Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 14:56, 3 June 2013

To remain listed at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/User conduct, at least two people need to show that they tried to resolve a dispute with this user and have failed. This must involve the same dispute with a single user, not different disputes or multiple users. The persons complaining must provide evidence of their efforts, and each of them must certify it by signing this page with ~~~~. If this does not happen within 48 hours of the creation of this dispute page (which was: 07:31, 22 May 2013 (UTC)), the page will be deleted. The current date and time is: 18:50, 29 December 2024 (UTC).

This matter concerns Xenophrenic (talk · contribs · logs)

Users should not edit other people's summaries or views, except to endorse them. ALL signed comments other than your own view or an endorsement should be directed to this page's discussion page.

Statement of the dispute

This is a summary written by users who are concerned by this user's conduct. Users signing other sections ("Response" or "Outside views") should not edit the "Statement of the dispute" section.

Desired outcome

The point of this WP:RFC/U is twofold. First, to clearly define and show, with evidence, the problems that the community indicated User:Xenophrenic demonstrates in his edits and discussions on Misplaced Pages. The second propose is for Xenophrenic to acknowledge the problems of the community and indicate a willingness to change. For any problems that are not there, all other editors should also acknowledge that. The purpose of WP:RFC/U is not to provide any penalty for Xenophrenic, as that is beyond the scope of WP:RFC/U. It is merely to help define the problem, if there is a problem. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 07:32, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Description

Xenophrenic's behavior has been brought up as part of the ArbCom case for Tea Party movement. However, his behavior stretches across several years and several articles related to U.S. politics. I first encountered this behavior at Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now in 2009. Generally speaking, he is a POV-pusher for a progressive POV. It is as though he's trying to remake Misplaced Pages into an opposition research database for Democratic Party political operatives to use, while preventing its usefulness for that purpose to members of other parties and political groups. He adds negative material to articles about conservative political figures and organizations, no matter how trivial or irrelevant it might be, or how much it employs fallacies such as guilt by association; and he removes negative content about progressive political figures and organizations. He achieves these goals by being tendentious, and by using edit warring to a limited extent (particularly the slow edit war technique, or tag teaming). Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 07:32, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Evidence of disputed behavior

Any Editor: Please provide any evidence here. Will work on formatting the evidence as it builds.

Note: This evidence only covers the past 79 days of Xenophrenic's editing at Misplaced Pages (March 9 to May 27). It is presented as a representative sample of Xenophrenic's editing at Misplaced Pages, dating back four years to 2009, when I first encountered him at Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now and at articles related to Ward Churchill. This particular 79-day period comes at a time when Xenophrenic already knew he was under scrutiny due to a conduct-based thread at WP:ANI, as well as the ArbCom investigation regarding the Tea Party movement article. One would think that with both community-based and ArbCom-based spotlights shining on him, Xenophrenic would be on his best behavior during this 79-day period. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 17:17, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Attempting to get this RfC/U deleted

• Editwarring on the UserList page at WP:RfC/U, trying to move his own RfC/U from "Certified" to "Candidates": — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• Repeated efforts to get this RfC/U deleted by others, because it allegedly does not state a case against him with sufficient evidence: — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

POV-pushing on Tea Party movement and related pages

I note that below, User:Casprings has cited an ANI thread in which "there was no community support or much problem seen with Xenophrenic's editing." That ANI thread was limited to Tea Party movement and was dated February 26, 2013. Also, Casprings has claimed that Xenophrenic is a party to the ArbCom proceeding. That is a false statement, since Xenophrenic is not listed among the named parties. I will focus on Xenophrenic's efforts on Tea Party movement (a conservative political organization) and related pages since February 26, 2013 as well as his efforts on unrelated articles under the U.S. politics umbrella. The latter inquiry may go back a lot farther than February 26, 2013 since those articles were beyond the scope of the ANI thread. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 23:11, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• Xenophrenic was editwarring in a derogatory comment on the Talk:Tea Party movement page, above my pre-existing post. (In the first of these four diffs, he also interleaved a false accusation against me, claiming that I was "misinterpreting" policy.) This comment was posted in boldface, in an effort to "prove" that the section of WP:RS he was quoting was more important than the one I was quoting. I moved his comment to the bottom of the thread per WP:TALK and asked him politely, on his User Talk page, to add any remarks at the bottom of the thread or immediately below the post he was responding to, and cited the WP:TALK policy. He removed the request, and restored the derogatory comments at the top of the thread. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 00:48, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• In late March and early April, two questions dominated discussion on the Talk page: whether the section describing the Tea Party's agenda should contain the phrase "opposed to illegal immigration" rather than the word "anti-immigration," and whether the lede sentence should include the word "grass-roots" as a descriptive term regarding the Tea Party. In my opinion, there was a consensus of editors supporting both changes, but consensus wasn't overwhelming. Around the second week of April, the article was locked due to an editwar about a different proposed edit, and discussion moved to a moderated discussion subpage. Xenophrenic refused for several days to participate in the moderated discussion, instead choosing to argue persistently and tenaciously against consensus in what amounted to an empty room: the original Talk page. Arguing against consensus is disruptive. Evidence of this behavior can be found in one of the Talk page's archives. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 14:56, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

• Xenophrenic went so far as to editwar in a sandbox-type subpage of the moderated discussion page, then entitled, "Allegations of bigotry in the Tea Party." Here we see three identical reverts within 10 hours and 10 minutes: Collect and I felt that we had consensus for a rearrangement of the article based on WP:WEIGHT, placing anecdotal evidence at the bottom of the article, and professional analysis from neutral secondary sources (regarding media coverage of those incidents) at the top of the article. Xenophrenic attempted to restore the original arrangement with anecdotal evidence at the top. Xenophrenic was also trying to editwar in a much longer quote from the Washington Post ombudsman, and other negative content, to put a more negative spin on three of the incidents. Xenophrenic was later identified by SilkTork (an ArbCom member) as one of four editors who were editwarring on that page, but he was not blocked for it. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 12:09, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• Just a few days later, SilkTork placed a warning in red print below one of Xenophrenic's posts on the moderated discussion page, warning him that his comments were straying into editors' conduct rather than suggested article content. This came a few days after SilkTork had admonished everyone on the page that comments had to focus on suggested article content, and avoid any discussion of editors' conduct; violators of this new rule would be warned, then blocked. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 12:09, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

POV-pushing on other articles related to U.S. politics

Xenophrenic has been editwarring and POV-pushing in favor of a progressive POV on a broad range of articles related to U.S. politics, beyond his involvement in Tea Party movement and related articles. This involved removing negative content and terminology about progressive organizations and public figures, while adding negative content and terminology about conservative organizations and public figures:

• Alan Grayson — Editwarred out a "however" statement in article mainspace by User:HangingCurve, explaining the circumstances of the return to Congress of Grayson, a Democrat. The appropriate solution would have been a "citation needed" tag. Portions of such statements can be very easily sourced, for example in the very Democrat-friendly Huffington Post as well as local Florida TV stations. All other elements of the "however" statement would have been easily sourced at Politico and in the decision by the editorial board of the Orlando Sentinel to endorse neither candidate in that race. All of this was one Google search away. Clearly such observations were made by notable media sources that were either neutral and reliable, or friendly to Grayson. Simply editwarring the observation out twice tends to support the argument that Xenophrenic is pushing a POV. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 01:12, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• Anthony Weiner and Anthony Weiner sexting scandal — removing sourced material from articles about a former Democratic congressman who resigned in disgrace. He removed a reliably sourced quotation of Weiner's own explanation of his behavior: — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, ACORN 2009 undercover videos controversy, James O'Keefe and Talk:James O'Keefe — editwarring to restore the unsourced word "deceptively," or "deceptive," in multiple mainspace locations as a descriptive term to describe the video productions of a living person. This living person posted videos on the Internet that apparently showed volunteers for a progressive organization telling a pimp and a prostitute how to conceal prostitution activities and avoid paying taxes. These videos triggered a cutoff of federal funding for ACORN and a sharp decrease in private donations, eventually leading to its bankruptcy. The word "deceptively," to the best of my knowledge is completely unsourced with regard to the ACORN videos. That word was used only in an opinion column by Michael Gerson of The Washington Post, and in an article on a small website called "The Blaze," discussing a completely unrelated undercover video by O'Keefe, involving Ron Schiller, president of the NPR Foundation. Xenophrenic, in the article mainspace, characterized ALL of O'Keefe's videos as "deceptive" without citing any sources, and claimed on the article Talk page that this "deceptive" nature was a "proven fact" rather than just what two sources (one an opinion column, the other a small website) had said about one video. In this large, detailed edit to the James O'Keefe mainspace, Xenophrenic sought to minimize the huge impact O'Keefe's videos have had on ACORN, NPR and other subjects of his undercover investigations, removing a huge amount of very well-sourced material, as well as removing a "citation needed" tag after the word "deceptive" (see above). In this edit, Xenophrenic carefully removed an indication of the ideologies and political affiliations of O'Keefe's detractors. In this edit, Xenophrenic redundantly identified the videos as "selectively edited." — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• ATF gunwalking scandal — in one of the biggest scandals of the Obama Administration, Xenophrenic slow-motion editwarred the description of ATF "gunwalking" operations from "2009 to 2011," making the time frame "2006 to 2011" to include three years under the previous Republican President , without any explanatory information. This is in the lede sentence of the article. Under Bush, the ATF tried three very small, limited operations with several safeguards in place, such as placing RF transmitters (radio tracking devices) inside the guns. One of these three operations did not actually involve gunwalking per se but instead used more conventional law enforcement methods. When things started going wrong, the ATF wisely shut down all three of these operations despite the fact that they had resulted in some arrests; one of the three operations lasted just two weeks. Under Obama, the decision was made to start a new, and enormously larger gunwalking operation without those safeguards. The operations during the Bush years were questionable. During the Obama years, resurrecting the idea of gunwalking from its well-deserved grave, enlarging it exponentially and taking away the safeguards — after all that had gone wrong previously — was a lot worse than questionable. It was reckless, and notable, neutral commentators have said so. The result was that three times as many automatic and semi-automatic weapons were acquired by criminal cartels under the Obama Administration than under the Bush Administration. Furthermore, the weapons acquired by the cartels during the Obama years tended to be a lot more deadly, including .50-caliber sniper rifles. Xenophrenic's edit effectively concealed these important distinctions. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• David Stannard — Editwarred out some negative material about an author whose principal work, American Holocaust, accuses the U.S. government of committing genocide against Native Americans. The same revert three times in 8 hours, 17 minutes. Xenophrenic claims it's unsourced, but another editor on the Talk page, User:TheTimesAreAChanging, arguing in favor of its inclusion, provided some fairly convincing proof: Here's Xenophrenic, being tendentious with said editor on the article's Talk page: Said editor's response: "You are a POV-pushing vandal." It's entirely academic because the whole passage was removed shortly thereafter as a WP:SYNTH violation, but it highlights the Xenophrenic philosophy. Rather than revert the whole mess as a SYNTH violation, he kept the positive SYNTH, and removed the negative SYNTH. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 15:32, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• D. L. Hughley — Editwarring to remove information about a stand-up comic, who frequently relies on social and political commentary from a left-wing perspective as part of his comedy routine. The information was that Hughley was eliminated in Week 5 of Dancing with the Stars (U.S. season 16), and the excuse used in the edit summary was that it was unsourced. (Is this really negative information? Wouldn't a "citation needed" tag have been sufficient?) — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:03, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting — Extended, slow-motion editwarring in the article lede sentence to ensure FAIR is self-described as "progressive," rather than using the less complimentary term "left-leaning" applied by an outside reliable source, or even the more neutral "liberal." Doing the same thing earlier, and removing the citation of that reliable source. Generally being tendentious on the Talk page with User:Arzel and User:Papajohnin. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 23:54, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• Farenheit 9/11 and Fahrenheit 9/11 controversy — Removing a source citation to an article that criticized an anti-war documentary, and slow-motion editwarring the article content to first identify "Bush supporters" or "Bush defenders" as sources of the criticism: Also reducing "many disputes" about the accuracy of the film to "a dispute": — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

• Guenter Lewy — Reverted the removal of the word "controversial" to describe the author's works in the lede paragraph. In several of his works, Lewy has generally been critical of anti-war activists and authors, describing some opponents to the Vietnam War as a "war crime industry." This is a very small example of adding negative content to articles about persons and organizations he perceives as conservative. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:03, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• John Kerry — Putting some positive spin, and removing sourced negative content, in the biography of the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee and current secretary of state. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 15:32, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• Organizing for Action — Another example of removing negative information about a progressive organization. The article cited Politico.com to link OFA, the progressive organization arising from Barack Obama's re-election campaign, to big-money Obama donors such as George Soros and several multi-billion-dollar corporations. This link belies OFA's claim to being a grass-roots movement. However, Politico only said "linked to"; the Misplaced Pages article said "donations from" ... the appropriate solution would have been a "citation needed" tag, or simply editing those two little words to correctly reflect exactly what the source says. Instead, Xenophrenic deleted the entire sentence as well as the source citation. In this diff, Xenophrenic removed negative, perfectly well-sourced information about OFA and replaced it with information that had a more positive spin, by cherry-picking which portion of the source (a government watchdog group called Sunlight Foundation) would be used. And in this diff, Xenophrenic toned down an accusation by Republican Mitch McConnell (well sourced in another government watchdog group, Public Integrity), and inserted a lengthy positive-spin quote by OFA chairman Jim Messina in front of the McConnell material, sourcing it to an op-ed column by Messina on the CNN website. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:03, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• Tom Smith (Pennsylvania politician) — Editwarring with an IP editor, 96.245.12.5, to ensure that the neutral term "then clarified" was replaced by the more negative "attempted to walk back," in the biography about a pro-life Democratic politician who switched to the Republican Party. The "attempted to walk back" terminology was only used by one source: a left-leaning, local Pennsylvania website called "Politics PA." — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 01:12, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

• Zero Dark Thirty — altered content to state that "some Republicans charged that the filmmakers were given access to classified materials" Original content was "other critics charged ..." A far more accurate representation of what the source said would be just one Republican (Rep. Peter King), after a very similar charge that was first being made by a non-partisan military man: "Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, said earlier this year that it was 'time to stop talking' after remarkably accurate accounts appeared in US newspapers in the days immediately following the operation. 'We have gotten to a point where we are close to jeopardising the precision capability that we have,' he warned." Xenophrenic's version cherry-picked what the source said, to make it sound like a politically-motivated attack that had no foundation in facts. Also, Xeno removed source citations for opinion columns by notable writers, such as Naomi Wolf and Glenn Greenwald, who were critical of the film. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Evidence offered at ArbCom re: Tea Party movement

Malke 2010: "Arguments over petty, silly 'news' items such as an incident in Maryland where a man claimed his outdoor barbecue grill was sabotaged by tea party members because he was an Obama supporter. Xenophrenic fought like crazy for that and anytime it got deleted, he put it right back. ... Goethean's and Xenophrenic's arguments and edit wars today are the same ones they had back in 2010. Goethean violates WP:PA and exhibits tendency towards WP:OWN. Xenophrenic violates WP:TE. The same sections, the same edits. Over and over. In the meantime, the article has not improved ..."

North8000: "The inevitable proximate finding will be that Xenophrenic primarily and Geothean secondarilyy have dominated the article via TE and prevented its Wikification. ... In each case the end result was that stayed in, and the result was determined by not by a decision but by whichever editor or set of editors was most relentless. And two editors (Xenophrenic and Goethean) have been controlling the result of the above and many other areas in the article via this method. ... Xenophrenic's large number of edits (#2 on the list) with a high proportion of those being reversals in disputes, they have more than anyone determined what is or isn't in the article. ... a look at the disputes and how they have ended up clearly shows that the dominant editing force in determining the article content on these has been Xenophrenic, backed up by Goethean at key moments."

North8000's ANI thread regarding Xenophrenic's tendentious editing:

Darkstar1st:

• Xenophrenic is the 2nd most active editor on the article with 388 edits and 449 in talk
• Xenophrenic's primary contribution to the Tea Party movement article is as a "revert-only" account. many edits are labeled as "Undo", scores more are full or partial reverts. There are a few minor content contributions, exclusively material critical of the Tea Party.
• Xenophrenic has been blocked several times for edit warring:

Evidence of tendentious editing, edit-warring, and disruption

Xenophrenic is attempting to insert "anti-immigration" into the Tea Party movement article as well as the term "nativism." Part of that discussion then lead to the following exchange:

North8000 comments on Xenophrenic’s use of “anti-immigration” instead of the relevant “anti-illegal immigration.”

Malke responds here: and here:

Xenophrenic replies:

Malke responds:

Xenophrenic replies:

Malke responds: Xeno

Malke responds and corrects part of her edit

Xenophrenic misinterprets Malke’s correction

Malke explains

Xenophrenic insists

Arthur Rubin then commented that the exchange was an example of Xenophrenic’s tendentious editing: “. . . I should add that now there is strong evidence toward Xenophrenic's tendentious editing in intentionally disregarding the obvious meaning of Malke's comments (in the "anti-immigration" section) in favor of an absurd interpretation. . .Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:22, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

Xenophrenic then edit warred in response: and again and again .

Xenophrenic then went to Arthur Rubin’s talk page: Not satisfied, he went to ANI:

Applicable policies and guidelines

{List the policies and guidelines that apply to the disputed conduct}

1. WP:TE
2. WP:DISRUPT
3. WP:POVPUSH
4. WP:Battle
5. WP:Civil
6. WP:Tag team
7. WP:PA

Evidence of trying and failing to resolve the dispute

(Provide diffs of the comments. As with anywhere else on this RfC/U, links to entire articles aren't helpful unless the editor created the entire article. Edit histories also aren't helpful as they change as new edits are performed.)

Attempts by Phoenix and Winslow

• This contains an extended conversation between Xenophrenic and me on the Talk:Tea Party movement page on April 17-25.

• This contains an extended conversation between Xenophrenic and me on the Talk:Tea Party movement/Moderated discussion page on May 12-13. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 07:32, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Attempts by certifier Malke 2010

• This is a conversation with Xenophrenic on Tea Party movement talk page:
• This discussion on Xenophrenic's talk page regarding his behaviours on Arthur Rubin's talk page:
• Xenophrenic deleted part of the above conversation:

Malke 2010 (talk) 21:20, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Other attempts

Users certifying the basis for this dispute

{Users who tried and failed to resolve the dispute}

1. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 07:32, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Malke 2010 (talk) 21:12, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Other users who endorse this summary

{Anyone is welcome to endorse this or any other view, but do not change other people's views. RFC/U does not accept "opposes" or "anti-endorsements"; the fact that you do not endorse a view indicates that you do not entirely agree with it.

1. This is correct. IMO there are other considerations (per my view below) but this is correct. After all of the research you did I'm sorry that I initially missed this...I thought that this was just the certification, and didn't notice that it was also a view to review & potentially endorse. North8000 (talk) 18:17, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
2. †TE†Talk 12:16, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
3. Darkstar1st (talk) 07:03, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Response 1 by Xenophrenic

I'd like to thank everyone who took the time to comment at this RFC/U. After reading the "Desired outcome" statement, I hoped this would be a great opportunity for some self-reflection and personal growth and improvement. The sheer volume of "evidence" produced at this page encouraged me that there would certainly be plenty of information I could use to help me make some constructive changes. So I dove in...

As I began to read through the compiled evidence, however, a disturbing trend started to emerge. I started seeing discrepancies in the "evidence" - it wasn't supporting what was being said about me. I decided to review every single diff and compare what was supposedly being shown with what was actually being shown. The contrast was startling.

• Examples intended to show that "he is a POV-pusher for a progressive POV" instead showed edits that pushed article content back toward a neutral middle. Reduction of one POV presence to promote NPOV was being misconstrued as promoting the opposite POV.
• Examples intended to show "he adds negative material to articles about conservative political figures and organizations" instead showed edits that stopped or reverted unbalanced removal and whitewashing of negative encyclopedic content from articles.
• Examples intended to show "he removes negative content about progressive political figures and organizations" instead showed edits that reverted unbalanced introduction of POV content, in order to move the article closer to NPOV.
• Examples intended to show "he achieves goals by being tendentious" instead showed tenaciousness, patience, thoroughness and persistence, but without the POV-pushing or disruption hallmarks of tendentiousness.
• Examples intended to show "edit warring to a limited extent (particularly the slow edit war technique, or tag teaming)" actually showed policy-compliant, productive editing - with similar unsolicited edits by other editors often being misconstrued as tag-teaming.

The discrepancies in the evidence were numerous, so many that I decided to make some brief notes about each item of evidence. Sometimes they were little issues, like claiming "you reverted 3 times in 10 hours" when it was over 3 days, or "you removed a reliable source because it was critical" when I had only removed a redundant copy, but left the original intact. Other times there were gross distortions of truth. Since I am not allowed to comment in the evidence section here, I've copied the evidence to a sandbox and added comments in green text, located here. I invite interested editors to review the evidence along with my associated comments, both sides of the story as it were, and come to your own informed determination. Does the evidence show tendentious editing, POV-pushing and severe problematic behavior, or does it show good faith editing toward a neutral point of view along with normal interactions, disagreements and discussions?

My summary observations:

1. The evidence given does not substantiate the alleged conduct described in the Statement of Dispute.
2. There is a tendency around here to mischaracterize every edit as an editwar; every action as tendentious; every question as argumentative; every agreement as tag-teaming.
3. Exclamations when discussing Misplaced Pages article subjects, such as "the most hated Democratic member of the House", "biggest scandals of the Obama Administration", "Democratic congressman who resigned in disgrace", "the less complimentary term 'left-leaning'", informs as much about the writer as it does about the subject matter.
4. Editors with preconceived negative opinions about another will likely see what they want to see, whether or not it actually exists.

Xenophrenic (talk) 18:05, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Casprings (talk) 19:24, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Individually, I think the response here is accurate. However, as noted on my talk page, I do think that when taken as a whole, Xenophrenic's edits demonstrate a battlefield behavior. -Nathan Johnson (talk) 19:38, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
3. --Ubikwit_{見学/迷惑} 07:48, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
4. Xenophrenic's subpage confirms in more detail what I concluded myself while checking the presented "evidence" in real-time.TMCk (talk) 19:11, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
5. — goethean 20:42, 31 May 2013 (UTC)

Views

This section is for statements or opinions written by users not directly involved with this dispute, but who would like to add a view of the dispute. Users should not edit other people's summaries or views, except to endorse them. RFC/U does not accept "opposes" or "anti-endorsements"; the fact that you do not endorse a view indicates that you do not entirely agree with it. All signed comments other than your own view or an endorsement should be directed to this page's discussion page. Users editing other sections ("Statement of the dispute" or "Response") should not normally edit this section, except to endorse another person's view.

view by Collect

There is neither doubt nor disagreement that User:Xenophrenic is an inveterate POV-pusher with tenacious editing habits. He seeks to make sure that people know how evil the Tea Party movement is, that it is racist, bigoted, homophobic etc. Unfortunately, this runs into WP:NPOV head-on. However, he has the right to delete warnings etc. from his user talk page under Misplaced Pages policy and guildelines, and that complaint does not really belong in an RfC/U.

Xenophrenic shows his POV in such other articles as Fahrenheit 9/11 , on Talk:Tea Party movement where he berates Arthur Rubin with a silly post , in the section "Interim remedy expected" which appears to be a bit of a noticeboard rant (Xeno appears to be a dramaboard regular complainant).

Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents/Tea_Party_movement;_looking_for_community_input shows my utter lack of animus here.

The proper result should be for Xenophrenic to acknowledge his problem with following WP:NPOV when making edits on political pages, for him to read up on Dale Carnegie and not to act like Misplaced Pages is, or ought to be, a battleground of any sort, to understand that we need to look at entire articles, and not seek to add material based on any personal point of view about the topic. And lastly to recognize that WP:CONSENSUS does not mean we end up with perfect articles - it means we end up with collegial agreement to accept stuff we may not really be in love with. Collect (talk) 14:12, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 01:44, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Malke 2010 (talk) 04:16, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
3. This is basically right with respect to Xenophrenic. Although I doubt anyone has clean hand in this topic. Stones, glass houses and all. -Nathan Johnson (talk) 16:39, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
4. Although I'm clearly biased, in that X has claimed that I've personally attacked him when pointing out his tendentious edits, this seems an appropriate comment. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:38, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
5. This is true. (Though not the whole story....my post below has some things I like about Xenophrenic) I'm adding my name here so that Xenophrenic starts to really consider this, NOT to get something done by others. North8000 (talk) 11:08, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
6. †TE†Talk 13:31, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
7. Darkstar1st (talk) 07:04, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
8. Capitalismojo (talk) 14:50, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Outside view by North8000

I've had an immense amount of interaction with and observation of Xenophrenic. For reasons which I will explain, I LIKE them, but I am also blunt and direct in a hopefully friendly way. These are just my opinions drawn from all of this; feel free to discount or ignore them. I say it as half complaint and half admiration that I consider them to be the most relentless, prolific, effective POV'er with-a-purpose of anyone I've had the occasion to observe in Misplaced Pages. The efforts I've seen have always been towards the same end of the political spectrum. IMHO they are the person who most comes to mind as the ultimate expert at achieving goals through tendentious editing. The one unique area that comes to mind when I say "relentless", is that this even extends to refactoring, relabeling and rearranging talk page items. The reason I like them is because they seem to have no meanness or nastiness in them, which in my book makes them several levels better than a whole lot of cleverly nasty and harmful people that I routinely see in Misplaced Pages. Xenophrenic does not "go after" people, they don't try to mis-use Wikipedian systems to "get" people, and are seldom or never really nasty in conversations. I think that this is a part of why they are so effective at doing what I describe above. In them I have also seen glimpses of a desire to prioritize creating quality in articles which gives me hope. I am participating here to help in some leaning on Xenophrenic to modify the behavior in question. This is NOT NOT to get action taken against them. Again, the above is my opinions drawn from history. Feel free to discount or ignore my opinions. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 18:15, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 01:45, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Malke 2010 (talk) 04:16, 24 May 2013 (UTC)
3. †TE†Talk 13:29, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
4. Darkstar1st (talk) 07:05, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment 1 by user:Casprings

There was no community support or much problem seen with user:Xenophrenic editing. There is an ongoing arbitration case in which many editors involved in the WP:RFC/U, including user:Xenophrenic, user: Malke 2010, user:Arthur Rubin, and user:North8000, are parties to. Editors should understand the full nature of this dispute by reviewing the interactions of the editors involved in this dispute. For example, one should should fully review the effort to look for community comment on the Tea Party Movement and the arbitration case the editors are involved in. Casprings (talk) 18:48, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. TMCk (talk) 20:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)
2. --Ubikwit_{見学/迷惑} 11:40, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
3. Agree with the first two sentences as FoF. Noting that I supported a topic ban on Xenophrenic in the first link. -Nathan Johnson (talk) 19:18, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
4. — goethean 13:29, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
5. Xenophrenic (talk) 16:22, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment 2 by user:Casprings

The evidence provided on the Tea Party movement, has already been examined by the Arbitration Committee. As of now, the draft finding of fact for User:Xenophrenic is:

Xenophrenic has edited Tea Party movement since March 2010, and is the second leading contributor with 397 edits - 63 of which have been reverts; 5 of which are identified as self-reverts or removing vandalism. Xenophrenic was blocked in 2011 for breaking community sanctions on Tea Party movement, and was blocked twice in 2007 and once in 2013 for edit warring on other articles. Xenophrenic has made 573 edits to the talkpage. There was no community support for a topic ban, Xenophrenic is not named as a party, and there is little evidence presented in the case to point to sanctions.

This summery is mostly correct.

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Only 1 substantive editwarring block, back in 2007, and Arbiters say I'm named without actually naming me, but otherwise accurate. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:46, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
2. TMCk (talk) 02:05, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Comment 3 by user:Casprings

The remaining, non-tea party evidence, are examples of good-faith content disputes. There is little or no evidence of a long term problem with edit waring. This is fully shown by user:Xenophrenic, here.

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:46, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
2. TMCk (talk) 01:54, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Outside view by 5.12.68.204

I was struck by the first piece of evidence provided by the certifiers above regarding "POV-pushing on other articles related to U.S. politics":

• Alan Grayson — Editwarred out a "however" statement in article mainspace by User:HangingCurve, explaining the circumstances of the return to Congress of Grayson, who is possibly the most <redacted> Democratic member of the House besides Nancy Pelosi. The appropriate solution would have been a "citation needed" tag. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 01:12, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

So Xenophrenic removed from a WP:BLP two incarnations of a statement which was unsourced, had a somewhat disparaging tone towards the subject, and was advancing a theory. Insofar (in over a month) none of the editors concerned with the removal of these edits have provided sources for that content. Furthermore, the same certifier berated Xenophrenic for supposedly writing with a POV in between the "Huffington Post and MSNBC". In that paradigm, the certifiers of this RfC/U seem to expect Misplaced Pages to be Written with a POV resembling WorldNetDaily if not Conservapedia, given how they've managed to state their own views about a couple of US politicians ("most hated") in this very RfC/U... 5.12.68.204 (talk) 13:04, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Note 1: "Most hated" was removed after my initial view was posted. 5.12.68.204 (talk) 16:18, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Note 2: The certifer has further modified his original statement without changing the timestamp . 5.12.68.204 (talk) 17:36, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Casprings (talk) 02:21, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
2. --Ubikwit_{見学/迷惑} 11:41, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
3. — goethean 12:55, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
4. Support up to, but not including, the sentence starting with "Furthermore, the same certifier..." This isn't a RFCU on the certifiers. Removing unsourced, contentious material from BLPs should be encouraged. Adding a {{Citation needed}} template is not a solution. -Nathan Johnson (talk) 19:29, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
5. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:38, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
6. Endorse in regard this edit only, without any implication or inference that any of X's other edits were in line. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 03:38, 2 June 2013 (UTC)
7. Edit actually shows a move to NPOV so endorse.TMCk (talk) 01:58, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

View by Ubikwit

I see this as by and large being overspill from the stalled Arbcom case on the TPm article. Since I withdrew from the largely partisan "moderated discussion" there, Xenophrenic is basically the lone voice arguing for an NPOV reflecting all points of view found in RS, whereas others have consistently and relentlessly argued to exclude any and all reliably sourced material that could be seen as exposing a negative aspect of the TPm. I don't see that Xenophrenic's behavior has exceeded the general scope of editor interaction on the contentious topic on the moderated discussion page, and since the Arbcom case is pending, I don't see the point of filling this RFC/U now.--Ubikwit_{見学/迷惑} 11:58, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. 100% agreement until the last sentence. I see the RFC/U as a form of information exchange, which in most cases can only be a good thing. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:38, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Casprings (talk) 00:29, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
3. — goethean 13:27, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
4. In terms of content, I agree only with the first sentence, and as to Ubikwit's assertions about his own actions. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 02:59, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
5. TMCk (talk) 03:03, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

View by ThinkEnemies

I'd like address this from a different angle, if I may. Judging by both the evidence presented against Xeno and his explanations -- What jumps out at me are two things.

• First, Xeno shows no desire for anything that resembles compromise. Period. I wikilinked compromise because this concept may very well be foreign to him. All that other stuff about edit warring and POV-pushing, which is true, takes a backseat to this underlying issue.

• Second, there's a clear desire on Xeno's part to use certain pages as a venue to disparage his political opposition. What a better place than the top of Google results? I'm sure right about now you'd love to see dozens of diffs to substantiate my claims. Well, I have neither the time nor patience to dig back years just to prove a point. This is my personal opinion expressed, based on my personal observations. It was my opinion when I decided to walk away from this project and sadly, not much has since changed.

Since Xeno would like this RfC to initiate some self-reflection and personal growth and improvement within himself, perhaps he should answer a simple question.

This process originated from the Tea Party Movement, so let's stay there:

Have you made a legitimate effort to improve TPM in both appearance and readability, as an article and more importantly, as an encyclopedic account -- Or, have you focused like a laser on just the controversies section for the purpose of giving negatives their place and most importantly, to prevent a whitewashing of said negatives?

Pretty sure everyone can tell which answer I'd accept as being an honest, self-reflection on Xeno's part.

Herein lies the problem. Xeno's active everyday on Misplaced Pages. I'm sure most would see this as a good thing. But, how many potential editors are dissuaded by his unsavory behavior? Me being one. †TE†Talk 00:19, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. I am also one of those editors who basically gave up editing an article for the above Darkstar1st (talk) 07:09, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Yes, this is an accurate appraisal. Capitalismojo (talk) 14:46, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
3. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:29, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
4. No doubt. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 02:55, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

View by darkstar1st

Here Xenophrenic requested i be topic banned at ANI, but gave no reason, nor difs, even after being asked by an admin . Much like his efforts to stop this rfc/u, Xenophrenic attempts to game the system by using a barrage of edits/actions and walls of text to overwhelm/silence editors who oppose his pov. Darkstar1st (talk) 07:21, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. I agree that Xenophrenic's addition of Darkstar1st to that list of proposed bans appears an underhanded move by Xenophrenic, considering that Darkstar1st's name had not even been mentioned by anyone on ANI up to that point, and also considering that the proposal contained nothing beyond a heading, i.e. not even a signature. I don't endorse the rest of this statement, because this RfC/U was poorly supported by diffs at its start. However, I agree that a more collaborative approach by Xenophrenic would have been better in that respect. The talk page contains some discussion on this issue. 5.12.68.204 (talk) 12:50, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Outside view 2 by 5.12.68.204

The certifiers' evidence contains:

• Anthony Weiner and Anthony Weiner sexting scandal — removing sourced material from articles about a former Democratic congressman who resigned in disgrace. He removed a reliably sourced quotation of Weiner's own explanation of his behavior: — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 22:46, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

The purported reliable source , which reads more like a trashing political pamphlet to me, does not even contain the putative quote from Weiner that it was supposed to support. It does contain some other quotes from Weiner, but nothing resembling the text added to Misplaced Pages. 5.12.68.204 (talk) 12:27, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Interesting, every time I looked into the sourcing of text in the TPm article I found similar discrepancies.--Ubikwit_{見学/迷惑} 13:08, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Sixteen different Misplaced Pages articles have been listed in 'evidence' as locations where alleged problematic behavior has occurred. Closer examination, as you've done here and in your previous View/Comment, show the allegation to be false. The same will be found across all 16 sample articles. I'm far from a perfect editor, but allegations that my behavior is tendentious or POV-pushing remain groundless. This fact, unfortunately, will not disuade a particular contingent of editors from repeating/Supporting the accusation endlessly. Xenophrenic (talk) 16:22, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
3. endorse this view of discrepancies.TMCk (talk) 03:06, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Outside view 2 by North8000

When there are forums about general behavior, examples can be used to deceive or inform. I consider it immensely important to determine which it is, and all too often this never happens on forums about general behavior. "Deceive" is done by cherrypicking exceptions (sometimes deceptively out of context, or with a spun descriptions). and then essentially implying that the exceptions "show" that the false assertion is true. The "inform" case is when they are used to reinforce an accurate assertion. There are ways to tell them apart. One is by the assessed sincerity and/or established credibility (or lack thereof) of the "asserter". Another is by close objective analysis a large quantity of evidence. A good test is what direction does it go as you objectively look close and close and at more examples. Does it go towards bearing out the assertions, or towards showing them to be groundless? This RFC/U should be unhurried and thorough to take the "closer and closer" look. IMHO, this is a case where the evidence informs and supports the general assertions and concerns about behavior expressed. A huge volume of evidence was presented. And IMHO the closer and more thorough the look, the more it supports the expressed concerns. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 21:18, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:29, 31 May 2013 (UTC)
2. Interesting point. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 02:57, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
3. There is a clear pattern. †TE†Talk 16:22, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

Outside view by The Magnificent Clean-keeper

I actually posted this at the talkpage first but then realized it is an ouside view that could and should be posted here.

Lots of accusations were made against the RFC/U's subject, Xenophrenic, but the evidence at the project page is little to non, not standing up to the slightest scrutiny. As I pointed out in my endorsing of Xenophrenic's view (Response 1 by Xenophrenic), the examples given by PW are ridiculous, in part false, mostly wrongly declared and not convincing at all as one could take any editor's edits to the same scrutiny and tilt it against them if one chooses so, but that doesn't make them true and only stick if one doesn't take the time to check the accusations made and the links that supposed to back them up. Also blunt accusations were made here on this talk w/o back-up in form of diffs or otherwise which makes me think this is more of a "witch hunt" than a proper RFC/U. Maybe there are some merits to it but so far they were not presented. What was presented are mere opinionated accusations. Unless the addressed points are corrected and true proof of the alleged improper tendency of the subject is added as evidence, this RFC/U has no merit and should be closed rather sooner than later and marked as frivolous and disrupting as it, so far, only used up plenty of time, w/o real cause so far, that could've been used to make constructive edits in article space by all involved/commenting parties, incl. myself. RFC/U's are not there to pick a "random" user editing against ones own point of view in an article where they have a dispute. (Of course I'm talking about the Tea Party which basically triggered the user to file this RFC/U). Also I have to note that almost every endorsement "against" Xenophrenic is made by editors opposed to Xenophrenic's point of view at the Tea party pages/discussions and were canvassed by the initiator. Thank you for those who are truly listening and thinking it thru.TMCk (talk) 04:53, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Me of course.TMCk (talk) 04:53, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
2. --Ubikwit_{見学/迷惑} 06:48, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
3. --TFD (talk) 16:38, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
4. In a nutshell. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:46, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
5. Casprings (talk) 20:12, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
6. The "evidence" about Guenter Lewy pushed me over edge. See below for details. I think now this RfC/U is itself tendentious and advise other editors to scrutiny the evidence further. 5.12.68.204 (talk) 21:32, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

Outside view 3 by 5.12.68.204

The evidence further contains:

• Guenter Lewy — Reverted the removal of the word "controversial" to describe the author's works in the lede paragraph. In several of his works, Lewy has generally been critical of anti-war activists and authors, describing some opponents to the Vietnam War as a "war crime industry." This is a very small example of adding negative content to articles about persons and organizations he perceives as conservative. — Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:03, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

What Xenophrenic did was to revert the deletion from the lead of the word "controversial" as describing the works of Lewy about genocide. There is a large section in the article detailing how Lewy basically denies that the Armenian genocide took place . If those works of Lewy are not controversial, then how comes Misplaced Pages has an article called Armenian genocide, when the allegedly uncontroversial works of Lewy say it was not a "real" genocide? (See quote in the article.) 5.12.68.204 (talk) 21:37, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary:

1. Casprings (talk) 21:43, 1 June 2013 (UTC)
2. I'll endorse that one, single revert of IP address edit by Xeno. But it's not exactly worthy of a cookie, now is IT? †TE†Talk 03:15, 2 June 2013 (UTC)
3. Endorse what I would've changed myself but was a bit to late.TMCk (talk) 03:11, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Discussion of this view or other people's endorsements belongs on the talk page, not in this section.

Reminder to use the talk page for discussion

Anyone is welcome to endorse any view, but do not change other people's views. RFC/U does not accept "opposes" or "anti-endorsements"; the fact that you do not endorse a view indicates that you do not entirely agree with it. All threaded replies to another user's vote, endorsements, evidence, responses, and other signed comments and talk not related to an endorsement should be directed to this page's discussion page.