Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Community sanction/Archive13

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Attack sites opened

An Arbitration case, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Attack sites, has been opened. Please add any evidence you may wish the Arbitrators to consider to the evidence sub-page, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Attack sites/Evidence. You may also contribute to the case on the workshop sub-page, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Attack sites/Workshop.

On behalf of the Arbitration Committee, - Penwhale | ^{Blast him / Follow his steps} 21:20, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Ratify indefinite ban of Giovanni33 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log)

The following discussion is archived. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Issue referred to Arbitration. MastCell ^Talk 18:12, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

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From AN/I. After an extensive block log and two very recent, lengthy blocks for edit warring and gaming the 3RR system, User:Giovanni33 has been blocked indefintely by User:Durova. His previous block on 15 August 2007 was reduced by User:El_C.

• Endorse indefinite ban. --DHeyward 05:10, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• I don't think dispute resolutions have worked in the case of Giovanni33 or would work now. Would be nice if he would change his ways, but after this many blocks and disruption, I doubt it. I have to support the indef block. --Aude (talk) 05:20, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse indefinite ban. Like I said at the ANI discussion, this is disappointing because Giovanni33 has a fantastic work ethic, but his block log and contributions show that he cannot refrain from edit warring and gaming the system to avoid 3RR. Pablo Talk | Contributions 05:21, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Unhelpful. There is an ongoing discussion at WP:ANI. Reopening it here (and with a leading request at that) is not helpful. Durova herself (!) is trying to work out a less radical solution. --Stephan Schulz 05:27, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
  • The community may ban Giovanni33 regardless of Durova's wishes. Pablo Talk | Contributions 05:28, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
    • Sure it may. That does not mean that it should rush to it, especially not as long as there is a productive ongoing discussion about this topic.--Stephan Schulz 05:37, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse this guy has caused more than enough trouble. -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 06:05, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Do not endorse and am suspicious at attempts to reduce this to a vote. AGF and all but as is said above - this is unhelpful and anyone calling for the perm ban of an editor when the "straw that broke the camels back" was him reporting a known pov pusher for 3rr needs to examine their decision criteria. Sophia 06:11, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
  • You must be confused. It doesn't matter what the "straw the broke the camel's back" is. What matters is Giovanni's lengthy block log and the disruptive nature of his contributions to the encyclopedia. Pablo Talk | Contributions 06:26, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Never mind the quality feel the width - great judgment criteria. I suppose it's easier than bothering with the background details. The perm ban of an established editor is a serious matter that should not be decided just by the length of the block log - most of which is over a year old. Sophia 06:38, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, you're right, we should just ignore his block log. Good call. Pablo Talk | Contributions 06:40, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

There is a whole area of options between "ban" and "ignore". I am not advocating "ignore" but still fail to see why this particular incident has attracted so much attention. Check out WP:RfC and WP:RfAr and you will see there are many ways to skin a cat. Of course you can always shoot the poor thing and be done with it. Sophia 08:49, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, it's not jsut one incident. It's the fourth edit warring incident in 2 months involving 4 differnt article and 4 different editors. All involved gaming the system. 3 of which ended in blocks and one of which ended in his 2RR pledge in July. His last block of two weeks was reduced by El_C for all the reasons that are being stated for why he should not receive an indefinite ban. Indeed, El_C is threatening to unilaterally reduce his block again. IT's clear that G33 has not taken his admonishments or his pledges to heart. --DHeyward 14:40, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Sarcasm will not get you the community ban you seek, Pablo. In fact, it increasingly appears to be a form of intimidation. Please try to be a bit more collegial, if not friendly, to your follow editors. Thanks. El_C 10:24, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

