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Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Historical elections/Preliminary statements

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Main case page (Talk) — Preliminary statements (Talk) — Evidence (Talk) — Workshop (Talk) — Proposed decision (Talk)

Target dates: Opened 6 August 2024 • Evidence closes 20 August 2024 • Workshop closes 27 August 2024 • Proposed decision to be posted by 3 September 2024

Scope: Conduct in the topic area of historical elections.

Case clerks: HouseBlaster (Talk) & SilverLocust (Talk) Drafting arbitrators: Guerillero (Talk) & Aoidh (Talk) & Z1720 (Talk)

Statements on this page are copies of the statements submitted in the original request to arbitrate this dispute, and serve as verbatim copies; therefore, they may not be edited or removed.

Preliminary statements

Statement by Anonymousioss

Statement by BigCapt45

Statement by CroatiaElects

Statement by DemocraticLuntz

Consensus was clearly achieved in favor of not removing elements of county pages (presidential election results) that had been there for decades and are clearly a key aspect of understanding a county. I'm not sure what this is about other than someone having sour grapes that the universe of users who care deeply about this aspect of county pages and believe it’s a critical aspect (even if prose might be preferable). DemocraticLuntz (talk) 22:10, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Mcleanm302

Statement by Number 57

I have seen an increasing problem with off-wiki canvassing (largely done via Twitter) since the middle of last year. This has largely taken the form of editors posting on Twitter about disputes they are having on Wikipedia (or about matters they disagree with), which in turn has driven both edit warring and canvassed contributions to discussions. In several cases, these canvassed contribution have changed the direction/outcome of the discussions (for example this discussion, the consensus of which completely changed after off-wiki activity started on 15 June).

In addition to the canvassing effect, the off-wiki activity has often involved personal attacks and sometimes veered into harassment. In one recent incident, an editor who edits under their real name had their details posted on Twitter by another editor who was using Twitter to canvass people to an American politics dispute. Wikipedia is supposed to be a collaborative environment, but from a personal perspective, it is extremely hard to maintain civil collaboration with editors that you are aware are saying things about you on their social media accounts that would fall under WP:NPA if posted here. When raising off-wiki personal attacks with one editor, rather than apologise, they brushed it off, saying it was "separate" to their Wikipedia work, while another editor who became involved in the dispute after seeing the posts on Twitter saying such attacks were fine "as long as it does compromise your privacy or safety".

If there is to be a case on this issue, I personally would like to see three outcomes:

  1. Clarity on whether making personal attacks on other editors on social media is sanctionable under WP:NPA.
  2. Clarity on whether posting about Wikipedia discussions/disputes on social media is canvassing (as some editors have claimed that such behaviour is not canvassing).
  3. Guidance given on how editors/admins should react to any future social media-based canvassing (e.g. locking articles affected, restoring articles to the pre-disruption status quo, discounting canvassed talk page comments etc).

Number 57 21:51, 20 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Primefac: Regarding your suggestion above, would my questions still be considered? I am concerned that this is an increasingly serious issue and guidance is needed on how to deal with future similar issues. In addition, if action is being considered against those involved in off-wiki disruption, would consideration also be given to action being taken against editors who have participated in the on-wiki disruption driven by the off-wiki stuff (for example, blindly reverting incorrect information into articles or ignoring RfC outcomes)? Number 57 00:59, 27 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In a word, probably. Primefac (talk) 13:19, 28 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Talleyrand6

Statement by VosleCap

Statement by Tryptofish

I'm phoning in from what The Good Captain aptly called the "peanut gallery", to comment about the aspect of hybrid cases that concerns whether or not ArbCom should assume the role of the filing party. I've been thinking about this, and I think I can offer a distinction that may be useful, and points in this case to yes, you should accept this case.

There's a pretty well-established consensus that ArbCom should consider cases where (a) the community has said there's a problem, and where (b) the community cannot solve it ourselves. Here, there have been some ANI threads, and there appear to be private communications from community members to ArbCom, in which there is private evidence of concerns about harassment and/or canvassing (per discussion here). That satisfies the criteria of (a) the community asking for ArbCom help, and (b) the community being unable to process private information. Also, and this is key, it might well be awkward to expect the editor(s) who feel harassed to come forward in public and be the filing party. So it makes good sense for ArbCom to "self-file".

In contrast, hybrid cases didn't work so well in the Polish Holocaust case, where ArbCom initiated the case after an outside publication criticized Wikipedia. (Strictly speaking, there had also been requests from the community, including a declined case request, but those never reached critical mass.) What prompted ArbCom to initiate that case was ArbCom's reaction to outside pressure. A couple of months later, ArbCom granted ECP to an account representing an outside group, in order for that account to file a case, but it turned out that that person was wasting everyone's time.

So the distinction I want to make is that it's good for ArbCom to self-initiate a case when there is private evidence, particularly of harassment, and members of the community have provided this private evidence, but might suffer further harassment if they filed the case themselves. I would want ArbCom to consider such cases, including this one. But when the pressure to start a case is coming primarily from outside the community, ArbCom should generally wait for a community request to come forward (or private evidence from the community about harassment), instead of ArbCom jumping ahead themselves. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:10, 20 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Robert McClenon (Historical elections)

The purpose of this statement is to respond to the Arbitration Committee's note that it is welcoming thoughts about the Tropical Cyclones case and other "hybrid" cases involving both public and private evidence. A principle that should be followed in this case, as in other cases involving off-wiki coordination, is that transparency is the best policy when possible, and that ArbCom should consider whether evidence that is received as private evidence must be kept private, or may be made public. Private evidence should be made public unless there is a sufficient reason for keeping it private. Valid reasons for keeping evidence private include preserving the identity of pseudonymous editors and fear of reprisals or adverse consequences. As much information as is possible should be made public, in order to maintain the trust and confidence of the community. Since Twitter / X is an open social medium, discussions on Twitter / X should be entered into public evidence, although the identity of pseudonymous editors should be preserved.

I have not been involved in the discussions of historical elections. However, I infer from the mention of county pages that one of the issues is similar to one of the main issues with tropical cyclones, which is at what level of detail should information be broken out. One of the issues with tropical cyclones was that discussion of when individual articles were in order about specific storms was being suppressed, based on a previously established consensus. If there are issues about keeping or merging county pages, it is necessary that they be discussed openly, on article talk pages, or by deletion discussions, not off-wiki. Guidelines for when separate articles are in order at the county level or other specific level should be agreed to by consensus when possible.

Transparency is the best policy whenever possible, and ArbCom should make as much evidence public as is possible. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:58, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Details

One type of private evidence may be evidence that is mailed to ArbCom by the submitter because the submitter does not want their identity disclosed publicly. ArbCom should consider both whether the evidence can be displayed publicly as an anonymous submission, and whether the submitter's reason for requesting anonymity is adequate, such as realistic fear of adverse consequence. The governing principle should be the maximum possible amount of transparency while protecting individual rights of privacy and fears of consequences. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:51, 30 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Jéské Couriano

My guess is that the lack of commentary from the parties is due to one of a few things:

  1. The /Motions page isn't anywhere near as visible as other Arbitration pages, which means that it's more likely the Arbitrators are going to drill down on anything you say.
  2. The disinfecting effect of bringing this to light is causing most of the parties who're involved in the off-wiki shenanigans to scarper in hopes that ArbCom will forget about this.
  3. " " " " " " " " is causing the parties involved in the canvassing to discuss things and figure out what sort of "party line", if any, they'll bring out for this case.

Just because no party is discussing it doesn't mean there's not a controversy. ArbCom has run cases where parties refused to give opening statements (or participate full-stop) in the past. —Jéské Couriano v^_^v threads critiques 16:07, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]