Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive83

Arbitration enforcement action appeal by Twilight Chill

Appeal declined. Nine days later, the only thing that is clear is that there's no "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" to overturn the sanction. T. Canens (talk) 06:32, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found in this 2010 ArbCom motion. According to that motion, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action.
To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).

Appealing user: Twilight Chill (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – Twilightchill t 00:38, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sanction being appealed: 1-year topic ban from the Armenia-Azerbaijan topic field, imposed at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Twilight Chill

Administrator imposing the sanction: Sandstein (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Notification of that administrator: [1]

Statement by Twilight Chill

In the light of the request's result and the sanction, imposed on me, I would like to clarify my editing at Caucasian Albania (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), which became the page in question. On January 31 a single-purpose account of Gorzaim (talk · contribs) added without discussion a lengthy controversial section titled "Caucasian Albania and Azerbaijani historical revisionism", an obvious violation of WP:NPOV. Although I indicated that problem in the edit summary when reverting, the contested section has been repeatedly restored with groundless edit summaries, particularly by another single-purpose account, Vandorenfm. Aside from WP:ICANTHEARYOU, I believe that such actions fall under provocation as described in Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2#Provocation (particularly, given the wording used in the aforementioned contested section, added by Gorzaim). As per WP:EW, "reverting to enforce certain overriding policies is not considered edit warring". I consider WP:NPOV, which is one of WP's three core content policies, to be among those overriding policies. Within that ramification and given that there was no 3RR violation from my side (which could be verified through Caucasian Albania page history), I believe that the sanction I was subjected to could be lifted or modified. Twilightchill t 00:45, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Sandstein

TwilightChill (previously editing as Brandmeister (talk · contribs)) argues that because the content he edit-warred to remove, [2], violated WP:NPOV, his repeated removal of it was not edit-warring. I disagree. Insufficient neutrality is not among the limited exceptions, WP:EW#3RR exemptions, to the rule prohibiting edit warring. This is because reasonable people can disagree about what is neutral and what is not. Therefore, edit-warring is not an acceptable mode of resolving disputes about neutrality. This is particularly so in the instant case. While the content at issue may well be non-neutral (I know nothing about the subject matter and can't evaluate that), it is not non-neutral on its face, as would be a text in the vein of "All [Armenis/Azerbaijanis] are liars and manipulate history to suit their nefarious purposes." This makes it even less appropriate to resolve a dispute about its inclusion by edit-warring rather than by way of discussion, especially in a topic area and by a user subject to discretionary sanctions. I therefore recommend that this appeal be declined. Sandstein 07:20, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I do agree that "edit-warring is not an acceptable mode of resolving disputes about neutrality." However, I respectfully disagree with seeing things in the context that the chapter in question is "non-neutral on its face, as would be a text in the vein of "All [Armenis/Azerbaijanis] are liars and manipulate history to suit their nefarious purposes." Azerbaijani revisionism regarding Caucasian Albania is a well established academic subject, as seen when viewing the sources that are brought to support the arguments made. The text is NPOV (although needs some extra work to make it more so), as there are no any neutral sources which would praise/support Azerbaijani efforts to manipulate history on this subject or disprove claims made. It is not surprising that Twilight Chill had to resort to naked edit war - he or anyone else would have no counter-arguments, because there are none. Manipulation of history is a state sponsored affair in Azerbaijan which is enforced by the government. Historians who do not comply risk ruining their careers. See the work of Antoon de Baets called "Censorship of historical thought: a world guide," 1945—2000. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002. de Baets writes: «In December 1994 historian Movsum Aliyev was arrested for insulting President Heidar Aliyev in a September 1993 article he wrote for the newspaper Azadliq, entitled "The Answer to the Falsifiers of History." He was held in an overcrowded prison in Baku for several months before his release in February 1995. In 19 % or 1997, the Ganja local government confiscated all 2,400 copies of a book about the nineteenth-century Russian occupation of Ganja.» Mass, state-sponsored falsification of history does happen in autocratic states. Virtually ALL Soviet historians were required to falsify history of the revolution and Stalinist era. ALL Nazi-era historians in Germany were required to support racist interpretation of world history. In many Arabic countries it is required to falsify the history of Palestine, etc. China is an example too. Therefore it is not UNREASONABLE to believe that most Azerbaijani historians MAY either falsify history or practice self-censorship. This is not about "nefarious purposes" of Azerbaijani scholars but about a well-researched issue of state-enforced bias. We should avoid making sweeping generalizations and should be careful about speaking in plural but mass, well-documented phenomena well-explained by reputable neutral sources is another matter. Gorzaim (talk) 19:30, 8 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Grandmaster

I agree that Twilight Chill was absolutely right by removing an extremely POV section, and by removing it Twilight Chill was trying to protect the integrity of Wikipedia as a reliable source of information. It should be noted that the sources that are used as references for the removed section contain plenty of info about Armenian revisionism, but the fact that the section is titled "Azerbaijani revisionism" and it has nothing about Armenian revisionist authors shows how biased the removed info was. I see no point in adding to the article information that has no direct relation to the ancient state of Albania, and especially when it is done in such biased and prejudiced manner, when only info attacking one country is picked, and negative info about the other is suppressed. In general, wikipedia is not a place for WP:ATTACK articles and sections in the articles, so I think that Twilight Chill was right by removing irrelevant info, and personally I don't find any sanctions to be appropriate here. Grandmaster 09:23, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Twilight Chill was wrong to engage in edit war, as per several comments here, and was wrong in his position regarding the chapter he tried to remove. Any article on Caucasian Albania should include a chapter of how knowledge about it is manipulated at least because those interested are entitled/warned to know that primary and secondary sources on C.Albania are manipulated, and why. This has nothing to do with WP:ATTACK, but with the state of knowledge on C.Albania. Also, unlike with situation regarding other historical subjects, C.Albania - as obscure as this topic is - is known in modern academia primarily because it is a politically-manipulated area of ancient history. Would an article about falsification of German history in Nazi Germany be an WP:ATTACK article? NO. Please feel free to add to the article if you feel it is incomplete. Vandorenfm (talk) 20:19, 9 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How come that the section says nothing about Armenian revisionism, even if it receives equal coverage in the sources quoted in the article? Plus, even the admins here agreed that it is very far from NPOV. I see no reason for such a POV section to be in the article, especially considering that it was added without any consensus with other involved editors. It is a clear violation of WP:ATTACK, WP:NPOV, etc. I suggest we reach a consensus first with participation of neutral editors, and only after that we can add to the article. In the present form the section cannot be included, as it damages the reliability of Wikipedia as a source of information. Grandmaster 08:36, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also, I have suspicions about the new accounts that make controversial edits to the article about Caucasian Albania. There was a large group of sock accounts banned from Wikipedia for edit warring in the same article. It is enough to check the history of the article. Now we have a group of brand new accounts that try to introduce the same POV. This tag team edit warring is highly suspicious. Most of the accounts listed here and here were active on the same article. I think the article about Albania should be carefully watched by the admins due to its troubled history. Grandmaster 08:44, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by (involved editor 2)

Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by Twilight Chill

Why don't administrators just be honest and admit that because of these Armenia-Azerbaijan remedies and enforcements, EVERY editor who regularly edits articles that fall under its sanctions will eventually be topic banned. Are these Armenia-Azerbaijan remedies and enforcements in any measurable way increasing the quality of the articles? If they are not, be rid of them. Have the actually become a self-defeating parody, a weapon in an endless POV war, used by one "side" to eliminate (for months, or years, or even for ever) editors seen as belonging to the other "side"? If that is all they are, be rid of them. Scribblescribblescribble (talk) 00:01, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe once every POV pusher from both sides is banned, civilised editing by those who can do it from NPOV can begin, thus eventualy leading to better articles. - BorisG (talk) 15:39, 8 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Fedayee

I think it is very ironic that Grandmaster of all people talks about the preservation of the integrity of Wikipedia when he has run a mailing list which was in clear opposition of that integrity. Also note that Grandmaster had recenlty no contribution other than jumping right in there to revert to Brandmeister's version, reverting someone on Duduk on the generally recognized position that the Duduk was originally an Armenian instrument and filing another CU. Regarding the given section that he has removed (effectively meatpuppeting for a user who was topic banned for one year), there is little if any POV in that section besides maybe its title. What is reported there is a generally accepted fact including by pro-Azeri authors such as De Waal. - Fedayee (talk) 06:00, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fedayee, I am commenting here in my admin capacity: do you have evidence for your allegation that Grandmaster has has run a mailing list to compromise Wikipedia's integrity, and that he was "meatpuppeting for a user who was topic banned for one year"? Sandstein 10:03, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I believe they are referring to ru:Википедия:Заявки на арбитраж/Азербайджанский список рассылки,. T. Canens (talk) 16:47, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I was refering to the link provided but not only that. In the content of the mailing list studied in the Russian Wikipedia, we read a reference on an English mailing list regarding the English Wikipedia. Someone uploaded also what appears to be a Facebook exchange. The limited exchange available shows that what was reported during the first Arbcom (English wiki, not Russian) case was accurate and that there was off-Wiki coordination which resulted into the AA. Another piece of information is that the articles which were targeted in the Russian mailing list were also targetted in the English Wikipedia at about the same dates.

To note also that the new users which Grandmaster refers to here appear to be from the Russian Wikipedia because that section of the article comes from there. They weren't just added out of nowhere... Sockuppetry should only be suspected when something fishy happens that can not be explained from current conflicts on the Russian Wikipedia. The most active Armenian users on English Wikipedia are not active on Russian Wikipedia, when the same cannot be said about the Azeri users. That's why when conflicts from the Russian Wikipedia are brought here, you see a spate of new users from one side because most of the time they do not have an account here. I am not saying that this explains all accounts, but that may offer some kind of explanation.

For the content of the mailing lists and the other discussions about English Wikipedia, I don't think I can provide them here but I would do it in private for the requesting admins. - Fedayee (talk) 19:41, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Admins are ill-suited to handle this kind of material; it should be sent directly to arbcom via arbcom-l

lists.wikimedia.org. T. Canens (talk) 06:18, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result of the appeal by Twilight Chill

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

This is a difficult case. Unlike Sandstein, I'm satisfied that the text at issue, at least in part, amounts to a violation of WP:NPOV. It contains sweeping generalizations on Azerbaijanis and "Azerbaijani scholars" ("A key revisionist method used by Azerbaijani scholars mentioned by Victor Schnirelmann and others was ”re-publishing of ancient and medieval sources, where the term “Armenian state” was routinely and systematically removed and replaced with “Albanian state.”" and "Azerbaijanis have been “renaming prominent medieval Armenian political leaders, historians and writers, who lived in Karabakh and Armenia into “Albanians.”"), which I think is very close to Sandstein's example of "All [Armenis/Azerbaijanis] are liars and manipulate history to suit their nefarious purposes".
I agree with Sandstein, however, that NPOV is not an exemption to the edit warring policy, and therefore the conduct at issue is sanctionable. Nonetheless, were I reviewing the matter in the first instance, I might well have exercised my discretion to select a lesser sanction given my conclusion on the NPOV issue. But what I would have done is a very different question from whether Sandstein exceeded his discretion in imposing the sanction. I don't think he did, and therefore must reluctantly conclude, my reservations above notwithstanding, that the appeal should be declined. T. Canens (talk) 18:15, 7 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Night w

No action at this time. EdJohnston (talk) 16:01, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Request concerning Night w

User requesting enforcement: Arctic Night 23:12, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: Night w (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Palestine-Israel articles#General 1RR restriction

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

[3] First reversion
[4] Second reversion, and violation of the 1RR (note: while the user asks to 'discuss this first', the user has reverted to the version that agrees with his/her point of view, not a neutral version).

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

Not applicable - WP:1RR is not really possible to warn about...

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): Not sure - I'm uninvolved here, and just noticed it as I was browsing around.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint: While reversion of vandalism obviously does not fall under the WP:1RR, this user was not reverting bad faith edits, despite claims to be doing so in the user's edit summary. In fact, the user was 'reverting' to a version that agreed with his/her point of view, rather than a neutral version (a neutral revision was requested by the other party to the dispute, to no avail - this user simply reverted to a POV version instead).

This also may be useful here - this is a discussion during which I believe Night w is attempting to defend his or her actions (not entirely sure though).

As an uninvolved user, I felt it right to report this here. I'm not sure whether Night w was in the right or not here, but I felt that the issue should at least be looked at.

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: Notified at 23:17, 10 February 2011. Arctic Night 23:18, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion concerning Night w

Statement by Night w

Disclaimer: I am fully aware of the 1RR policy concerning this page, and admit that I have violated this. This issue relates to a recent ANI discussion (here), and a new one (here). Nightw 06:29, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The page in question is one that is primarily edited by only two editors, myself and one Alinor (talk · contribs). Unfortunately, we rarely see eye-to-eye, and my actions on this page have been regrettable on numerous occasions in the past. Regarding the recent actions in question:

Both reverts made within the 24-hour period concerned the same material.
Both reverts undid repeated changes by Alinor that were under ongoing discussion on the talk page, and that were repeated without consensus.
Both reverts undid repeated changes by Eliko (talk · contribs) that were scrutinised under two ANI discussions (see links above), a TfD nomination, that were made during ongoing discussion at the OR noticeboard, and that were repeated without consensus.
Both reverts were to a stable version from a period in which only minor edits were made for six days, so that ongoing discussion could reach a conclusion.

I admit to violating 1RR, and I'll accept whatever consequences arises from that. Having said that, with only two other users involved in editing that page, I'm at a loss trying to keep that article stable, and the situation called for reverting to a stable version, and for discussion to take place on the talk page. Nightw 06:29, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others about the request concerning Night w

Night w, both of us were involved in back and forth editing, yes. But I see that you continue to push for your undiscussed or non-consensus changes and even claim that they are the "stable version". Just because I refrained from reverting your edits for a few days while I waited for you to use the Talk:Foreign relations of the Palestinian National Authority and Talk:State of Palestine where many of the sections were "waiting" for your input. Please stop claiming that a version pushing your edits is "stable". On both articles you don't agree with some of my changes and I don't agree with some of your changes; if you insist you can revert to a version with NEITHER, not to a version with your changes that I don't agree. Such versions are for Foreign relations - [5] (see my 13:20, 10 February 2011 comment at the talk page there) and for SoP - [6] (Or some version before that - such that doesn't include neither your nor mine changes that the other side doesn't agree with). Of course, reverting to those versions will not be the best solution (as they have some imperfections that we both agree that should be corrected) - but we don't have another option if you continue to refuse to discuss at the talk pages. I would be happy to discuss on the talk page while the article is presented in "your version" - if you were admitting that it's not "stable/consensus". But since you continue to claim that your unilateral changes are "stable/consensus" (and even try to use the time I refrained from reverting them as proof that they are such) I suggest that both articles are immediately reverted to a real stable version (without neither your nor mine changes). Separately there is the issue with the Eliko sources that I really don't understand why you object so furiously. Alinor (talk) 10:17, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a separate issue, since you've incorporated it into your own edits that you've repeated without consensus, or even a discussion in attempt to attain one. Considering that there is an active discussion on the OR noticeboard about this issue, overriding that discussion before consensus can be achieved is a massive violation of policy, and an insult to every editor that is involved in trying to achieve a consensus there. Nightw 10:42, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The Eliko sources are a separate issue. I incorporated these into my edits, just as I incorporate your edits that I agree with. Eliko added them to the page and in the next of my edits I retained them (because I agree with their inclusion).

The main problem is your claims that your version is the stable version. I suggest that you and I don't make any edits to these two articles, make a list of all changes (compared to the real stable versions), discuss and hopefully agree (with the involvement of another editors maybe - as Chipmunkdavis suggests below), then implement only what's discussed, then we will know what the "new stable" version is, then we can discuss further changes. Alinor (talk) 07:24, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oh no! The page is wrong! I suggest that instead of any editor undergoing blocking, the article(s) be fully protected for awhile and the dispute taken into some form of dispute resolution such as an RFC or 3rd opinion. I personally don't see the discussion just between these two editors going very far here, especially due to the situation. Probably a good idea if both post their argument, back off, and cool down. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 13:16, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- I agree with Chipmunkdavis. I'm not familiar with the article in question but I've seen these two at work at State of Palestine, and blocking one or both of them won't help. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 07:55, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reverting is only half the problem. Since it's such a contentious topic, the other half is making undiscussed changes that the other more often that not fails to identify as improvements. I suggest that we (meaning Alinor and myself) should be required to propose all changes that are likely to be challenged before we bring them to the article, as most changes we make seem to end up being discussed anyway, no matter how minor. If Alinor can agree to this, we can get things working quite efficiently. Nightw 11:57, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I currently refrain from editing these two articles and expect to do so until the current batch of "issues" is resolved. Of course I agree to discuss changes on the talk pages (there are plenty of open discussions already). And OK, for future changes we can first discuss before implementing (I'm hesitating to say "all future changes" - sometimes it's obvious that there will be no objections - for example when somebody finds a source for "Ramallah mission of country XXX"...). I hope the "stable version" issue is also clarified - see my comment above. Alinor (talk) 13:51, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Great. Nightw 19:05, 14 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Night w

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Alinor and Night w are the two main contributors to Foreign relations of the Palestinian National Authority, with 270 edits each. They both seem to be well-intentioned, but their constant warring is why they are here. Since this is a contentious article which falls under I/P, I recommend that both of them be topic banned from the article for one month, while they can still contribute on the talk page. Before this closes, if they can make a credible proposal for how to work together in the future, this action might be avoided. For example, an RFC, an agreement to always talk before reverting, an agreement on how to format references, etc. I suggest we allow 24 hours for this miracle to occur, and then decide. EdJohnston (talk) 17:35, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Concur with EdJohnston. AGK [•] 14:32, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Since Night w and Alinor seem to have moderated their tone, and may be willing to compromise, I am closing with no action. Admins may keep Foreign relations of the Palestinian National Authority on their watch list to be sure the problem does not recur. EdJohnston (talk) 15:59, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Grandmaster

No personal sanctions against Grandmaster. Caucasian Albania is now under article-level sanctions, which addresses the problem. EdJohnston (talk) 16:21, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Request concerning Grandmaster

User requesting enforcement: Vandorenfm (talk) 21:15, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: Grandmaster (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: Presumed to be the AA2 discretionary sanctions - Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2#Amended Remedies and Enforcement. AGK [•] 17:18, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

[7] Unexplained accusations of POV accompanied by revert
[8] Unexplained accusations of POV accompanied by revert
[9] Removed an entire section in an article, repeating action of a user who was banned for that very set of actions; possibly “sneaky vandalism” as described in Types of Vandalism
[10] Removed an entire section in an article, repeating action of a user who was banned for that very set of actions; possibly “sneaky vandalism” as described in Types of Vandalism
[11] Accompanied his removal of an entire section in article by rude commentary featuring unfounded accusations of propaganda
[12] Pressed accusations of sock puppetry despite documented evidence to the contrary

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

> Warning by Vandorenfm (talk · contribs)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): block

Additional comments by editor filing complaint

The case concerns User:Grandmaster, who was recently banned from editing Russian wiki for 6 months, with subsequent topic ban for another 6 months when the first ban expires this year. Admins of Russian wiki identified User:Grandmaster as a mastermind behind a virtual organization in which he coordinated actions of a dozen of Azerbaijani editors to edit multiple articles in Azerbaijani/Armenian topic area [13].

There is some evidence that User:Grandmaster may similarly be part of such virtual organization in English wiki. Here User:Quantum666 posted a message to Grandmaster under "Shusha/Shushi" seeking his involvement [14]. User:Quantum666 was part of the Russian wiki cabal that Grandmaster allegedly managed, and was indefinitely banned by Russian admins [15].

User:Twilight Chill, also known as User: Brandmeister was User:Grandmaster’s yet another alleged partner in the cabal in Russian wiki, and was banned for such involvement [16]. User:Grandmaster replaced User:Twilight Chill in edit warring and removal of an entire chapter in the article Caucasian Albania when User:Twilight Chill got topic-banned in English wiki for one year for such unexplained reverts. Grandmaster’s decision to support User:Twilight Chill’s actions in Caucasian Albania may represent additional evidence that both are part of such organization in English wiki as well. User: Twilight Chill aka Brandmeister has been banned from editing any topics related to Armenia/Azerbaijan in Russian wiki [17].

User:Twilight Chill’s and, hence indirectly, Grandmaster’s actions, were censured by the sysop/admin User:John Vandenberg who wrote to User: Twilight Chill: “Twilight Chill, wrt your NPOV concerns, edit warring and removal of entire sections isn't appropriate. Historical revisionism is relevant to Caucasian Albania” [18].

In violation of AA2#Category:Wikipedia_sockpuppeteers [19], Grandmaster posted baseless accusations of sockpuppetry [20], disregarding the fact that several times such connection has already been declined by sockpuppetry investigations [21], [22], [23].

In the past Grandmaster was subjected to the following restrictions regarding reverts:

Revert parole [24]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: The requesting user is asked to notify the user against whom this request is directed of it, and then to replace this text with a diff of that notification. The request will normally not be processed otherwise.

[25]

Discussion concerning Grandmaster

Statement by Grandmaster

I don't really understand what I'm being accused of here. Whatever happened in the Russian wiki has nothing to do with en:wiki, it is a completely different project. Plus, I'm not banned there anymore, and back to normal editing. I can name editors who are permanently banned in other wikis, but edit here, and vice versa, and don't remember anyone ever being punished in en:wiki for misconduct in other wikis. As for 1 year revert limitation in en:wiki 4 years ago, it was imposed on all active editors in AA articles at the time, I never violated it, and it is long over for everyone. I have no history of blocks, bans, etc in en:wiki since 2007, that is for many years. I don't find my reverting to be excessive, especially comparing with 4 rvs in Caucasian Albania by the editor who filed this complaint and countless rvs by other accounts who supported him. For instance, the account of Oliveriki (talk · contribs), whose only contribution is 3 rvs in AA covered articles. And it is really strange that I'm accused of reverting extreme POV edits by the banned user Rjbronn. Also note that I was one of the main contributors to Caucasian Albania article for many years, which is obvious by look at talk and history of the article. Of course, I have that article in my watch list and follow what's going on there from time to time. I don't find this to be a good faith report. I see no diffs of any controversial edits by me, or mass edit warring across multiple articles, or anything of the kind that would require some drastic measures against me, especially blocking, as Vandorenfm requests. Of course, it is up to the admins to decide, I always abode by their decisions. Grandmaster 22:07, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others about the request concerning <Grandmaster>

I support Grandmaster in this case as Vandorenfm is most noticeable for adding ONLY Armenian based references in disputed articles, then bragging about how people are against him. Enough to check his contributions.--NovaSkola (talk) 21:28, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Please note that your statement "adding ONLY Armenian based references in disputed articles" is factually untrue in its entirety. Vandorenfm (talk) 21:34, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Grandmaster

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

I did close this as inactionable because the arbitration remedies it was being alleged had been violated were not named. I presume the decision in question is the AA2 discretionary sanctions: Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2#Amended Remedies and Enforcement. AGK [•] 17:18, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Grandmaster's actions that are mentioned in this complaint are all about Caucasian Albania (except for an issue about possible socking, which anyone can report at SPI). Now that Sandstein has placed Talk:Caucasian_Albania#Discretionary sanctions, Grandmaster is no longer able to edit that article. (He is one of the editors sanctioned under the original WP:ARBAA decision). Since this appears to take care of the only specific problem mentioned in this complaint, the issue can be closed. Since Vandorenfm does not yet have much of a positive record with AA articles, I recommend that he try to work for a while as a content contributor and try to avoid the admin forums. EdJohnston (talk) 16:18, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

NPz1

No action here. Editor has been indef blocked as a sock, per WP:Sockpuppet investigations/MUCHERS22. EdJohnston (talk) 16:27, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Disregard. Blocked and tagged already.Cptnono (talk) 06:57, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User:NPz1 recently began editing in the topic area. There have been three blocks since January 28.[26]

NPz1 is currently blocked but an obvious sock, User:JackhammerSwirl, made a similar edit and breeched 1/rr. No checkuser shoud be needed per DUCK:

Similar reverts (no one else has presented this and the wording is exact):

Jackhamerswirl

NPz1

Similar interest in Iran (not in topic area as a whole but provided as proof of socking):

JHS
JHS

NPZ
NPZ

User requesting enforcement

User:Cptnono

User against whom enforcement is requested: NPz1 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated

Socking and 1/rr violation in the Palestine-Israel topic area

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

3 blocks and notified as shown on the block log and case page

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

[27]
[28]

1/rr breech and socking.

Enforcement action requested

Indefinite topic ban

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

[29]
[30]

Discussion

Result

Ryoung122

Not an actionable request.

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Request concerning Ryoung122

User requesting enforcement: David in DC (talk) 13:21, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: Ryoung122 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: WP:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Longevity#Ryoung122_topic-banned

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

Announces potential source material for longevity lists and bios

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

Not Applicable

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): Strongly-worded admonition and reminder of topic ban. Especially the phrase "broadly defined".
Deletion of the edit and oversighting of the diff.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint: This appears to be an effort to suggest a source for longevity articles. It appears to be an effort to continue to "lead" the World's Oldest People wiki-project. It appears to be an effort to determine the limits of an envelope specifically labelled "broadly defined". Occuring so close in time to the topic-ban, it suggests the need for simple, declaratory, public admonishment. If heeded, no further action will be necessary. If not, and someone needs to cite prior warnings in a subsequent enforcement request, (s)he'll have a record to work with.

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: I have notified the editor. David in DC (talk) 13:28, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Please, this is a blatantly obvious violation of the topic ban. Do please review the history and take action. Itsmejudith (talk) 17:13, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion concerning Ryoung122

Statement by Ryoung122

Comments by others about the request concerning Ryoung122

As the ~~arbs~~ users who have commented so far below say, writing that census data coming out soon is a violation of a longevity topic ban how? Looking at his edits following that statement, the note seems to be for new population numbers for cities, which is not even close to violating anything. Make an enforcement request when he actually violates something. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:21, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, what arbitrators have commented on the request :P? And yes, nobody had mentioned that the context of his comment was probably population numbers for cities; that convinces me even more that the request is not actionable. AGK [•] 17:43, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Ryoung122

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

I don't see how an unspecific announcement of the availibility of census data is longevity-related. I suggest closing this report without action. Sandstein 14:24, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Sandstein that no enforcement action is needed. EdJohnston (talk) 16:17, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I concur that this request is not immediately actionable because Ryoung's comment was not unquestionably related to Longevity (from which he is topic-banned). But it is clear why the filing party could argue that the comment did constitute a topic-ban violation, and I would accordingly caution Ryoung against attempting to evade his topic-ban by means of a comment on an unrelated venue (such as his talk page). Editors who are topic-banned often find that leniency is rarely showed by administrators in complaints about ban evasion, and Ryoung must be especially careful that he is never participating in a discussion relating to longevity. That aside, this complaint is not actionable, and so I will with this edit close this thread. AGK [•] 17:26, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Vandorenfm

Vandorenfm topic-banned one month from AA. Twilight Chill already blocked one week. EdJohnston (talk) 06:50, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

User requesting enforcement: Twilightchill t 21:36, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: Vandorenfm (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: Wikipedia:AA2#Amended Remedies and Enforcement

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

The continuous reverts look like an attempt to win the ongoing dispute. Seems to be a breach of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2#Edit warring considered harmful and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2#Assume good faith

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

[31] Warning by Twilight Chill (talk · contribs)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): Revert restriction or any other sanction deemed appropriate

Additional comments by editor filing complaint

Regarding Sandstein's comment below on request's reasons, I would note that because the aforementioned reverts fall under AA2 case, this board seems to be more appropriate rather than WP:ANEW, where edit-warrings are commonly reported. Given that WP:TBAN does not explicitly ban the AE requests and the AE notice that "most editors under ArbCom sanction... should be treated with the same respect as any other editor", I think this report is warranted: Vandorenfm's (as well as Gorzaim's) edits create unhealthy editorial atmoshphere in the Caucasian Albania article for a couple of days. Twilightchill t 22:41, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: [32]

Discussion concerning Vandorenfm

Statement by Vandorenfm

I do not see any reason for this request. User: Twilight Chill has been edit warring for which he was recently topic-banned for one year. In essence, he is trying here to accuse me in responding to his disruptive actions for which he got eventually banned. His removal of large portions of texts was courteously reverted with proper explanation and suggestions to cooperate. User: Twilight Chill refused to explain his actions [33], [34]. In other words, he continued his unexplained “naked” reverts, claiming with no evidence and explanation that the text he kept removing violated WP:NPOV. And, as a result of his actions User: Twilight Chill was topic-banned for a year. His hands cannot be more unclean for this request.

Regarding the entire business of removing chapters from the article Caucasian Albania, the sysop/admin User:John Vandenberg wrote to User: Twilight Chill: “Twilight Chill, wrt your NPOV concerns, edit warring and removal of entire sections isn't appropriate. Historical revisionism is relevant to Caucasian Albania; maybe the section should be trimmed down a bit, but that should have been discussed on talk, noticeboards, etc., or a RFC if consensus can't be found. Removing it wasn't the right approach” [35]. By this User:John Vandenberg confirmed that:

User: Twilight Chill was edit warring
Removal of entire sections isn't appropriate
Discussion of historical revisionism is relevant to the article on Caucasian Albania (in contrast to what some editors claim

I was simply following the admin User:John Vandenberg recommendation when I was trying to deal with “removal of entire sections,” that’s all.

When User: Twilight Chill got banned for one year for edit warring, “removal of entire sections” was being done by the veteran Azerbaijani editor User: Grandmaster. User: Grandmaster is a confirmed disruptive editor in Russian Wikipedia, currently blocked for 6 months: [36]. User: Grandmaster was accused by Russian admins in being a mastermind behind a syndicate in which he coordinated actions of a dozen of Azerbaijani editors to disrupt multiple articles in Azerbaijani/Armenian topic area [37]. I appeal to the admins to deal with User: Grandmaster in English-based wiki as well, and stop him asap because he may practice the same tricks here. And one of User: Grandmaster’s accomplices in Russian wiki was the same User: Twilight Chill also known as User: Brandmeister, [38]. User: Twilight Chill has been banned from editing any topics related to Armenia/Azerbaijan in Russian wiki [39].

User: Twilight Chill’s first accusation called “revert with inappropriate edit summary” is baseless. Everyone can see that it was unclear why he removed an entire good and well sourced chapter from the article. He never explained what he was doing and why.

His second accusation called “subsequent unsubstantiated revert” is a false claim. “Unsubstantiated revert” was Twilight Chill’s, not mine. I corrected an unexplained disruption. I substantiated this revert on talk pages. And it was clear that User: Twilight Chill was edit-warring since he did not explain why he was reverting, for which he eventually got topic-banned for one year.

His third accusation called “further revert with the "vandalism" considerations” is unfounded. In “Types of vandalism” [40], under “Sneaky vandalism,” we read that vandalism is “reverting legitimate edits with the intent of hindering the improvement of pages.” The history of Caucasian AlbaniaI is an obscure topic by itself and, as, testified by numerous sources, people care about it because this issue is misused for political reasons in Azerbaijan. Azerbaijani authors were accused in the West and Russia of manipulating historical texts, and world readers should be aware of this phenomenon, and should know why that happens. Robert Hewsen, a historian from Rowan College and the acknowledged authority in this field, wrote in his volume Armenia: A Historical Atlas, published by Chicago University Press:

Scholars should be on guard when using Soviet and post-Soviet Azeri editions of Azeri, Persian, and even Russian and Western European sources printed in Baku. These have been edited to remove references to Armenians and have been distributed in large numbers in recent years. When utilizing such sources, the researchers should seek out pre-Soviet editions wherever possible. Robert Hewsen. “Armenia: A Historical Atlas. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001, p. 291

By removing this chapter without any explanation User: Twilight Chill and User: Grandmaster were both “hindering the improvement of pages” as explained in “Types of vandalism” [41]. In fact, I did not accuse anyone in vandalism directly, just hypothesized and warned that this, theoretically, can be seen as vandalism. But my courtesy remained unanswered.

The forth accusation “new revert with the accusations of "disruptive editing" unfounded as well. User: Grandmaster was indeed engaged in disruptive editing, removing an entire chapter several times [42], [43]. Instead of detailing out what is wrong with the chapter and giving examples why what he says is true, User: Grandmaster explained his actions with this: “wiki articles are not a place for propaganda” [44]. This is a violation of WP civility code. I suggested twice that User: Grandmaster may modify content if he feels it is incomplete or lopsided. But User: Grandmaster was not listening.

Overall, I was following/enforcing User:John Vandenberg’s assessment of the situation. User:John Vandenberg’s text is this [45].

I strongly disagree that "Vandorenfm's contribution history suggests an account created solely to make warlike partisan edits in the AA topic area." I have been unduly busy with this issue only because of disruptive behavior of banned members of Russian wiki like Grandmaster and Twilight Chill. They slow me down. I am a new user but have already create a page on Nor Varagavank.

Vandorenfm (talk) 03:15, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Additional Comments No 1

My actions cannot be considered as edit warring since I was reverting bad faith edits of the banned User:Grandmaster, Russian Wiki's most notorious disruptive editor of all times [46], [47]. The decision of the arbitration committee of Russian wiki says: "Арбитражный Комитет постановляет заблокировать учётную запись Grandmaster на 6 месяцев. В течение 6 месяцев после разблокировки на участника будет наложен запрет на редактирование спорных статей и ограничение на редактирование пространств Википедии, как описано в пункте 3 данного решения." That means: "Arbitration Committee decided to block the account Grandmaster for 6 months. During 6 months after the block is lifted, this participant will be banned for editing disputed articles for 6 months, per point 3 of this decision."
To User:Sandstein: I took a seminar of how to edit Wiki run by a group of American volunteers. That's why I was brought up to speed so quickly, and could edit Wiki easily. Such seminars are a common practice on university campuses these days. Vandorenfm (talk) 17:44, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others about the request concerning Vandorenfm

This is just to note that, unrelated to this request but because of the continued edit-warring which it partly reflects, I have applied article-level discretionary sanctions to Caucasian Albania, as described at Talk:Caucasian Albania#Discretionary sanctions. Sandstein 21:45, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Something is clearly wrong here. We have 4 strange accounts, Xebulon (talk · contribs), Vandorenfm (talk · contribs), Gorzaim (talk · contribs) and Oliveriki (talk · contribs). They all started appearing one by one since November, and edit the same set of articles in AA area, the main focus being that about Caucasian Albania. [48] Oliveriki is clearly a throwaway account created for the sole purpose of reverting, while Gorzaim is the one used for controversial editing, and the rest seem to be used for reverting and posting support comments for Gorzaim. It is interesting that Caucasian Albania is the same article that was a favorite target of a well-known sockmaster Verjakette/Paligun, and these CU results might give some idea about the scale of disruption: Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Erkusukes and Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Paligun/Archive. Even the CU clerk noticed that something strange was going on, but the CU showed no connection between those accounts: [49] However behavioral evidence is too strong to dismiss suspicions. Verjakette used open proxies to evade CU detection, so the socking was established only after a number of checks. It is also of interest that Gorzaim and Vandorenfm mostly do not edit on the same days, when one is gone, the other takes his place. It could be that it is one person changing his location, which allows him to evade CU. But the edits of those accounts are absolutely identical. I think the activity of these 4 accounts needs a thorough investigation, and in my opinion they clearly fail a duck test. Btw, yesterday this SPI request: [50] proved that another puppeteer was involved in Caucasian Albania article, so we might be dealing with more than one sockmaster. Also, I think the article needs to be protected on a neutral version, and controversial parts can be included only when a broad consensus with involvement of third party editors is reached. The arbcom decision was clearly about consensual editing in AA area. Grandmaster 11:04, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

If it is a problem that this request was filed by the topic banned user, I can sign up for it, or resubmit it, because I think that the conduct of Vandorenfm deserves consideration. Grandmaster 08:21, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

2 days after the protection, the article reverted again by Gorzaim (talk · contribs), without any consensus. [51]. As I understand the decision was that everybody is banned from that page. Grandmaster 20:25, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by BorisG

I find it quite extraordinary that admins consider request by a topic-banned user. This rewards and encourages violations of the topic bans. Yes admins also block the filing party but this is clearly a penalty they are prepared to pay for having the rival party topic banned for a long time. We should avoid encouraging such behaviour. - BorisG (talk) 15:03, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Since this editor was banned from the entire area of the conflict, rather than from only editing articles on the subject, I agree with Boris. This should not be encouraged. Vandorenfm is clearly an SPA, but I am not sure if we have a clear policy about SPA, especially when they also make some constructive edits, as Vandorenfm did. Biophys (talk) 16:53, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I will look at wp:ru over the weekend. ~~Feel free to move my comment.~~ - BorisG (talk) 14:57, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nothing of real interest except an article about Armenian terrorism and many other subjects that are much better developed on ruwiki than here. Rather than fighting, these editors should simply translate good materials from Russian.Biophys (talk) 18:56, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I am of the firm opinion that contributions from topic banned editors should not be considered, and this includes this request. I also note that it appears that this request was files after V commented on twighlight chill's appeal. I therefore think we should NOT be looking at the substance of this request. It is also not clear to me whether admins want me to look at wp:ru and what exactly they are interested in. If you want me to look, please pose specific questions, if any. Otherwise I will do something more useful. Cheers. - BorisG (talk) 01:35, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have read the entire case and checked which of the sanctioned users are present on enwiki. I have e-mailed the list to EdJohnson. As for the translated version, obviously it is not proper English but should be clear in the main. I cannot edit the whole translation; I think it is unnecessary. If anyone is intersted in interpretation of a particular section or passage, I am happy to give one. Cheers. - BorisG (talk) 08:35, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Vandorenfm

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Waiting for a statement by Vandorefm, but at first glance this looks like sanctionable edit-warring. But I note that the requesting editor is topic-banned from this area of conflict (User talk:Twilight Chill#Arbitration enforcement topic ban: Armenia and Azerbaijan), and this AE report is not one of the exceptions recognized in Wikipedia:BAN#Exceptions to limited bans. I ask him to provide reasons why he should not himself be sanctioned for violating his topic ban by making this enforcement request. Sandstein 21:57, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I suggest that Vandorenfm be topic-banned from AA for three months, and that Twilight Chill be blocked one week for violating his own topic ban. Vandorenfm's contribution history suggests an account created solely to make warlike partisan edits in the AA topic area. Longer-term, putting full protection on Caucasian Albania for two months might be considered. Admins could still perform any edits which had consensus if they were requested via {{editprotect}}. A search of the AE archives for Caucasian Albania gets 23 hits. EdJohnston (talk) 23:04, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Accounts "created solely to make warlike partisan edits" should get an indef topic ban, if not an indef block. I find the recent number of ARBAA2 reports to be concerning. T. Canens (talk) 03:21, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - I'm not sure that Vandorenfm can accurately be described as a disruption-only account. They have created one useful article, Nor Varagavank (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) - but one wonders that a user only registered since December 2010 and with very few other edits would be able to create such an article. At any rate, the evidence shows that Vandorenfm has been edit-warring to win a content dispute, by reintroducing a contested section four times, and his statement does not rebut this. The merits of the arguments for or against the section's inclusion are not relevant; one does not resolve such disputes by edit-warring. I support a topic ban on that basis. I am also issuing an enforcement block to Twilight Chill. Sandstein 09:34, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Vandorenfm has made reference to ruwiki. I wonder if any enwiki admins have been following the AA disputes on the Russian wikipedia. It is not out of the question that we could pay some attention to the events there, especially regarding groups of people coordinating their edits, if there is a person fluent in both languages who can explain them. There was a Russian arbcom case that closed in August 2010, called 'Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Azerbaijani mailing list'. I see that the list of case participants includes some familiar names. Can anybody help interpret that case for us? EdJohnston (talk) 05:01, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- Reading the Gtranslated version, it seems to be an EEML-style mailing list used for coordinated edit warring and canvassing. T. Canens (talk) 05:14, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - Can you post that translation somewhere? (It's an automated derivative work of CC-BY-SA text, so ought to be CC-BY-SA also.) I can't get Google to translate the full page. Sandstein 18:30, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    - User:Timotheus Canens/sandbox. T. Canens (talk) 20:53, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      - Thanks. I'm not sure how this Russian case applies to this request, or falls within the remit of AE at all, unless somebody can show evidence that the same people are coordinating their edits on this Wikipedia also. Although the Wikimedia projects are normally considered separate for dispute resolution purposes, I believe we should take ArbCom-established misconduct on another project into account when deciding how to address misconduct on our project. Sandstein 21:57, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
        I'm not sure that we should. For the purposes of sanctioning editors, we historically have considered only evidence of misconduct on the English Wikipedia. This is because: 1) editors can behave differently on different projects (because whilst, for instance, on one project he might be being hounded by a troll gang and thus have been banned, on this one he might not be working with such problematic peers); 2) allowing misconduct on one project to affect an editor's standing on another ruins the paradigm of allowing editors to prove their good intentions on another wiki (much as commons and simple does for us).
        I would make an exception if, per above, there are possibly cross-wiki tag-teams; but I am unconvinced that we could explore such a complicated allegation in a simple thread on AE (without at least creating a sub-page). AGK [•] 14:39, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- I suggest we go ahead and close this with a warning to Vandorenfm that he may be topic-banned from AA unless he shows by his actions that he is willing to work patiently for consensus. (The warning will be logged in the case). TwilightChill should, as I suggested above, be blocked one week since filing this report was not allowed by his topic ban. The brief mention of the Russian arbcom decision above will, I hope, cause editors who may have been involved in AA disputes on the other wikipedia to use caution here. Sandstein has imposed article-level discretionary sanctions at Caucasian Albania which ought to help with the disputes on that article. EdJohnston (talk) 15:42, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - Edit-warring is still edit-warring. I would prefer to impose a brief topic ban on Vandorenfm, but if you want to close this with only a warning, I won't object. Sandstein 14:33, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- I am closing with a one-month topic ban of Vandorenfm from the AA articles. TwilightChill was already blocked one week by Sandstein for violating his AA topic ban by filing the enforcement request here. A complaint at AE about edit warring by someone else is not among the exceptions to topic bans allowed at WP:TBAN#Exceptions to limited bans. (Twilight could have asked at AE about his own sanction without penalty). An article-level sanction was imposed on 10 February at Caucasian Albania by Sandstein, which ought to help with the constant edit warring there. EdJohnston (talk) 04:57, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Tentontunic

No action against individual editors, but the article is placed under additional restrictions instead.

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Request concerning Tentontunic

User requesting enforcement: TFD (talk) 03:51, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: Tentontunic (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: Wikipedia:DIGWUREN#Discretionary_sanctions

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

[52] 20:07, 16 February 2011 (And remove POV tag, silly to have had it here since 2009.)
[53] 23:33, 16 February 2011 (Absolutely no justification for this given. Pure hyperbole.)

Edit-warring on article covered by Digwuren sanctions under 1RR. I set up a discussion thread in the article talk page.[54]

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

"Not applicable."

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): Block or warning

Additional comments by editor filing complaint: I note that Tentontunic has self-reverted.[55] I therefore no longer see any need for further action. TFD (talk) 12:58, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Sandstein:

Although Tentontunic says "The Four Deuces edits appear to be to remove content", the edits were to restore POV tags that had been removed without consensus on July 10, October 3, Dec 1 and Feb 16. In all cases there was discussion on the talk page in which I participated.[56][57][58] None of these discussions led to a consensus to remove the POV tag. There is currently a new discussion about the neutrality of the article.[59] Since the article has been nominated for deletion 5 times, has 25 archived talk page discussions, is under 1RR (and Digwuren), and has had administrators attempting to resolve disputes, it would seem that there is a dispute over neutrality. The tags have been in place since the article began, and numerous other editors have replaced them when they have been removed. TFD (talk) 15:14, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I will now look through the edit history of the article. Could you please allow me time to find the examples. TFD (talk) 16:27, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Below are examples of other editors restoring the POV tags during the period under discussion. I do not know if this is an exhaustive list.

July 10 - Verbal[60]
Sep. 5 - Big Hex[61]
Oct. 3 - Igny[62]
Oct. 3 - Giftiger wunsch[63]
Oct. 4 -Igny[64]
Oct. 12 - Igny[65]
Dec. 3 - Petri Krohn[66]
Dec. 3 AndyTheGrump[67]
Dec. 9 - Igny[68]
Dec. 9 - Igny[69]

TFD (talk) 19:12, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The POV tag had originally been posted by Russavia 5th August, 2009, two days after Joklolk created the article.[70] After the POV tag was removed, Paul Siebert restored it 29th January, 2010.[71] TFD (talk) 04:50, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Tentontunic - Igny was blocked 3 minutes after the 1RR violation.[72] I did not log into Wikipedia on that day. TFD (talk) 20:29, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Martintg - your account of my previous report to AE is incorrect. I had not "also reverted" and in fact had not edited that article for four weeks before the edit-war leading to the report. While there was edit-warring on both sides involving four editors, I only reported one editor because he was the only one who had been issued a Digwuren warning. I did not for example report User:Mamalujo, although he had made the same edits as the user I reported.[73][74][75] TFD (talk) 21:48, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment on Administrators' recommendations. You might considering widening this to include editors who have received sanctions for any topic area. This article attracts editors from a wide range of topic interests. Also, the article Communist terrorism might be added. It is tagged for neutrality, has been nominated for deletion 3 times, has 12 pages of archived discussions, is considered an Eastern European article, is subject to 1RR and is currently protected from editing until March 15th. TFD (talk) 05:33, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: The requesting user is asked to notify the user against whom this request is directed of it, and then to replace this text with a diff of that notification. The request will normally not be processed otherwise.

[76]

Discussion concerning Tentontunic

Statement by Tentontunic

Is removing a tag which has been forcibly kept on the article since 2009 really a revert? The Four Deuces appears to have ownership issues on articles relating to communism. Having now looked at the article history it seems he has had a slow motion edit war going since at least july 2010 [77] [78][79][80][81][82] In fact all of The Four Deuces edits appear to be to remove content. Now contrast this behaviour with his actions on left wing terrorism. He removes a POV tag within hours of it being added to the article [83] This is an article he has edit warred uncited content, including BLP violations into the article. I would ask administrators to look at the Communist terrorism article history as well. Tentontunic (talk) 08:23, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have also self reverted [84] Which makes this request moot. Tentontunic (talk) 09:15, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It appears IGNY has one less than The Four Deuces. The Four Deuces, might I ask, did you report IGNY for his breaking of the 1R on the 9th of december? Tentontunic (talk) 19:30, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others about the request concerning Tentontunic

Considering TFD's problems above (where he narrowly escaped sanctions), this is not an action which could remotely defuse anything at all. It looks more strongly like "I escaped, but I will make sure you don't" than anything else (a neat variety of Wikilawyering at best, and an example of the problem noted in the prior case at worst). Note also the relative size of the article in 2009 and its current size. Collect (talk) 11:37, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with AGK that editing this article has become a problem. Some people even place the jokes by Ann Coulter that Darwinism was responsible for the killings [85]. This should stop.Biophys (talk) 20:08, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Another article to which an AE report lodged by TFD against an editor[86] resulted in an article based sanction when it was found that TFD and others had also reverted. Given TFD's apparent propensity to report only his opponents for reverting while ignoring the behaviour of his allies, indicates a certain tendentiousness in making these complaints. I've lost count of the number of AE reports TFD has submitted in the past year, but this excessive use of this board to get an upper hand in content disputes seems to indicate a certain battleground mentality. Perhaps some kind of restriction on submitting AE reports for TFD may be in order here. --Martin (talk) 21:02, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think that any sanctions on any individuals involved in disputes over this article are likely to be counter-productive, simply because they distract us from actually addressing the root cause - the article itself, or more accurately the article title. Simply put, it is a conclusion dressed up as a topic. To describe it as 'synthesis' is to give it more credibility than it deserves. It is little more than propaganda, with no attempt to analyse, or even define, it's actual topic. That millions have died under Stalin, Mao, or Pol Pot is self-evident, but to simply attribute this to the actions of 'Communist regimes' amounts to nothing more than political name-calling unless it is accompanied by a meaningful analysis of the wider circumstances - something the very article title precludes. I'd suggest that the best solution would be to impose a 'topic ban' on the topic, and let us deal with state-imposed killing on a proper analytical case-by-case basis, free from cheap slogans. AndyTheGrump (talk) 05:13, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is a good point. - BorisG (talk) 06:02, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Eh. There is a basic disagreement between editors as to whether this article should exist at all. It's been to like four hundred fifty seven AfDs, fifty one point eight article name moves and has a thousands and ninety one archives of the talk page. One group refuses to even entertain the possibility that this is a viable topic and wants the article deleted or at least completely gutted of content no matter what. The other group thinks otherwise. They fight. They fight. Fight fight fight. Fight fight fight. It's like the Itchy and scratchy show. They use this very board as a tactic in this fight (one group more than other, IMO), just like they use AfD and RMs. Any editors "in between" get caught in the cross fire and end up moving to the corner solutions over time. The administrators on this board facilitate and enable this ongoing conflict by floating the possibility that one side can "win" by getting the other side banned, which in turn encourages further fighting. Andy happens to be in the first group and his comment above is him just saying "don't impose sanctions, let's "us" delete it even though we couldn't get that done at AfD" - by "imposing a "topic ban" on the topic".

Normally I'd say, just declare it a "free for all zone" and let them go at it, but that won't work in this case since it's easier to delete than to create. So rather I think that every two weeks a random editor who has made an edit to the article should get a completely arbitrary two week ban. That way only people who are really really passionate about the subject will actually make edits and risk the ban. And then they will get banned. And then the problem will be solved.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:36, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As always, the problem is not the subject but the people. Subjects do not revert. Yes, some articles will never be good, but that's because of people who are engaged in soapboxing, original research, censorship, debates to nausea and arguing reductio ad absurdum, instead of simply making their reference work. Another possible solution: just ban all people who recently edit-war in the article from editing this particular article (there is a list of participants above), and do the same in other cases on a regular basis. I do not argue in favor of such approach, but this is something to think about.Biophys (talk) 16:15, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Volunteer Marek

Slap discretionary sanctions on the article itself but put this warning [87] way up on top so that everyone can see it. That way they can't say they haven't been warned.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:25, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well Sandstein's article discretionary sanction had an interesting impact on London Victory Celebrations of 1946. A recent move request was successful achieved through "silent consensus" because anyone with any interest was not able to discuss it due to the article sanction. I'm not sure that was the intended result since the aim should be to encourage discussion, but perhaps for those who wish to delete/move this article it may well be their preferred outcome. How ever, given the high level of conflict in the current article such an article sanction would do nothing to stop any potential sock puppetry I'm afraid. A better solution is to simply fully protect the article for a year, which would stop any sock puppetry and at least enable talk page discussion on potential improvements that could be implemented through requests to admins after consensus is achieved. --Martin (talk) 20:26, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone wanna take a bet that in the event that AGKs/Sandstein's proposal goes into effect, particularly if it goes into effect with T.Canens' "extensions", the article's gonna wind up at AfD within two months, for the like the 80th time, or be turned into a redirect, or a disambiguation page, and the sanction will successfully achieve what five previous AfDs and numerous other disruptive activities (obviously not everyone who opposes the article's existence is disruptive, but some are/were as these AE requests demonstrate) have failed to achieve in the past two years?

Personally I've given up on the article, haven't edited it in long time, and I'm just watching this whole thing out of morbid curiosity.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:28, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment of the idea to prohibit more than one revert

The prohibition to revert the same action more than once would become a hidden form of a poll: if you have N editors who shares the POV #1 and M editors sharing the POV #2, then the edits shared by the first group will automatically prevail if N > M+1 (if the first edit was made by the editor from the first group), and if N≥M+1 (if the second group editor made the first edit). In this particular case (when the editors working on this article are separated on more or less equal camps sharing the opposite POVs), such a scenario is highly probable. I don't think that would be in accordance with WP policy.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:38, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You have obviously given much thought on how Sandstein's proposal could be gamed, how would the first part of his proposal play out? --Martin (talk) 21:10, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The AGK's clause #1 in its present form can and will be gamed, because it treats different editors sharing the same POV as different editors, whereas in actuality most editors are split onto two groups sharing essentially the same POV. The editors from the same group revert each other very infrequently, and, when they do that they are perfectly able to resolve the dispute by themselves, so it never leads to edit wars. By contrast, if some user reverts some edit made by a member of the opposite group, that revert, as a rule, is supported by other members of his team. As a result, the current state of the article depends on the relative number of currently active users belonging to these two teams. In other words, we have the same poll that inevitably leads to the victory of the POV supported by simple majority of the editors (or, if the groups are numerically equivalent, by the group that started first. For instance, the 3 : 3 situation will develop as "edit - revert 1/2 - readd 1/1 - revert 2/2 - readd 2/1 - revert 3/2 - readd 3/1 end; all six editors exhausted their limits, the new edit stays.) The AGK's clause #1 just will make this process slower.

I am afraid that arbitration is the only way to resolve this issue.--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:49, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

So let me get this straight...

...the current proposal is that "This complaint is dismissed without action against Tentontunic or The Four Deuces", i.e. the two people that were apparently edit warring and causing trouble on the article, but that a whole bunch of editors, many of whom have not edited the article in months, have not caused trouble at the article and have not edit warred over POV tags or anything else, are made subject to sanctions? Ok, even by usual AE/Enf standards that sets some kind of a record.

AN/I is the proper place to have these kind of decisions reviewed by the community, right?Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:06, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sanctions can be appealed. I am not aware of an appeal process for lack of sanctions. If you think AE closers are not following the spirit of the Arbcom decision, you could ask Arbcom to review the matter by filing a Request for clarification. Or, if you have nothing else to do for the next few months you could file a new Arbcom case. This article seems fated to cause endless suffering, but we can't get rid of it. It is not surprising that new remedies are being proposed by the admins, since hardly anything seems to work. EdJohnston (talk) 05:42, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not asking how to appeal anything, since this doesn't concern me. I'm asking for oversight of a particularly wrong headed AE decision which arbitrarily sanctions uninvolved parties for no good reason.

It is not surprising that new remedies are being proposed by the admins, since hardly anything seems to work. - ok, can you explain to me how letting the people who are causing the trouble off scot free, but instead sanctioning a bunch of people who have done nothing wrong will actually improve the situation? I was joking above when I suggested that editors just get banned at random, but it seems you guys managed to top even that. And what do you think the practical outcome of this sanction will actually be? TFD is already trying to use the proposed sanction to further ensure a successful future AfD procedure and also trying to extend it to another article he'd like to have deleted [88]. Way to reward edit warring and battleground behavior. Has anyone actually bothered to think through beyond the step of "swing the ban hammer in the wrong direction"?

If you want a serious suggestion on how to improve a situation, here's one: look through the AE board requests relating to this article from the past six months or so and make a list of all the people who were either subject of these AE requests or filed these AE requests. Sanction THOSE editors. There might be some innocents there but at least the "nuke'em all and let God sort them out" strategy will at least be in the correct general area.

I got to say that I am truly amazed at how, um, "misguided", this proposal is.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:19, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

And I also got to ask, has anyone who's proposing these sanctions actually bothered to look at the revision history of the article in question [89]? The only people related to Digwuren case who made edits to it in the past six months or so (going back to June 2010) are Petri Krohn, Mark Nutley and The Four Deuces, and the first two of these are no longer editing the article and haven't for awhile. Aside from TFD, all the people making edits (good ones or bad ones) to that article have nothing to do with Digwuren or any other case. So how is this exactly going to help?Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:46, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I object to this proposed sanction in the strongest possible terms. The Four Deuces and Tentontunic edit war over a POV tag, you admins propose to let them off without any sanction what so ever while banning a whole group of people who for the most part haven't edited this article for well over a year and have absolutely nothing to do with the current dispute. What possible justification can there be for such a thing? --Martin (talk) 07:53, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I do not think I was edit warring, I reverted once. The tag has been there since 2009 I honestly did not think removing it would count as edit warring, since I have now looked more closely at the article history I have seen the same editors who wish to delete the Communist terrorism article have much the same stranglehold on this one. That The Four Deuces has a battleground mentality is obvious in his most recent edits, even going so far as to propose for deletion an article I created. I shall go on a voluntary 0RR on the mass killings article, it is unfair that others be punished for my transgression. Tentontunic (talk) 13:43, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Nanobear

There seems to be evidence indicating that Tentontunic is a sock of User:A50000. See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Tentontunic. This is probably relevant to this thread. Nanobear (talk) 14:02, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by AndyTheGrump (Comments below moved from the results section, Sandstein 22:04, 20 February 2011 (UTC))[reply]

You what? "Armenia/Azerbaijan-related sanctions"? WTF has this to do with the article in question? AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:30, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This is getting silly

Sorry, but it is. If we carry on like this, we'll end up with 'Mass killings under Communist regimes - the Wikipedia article than nobody can edit'. At what point are people going to admit that the problem isn't the editors, it is a system that actively encourages the preservation of contentious articles: if you come up with abject nonsense/synthesis articles, they get deleted, but if you come up with politically-loaded nonsense/synthesis articles, they get edit-warred, protected, and smothered in sanctions. The old hands circle like vultures, looking for anyone to make a slip so they can be dragged through AN/I or wherever, while the article itself remains in its same boobytrapped state. I'd like to suggest we start thinking about finding a process to remove such articles, not because they are 'wrong', but simply because they cannot ever be made 'right' - they are magnets for controversy, and incapable of being written in a neutral manner using the processes that Wikipedia relies on. We need to accept that there are some subjects better left to other forums, and that the endless warring over the same issues is usually a good indicator that a subject is in this category. Eventually, we'll have to admit defeat, and accept that this is a topic we can't write a sensible article about. AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Tentontunic

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

In view of the self-revert I do not think that a sanction is needed at this time, but may well be imposed if the situation repeats. I invite The Four Deuces to give reasons why he should not himself be sanctioned for slow-motion editwarring as per the diffs provided by Tentontunic (I note that the most recent revert, [90], took place a few days ago). Sandstein 14:28, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The Four Deuces, can you please provide diffs of any occasions of someone else but you re-adding the "POV" tag to the article? Sandstein 16:09, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I see that, somewhat recently, the POV tag has been added and removed by users other than Tentontunic and The Four Deuces (hence TFD)[91][92]. To every editor of the Mass killings under Communist regimes article, I would stress the importance of focussing on the actual content of the article and of never edit-warring over unimportant things like an "Article has POV problems" messagebox. Having done a brief, preliminary evaluation of the recent history of this article, it seems to me that a drastic re-focus is needed: I see copious reversion—all of which is quite vociferous—when measured talk page discussion (or alternative methods of dispute resolution, such as mediation or requests for comment) is what is needed.
I am inclined to say that we ought to apply discretionary sanctions of some form to this article, such as a novel form of probation that would allow us to immediately ban from the article any editor who uses reversion over discussion more than once (as the standard 1RR, that results in short blocks for violations, seems to not be working). AGK [•] 17:40, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. Do you think that a sanction similar to the one described at Talk:Caucasian Albania#Discretionary sanctions (that article had similar problems) would work? Alternatively, or additionally, we could require that no editor may revert the same action (or a substantially similar action) more than once. Sandstein 22:16, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That'd do the trick, I think. It's nicely crafted; is that your work, Sandstein? I'm inclined to include add something positive to that sanction, just because there's rarely anything in discretionary sanctions other than "BEHAVE OR BE BANNED!" - which isn't really conducive to a positive editing environment. See below for my proposal. AGK [•] 00:20, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed: That the following discretionary sanction be applied to the Mass killings article:

Under the provision of the Arbitration Committee decision at Wikipedia:DIGWUREN#Discretionary sanctions, the following discretionary sanctions now apply to the Mass killings under Communist regimes (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) article:
No editor may make more than one revert (as defined at WP:EW) per week on this article;

An editor who makes more than one revert per week to this article may be banned by any uninvolved administrator from editing the article for a period of four months;

All editors with Armenia/Azerbaijan-related sanctions are banned from editing this article and its talk page. For the purposes of this ban, these editors are all who have at any time been the subject of remedies, blocks, or other sanctions logged on the case pages Wikipedia:DIGWUREN, irrespective of whether or not these sanctions are still in force or whether they were imposed by the Arbitration Committee or by an uninvolved administrator;

Editors banned for four months under the above provisions can after two months request at Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement that their ban be lifted. Bans will only be lifted if, in the opinion of an uninvolved administrator, the banned editor is capable of contributing constructively to the article. Bans may not be lifted if a majority of uninvolved administrators contend that the ban should persist for the entire four-month term.
Where an editor makes more than one revert per week, this should be reported at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement in the ordinary way. This sanction can be appealed as described at Wikipedia:DIGWUREN#Discretionary sanctions.

Also proposed: This complaint is dismissed without action against Tentontunic or The Four Deuces. AGK [•] 00:20, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Are you sure you meant "All editors with Armenia/Azerbaijan-related sanctions"? Also, WP:EEML and WP:ARBRB should likely be included as well. T. Canens (talk) 01:02, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I wrote the Caucasian Albania sanctions. I agree with T. Canens but am not sure that sanctions 2 and 4 in this proposal are useful or consistent with the others: In the event of any violations of the revert restriction (no. 1), an AE sanction of some sort will ensue, which automatically leads to an indefinite article ban per sanction 3. No. 4 also looks a bit like instruction creep (whether a ban is lifted after 2 of 4 months is not very important), and it is at any rate not clear to me that we can by discretionary sanction impose binding procedural rules about the appeal of those sanctions. The idea of encouraging editors to edit constructively is worthwhile, but I'm not sure that it's worth the additional hassle of appeal discussions, etc. Sandstein 01:23, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I support the closure of this report with no action againt Tentontunic or TFD, and recommend approval of Sandstein's article-level sanction. In AGK's proposal I think he meant to write 'Digwuren' instead of 'Armenia/Azerbaijan.' EdJohnston (talk) 04:31, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the input. To address certain objections above, the basis of these sanctions is that the history of this article shows that it has been the subject of so much contention and conflict by so many previously sanctioned editors that the best way to stop the conflict is to remove most previous players from the game, so to speak, which allows editors who are less emotionally invested to work on the article. This is more productive than simply sanctioning one or two of the combatants.

On this basis, I am closing the request with these sanctions:

No editor may make more than one revert per week on this article (see WP:EW for the meaning of "revert").
All editors with Eastern Europe-related sanctions are banned from editing this article and its talk page. For the purposes of this ban, these editors are all who have at any time been the subject of remedies, blocks or other sanctions logged on the case pages WP:DIGWUREN, WP:EEML or WP:ARBRB, irrespective of whether or not these sanctions are still in force or whether they were imposed by the Arbitration Committee or by administrators.

Violations of these restrictions may be reported to the arbitration enforcement noticeboard and may result in blocks or additional sanctions without further warning. This sanction can be appealed as described at Wikipedia:DIGWUREN#Discretionary sanctions. Sandstein 22:25, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

These sanctions are logged on the article talk page and the case page, and are displayed to editors in the article and talk page's edit notice. They supersede the previous 1R/day restriction also noted there, which I assume is not a problem because the new sanctions extend rather than overturn the previous sanctions. Sandstein 22:25, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

PCPP

PCPP and Asdfg12345 are topic-banned.

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Request concerning PCPP

User requesting enforcement: Asdfg12345 21:08, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: PCPP (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: Falun Gong discretionary sanctions

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it: (See below.)

I apologise for the length. Well done to the people who read this, examine the dispute, and make judgement. I give a sampling of diffs below. There are many more compiled here, on the RfC I opened against this user. I recommend whoever judges this to look into the background there and read the remarks. That background is pretty crucial to understanding the evidence here.

We are talking about what are often quite complicated discussions and disputes. There are any number of ways to present what the dozens and hundreds of sources say about any given topic. And particularly on a topic like this, which has proven to be quite controversial on Wikipedia, there are multiple possible presentations. The key thing is, however, that PCPP has no interest in any other presentation than his own. And he asserts it emphatically, and does not shy away from engaging in revert wars against multiple editors to advance his view. Except for perhaps the recent case and a few other egregious edits, most of the time it is hard to put your finger on precisely why what PCPP is doing or saying is a clear violation of the rules: everyone is allowed to remove inappropriate content, or question sources, or rephrase things, or reduce things. But when he does it constantly, including revert wars, all centering around removing negative information about the Chinese Communist Party, it becomes a troubling pattern. And it is infuriating for editors who want to do serious research on the pages.

Thus, PCPP is guilty of violating the central tenets of Wikipedia: he is a biased, tendentious editor who edit wars to remove or reduce information he perceives as negative about the Chinese Communist Party, and does not engage in meaningful discussion or research. Most of the diffs below fit into this rubric.

Recent dispute: [93] [94] [95] Explanation: In these edits PCPP goes against an emerging consensus to simply blank information that accords with RS and is relevant to the topic in question. Why? Only he knows.

Tiananmen square self-immolation page:

[96] -- blank content under discussion. Typical expanation "disputed." Never mind who is disputing what.
[97] -- this is a typical edit: vast changes, pushed through unilaterally, all meant to promote one point of view. See the corresponding discussion on the talk page and it quickly becomes obvious how much effort other editors (including myself) put into explaining themselves, and how PCPP simply ignores it.
[98] -- Another, along the same lines. Many of the reverts he did during this time were similar: they involved sweeping reversions of content that had been much discussed and debated by multiple editors on the talk page. And then he put up an RfC and proceeded to revert back to his version, claiming that the outcome of the RfC had to be resolved (in some cases, yes, you can see how this would make sense, but it was very hard not to view this as anything but a ploy)
[99] -- another example, followed by more along the same lines: [100]. That was reverted by another editor: [101]

Persecution of Falun Gong page:

[102] -- mass blank. Reason? Because I did not discuss the edit previously.

Falun Gong page:

[103] -- rv, no discussion, no edit summary (this particular edit had been discussed extensively, but was supported by multiple editors and had multiple sources--the problem is not with there being a dispute, but with PCPP's means of "resolving" it)
[104] -- this is a good example. That line needed a source, but it was missing one I guess because it is just such a basic and common accepted fact. In any case, he did not delete it because it had no source, but because of what it said. When looking at the corresponding discussion, PCPP is often not to be found.

Organ harvesting page: [105][106][107][108] -- each of these would be potentially OK, the point is that he did not really discuss properly and always much tendentious edits meant to change what sources say when it comes to something about the CCP. In the edit about the Amnesty info, when you check the ref 56 on that page, it is a different thing Amnesty says--so there was not a duplication, as he claimed. Each of these edits, isolated, would be potentially fine. The point is that they are strokes in a large picture.

The point is this: the views that PCPP holds, and even his editing with them in mind, is not in and of itself something he can be prosecuted for. Theoretically, if he states his point clearly, bases it on fact and good research, and argues it elegantly, he could get away with much. The trouble is that he is aggressive and uncommunicative, he ignores long and careful discussion in favour of the quick revert. He has contributed little to the pages except frustrating the efforts of those who want to do good work.

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

previous AE report 2010-03
notification of sanctions by Stifle (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
I made a series of notes to him asking him to stop: [109][110][111][112][113][114] ; he began deleting them: [115][116]

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): Indefinite topic ban.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint: (Moved to #Comment by filing editor concerning PCPP.)

I suggest the indef topic ban because this has already dragged on for so long, ever since PCPP began editing Wikipedia. If you look through the RfC you will note this clearly. If he is allowed off the hook this time I assume he will simply become more sophisticated and waste a lot more of other editors' time in the long run (unless they give up editing Falun Gong pages first, which is a possibility). It is clear that he is not here in good faith. Others have already come to that conclusion. He turns every discussion into a battle, immediately polarising the debate, making the editing environment simply an opposition, a battle. He is not here to work intelligently, but to fight for his point of view, and he does not stint from edit warring to promote it. If more evidence is needed to substantiate these claims, please advise me.

A final note, regarding my own conduct: I reverted PCPP twice in the recent dispute. I slightly regret the second time. It was not necessary. Three editors had expressed support for the information, it was reliably sourced, and it fit with the requirements of the page. So often one feels helpless in the face of PCPP's senseless explanations for his edits that the "revert" button becomes the one concrete assertion of truth over nonsense. But it is not the best, and should be used with more judiciousness than I used it today. --Asdfg12345 23:58, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: [117]

Comment by filing editor concerning PCPP

For a long time now PCPP (talk · contribs) has been engaging in disruptive editing activity on Falun Gong related articles and any articles that include content related to Falun Gong. He does it with other articles related to the Chinese Communist Party, but Falun Gong appears to be his forte. As for evidence, his edit history is probably the best possible example: most Falun Gong-related edits are disruptive, very few of them are about adding new information, and nearly every single one of them is about degrading or simply deleting information that is unfavorable to the Chinese Communist Party. I suggest simply looking at his history.

But the specific "incident" I want to highlight here happened on the List_of_wars_and_anthropogenic_disasters_by_death_toll. See the history and discussion. The point is this: he is opposed by three editors who find it legitimate to include information about the persecution/genocide against Falun Gong in the article about alleged genocides. A judge ordered an arrest warrant against Jiang Zemin and Luo Gan, leaders of the persecution, and called it a genocide. That is in this article. There was other media, too.

PCPP has already done three reverts on this page within a few hours.

He has been doing this for a long, long time. Please check his edit history on this topic. His primary method is to be aggressive and edit war. When he does discuss things it is never substantial. He throws out a few sentences, sometimes irrelevant, and continues in the same vain. Meanwhile other editors (including myself) present long explanations for their thinking and changes. He ignores it all and just deletes the stuff he doesn't like. Editing the pages becomes extremely tiring.

Here is a long list of his biased editing that I made a long time ago. Since then he has done much of the same. He came within a hair's breadth of being banned a couple of years ago, and has only gotten worse since then. It is my neglect that has allowed this to simmer for so long. I think it is extremely clear that this editor should no longer be involved in anything related to Falun Gong, and I believe the other editors, when they hear of this motion, will be greatly relieved that something is finally happening. I know of at least three other editors who take an interest in the Falun Gong articles that, from what I can tell, are fed up with PCPP's disruptive behaviour.

Falun Gong is one of the articles on probation. PCPP is a longtime disruptive editor who has now just done three reverts against the consensus (two explicit, one implicit) of three other editors for including reliably sourced information. He should simply be banned indefinitely from the pages, and I don't think anyone who edits the articles will disagree.

Background

Comments by other editors

(I take the liberty to simply collect these from different places and present them here, but I hope others take a look and weigh in directly.)

[118] PCPP, your edits to this page recently are uniquely disruptive. I cannot but wonder what your intention is; if you desire to see the page contain a level and honest description of events and views, I must inform you that your participation so far is not conducive to this end. Instead, the level of aggression and persistent POV-pushing that you display derails any substantive conservation and leads other editors to turn on you. Prior to your arrival here, we were in the midst of a substantive discussion on how to improve the article, and were in the process of reaching agreements on some changes. You then proceeded to revert these changes without discussion. They were restored and explained, but before the discussion could continue, you then reverted wholesale again. This time you offered minimal discussion in which you made several specious arguments that you failed to substantiate or defend... I similarly do not appreciate that you cannot be taken at your word; I realize now that it is necessary to check your edit summaries against your various difs. You also misrepresent the rationale cited by other editors for their changes. Now, I can assume good faith and believe that these are innocent mistakes, and part of me is inclined to do this. But I am beginning to suspect that there is a certain amount of deliberate disruption and deception here. You may consider taking a step back from these articles and going for a nice long walk. Homunculus (duihua) 16:44, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
[119] I just saw this after the shock I got in the recent kerfuffle. Completely agree. I actually wish he would just go away. All PCPP does is POV-push, and he's done it for years (looking at the RfC someone compiled a while ago). I will actually stop editing that page if it keeps it up, so you can't say his tactics don't work. —Zujine, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
[120] A final note, just to make sure this is not forgotten: I appreciate Silk's positive view of things, but I was monitoring the page before I began editing and commenting, so I saw how it unfolded: PCPP has been absolutely disruptive all the way along. You'll notice the amount of ink other editors have spilled tripping over themselves trying to explain their highly reasonable edits, and the throwaway remarks PCPP makes in response, along with either constant reverts, or what cumulatively amount to reverts. I have been frustrated by this editor, and I can only imagine others have. I know we're not supposed to name names, etc., but this must be pointed out because I don't want a repeat of it. All the changes that he/she resisted have actually been made, they are entirely reasonable, the only difference is that X amount more time was wasted because of his/her stubborn resistance. I won't say more on it for now, but if the problem flares up again I will even more unimpressed. —Zujine, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

I urge someone to look into the matter and make the appropriate judgement. I will alert PCPP now. --Asdfg12345 20:22, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I have copied the above from Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Disruptive editing on topic on probation. - 2/0 (cont.) 21:08, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(Administrative note) I've moved the above content to its own section due to your statement's length. Having all that squashed in at the top alongside the request information wasn't pretty at all. Hope that's okay with you, Asdfg and 2/0. AGK [•] 21:34, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion concerning PCPP

Statement by PCPP

Sigh, I consider this a bad faith attempt by Asdfg to rid of me. He was previously given a 6 month topic ban on the Falun Gong articles by AR on the evidence of numerous editors[121], in which Sandstein found him to be a [122] "single purpose account dedicated to editing articles related to Falun Gong so as to make that movement appear in a more favorable light, and that he has repeatedly participated in edit wars to that" and is "more committed to promoting Falun Gong than to our encyclopedic mission, which makes his contributions detrimental to that mission." Clearly, his editing patterns still reflect that.

The edit war on the List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll article was again instigated by his problematic editing. The ordeal of Falun Gong in China is a contested topic, and Asdfg inserted controversial material classifying the repression of FLG as "genocide", a term not agreed by any serious sources on the topic such as scholar David Ownby, and human rights organizations such as Amnesty International. The source he used comes from a local court decision in Argentina and Falun Gong's own website, which fails RS. I noted these on the talk page, but Asdfg joined in by issuing personal attacks against me during a talk page discussion with another editor [123]. He referred to me as a "disruptive troll that does not care about the encyclopedia or any objective standard of research" and that I'm "here to push CCP propaganda and that's it."--PCPP (talk) 21:37, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others about the request concerning PCPP

Personally I find all this very unsavory. But I am involved, so I should probably speak up.

In my various interactions with PCPP, I have tried to hold my tongue and avoid accusations of bad faith. This is not because I have the slightest regard for this individual, though, or for his intentions. I have encountered this editor on several articles related to either Communist Party history or Falun Gong, and have found him to be exclusively concerned with massaging the image of the Communist Party and maligning Falun Gong, in spite of any facts that may stand in the way.

I cannot recall one instance in which he contributed in a productive way, let alone an objective way, to these articles. He mainly deletes content, and when challenged, he is typically unable to offer a reasonable defense for doing so. He does make numerous weak attempts to justify his edits, consuming much time; his recent reverts on List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll is a good example of how he’ll delete with one excuse, and when it is shot down, he will simply embrace another justification for deletion, and another, and another... By the end, he is arguing that Falun Gong should not be on a list of genocides because the National Endowment for Democracy is an American propaganda agency, or because David Ownby has not said it is a genocide (even though Ownby states that he is not an expert on the human rights issues related to Falun Gong, but instead on the religious and historical context surrounding it). It's exhausting.

As inhumane as it may be, my problem is not with this editor’s ideological bias per se. Nor do I care that he has recently taken to accusing me of bad faith.[124] My problem is with the means he uses to advance his point of view, which include blanket and repeated reversions without discussion, editing against consensus, leveling personal attacks against editors who disagree with his aggressive behavior, misrepresenting sources, cloaking controversial edits under innocuous edit summaries, and deleting anything that does not comport with his view of the world.

I can imagine that cognitive dissonance is a difficult thing to live with. It’s hard to accept that Mao Zedong is not a saint, and that innocent people are victimized by the Communist Party. But I would recommend that the best way to cope is to try accepting facts, rather than deleting them from wikipedia in a vain and annoying attempt to shape the world to accord with one’s personal beliefs.

Asdfg was concerned that in filing this request for arbitration, PCPP would attempt to distract from his own behavior by drawing attention to Asdfg’s history. I was prepared to file this request in his stead, because I do not want the conversation to be derailed. I have wasted enough time unpacking the specious arguments that PCPP offers to support his indefensible position on these topics. Homunculus (duihua) 22:55, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Timeline and analysis by Asdfg

There is some important information that I would like to bring to the discussion. I hope it can be evaluated in an impartial light. Consensus and discussion are fundamental to Wikipedia: even if the editors in a discussion were discovered to be wrong on a fact, or a source, or a statistic, in a post-hoc analysis, does not mean that the discussion at the time was not important or should not have been participated in. Such errors could have been corrected through the process of consensus and discussion, rather than revert warring. But in this case I think any errors have been magnified and can be easily fixed.

Firstly, it is important to note that the talk page discussion was ongoing, and that there appeared to be a consensus between three editors that the content should be there. The talk page discussion was not belated. Secondly, it was said that I made personal attacks: (go away, troll), and also that I added content that was not a reliable source because I cited Clearwisdom and a blog (by Ethan Gutmann, an expert on the matter).

On the first, I am wrong. The best I can point out is that PCPP does the same, and that the atmosphere he has created is already poisoned. But that is no excuse. I assume that I do not have to pretend he is editing in good faith, but should refrain from statements like troll, etc. I will seek clarification separately on what is permitted, but I have had worse things said of me (see my userpage, with no consequences—and nor should there have been consequences.) Is it the case that editors should not be allowed to share their views about the character of another editor?

On the second, PCPP cited the quality of these sources (in no great depth) to delete the entire row, rather than offer a solution about the sources. We sought discussion on the talk page and were reaching a consensus, but he reverted repeatedly. I added in information that may not have had a reliable source, and we may not have come up with one: but that does not justify repeatedly deleting an entire row of content. Please note that "personal attacks" seem now part and parcel of editing these pages with PCPP.

Regarding Homunculus saying that Chinese officials had been found “guilty” rather than “indicted”: that’s clearly a technical mistake and a good faith edit. If that had been discussed, those words simply could have been changed rather than the whole line deleted. It seems to cheapen the discussion to pick him up on what was clearly a good faith mistake that can be corrected by the change of a word.

But ultimately, please simply note this timeline of events. I think this best demonstrates what happened.

[125] I add Falun Gong to list of genocides and alleged genocides
[126] PCPP removes the entire row of information with a terse explanation asking for reliable sources
[127] Homunculus puts it back with “Reuters as a reliable source, both for low estimate of death toll and for reference to genocide.” (Reuters piece cites, but does not itself endorse, the low-end death toll estimate).
[128] PCPP reverts wholesale again, removing all information. He leaves another terse edit summary saying “Reuters simply quoted FLG Info Center,” and thus is not a RS
[129] Homunculus leaves a note on PCPP’s talk page to discuss why he removed the information twice, and suggesting that if he takes issue with the quality of one reference, the solution is not to delete an entire row of content. Threatens to revert back again.
[130] Homunculus reneges on threat to revert, and instead notified PCPP that he will attempt to find solutions through a discussion on the talk page
[131] Homunculus starts talk page discussion, seeking feedback on the questions of whether Falun Gong should be included in list at all, and if so, how to solve the RS issue.
[132] PCPP says to Homunculus on his talk page: “Oh great, appearing merely 4 hours after my edits and begin reverting, you're obviously up to something...The material is added simply to prove a POINT.” He then goes on to expand on his comments, saying to Homunculus: “I don't know whether you're here to edit an encyclopedia or help spread FLG propaganda.”
[133] Homunculus seeks input from {user|SilkTork}, who has been a mostly neutral and careful administrator, to weigh in and attempt to quickly arrive at a solution before matters escalate.
[134] SilkTork writes on the talk page: "Use one of these sources, and if anyone reverts you again, let me know and I'll talk to them.”
14:37 [135] Seeing that there is a consensus that Falun Gong should be included in the list of alleged genocides (i.e., Homunculus, SilkTork--PCPP had said nothing on the talk page and had only attacked Homunculus so far.) Asdfg12345 reverts PCPP for the first time (the notorious ‘go away’ remark. DOH.)
14:42 [136] PCPP reverts, again removing entire row of content on Falun Gong against consensus.
15:05 [137] Asdfg reverts again, with some handwringing.

The rest is history, the talk page discussion can be seen here: [138] -- clearly it was not belated, at least on the part of other editors. But one could say it was belated on the part of PCPP, because only after he had reverted three times did he begin trying to talk in a normal manner about the inclusion of the material.

The question of reliable sources was discussed on the talk page. The best solution the editors who were actually talking about it suggested was to simply cite Falun Dafa Information Center, or something. We didn’t come up with something better for the moment. Wikipedia is a work in progress. That’s not wrong. But where there are problems, or imperfect sources, I would hope that interested editors can discuss and work together in a good-faith manner to arrive at solution. Deleting all content when one source or one word is off creates a needlessly hostile editing environment.

The complaint about Gutmann as a source is also a separate matter: it doesn’t seem to make sense for an outside admin in a post-hoc analysis to determine that a source is not reliable and then read that decision into the proceedings. Gutmann as not reliable was not properly thrashed out on the talk page. It is, at the very least, something that can be discussed. But in the end he is an established expert who has conducted years of research on the topic and has been invited to Congressional panels to share his research. The information I cited was the transcript of a testimony he had given, as an expert, on the topic. It was republished on his blog. PCPP gave no substantive reason for disputing the Gutmann as a reliable source; he charged only that Gutmann’s relationship with the National Endowment for Democracy disqualified him. I hope the above helps to put things into perspective.--Asdfg12345 15:38, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Analysis by Sandstein

I'll be taking a look at this if I have time over the next few days. This space is for my notes about the contested conduct.

List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views): The conflict between PCPP and Asdfg12345 concerns content added by Asdfg12345 that lists the persecution of Falun Gong among "genocides and alleged genocides". PCPP reverted this addition thrice, arguing that the sources were not reliable (and once without rationale), and Asdfg12345 reverted that removal twice. There has been belated talk page discussion. My opinion is that both editors are at fault, but that the conduct of Asdfg12345 is more problematic:

PCPP made the three reverts cited in the evidence with a very terse (or no) rationale, and without engaging in talk page discussion, thereby edit-warring.
Asdfg12345 made personal attacks against PCPP at [139] and at [140] (edit summary: "Go away."). Also, he added (and reverted to add) content that does not comply with WP:RS, because the sources he cites to support the estimated death toll, http://clearwisdom.net and http://eastofethan.com, are self-published and appear to have an agenda in the conflicts surrounding Falun Gong and/or the Chinese Communist Party, which makes them patently unsuitable as sources in this context. Sandstein 08:24, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Broadly agree with the above. I'll add that I find this edit by Homunculus (talk · contribs) to be a violation of our biography of living people policy, inasmuch it states that certain Chinese officials are "found guilty" of certain crimes when the sources, even if reliable, state merely that they were indicted/ordered to be arrested. Accordingly, in accordance with WP:BLPSE, I'm removing that sentence from the article and I'm further formally warning Homunculus on the relevant discretionary sanctions. T. Canens (talk) 09:41, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I concur. Sandstein 17:15, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views): A featured article, generally stable from April 2010 to January 2011, describing a locus of conflict between the Falun Gong movement and the Chinese government. As far as I can tell, the conflict at issue here is mostly about the prominence that should be given to the claim that the incident was staged by the Chinese government – a claim that was mentioned only briefly thrice in the previous and in the featured version. The outline of the conflict is:

On Jan 23, Asdfg12345 edited the lead and the article body so as to give much more prominence to the claim that the incident was staged and to describe the persecution of Falun Gong resulting from the incident as much more intense.
On Jan 25, PCPP edited the article to revert most but not all of Asdfg12345's changes.
This was reverted within the hour by Asdfg12345.
PCPP re-reverted on Jan 26 and was in turn reverted by Homunculus.
PCPP made further edits substantially reverting the article back to his preferred version, only to be reverted again by Asdfg12345, who was in turn reverted back by PCPP on Jan 27.
Then PCPP was reverted by Zujine (talk · contribs), whom PCPP reverted back.
Complicated editing, including at least partial reverts, ensued between PCPP, Homunculus and Zujine, until Asdfg12345 made another edit that is clearly identifiable as a revert on Jan 28, which PCPP followed up with a minor revert on Jan 29.

But for an unopposed change by Homunculus, the article has been stable since and retains much of the content added by Asdfg12345 on Jan 23. There was talk page discussion throughout the dispute.

Again, I think both editors under discussion here are at fault:

PCPP engaged in intensive edit-warring, making at least five major reverts of Asdfg12345's changes within a few days, even though it appears that his position was not supported by any other editors.
Asdfg12345 made at least three major reverts of PCPP's removals.
His editing is also otherwise problematic. I am particularly astonished by the edit summary of his first revert, "restoring to consensus version before PCPP's unilateral revert action", which misrepresents the situation: it had been Asdfg12345 who had made extensive undiscussed changes to a stable featured article, so if there ever was a "consensus version", it was the one PCPP reverted back to.
I am also concerned that Asdfg12345's extensive changes may violate the WP:UNDUE part of the WP:NPOV policy by giving excessive prominence to the (apparently minority) opinion that the incident was staged. I do not say this because I know anything about this opinion, the incident or indeed Falun Gong itself (I don't), but because I note that this opinion was mentioned only briefly in both the featured and the previously stable version. It is therefore reasonable to presume that a massive change in the perceived prominence of this opinion substantially upsets the balance of the article and would need extensive consensus-building before being made (or, per WP:BRD, before being re-added after the first revert). Sandstein 17:15, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Persecution of Falun Gong (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views): The diff submitted as evidence is of Dec 2010 and thus rather stale. But I note with surprise the following exchange on 18 Feb 2011:

PCPP: [141], edit summary: "Restored POV intro"
Asdfg12345: [142], edit summary: "Reverted 1 edit by PCPP (talk); Bad PCPP! Bad PCPP!. (TW)"

These edit summaries are very odd, and the one by Asdfg12345 is strongly incivil, because he addresses PCPP as though he were scolding a dog. Sandstein 17:25, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Falun Gong (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views): The diffs submitted as evidence are of November and April 2010 and therefore stale. There seems to have been no recent conflict between Asdfg12345 and PCPP with respect to this article. Sandstein 17:31, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by BorisG

From a brief look at the diffs provided, there appears to be a pattern of tendentious editing by PPCP (talk · contribs). Like in so many ideological and ethnic disputes, no party is without fault. However, to me, it seems that PPSP is less willing to seek and respect consensus and compromise than Asdfg12345 (talk · contribs) or Homunculus (talk · contribs).

At the request of Asdfg12345 (talk · contribs) I have read the entire talk page Talk:Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident. I think this is a lot more effective than reading individual diffs. I have come to a radically different conclusion to that of Sandstein. I think Asdfg12345 (talk · contribs) is an editor who has his POV (who doesn't?) but who is constantly willing to seek compromise. He has indeed engaged in some incivil behaviour, but I reject the view that he is unable to edit constructively and seek consensus. I did not find any sustained pattern of disruption on the part of Asdfg12345 (talk · contribs) that would remotely warrant a long-term sanction. I urge admins to reconsider.
One other point. I do not agree with the logic that since Asdfg12345 (talk · contribs) has changed the relative weight of one POV as compared to a stable version as evidence that he has given it an undue weight. There are many articles on Wikipedia that are stable and yet extremely biased. For example, the article on Lenin reads, for the most part, as communist propaganda. For example, the only accounts about Lenin's personal life are those of his closest associate Trotsky and his wife! If someone came to that article and tried to make it more balanced, would you classify it as giving negative comments undue weight? Furthermore, official and government controlled Chinese sources should be treated with extreme caution. - BorisG (talk) 08:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

On your second point, there's a strong presumption that a featured article, at the time it was featured, complies with our basic policies such as NPOV. T. Canens (talk) 00:36, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Enric Naval

Wow, not a bad solution. Asdfg has been needing a perma-ban from Falun Gong for a long time, and PCPP might finally learn to be less aggressive. --Enric Naval (talk) 19:48, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by The Resident Anthropologist (talk)

Having observed both individuals in action neither is a benefit to the topic area. A Sandstien has observed PCPP is overly aggressive in editing style as to include a negative portrayal of FLG. Asdfg12345 has the same issue but with the opposite POV. ~~I think the 6 months for PPCP is acceptable but a year would be my recommendation with an opportunity for appeal at 6 months.~~ The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 21:29, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewing the Evidence SandStien provided more closely the more I am convinced that PCPP need a perma-topic ban. The basic violations of WP:EW which are recurring issue. The Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident Edit War Sandstein brought up showed that it is not just Asdfg12345 vs PCPP issue but rather PCPP's POV versus NPOV. The Restore POV Intro is the most disturbing since I can see no reason to suggest it was sarcasm or other such attempt at humor. I think a full indef Topic ban may be appropriate with a chance to appeal after one year. The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 03:11, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I must concur with others that the long term topic banning would not be Terribly helpful in this case. I agree with Zujine on Asdfg12345, my experiences have been rather limited with both but I think Zujines observations are in accordance with my own on Asdfg12345. The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 19:00, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ohconfucius, makes a good point about below "I have also seen and experienced enough concert parties, aggression and lawyering at FLG articles to drive me away from editing that topic for good." This is our enemy here those who show "aggression and lawyering at FLG articles" tend to drive others away the topic. Behavior that causes people to be driven away from "editing that topic for good." are what we are dealing with here. Looking over old talk page discussions this seems to be the the issue. The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 02:48, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Its also worth noting that Asdfg12345 claims to have retired likely to avoid sanctions. The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 02:48, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I retired because of what I perceived to be the unfair way the adjudication was carried out. In my view important evidence was ignored and other evidence used selectively and magnified to the point of creating a false picture of my engagement with the articles in question. Simply examining, for example, the history on the 'List of anthropenic disasters' page shows that I was putting back reliably sourced, consensus material. If you look at the talk history of the Tiananmen page, too, you see that I was participating in discussion and hashing things out in a productive manner. But if you are biased then what you see is: tag-teaming (with some other guy that has no dog in the fight whatsoever?) and POV-pushing, and in the latter case: vigorously subverting NPOV for a political cause. Either way, both views require blocking out large amounts of evidence, to the extent of ignoring thousands of words of talk page discussion. The analysis of BorisG, and the even more concise statement of Biophys, are what it comes down to. That's why I felt the adjudication was, in my view, wrong and simply unfair. That's why I put the retired tag there. I regretted it, actually, because I thought it would more likely result in a harsh sanction. I appreciate everyone taking the time. As volunteers taking part in the maintenance of a virtual community, my overall assessment is very positive. Banned or not, I intend to take a break, so I will leave the tag a while. I've seen people do this before. --Asdfg12345 16:44, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Maunus (talk)

I agree with Enric Naval and Resident Anthropologist. Asdfg does not have sufficiently clean hands in this topic area to be granted enforcement against others with no blame coming on to him/herself. It does seem that PCPP is also in need of a topic ban. In short I recommend a round of topic ban's for everyone involved. (I briefly attempted to mediate Falun Gong related articles ca. 2 years ago - I left because of the enormous amount of civil pov-pushing from the pro-Falun Gong side then (among them asdfg)- most anti-Falun Gong editors were banned in that period)·Maunus·ƛ· 21:57, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Ohconfucius

Falun Gong articles have been a hot and disputed area, polarised by the omnipresence of Falun Gong activists (mainly) and their opponents editing this series of articles in a more or less SPA-fashion.

Following the Arbcom case, after Samuel Luo and Tomananga got themselves indeffed for socking, the FLG SPAs have been in ascendancy. I and a number of others got involved for several months, but the path is strewn with carcasses. Today, all that is left to buttress the relentless advocacy of the FLG cabal is PCPP. I advised him not long ago to abandon the FLG articles, and he appears to not to have taken up my advice. The reason I suspect he remains there is not that he enjoys the conflict, but that he feels deeply that there ought to be some counterbalance to the FLG cabal. I was able to collaborate sufficiently with asdfg to help build 'Self-immolation', but it only truly achieved FA status through the efforts of respected editors SilkTork (talk · contribs) and Jayen466 (talk · contribs), who helped put the WP:NPOV issues into sharp focus. A quick glance of the article in its current state – as has already been observed by Sandstein – indicates that the strong pro-FLG bias has once again been restored. That alone says enough.

PCPP is not at all easy to work with, and the FLG editors a little less so – but there are more of them. Their very strong and persistent advocacy of their cause amounts almost to conflict of interest editing. PCPP is over-reliant on the revert button, whilst the FLG cabal relies much more on saliva and lawyering. In addition, since his topic ban, asdfg is visibly much more bitter at the way WP works vis a vis the FLG viewpoint.

Just looking at the edit history to 'List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll', it seems that there may have been tag teaming against PCPP's revert button. This is a case of six-of-one and half-a-dozen-of-another. They need a big dose of something stronger than a trout. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 10:03, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I know relatively little on the subject, but let's just quickly look at the 'List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll', as you suggest [143]. PCPP repeatedly removes relevant text sourced to Reuters: [144]. Asdfg12345 restores it. Then Homunculus places other relevant information sourced to Reuters [145]. This looks like a single user (PCPP) fighting against WP:Consensus by removing relevant and reliably sourced information. He is definitely at fault here (agree with BorisG above). Biophys (talk) 17:38, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes and no. We're not so much talking about vandalism here but a serious difference of opinion. WP:EDITWAR makes no distinction to a 'good' revert and a 'bad' revert, so anyone engaging in such behaviour is unacceptable. I have also seen and experienced enough concert parties, aggression and lawyering at FLG articles to drive me away from editing that topic for good. I didn't post any diffs, but just thought some context would be useful. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:07, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No one talks about vandalism here. But removing relevant and reliably sourced materials is a stronger indicator of NPOV violations. Yes, I can see that one of PCPP opponents does not know the difference between "being indicted" and "found guilty" by a court (this is very common in such disputes; sometimes they indeed do not know). One should simply replace "found guilty" by "was indicted".Biophys (talk) 05:41, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Biophys, the "relevant text sourced to Reuters" does not reflect what is in the source which you may read here. The fact that a claim has been reported by Reuters does not make it a fact and part of the section removed was sourced to the Falun Gong website, which is not a reliable source. TFD (talk) 05:59, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No, this is publication by Reuters, and it is responsible for their publications. It tells that famous Mr. X. was indicted by court in the country of A. This is factual information that can be easily verified by other sources. I would be very surprised if Reuters published an easily rebuttable disinformation. Not a reason for edit-warring any way. Biophys (talk) 17:24, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that we encountered a problem deciding what to cite for the low-end estimate. This was one of the two questions I raised in my first comment on the talk page, and at the time the best solution we could arrive at was to agree that Falun Gong sources could temporarily suffice (whether the Falun Dafa Information Center is a RS is somewhat debatable; human rights organizations regard it as one. In most cases I would say it is not, but I want to problematize this a little by pointing out that it may not be so clear-cut in this case). What was disturbing, to me, was that PCPP deleted all content on Falun Gong, ostensibly because he didn't like one source (it becomes clear when you read his later talk page comments that his real problem is with the categorization of the Falun Gong suppression as a genocide, and he was merely grasping for any excuse to have it deleted from that list). After the second time he did this, I left a note on his talk page proposing that he try to constructively offer solutions, or ask other editors to seek a better source, rather than deleting the entire row of content over one problematic reference. He responded with a personal attack, and continued to revert thereafter, ignoring the talk page discussion that was taking shape. So, regardless of whether we count the Falun Dafa Info Center as a RS, he did delete other sourced content three times with no discussion.Homunculus (duihua) 14:33, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"at the time the best solution we could arrive at was to agree that Falun Gong sources could temporarily suffice (whether the Falun Dafa Information Center is a RS is somewhat debatable; human rights organizations regard it as one. In most cases I would say it is not, but I want to problematize this a little by pointing out that it may not be so clear-cut in this case)" – I'd just comment that that statement is self-contradictory. On one hand, you believed that the FLG source could not be considered reliable, yet you conceded – for some reason that you did not explain and that I do not want to go into– that it "could temporarily suffice". I believe that you were letting your guard down: I have experienced years of these FLG accounts, some of whose of wikilawyering could convince even many hardened sceptic that their claims were true and their advocacy was reasonable. asdfg is the mildest but the most verbose one of them all, lacking in the disruptive aggression of Dilip rajeev and the arrogance and personal attacks as Olaf Stephanos. asdfg's dedication to the FLG cause, his verbosity and eloquence are all a great credit to him, but equally strongly demonstrate his advocacy and the proselytism that Falun Gong is well known for. No, none of that entirely legitimise the actions of PCPP, which I think we are agreed were improper. However, I would just state that I have occasionally undone reverts of FLG editors made by PCPP, and he has not once reverted me. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 16:48, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How wrong I was! It seems that Olaf is now encouraged to stay. <sarcasm>Happy editing! </sarcasm>--Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 17:14, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ohconfucius, I hope you will forgive me for not wanting to wade into the interpersonal disputes you allude to here. I'm sorry you've had such negative experience. But you asked me a question, so I will here answer to resolve any confusion that my 'self-contradictory' statement may have caused regarding the use of the Falun Dafa Information Center as a source on the low-end estimate (or rather, using a Reuters article that cited the FDIC estimate). What I meant to say in my comment above is that the FDIC is not an ideal source, precisely because its use will also be susceptible to challenge and doubt. Wherever possible, I think we should seek a better source if one is available. However, it is regarded as a legitimate and reliable source of information on Falun Gong human rights issues by more mainstream human rights organizations; I have seen its estimates used without qualification by groups like Amnesty International, for instance. The reason, as I understand it, is that Chinese authorities deny access to human rights groups and foreign diplomats to Falun Gong adherents in China, making independent corroboration of rights abuses nearly impossible. In the absence of independent verification, these groups have apparently concluded that the FDIC is more or less reliable, or is at least the best available source. We were in a similar position here; until Asdfg pointed one out, I could not find an alternative for a low-end total death toll estimate. In the absence of a better source, I used a Reuters article citing the FDIC estimate, and started a talk page discussion to see if anyone could think of a better source. In the short time that the discussion was ongoing, no alternative was suggested. I hope this answers your question. If you want to talk more, I would be happy to, but perhaps we can take it elsewhere. Homunculus (duihua) 18:01, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Biophys: Here is the edit removed by PCPP which you call: a "relevant text sourced to Reuters":

| 3,000^[1] || Persecution of Falun Gong || China || 1999 || ongoing || A nationwide persecution led by the Chinese Communist Party against the spiritual group Falun Gong. The decision to "eradicate" the practice was made by then paramount leader Jiang Zemin in 1999. The practice had grown extremely quickly and was popular among a large cross-section of society, implicitly undermining the Communist Party's control of society. Means of persecution include arbitrary arrests, torture, forced labor, and, it is alleged, organ harvesting. For the source describing the persecution as genocide see: Falun Dafa Information Center, "[146]

The Reuters article does not claim that 3,000 were killed, but that Falun Gong makes that claim. Furthermore, the notes are entirely sourced to the Falun Gong website.

TFD (talk) 19:33, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Zujine

I hope my comments do not come too belatedly, but I see others continue to weigh in on this matter, so I will add my piece. I was not involved in the edit war at List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, but I have read through the diffs and the timeline provided by Asdfg, and am not surprised at PCPP’s behaviour. The patterns of editing he displayed on that article — to delete large amounts of content without discussion, and to do so repeatedly against consensus — is consistent with what I have observed elsewhere. I would favour a lengthy, if not indefinite topic ban against PCPP.

As to Asdfg, there is little doubt that he has an emotional investment in the subjects he edits (namely Falungong), and while this usually finds manifestation in very active editing and discussion, it can turn to incivility when it comes to PCPP. I have also been extremely frustrated by PCPP, though I express it quite differently, so I can emphathise with Asdfg on this point.

Crucially, when PCPP is not around, I have found Asdfg to be easy enough to work with. I do not always agree with his edits, nor he with mine, but we are nonetheless able to hash things out and move forward on editing pages. If he is not banned, I hope that he will learn from this experience and be more circumspect in the future. If he is banned, the editing environment on Falungong articles might be more relaxed, but I would also count it as a loss, as Asdfg does bring in good quality research and is probably more intimately familiar with the relevant sources on Falungong than any other editor. —Zujine|talk 18:34, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning PCPP

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

The instructions for AE requests require that a list of diffs of allegedly sanctionable edits be provided. Because this request does not include any such diffs, I intend to close it as not actionable without any consideration on the merits. Sandstein 22:11, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

While I agree that, paraphrasing one of my favorite analogies, admins "are not like pigs, hunting for truffles buried in" editor contributions, in this case the allegedly sanctionable diffs is readily accessible from the page history of List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll at [147]. I therefore do not consider the omission fatal to this request. However, I think it is necessary for us to consider the conduct of all parties here. T. Canens (talk) 23:30, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Based on my analysis in the section above, I evaluate the conduct of the two editors at issue here as follows:

PCPP (talk · contribs) has engaged in intensive edit-warring in order to make Falun Gong-related articles read less favorable to Falun Gong, in violation of WP:EW. PCPP has previously been blocked for 48h and a week in response to Falun Gong-related problematic editing. I believe that a time-limited topic ban is appropriate in this case to prevent him from continuing to edit-war.
Asdfg12345 (talk · contribs) has engaged in more moderate edit-warring in order to make Falun Gong-related articles read more favorable to Falun Gong, in violation of WP:EW. In this context he has also violated Wikipedia's policies WP:RS, WP:NPA and WP:CIVIL, and it is likely that he has also not complied with Wikipedia's policy WP:UNDUE. He has previously received a 24h and a 48h block, as well as a six month topic ban, in response to Falun Gong-related problematic editing. Because this severe sanction has now been shown not to be enough to deter him from continued problematic editing in this topic area, I believe that an indefinite topic ban is appropriate.

If no admin disagrees, I intend, in application and enforcement of WP:AFLG#Motions, to sanction these editors as follows:

PCPP is topic-banned (as per WP:TBAN) from Falun Gong for six months.
Asdfg12345 is indefinitely topic-banned (as per WP:TBAN) from Falun Gong. I will consider lifting this sanction on appeal after at least a year of unproblematic editing. Sandstein 17:54, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I broadly concur with Sandstein's assessment of the situation and the proposed indefinite topic ban of Asdfg12345. I'm adding only the following:
- Given the discussion here, I believe it is more appropriate to view PCPP's second block as 24 hours instead of 1 week.
- More generally, especially given that the edits of Asdfg12345 are violations or likely violations of our content policies and guidelines and PCPP's sparse history of sanctions (the last AE thread is almost 1 year ago in which the proposed sanction was a 2-week topic ban; the last actual sanction imposed is from 2008), I think a four month topic ban would be a better starting point, with the caveat that if edit warring or other disruption resumes after the ban expires, the length would likely be quickly escalated.
- WP:RS is a guideline, not a policy. (This is pretty much nitpicking in this context, though.) T. Canens (talk) 20:02, 19 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - Thanks for the feedback; I agree. PCPP is therefore topic-banned for four months and Asdfg12345 indefinitely. Sandstein 23:38, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Arbitration enforcement action appeal by Passionless

Unblocked by blocking admin. T. Canens (talk) 22:53, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found in this 2010 ArbCom motion. According to that motion, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action.
To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).

Appealing user: Passionless (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – Passionless -Talk 01:52, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sanction being appealed: WP:AEBLOCK

Administrator imposing the sanction: AGK (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Notification of that administrator: [148]

Statement by Passionless

At the time of my 'breaching edits' the WP:AE which put the sanctions on me was stated that my sanctions were "a three-month topic ban from Refaat Al-Gammal, with a concurrent six-month 1RR/week restriction in the entire area of conflict." I followed these rules, yet I get blocked for writing my ITN. And look at User:Shrike too, no one told him talk pages were off limits too, but when he was told so he went and reverted his edits. The sanctions are fine and I don't mean this as a personal attack, but the blocks on both me and Shrike are a case of assuming bad faith.

Further statement by Passionless (copied here from their talk page at their request - JohnCD (talk) 10:23, 21 February 2011 (UTC)):[reply]

AGK told me I was banned from I/P articles per what was written in the WP:AE as seen by this edit. I went and saw it was soon changed so of course I would think that since the ban was changed where AGK told me to look, it was actually changed. Anyways, how is this block even in line with WP:BLOCK, this block is 100% for punishment purposes, it is NOT preventing any damage or disruption, or was my article for a future In The News, really that terrible, and is the currently messed up current events portal really better than normal. Passionless -Talk 08:32, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by AGK

During the initial Arbitration Enforcement thread, there was an edit conflict between T. Canens and I. We both actioned the request at almost the same time—he first, me a moment later—but I got to the case log of sanctions first, and then notified both users first. Once I'd informed both users that they were sanctioned, I then noticed that T. Canens had already done so (having not had an edit conflict notice because of MediaWiki's edit conflict auto-resolver) and suggested that we replace my sanctions with his.

Nothing further came of the discussion, because we kept missing one another when we were next online over the next day or so, and so the discretionary sanctions stood. It is understandable but not excusable that Passionless saw the discussion here about modifying the sanctions and thought that my sanctions were no longer in place or were being challenged. But I wonder why he thought that he could still make the edit he did, when T. Canens' proposed sanctions superseded mine in that they were less lenient. I cannot help but feel that Passionless' edit was a last-ditch attempt to squeeze in a last few edits before my sanctions were replaced by T. Canens', but that is of course speculation. What I can say without speculation, however, is that the sanctions, whilst under discussion, had not been lifted or modified and were very much in place. On that basis, I would recommend that this appeal be declined.

I would be willing to lift my block early on the basis that there was an understandable misunderstanding, and I am of course happy for my block to be reversed by a consensus of uninvolved administrators. For whatever it would be worth, I would request that, in either case, the block be lifted only if Passionless accepts that the topic ban still applies, and that, if he is found in violation of it again, he will be again blocked. On a slightly different note, I see that Sandstein is proposing that it be lifted as redundant because my topic-ban is being superseded by T. Canens'. I reject that thinking and think to lift a block in such a way would be rather odd and somewhat pedantic: what is happening here is that my signature on the topic ban is being replaced with T. Canens', as a courtesy to the fact that he got there first and that it was my fault for not noticing that there was an edit conflict, and that some additional sanctions (a 1RR, a per-article topic ban, etc.) are being placed separately by T. Canens.

Tl;dr: The new sanctions are a modification of my previous ones, and do not nullify all enforcement made under my sanctions when they were in effect (as seems to be assumed below). Likewise, as a matter of principe, we should not waive the enforcement of a legitimate discretionary sanction on the basis that the sanctioned editor wrongly believed that his sanctions had invisibly been lifted. Any reasonable person would at least have asked for clarification, if the obvious reality was not clear from simply reading the discussion, instead of creating a brand new I/P article. No? Respectfully, AGK [•] 11:55, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

EdJohnston: Per my third paragraph above, so would I. If Passionless indicates that he would agree to that arrangement, I will happily honour it. AGK [•] 19:01, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by (involved editor 1)

Statement by (involved editor 2)

Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by Passionless

It appears that the sequence of events is thus: (1) Passionless is made subject to a wide topic ban [149], (2) he violates this ban possibly because he believes that the ban had been reduced in scope, (3), he is blocked in enforcement of the ban [150], (4) only then is the ban actually reduced in scope [151]. On this basis, it would appear logical to lift the enforcement block, because the topic ban it is intended to enforce no longer applies – based on the principle that blocks are preventative and not punitive. For these reasons I think that the block, while certainly correct at the time it was issued, is no longer necessary and should be lifted. Sandstein 10:44, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result of the appeal by Passionless

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

Note: Moved from [152]. T. Canens (talk) 02:53, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm of the view that the appeal should be declined. My initial comment at the AE thread is explicitly a proposal, and has no binding effect whatsoever; therefore the operative sanction at the relevant time is AGK's broad topic ban, and the edit is a clear violation of that ban. The original sanction was replaced with a narrower ban and a 1RR/week restriction after AGK has already issued the blocks. T. Canens (talk) 08:11, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I recommend declining the appeal. If this were not AE, we might consider lifting the block, and accepting that Passionless might have been confused about the restriction. But the editors who are named here are usually quite experienced, and it's fair to expect them to carefully read what is left on their talk page. Passionless had previously managed to get himself notified under I/P, so he should know the rules. If it were just my decision, I'd accept him agreeing to abstain from the I/P topic area for one month in lieu of this block. EdJohnston (talk) 18:17, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I reported this unblock offer at User talk:Passionless#Comment regarding appeal, but he did not accept it. From the language he used, I sense that Passionless is not following all the nuances of our process. EdJohnston (talk) 15:56, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fifelfoo

Attention: This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.

Summarily declined because no diff of the required warning about discretionary sanctions is provided. Warning now issued.

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Request concerning Fifelfoo

User requesting enforcement: Tentontunic (talk) 13:11, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested: Fifelfoo (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated: WP:ARBRB

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

[153] Personal attack in calling me arrogant. and failure to WP:AGF
[154] After I requested he remove his personal attack he responds in similar fashion in calling me arrogant again.
[155] In this section Fifelfoo displays a battlefield mentality, his first post is highly combative, with no attempt at meaningful dialog, this of course eventually lead to his personal attacks.

Diffs of notifications or of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required)

{{{Diffs of prior warnings}}}

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction): Told to be cooperative, not combative.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint: I do not see how I have been arrogant in any way on this talk page, I asked a question and was met with outright hostility, the source for my statements meets WP:RS. In the name of terrorism: presidents on political violence in the post-World. State University of New York Press by Carol Winkler and I fail to see why I have been attacked for making a suggestion on the article talk page. Fifelfoo is displaying a WP:BATTLEFIELD approach in editing the Mass killings under Communist regimes article, he refuses yo WP:AGF and engages in WP:NPA.

If this is the incorrect notice board for this please remove the complaint and let me know were one does complain about this form of behavior. Tentontunic (talk) 13:11, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fifeloo now appears to be looking for support for his actions from other editors who share his POV. [156] [157] Tentontunic (talk) 13:59, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested: [158].

In response to Fifelfoo`s four points.

1. So asking a question is IDHT aggressiveness
2. This content is also mentioned in Final solutions: mass killing and genocide in the twentieth century by Valentino see p86. This book is already a source in the article. The definition of mass killings under these circumstances is already in the article.
3. See above.
4. The editor has been counselled on policy, I would beg to differ, what you have actually done is adopt an aggressive stance in response to perfectly reasonable questions. Tentontunic (talk) 15:38, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

One final thing, Massacre at Huế Dak Son Massacre To say I did not look in the archives is another bad faith assumption, neither of these issues have been brought up on the article talk page before now. Tentontunic (talk) 15:45, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion concerning Fifelfoo

Statement by Fifelfoo

Process: ARBRB doesn't appear to have coverage for this request; the attempt to resolve this dispute was perfunctory and "gaming"; the editor has avoided the most basic dispute resolution processes suggested on the talk page such as familiarising themselves with the page's archives, the literature, and the article itself.

Content: The editor listing this request is playing IDHT games on talk; and, does not understand basic policy including SYNTH, OR, Reliability. They have been repeatedly advised of this behaviour, and continue in it. This behaviour is arrogant, tendentious, and highly aggressive.

1. The editor's IDHT aggressiveness can be summarised by their statement, "... Valentio`s estimates? He is but one scholar, why do we not estimates by others?" two hours and fourty minutes after Valentino's centrality to the article was explained, "It does not meet the criteria for the only source presented in the article that defines "mass killings under Communist regimes"."
2. The editor is proposing that a book on US presidential media strategy, analysed as discourse theory, is a reliable source for cross national comparative demography of deaths under communist regimes. Previously they have suggested literary criticism as reliable for historical works. This is a combination of google scholar cherry picking with an inability to understand the purpose of an encyclopaedia.
3. The editor is producing original research definitions of what "mass killing" constitutes, when the only cross cultural analysis of communist caused large demographic removals very clearly defines mass killing; and, persists in IDHT after this
4. The editor has been counselled on policy, and has failed to change their behaviour. Their problem is currently a behavioural one: a conduct issue. Fifelfoo (talk) 13:29, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by others about the request concerning Fifelfoo

I would suggest that Fifelfoo be strongly cautioned as to language. In particular, the use of accusing others of "not hearing" when the same complaint might be easily laid at Fifelfoo's feet. It is always amusing to see a "defense" make clear the problem. Meanwhile, the source is WP:RS under WP policy - the issues on the article talk page are strongly reminiscent of some other pages where only "right" information is allowed, and "wrong" information is disallowed. WP readers are expected to be able to examine the references, not to have "correctness" determined by any group of editors. Collect (talk) 13:55, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am in an ambiguous situation: from one hand, I have been informed by Fifelfoo about this case, and, as a result, I ought to abstain from participation in this discussion, however, from the another hand, I am watchlisting some key pages that make me aware of these type events even despite the Fifelfoo's post. Therefore, I decided to express my opinion.
Let me point out that the whole discussion is moot: Tentontunic requests Fifelfoo to be non-combative, but they are doing that by rather combative means. I concede that the wording used by Fifelfoo is not too friendly, however, it can be easily re-worded to meet formal criteria, but the main idea would be preserved. For instance, instead of

"The level of combativeness is pretty much a correlation to your arrogance and holding your personal opinion as if it is reliably sourced in the scholarly literature"

Fifelfoo could write:

"The level of combativeness is pretty much a correlation to arrogance of your posts that reflect your personal opinion as if it is reliably sourced in the scholarly literature"

Whereas the first version is a comment on a contributor, the second one is a comment of a contribution, which is absolutely in accordance with WP policy. However, everyone will agree that the main idea (a correct idea, btw) is preserved in the last version. Therefore, if Tentontunic wants Fifelfoo to formally meet WP behavioural criteria, this result can be easily achieved by slight re-wording of the Fifelfoo's posts (the step I would strongly recommend to do in any events). However, if Tentontunic is interested in a genuine collaboration, they will never achieve this goal by posting here. What I would recommend to Tentontunic is to make a short break, and during this break to read the archives of the Mass killings under Communist regimes talk page (I concede the archives are very long, and I am ready to explain how to find a relevant section).
Let me also point out that, whereas newbies have some privileges, they are expected to observe some minimal rules of politeness. For instance, they are expected to familiarise themselves with the history of a discussion they have joined.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:02, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Fifeloo that not all sources that adhere to WP:RS are equal. Peer reveiwed articles and books are preferred to non-refereed sources, especially on matters requiring complex research. However even if he is 100% correct on the sources issue, that does not negate the need to AGF and adhere to Wikipedia civility policies, the policies that he dares to violate on this very page. He needs to describe comments and edits, rather than editors. BorisG (talk) 16:09, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Fifelfoo

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Discretionary sanctions require a prior warning about the possibility of discretionary sanctions ({{uw-sanctions}} or equivalent). Because no diff of such a warning is provided in the enforcement request, it is summarily declined without examination on the merits. The editors involved should use normal means of dispute resolution. However, in reaction to the personal attacks in evidence here, I am issuing a formal arbitration enforcement warning to Fifelfoo myself. Sandstein 16:10, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

^ Reuters, [159] || 162,000[160], Remarks on the 10-year anniversary of the Falun Gong persecution, chaired by Edward McMillan-Scott, Foreign Press Association, London. accessed 2/12/10

[1] Reuters, [159] || 162,000[160], Remarks on the 10-year anniversary of the Falun Gong persecution, chaired by Edward McMillan-Scott, Foreign Press Association, London. accessed 2/12/10

[1]