• Object to sanctions here while ANI discussion is ongoing. Let the dust settle and see what happens with Durova's offer. R. Baley 06:56, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Object - Length of block log is as much dependent on how quick admins are to block someone as to their actual actions. There are many users with just as extensive a history of edit warring and POV pushing as Giovanni33... several of them actively campaigning for this ban. That their block logs are not, in some cases, as lengthy as Giovanni33's demonstrates to me why such a criteria is a poor choice. Much (though not all) of the impetus for this ban is an effort by one set of edit warriors to banish their opponent. That isn't something we should ever encourage, and if it succeeds it should be applied equally to long term edit warriors of all stripes with similar histories... whether they have the block log to show for it or not. --CBD 07:12, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse indefinite ban for Giovanni33, or alternatively a 3 month block followed by a 1-year probation period allowing for 1RR only. Breaking 1RR during probation shall result in an automatic indef-ban. If this alternate suggestion is taken, force the resumption of Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Mao: The Unknown Story 2‎, which may be escalated into WP:RfArb if the mediation fails again. Those requesting for "parity" here should rather join the aforementioned mediation/arbitration on Mao/Jung Chang to pursue their content disputes. No sanctions are necessary for other editors at this point.--Endroit 14:06, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• I was inclined to support a short-term ban from the whole project, to be followed by a permanent topic ban on all Asia-related articles. But after seeing the evidence of stalking, I have to reluctantly endorse an indefinite ban. Blueboy96 14:29, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Stalking?????? No one is actually taking that one seriously as it's absurd and an accusation put out by the editor who Gio was in conflict with. Sophia 14:36, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

That was me, providing the diff's at ANI. I don't believe I ever was in a conflict with Giovanni33. Do you have any proof of it, Sophia?--Endroit 14:53, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose. It takes two to edit-war; it seems unfair to indef-ban one side in a war (particularly when it's the opposing side in this case that actually violated 3RR). This seems to be another case of a double standard being imposed by the ruling clique. *Dan T.* 14:33, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Object. Duplicating an ongoing discussion at ANI here is a bad idea, and this discussion was only started after it become obvious that there was not consensus for an indefinite ban at ANI. On his talk page, after being prompted by Durova, Giovanni (following others before him) has proposed alternate remedies of 1RR probation or a topic ban on Mao related articles (with both remedies to be in effect for himself and the editor he edit warred with). Let's pursue those options for now and keep the discussion in the place which it began. I'd rather not even comment here and lend credence to this thread, but I don't want a few editors who have been in content disputes with Giovanni in the past to do an end-around on the dialogue that is already happening.--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 16:44, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Endorse. The behavior of other users should also be looked into, but that doesn't excuse Giovanni33. A fairly lengthy ban (at least 6 months) would be my second choice, though still acceptable. Chaz ^Beckett 17:00, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose - Other solutions should be tried before an end-all-be-all indefinite block. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 18:28, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose - Agree with many here, a contributing editor should not be blocked, especially after showing such an ability to improve in bahavior. If an admin finds themself loosing patience, perhaps they should step back, patience is required to deal with situations. Their proposal, Giovanni33 that is, seems to be the best implementation to avoiding further edit warring over the issue. --SevenOfDiamonds 01:06, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Giovanni33's offer

Reposted from user talk:

:Thanks for your offer and being amicable. For the good of the project, I propose a 1RR limit for myself and John Smiths as fair. I self imposed a 2 RR for myself, and only went to 3 when I saw what he was pushing. I'll happily go to 1 revert as a limit for a proposed lenght of time as is agreed per consensus (1 year, 6 months?), with the condition that the same applies to the other editor in these edit wars with me, who has been reverting in excess of what I have been doing over several articles (more than myself). Since this ANI is considering both of us (or should be, per the 3RR report), its apropos that both are dealt with in a similar manner with a solution that benefits the project. It would also dispel appearances of being one-side, unfair, etc.Giovanni33 03:13, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I would like to propose a 2nd solution that I think would be better for WP: a topic ban on Mao related articles--but again for both parties. The edit wars all center around the Jung Chang book and Mao's China, and I'd be happy to accept a topic ban on these articles provided John Smiths included, as well. This would be my first choice, and I think a better solution as it would end the edit wars period, instead of slowing them down (I can see John Smith doing 1 revert a day, and this would not a real solution).Giovanni33 03:52, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Both of these suggestions include reciprocal sanctions on another editor. I would really need to see evidence in support of such a thing before backing that idea, but I have an alternative proposal: this type of remedy fits within the scope of community enforceable mediation where two editors can come together and agree to binding remedies upon themselves. If John Smith is agreeable, I propose a limited unblock of Giovanni33 for the exclusive purpose of community enforceable mediation, which would last until CEM concludes or for one month: if no agreement is forthcoming by that deadline I'd refer to arbitration (shifting the limited unblock to arbitration). This comes with no automatic limitation on John Smith's editing privileges, although I or any other administrator may take action as appropriate. Durova^Charge! 17:09, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Agreed it would be best for all concerned if the two can reach a settlement between themselves. If this fails, actions with respect to Giovanni33 and John Smith should each be considered on their individual merits. Raymond Arritt 17:19, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment - Option One proposed by Gio seems more favourable to me. As someone who have seen the work of both editors, I know that they have valuable contributions. Only they need to be more willing to give-and-take when they disagree. But I have a question for this Option One - would it be a 1RR/article/week? And is it limited to those articles they have edit warred over? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 18:28, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

The idea of community enforceable mediation floated by Durova sounds excellent to me, and is probably largely in line with the spirit of Giovanni's suggestions which seem to revolve around both parties agreeing to some wrongdoing, agreeing to dial down the level of conflict, and submitting to restrictions on their editing activities. Has User:John Smith's been contacted about this proposal? I think he is blocked now but it seems like it would be useful to bring him into the discussion via his talk page.--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 18:47, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

John Smith's and I have traded e-mails and had an online chat. He's preparing a proposal. I'll post here when it's ready. Durova^Charge! 19:16, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment This was his pledge 6 weeks ago on a 3RR/edit warring transgression that went unblocked. A few weeks later, he was blocked again for edit warring with a different editor on a different article. That block was reduced by El_C. This weeks edit war was with yet a different editor, a different blocking admin and a different article. If the 2RR pledge didn't mean anything and his blocks keep getting reduced, why is their a belief that anything other that a long period of quiet reflection will produce a change in behaviour? --DHeyward 22:31, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment — This appears to be an effort by Giovanni33 to shirk responsibility by blaming it all on one user. However, Mongo and others were involved the last time, not John Smith's. I believe the admins from the other recent incidents need to be consulted to determine the appropriate action here. At least a 3-month block on Giovanni33 is in order, for his general disruptions, in addition to the WP:CEM suggested above by Durova.--Endroit 23:39, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

John Smith's offer

This is longer so I'll link to it. Reactions and comments are welcome, and Giovanni33 may respond by talk page posts, e-mail, or chat. Durova^Charge! 21:04, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

It's basically a rant, devoid of any introspection (in it, John Smith doesn't acknowledge his pov pushing of Changism for years). The proposal, if I could parse it, involves himself having some sort of revert advantage, that he promises not to use to his advantage. As a sign of good faith, he asks that his version in the dispute be retained. Feel free to stop me at any time. El_C 22:51, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, please do stop. I'm seeking an effective community solution here to avoid arbitration, which is where things will go if we can't achieve consensus. If there's something constructive to build upon please focus on that, or if there's nothing of value then please say so without placing additional strain on the discussion. Durova^Charge! 23:20, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

If you're unwilling, or unable, to reach parity, which thus far seems to be the case, perhaps arbitration would be the best recourse. El_C 23:28, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I certainly am willing and able to reach parity if I see a good case that parity is appropriate. You're welcome to make such a case. Please offer evidence in a dry just-the-facts-ma'am presentation. Durova^Charge! 23:46, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I just am not sure you are capable of being evenhanded, seeing that your first action will need to be justified in the result. El_C 01:06, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

If you need any evidence of my impartiality, see Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Agapetos angel where I was the sole defender of an editor whose ideology I abhorred. I simply don't accept the paradigm that it takes two to tango: I've seen enough editors where there was a primary antagonist, and it's a very commonplace tactic for a primary antagonist to invoke it takes two to tango in a bid for retributive action when sanctions appeared to be imminent. So I examine each instance separately and so far I'm not impressed by the direction that this conversation has taken: rather than a presentation of evidence for analysis and judgement this approaches challenges to my capacity for analysis and judgement. WP:AGF should weigh here. Please, if you have evidence to present for community discussion then do present it. Durova^Charge! 01:49, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Regardless of your impressions, I object to you deciding the content end of an edit war that's been going on for years via clumsy action that obviously lacks consensus and is only supported by seemingly well-defined circles. El_C 03:03, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Reposting: I think Giovanni sees the world too politically and categorises people as being "with him", "against him" or "not involved". He also has trouble accepting that others may have a valid point and trying to find compromise that maybe he doesn't agree with but is a "halfway house" that can move things on. So whilst he was blocked, I would suggest we get a mediator (maybe 2-3) to chat things over with him every so often to see how he was feeling. I think he could do with a sort of "behavioural mentor", someone (or some people) to try to get him to be more flexible and less prone to just want to get what he initially thinks is right. If for some reason they thought he hadn't changed they could recommend he stay blocked, but generally they would be there to help him out.

After the X weeks/months were up, Giovanni would be allowed back. He would be put on 1-revert parole (either per article per week or week) for 6 months/1 year. If he started breaking the terms he would be indef blocked. Also if he was referred again by wikipedians for repeated disruptive behaviour even after the parole was up he might be indef blocked, though that would depend on how people felt at the time.

As for myself, I would re-assure Giovanni I wouldn't game his parole by agreeing not to get involved in articles he has edited and/or still edits which I have not edited. He would draw up a list of articles he is interested in that he thinks apply and we could agree them with someone like Durova. If I started reverting his changes on those articles we had agreed on, I would get a 72-hour ban.

In regards to the points we had been mediating, I would agree not to use my revert "advantage" to change them. In return he would agree to med-arb with three administrators who have not been involved in blocking/unblocking us, editing in our favours/against us, etc. I would suggest Durova (again as a very non-partisan admin) be chair admin, and if we couldn't agree on the other two she would find them herself. As a sign of good faith I would ask that Giovanni not try to change the recent edits I proposed to the lead of the Mao: The Unknown Story article - if he was not happy with them after he returned from his block he could ask they be included in the med-arb.

Some wikipedians sympathetic to Giovanni may think this proposal unfair, but I would point out that if we can't agree to a resolution the matter will go to arbitration, which will be long-winded and probably eventually ban Giovanni or otherwise censor him more severely. There is no reason why we can't get to the position where Giovanni never edit-wars again, but I think a bit of "tough love" is is required here to do that. John Smith's 20:54, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

First you link to it, now you're "reposting it"? ^[1] Is this some sort of rhetorical device? It looks like it serves to drown the discussion. El_C 23:34, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

To be candid, your comment looked like an attempt at poisoning the well. I'm not attempting any sort of rhetoric: I have no dog in this race. I'd just rather achieve a workable consensus if it's possible to do that without referring the matter to WP:RFAR. Durova^Charge! 23:43, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I am still talking about parity. I find tou are not being responsive about this limited point. El_C 00:08, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

My view of parity is that we consider each case equally dispassionately on its own merits. Giovanni33's case should be considered on its merits, including present behavior in light of prior context. John Smith's case should be considered on its merits, including present behavior in light of prior context. The "if you block one of mine, then we have to block one of theirs" approach uncomfortably resembles tit-for-tat rather than true parity. Raymond Arritt 00:19, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Block-log and political-derived prejudice appears headed to skew any notions of fair review, leading to such distortion. El_C 01:06, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

My worry is that many seem to not be reading the block log correctly, citing each line as a seperate block, and ignoring the time many of those took place and the long stretch between them. They should also take note of who the last blocking admin was back in 2006, and who seems to be advocating the block now. --SevenOfDiamonds 01:09, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Giovanni's remedies seem to be first more fair, limiting one user and not the other, is just telling one its ok to war and the other its not. What prevents the one not limited from continuing to drown the other out? I am more in favor of the first then the second, however if the belief is the topic and their views, then 2 should be studied. I agree with others, John seems to just be ranting, not actually making a solid proposal. --SevenOfDiamonds 01:02, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

There seems to be a worry that John Smith is getting off lightly while Giovanni33 bears the brunt of the punishment. Since this is a CSN notice about Giovanni33, this would be appropriate. JS has a much less impressive block log. I have not seen him reported on ANI or CSN previously as Giovanni33 has. He has not violated other rules such as gaming the system and sockpuppet policies as Giovanni33. In fact, he received one the harshest 3RR penalties from El_C given his block log and he chose to block JS but not Giovanni for edit warring on April 4 (yes they were both involved, it was the same article). It's clear that El_C has a conflict with JS and feels some affinity for Giovanni33 as he has inly blocked JS and only unblocked Giovanni33. Bringing JS into Giovanni33's CSN is more of a red herring. This is about Giovanni33's inability to act civillly within the bounds of consensus and the community adopted policies such as 3RR, Sockpuppetry and Gaming the System and his inability to live up to his previous commitments and promises. --DHeyward 02:31, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

You really should try not to accuse admins of anything unless you are going to stand by them and report it properly. Slinging mud is not appropriate. --SevenOfDiamonds 03:31, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think I accused anybody of anything here except Giovanni33 who should be blocked indefinitely. I know of no policy that El_C has broken so there is nothing to report. It certainly would be wildly inappropriate for him to use his admin tools to change the blocks of either Giovanni33 or John Smith as he has a history with both of them. --DHeyward 03:42, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Arbitration request opened

This thread can close now. It appears unlikely to generate consensus so I've taken it to arbitration and given limited unblocks for both John Smith's and Giovanni33 for the purpose of participation there. Other editors may wish to revise and expand the lists of involved parties and dispute resolution attempts. Durova^Charge! 03:50, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Proposing Community Ban on User:Gold heart

Let it Snow!

• Pile-on support I know this is closed, but I just wanted to register my support of Alison. She's a great admin and crap like this won't be allowed. Of course it's snowing. . .as well it should be. Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. R. Baley 07:18, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Catalonia closed

The above arbitration case has closed. Maurice27 (talk · contribs) is banned for 30 days, and the parties to the underlying content disputes are encouraged to continue with the normal consensus-building process to produce high-quality articles. For the Arbitration Committee, Picaroon (t) 02:14, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Proposing Community Ban on User:Ferrylodge

The following discussion is archived. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Wide margin of support for indef ban of Ferrylodge; indef banned. FeloniousMonk 16:11, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

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Ferrylodge (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Perhaps some of you recall Ferrylodge, who has been waging a low-level edit war via attrition on Abortion and related pages since December 2006. His technique has been successful enough to drive at least one contributor (one of our better and more productive ones) from the project altogether. He has now turned his attention to harassing, attacking, and maligning me - using the same just-under-the-radar techniques - while continuing his tendentious editing. I have been ignoring this, but it has reached a point where I am now asking for community involvement.

His approach is that of a 'victim bully,' using claims of having been wronged to attempt to gain leverage over others. He has twisted my attempt to support consensus into me being an "edit warrior", my attempts to enforce policy and guidelines into "harassment" and so on. Examples, all taken from today: In the "edit war", he was blocked by MastCell for 3RR on Stillbirth, for insertion of the word "womb". My count (and I may have missed some) is six editors supporting "uterus" over "womb" as a more accurate and appropriate term, and one or two "no preference" editors, and one, Ferrylodge, edit warring to use the word "womb" - the debate has been spread over multiple articles. This is indeed a content dispute, I am well aware of that. I am not here for suggestions or help on the content dispute. I am here because Ferrylodge is maintaining his position that he alone is correct, that he alone is NPOV, that editors who disagree with him are disruptive edit warring POV pushers. No one supports his preferred phrasing and since his block, no one has reverted to his version or inserted the word. He added a POV tag to Abortion because his edit did not have consensus nor even support. This is dishearteningly similar to Sam Spade - in specific, that he "wages POV war designed to wear down opposition, even where he is in a minority of one, by sheer unreasonable persistence in the face of consensus", and he maligns those opposing him to make it appear that it is a personal matter on their part, rather than a policy matter on his. He even "strongly recommended" (on Talk:Pregnancy) that an opposing editor on the Stillbirth article be blocked for disruption, because of course it could not be a simple case of Ferrylodge editing against consensus - it must be that the other editor is disruptive!

He consistently cherry-picks my words to twist them into false meaning - for example, when I referred to a word as "vulgar" and to clarify I posted the definition link to the meaning of vulgar I was using (commonly used language), he removed it with the edit summary " Please do not post at my talk page, KC." - then proceeded to post on his talk page that "she said that I was trying to insert a "vulgar" word into the article. It astounds me that an admin can get away with such incivility, and I find it very difficult to respond in a constructive way to her personal attacks" - which is typical of his tactics, for I must either ignore his misrepresentation of my statement, or ignore his request to not post on his talk page - which surely he learned in his block for harassment would be harassment, as that is precisely what he was last blocked for. In short, he's using the "lessons learned" not to be a better Wikipedian, but to game the system so that he is "innocent" and I am "doing wrong." I am not the only editor he uses these tactics against, if similar evidence for these actions against other users is desired I can dig though his history and place them here.

I doubt that an Rfc would be of any help, because in the few previous instances I have seen of community input, Ferrylodge showed himself resistant to the concept that he could possibly have erred at all. See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive252#Harassment Charge By Bishonen Against Ferrylodge, followed by Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Bishonen 2, followed by Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive259#Disruptive editing at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment by Ferrylodge - all of which stemmed from one 24-hour block, and all but the last were Ferrylodge stridently defending himself and accusing all and sundry. The last was a suggestion that he'd become disruptive enough on the Rfc talk page (post-closing) to be blocked. I argued against blocking for disruption, because the minute that was posted, he ceased the disruption. My mistake. I note a similar pattern of behavior every time attention is focused on Ferrylodge - he fades quietly into the background for a brief spell, then returns renewed to the attack. This has gone on long enough. KillerChihuahua^?!? 23:32, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

• Hmmm, blocked once for harrassment already and still at it. Doesn't seem amendable to any view other than his own or willing to let matters drop, and too willing to carry a grudge. I doubt other forms of WP:DR will yield other outcomes. A ban seems warranted, and I'd support one. Odd nature 23:44, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong support per all the evidence presented by KillerChihuahua, and the fact that he has been warned dozens of times to stop harassing KC, and he still continues with no attempt to be civil. Need I note that he was recently featured in the Washington Post for edit warring on the Fred Thompson article? ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:54, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Also would support a ban on Ferrylodge, or at minimum a topic ban of all pregnancy-related articles and all politics related articles. Incidentally, the article that Swatjester refers to can be found here. JoshuaZ 00:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong support for ban However, per KC's comments and my own personal observations including this response, he needs to go. Moreover, this offensive RfC just begs for removal of this person from the project. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 00:12, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• I admit that I am the contributor who has stopped editing Wikipedia due to having to deal with Ferrylodge's tendentious editing. I first encountered him in December 2006, when he came to Abortion,[49], which ended up leading to his first block for 3RR. I was accused of "request[ing] that [he] be blocked,"[50] although I'd only reminded him to watch out for 3RR in an edit summary,[51] and the blocking admin confirmed that he had acted indepedently.[52] I tried to put this behind, and to focus on content, not the contributor, during the many disagreements that arose between Ferrylodge, myself, and other editors on abortion and pregnancy-related articles in the following months. It was difficult, though, because I sometimes got the impression that Ferrylodge was trying to make things personal, such as when he apparently went out of his way to insert himself into a minor dispute which arose between myself and an anonymous editor on Vaccine controversy, although the dispute did not involve Ferrylodge, and Ferrylodge had never edited the article in question.[53] I am surprised to find that he is still making disruptive edits on the same constellation of articles — Abortion, Pregnancy, Stillbirth — after almost nine months.[54] I think this is a very long time to learn the ropes on Wikipedia; Ferrylodge has had ample time to learn how to work cooperatively with other editors. When I felt that my personal frustation was beginning to compromise my ability to contribute to this community, I left, but Ferrylodge continues to edit despite the chip on his shoulder, and refuses to let bygones be bygones with regard to users like KillerChihuahua. I don't think it's fair to editors who have dedicated themselves to building this encyclopedia to have to sort out Ferrylodge's disruptive editing and confrontational behavior any longer than they already have. -Severa 01:37, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support motion. I just thought I would clarify in case this was unclear from the statement above. -Severa 02:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Please note that I have unblocked Ferrylodge so that he can participate and respond here. I had blocked him earlier today for violating 3RR; he requested an unblock to respond here, and I felt that was only fair. MastCell ^Talk 03:09, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
  • I agree, but only for commenting here. Any other editing or disruption and it's right back to blocksville. FeloniousMonk 03:35, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support block. He's a chronic troublemaker, unlikely to change. FeloniousMonk 03:35, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Also supporting. KillerChihuahua makes a strong case. As a second choice, would support a topic ban on reproduction and political articles. Durova^Charge! 04:22, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose ban

Firstly, perhaps I should say that I personally am strongly inclined to side with KC on the issues in question and to oppose Ferrylodge's POV. But while Ferrylodge is clearly an obstinate editor, I don't believe the evidence presented by KillerChihuahua here is enough to warrant a ban. Nor do I see any evidence, that some have alluded to, of "harassment".

One inadvertent breach of 3RR in a year hardly constitutes grounds for a permaban, and I see little evidence of KC's assertion that Ferrylodge routinely defies consensus. For example, recent discussion at Talk:Abortion indicates that Ferrylodge has as much support for his views as opposition.

Ferrylodge seems prepared to discuss his concerns at length on talk pages, and I think if he were to make a commitment to agree to abide by consensus, that ought to be sufficient at this stage. If not, then I think this is a problem that would be best handled by an RFC, I don't see that it's severe enough at present to warrant intervention here. Gatoclass 07:49, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: This has nothing to do with POV - there are always editors of all POVs on the articles in question, and generally, we all work well together, or at least, well enough. This is an issue of low-level, constant warring, both on the articles, and against any editor FL perceives as "in his way". Like Sam Spade, the individual instances are annoying and bothersome, but not enough to bother doing much about - the volume is such that I haven't even bothered responding to most of his misrepresentations of my statements and views. But the sheer volume of it makes it impossible to ignore. If it were just that he accused me of harassment, I'd ignore. If it were just that he twisted everything I said into something else, I'd probably keep it between us. But he's driven off one editor completely, he is working on Tvoz, as seen by her lengthly evidence - and that from only 10 days. The three here are not the only ones. I posted instances from only one day, and could easily write a full page correcting his false representations and misleading statements from his response, below - and this is one reason he's a problem. He "responds" by a series of false or misleading statements about what "KC asserts" - all of which instances are utterly false or grossly inaccurate or misleading. His "willingness to discuss at length" bears this same flavor. Its not willingness to discuss, its wearing out the opposition in bullheaded obstinacy and unsupported accusations and misleading representations of the other party. What purpose would it serve if I were to spend the full page necessary to correct his false allegations against me in his response, below? We'd get the same kind of thing as we saw on ANI, where all but one editor told him the same exact thing, and he did not change his view or even concede that others might have any validity. He actually escalated it, having gotten no joy on ANI, to an Rfc. Read the ANI thread, read the Rfc, and I don't see how anyone can think an Rfc might have a positive effect. Actually, just read his response, which has nothing to do with him addressing any problems in his behavior, and everything to do with making it personal by attacking me, Bishonen, and Severa. Because, as usual, FL cannot possibly have erred at all - its everyone else who is in the wrong. KillerChihuahua^?!? 10:45, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Like Sam Spade...the sheer volume of it makes it impossible to ignore - KC

That may be the case, but perhaps I should remind you that Sam Spade was never permabanned from Wiki. