniator is by definition heavily involved, so that is always a bad idea. Yoenit (talk) 15:41, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Yoenit. That is all I needed to know (I too am happy to leave the rest up to the admins in question). I got the idea that an initiator could close from reading the instructions at WP:RFC. Perhaps I have misunderstood. Doesn't really matter since I was not planning on doing so in any case. Blueboar (talk) 15:53, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Single purpose account, misuse of article for soapbox

The new SPA account, User:The99declaration has made some rather obtuse postings on the article 99 Percent Declaration that could constitute legal threats and are certainly WP:SOAP --Amadscientist (talk) 02:38, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't see explicit legal threats, but I do see problems with the username. That username definitely needs a change to an individual one. –MuZemike 02:49, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I understand MuZemike's post...but not the unsigned post by User:Pugugil below.--Amadscientist (talk) 03:21, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

What post? . Drmies (talk) 03:57, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

The post that was deleted. Perhaps he meant something by it. Your question seems tongue in cheek at best and dishonest at worst.--Amadscientist (talk) 04:14, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Dualus has been doing a little manipulating of that spam post and the users talk page.--Amadscientist (talk) 04:16, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:The99declaration is apparently Michael Pollok, a criminal defense attorney and the author of the first drafts of the 99 Percent Declaration. Please help keep this important contributor! There are very serious WP:BITE issues on the part of Amadscientist, who has repeatedly blanked the author's correspondence from Talk:99 Percent Declaration because there is a content dispute concerning very recent events with the Occupy Wall Street Demands Working Group. Instead of welcoming The99declaration, Amadscientist wrote this as his first message on his talk page: "Single purpose account. Misuse of article space for personal soapbox is unacceptable.--Amadscientist (talk) 02:28, 4 November 2011 (UTC)" and became upset when I welcomed the user. I do not believe Amadscientist is here to write an encyclopedia nearly as much as to try to push a point of view, and I have complained about tag-teaming on Talk:Occupy Wall Street where such behavior is still clearly in evidence. Please help. Dualus (talk) 04:39, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

See formal ANI complaint below.--Amadscientist (talk) 04:44, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Talk page blanking continues to WP:BITE the original author of the 99 Percent Declaration -- what can be done to save Mr. Pollok as an editor?!? Dualus (talk) 05:05, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I could always apologize for biting the newcomer, but that does not excuse your manipulation of the talk pages, or your refusal to stop unwanted contact.--Amadscientist (talk) 05:11, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Am I to understand that you are referring to my restoration of material I posted to Talk:99 Percent Declaration from new user Mr. Pollok's comments on the deletion discussion, as "manipulation"? Why do you think I am not allowed to post to talk pages? Dualus (talk) 05:33, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit war at Luchow's

I'm bowing out, since Mrs. Drmies is wondering what's keeping me. Beyond My Ken notified me of something brewing in Luchow's, particularly some ownership issues. He was right; I've reverted, left notes on the user's talk page, and finally a 3R warning. I came withing one clock of blocking them for disruptive editing and edit-warring, but I should leave that to someone else, if it has to come to that (I hope not). Your interest is appreciated. Drmies (talk) 03:56, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I blocked BruceWHain (talk · contribs) before seeing this message, but not much has changed so my block still stands. Tiptoety 04:13, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I was about to pounce this one, darn. Here's the block log and offending edit for archival purposes. Tell Mrs. Drmies that we apologize for keeping her waiting! m.o.p 04:17, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

...and I have declined Bhatman ... err ... User:BruceWHain's unblock ... which wasn't really an unblock ... then again, just like Chuck Norris, Bhatman wouldn't need an unblock. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 09:21, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Easy4me - disruptive editing? (moved from AIV)

• Easy4me (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – vandalism after many many warnings. RadioFan (talk) 00:23, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not seeing any vandalism. The corrections I'm looking at seem to be accurate rather than subtle vandalism. If I'm wrong, can you provide some diffs? Swarm 02:00, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

This editor has a consistent history of making seemingly random edits, primarily in music articles and often around release dates, without edit summaries and without references. Hard to tell if they are accurate or not without refs. Without something to identify what they are doing here, if just the occasional edit summary, it's seen as vandalism.--RadioFan (talk) 02:21, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, that's disruptive editing to me, since malicious intent cannot be inferred but standard editorial procedures are being demonstrably ignored. Still blockable. Daniel Case (talk) 03:23, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm moving this here from AIV, as it seems to be either a user lacking some clue or a malicious slow-moving vandal. I'm of the opinion that the user is just attempting to help, as evidenced by their interactions with editors who have warned them: see , . Of course, some more eyes would be nice.
All editors involved in the discussion and Easy4me have been notified by myself. m.o.p 04:12, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, just to clarify, if an editor is making good-faith (even if obviously incorrect) edits but ignores attempts to discuss, and starts getting warned to stop, then they ought to be blocked if they continue. I have not yet read the contribs and I don't know if that's what's happened here. Daniel Case (talk) 05:12, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Well feel free to read the contribs and share your thoughts; I scanned some, and I see nothing to suggest this user isn't acting in good faith, much less vandalizing. It's not easy to tell, though, so I agree that a review is justified. Swarm 11:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Guys, I swear I'm not trying to vandalize or anything like that. I'm just a regular editor like you guys. I just keep forgeting to put something in the edit summary and I don't know when to mark it as a minor edit. Also, about the single release dates... I'm going by what the song pages say they were released. If you say that they are incorrect, edit those song pages. Plus, I've never contributed to discussion pages and need some info on that. I hope you guys can understand. Thanks and keep editing! :) Easy4me (talk) 12:19, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, if any facts you introduce into articles are incorrect to us, but you think they're correct, this is what you need to do. Again, although you seem not to be disruptive, I have viewed your edit history and saw some factual errors repeatedly being made. --Bryce Wilson | talk 14:28, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

You also seem to make some edits which are basically changing something, then changing back, which can be known as editing for a high article account to game the system. --Bryce Wilson | talk 14:32, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I think I sorta see what you mean. Yes, occasionally I do make factual errors and I notice them like two minutes later and undo them. It may be a force of habit. I have ADHD. Sorry for those edits I make sometimes. Easy4me (talk) 15:28, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Dualus manipulating spam posts of other editor and talk pages

Note: Recommend merging this section with #Single purpose account, misuse of article for soapbox above. Dualus (talk) 05:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Dualus has been using the spam soapbox message left on the article 99 Percent Declaration and on the "Request for deletion" discussion by another user. He placed the text on the talk page to make it look like a message left there by the editor and also signed the post as the editor in question. He also went to the editors talk page and began manipulating a post left there by me. He has also seen fit to request off wiki discussion against my previous request that he not contact me further on my talk page. --Amadscientist (talk) 04:42, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I strongly object to the blanking of my contributions to Talk:99 Percent Declaration and the WP:BITEing of Michael Pollok at his talk page. Dualus (talk) 05:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I strongly object to your manipulation of another editors post. Something I have warned you about before.--Amadscientist (talk) 05:27, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

What precisely are you complaining about? How can you accuse me of "manipulation" when you have just blanked the same section from Talk:99 Percent Declaration four times over the space of an hour? Have you read WP:TALK? I know you have already been warned about edit warring. Dualus (talk) 05:47, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It appears that user Dualus has been attempting to request contact of editors off wiki. I am not the only one, although I have stated clearly his contact on my page is not wanted.--Amadscientist (talk) 05:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I have been attempting to tinychat with those who have been accusing me of trying to push a point of view. Only one editor has agreed to do so tomorrow. If any admins would like to join in, that would be great. Unless there's some reason it isn't allowed. In the mean time, would someone please restore my blanked material to Talk:99 Percent Declaration? Dualus (talk) 06:06, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Dualus is an extremely disruptive and tendentious editor. He has a habit of hounding editors who disagree with him to the point of harassment, often pressing them to talk off-wiki. Inserting disputed content into articles without adequate discussion, Making bad-faith accusations against anyone who disagrees with him, and is a constant state of "I didn't hear that!" where he argues the same points ad nauseum regardless of how many times they have been refuted by multiple editors. He has had an edit-warring noticeboard complaint about him in the last 24 hours, and it doesn't take more than a look at Talk:Occupy Wall Street,Misplaced Pages:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 26 or the article talk page in question to get a clear idea of this editor's propensity for disruption. Trusilver 06:50, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Couldn't have said it better myself, Truesilver. At least, not without combing through about 500 man-hours of absurd editorial conduct by the user in question, in order to document the utter disregard for both substantive content policies and the policies relevant to maintaining a collaborative atmosphere. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 16:57, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I recommend reviewing those diffs. While some show honest mistakes, I don't see how any of them show "an extremely disruptive and tendentious editor." Honestly I have no idea what tendentious means. I welcome discussions about my behavior, and I have been trying to reach compromises. But for now, would someone please restore the blanked material of mine back to Talk:99 Percent Declaration? I don't want to be accused of edit warring simply because I am trying to keep my own article talk page section, from the author of the subject of the article, no less, from being deleted. Dualus (talk) 07:04, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Ownership of articles?--Amadscientist (talk) 07:31, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

When I refer to "my talk page sections which you have repeatedly blanked" I am not saying I own them, I am saying I put them there. Per WP:TPO it is completely inappropriate for you to delete them! Dualus (talk) 07:41, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Per Misplaced Pages:Biographies of living persons Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion. Users who persistently or egregiously violate this policy may be blocked from editing.--Amadscientist (talk) 07:42, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, that's what the policy says. Are you suggesting that the material you keep deleting is somehow a BLP issue? Dualus (talk) 07:47, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not see the BLPVIO. Please can you explain on the article talk page how it violates BLP. Spartaz 07:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

If an editor makes a claim on the article itself with no references it is contentious, regardless of the fact that they claim to be that person. The continued use of this material by Dualus is a clear BLP issue. Is this incorrect?--Amadscientist (talk) 08:07, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, its an incorrect application of BLP. Its good reason to depreceate the content and we couldn't use it as its as meaningless as a usenet posting but its not a BLP vio. Spartaz 08:23, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Please see the talk page for specific accusations against named parties that do make this a BLP issue. Thank you.--Amadscientist (talk) 08:37, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I have added the exact sections of BLP violations as requested.--Amadscientist (talk) 10:22, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Where? Dualus (talk) 15:33, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I, too, would like to see some links. However, anything posted by that redlink and claiming to speak for someone has to be considered a BLP violation unless proven otherwise. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 15:39, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Dualus continues to replace this contentious material and has been edited warring against the policies and spirit of Misplaced Pages. I wonder if a block for these actions as well as unwanted contact would be appropriate at this time?--Amadscientist (talk) 07:44, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

"Unwanted contact"? Are you referring to the fact that you keep deleting whatever I write on your talk page? I recommend that interested parties review your deletions of my questions on your talk page. In the mean time, what is the specific reason you keep blanking the message from Mr. Pollok? Dualus (talk) 07:47, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• ENOUGH ANI is not a venue for bickering between participants in a content dispute. Please can you both stop the back and forth and allow other people to go through the allegations and consider them. Flooding the section with arguing between the two of you is going to get you both blocked if you don't stop. Spartaz 07:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I would challenge the presumption that the editor called 99-whatever actually is who he claims to be. In fact, the "conservative" thing to do, as per BLP rules, would be to assume that he is NOT, and that anything he says could potentially be a BLP violation, as it would put words in his mouth. Now, if the actual subject can be confirmed to be that guy, then it's a different story. But that would have to be done by reliable sourcing, not by a red-link claiming to be someone. For example, if CNN has an interview with the actual guy, and he says "I'm editing Misplaced Pages under this 99-something user ID", that would tend to make it more credible. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 10:58, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. If an individual claims to be the subject of the post and asks for modifications, are they not usually directed to OTRS to prove/disprove the claim first. Putting information in the article or on the talkpage because "I'm Foo, so I know it" is likely to be a BLP violation. Elen of the Roads (talk) 11:09, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Phoenix and Winslow

User:Phoenix and Winslow has made an attack against a company that is unwarranted and offensive, its also one in which he holds a bias against the company as it won a court case that defines Ugg boot as a generic in term. If this was made against and editor or a individual person I'd have no hesitation in blocking the users account before bringing it here for review. The thing is this isnt an individual its a company Uggs-N-Rugs but P&W description of the company is matter we should be concerned about Misplaced Pages is not a soap box, IMHO sanctions should be taking to address this action as its clearly intended to disrupt the discussion and prevent consensus. Gnangarra 06:34, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• • User advised of discussion Gnangarra 06:40, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Err, I really don't see it. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 09:17, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I assume the reference is to referring to "Uggs-N-Rugs" as "Uggs-N-Muggs". To be honest, I do see a problem with some very POV claims being posted, repeatedly, with a lot of aggression towards Australian companies and editors, that sometimes feels to be borderline trolling. I'm not sure that it is something that could be handled here, though, but I'm also not sure what the best route is. Try for mediation again, perhaps? - Bilby (talk) 09:26, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

My first instinct here was to regard this as a specious attempt to have dissent shut down (in isolation that's nowhere near a blockable offense and would be worth a rebuke at best if the subject were a BLP), but looking through the discussion there's certainly something troublesome about Phoenix and Winslow's approach to the article. You know you're heading down the wrong path motives-wise when you begin making analogies to the way Barack Obama's BLP is free of conspiracy theories and use it as an unfavourable comparison. Phoenix and Winslow should be advised to leave his personal opinions of the subject at the door when discussing them: the rest should take care of itself, given that it seems to have been established that P&W is in a distinct minority on the content matter. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:58, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

User:93.167.122.65

I picked up a 3O request for the article Giles Coren, but I don't think my response there is likely to make much difference. The dispute concerns an edit war over adding the sentence "he is best know for his anti-Polish prejudice" to the lead.

Can I suggest semi-protecting the article and blocking account creation from the IP address?

Thanks.--FormerIP (talk) 12:33, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

IP blocked 72hrs. If he comes back on same IP it will be longer, if IP changes I can semi the article. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 12:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

OK, thanks. --FormerIP (talk) 13:02, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Kai Chen Qiu

Can someone take a quick look at the edit history of Kai Chen Qiu and then delete it? It's a hoax page, but the number of new editors working on it may indicate sock puppetry. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:24, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It's just been deleted, but it might be worth checking on the socking issue. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:31, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

There's a good chance there's meat in those socks, but nonetheless this was a good block. Typical bored schoolkid nonsense. The autoblock that's been added should put an end to this. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 14:43, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Structural inequality in education and Structural inequality

New article Structural inequality in education appears to be a copy of an old version of Structural inequality. I don't know anything about the subject matter, so have no idea whether they are OK or not, or whether the articles should be merged etc. However, the attribution has now been broken so something needs doing about that please. Polequant (talk) 14:50, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Seeing as the talk page of the original article has a discussion going back to last month where this was planned out, was there a particular reason that you chose to run straight to the drama board with this rather than simply sending a friendly note to the user explaining what he missed, or alternatively simply fixing it yourself? Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 15:01, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

And can you tell me how I can sort it out please? I cannot do a manual move as there is now something in the way. That is why I brought it here, not for any drama. And I see you are an administrator, so you can sort it out. I would be grateful if you could do the honours. Much obliged. Polequant (talk) 15:08, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

The user's already left a note to that effect on the new talk page. If you want to make it more formal, add {{split from|page=Structural inequality|diff=http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Structural_inequality&oldid=458531007|date= 22:17, 3 November 2011}} to the top of tjhe split page. If we were being incredibly pedantic we could histmerge the new page from the user sandbox, but it doesn't really matter because the sandbox page has only had a single editor who is the same as the author of the new page. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 15:17, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It didn't look like a split to me, it looked like a copy-paste move and a completely new article in it's place. But if that's all that is needed for attribution then fine by me. Feel free to close. Polequant (talk) 15:24, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

That's basically what it is. I'll split the history when I have time later, if no one else has. -- zzuuzz 15:29, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Energy Catalyzer

This discussion is becoming increasingly overrun by bad faith and bad behavior. At this point it seems to me that the thing is going to get kept at least and likely merged. I would invited some disinterested administrator to step in and close the thing and save the lives of countless innocent electrons. Mangoe (talk) 17:39, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

That sure was an interesting discussion to read. Closed as keep. m.o.p 18:03, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

1. Jimmy Wales. "WikiEN-l Zero information is preferred to misleading or false information", May 16, 2006, and May 19, 2006; Jimmy Wales. Keynote speech, Wikimania, August 2006.

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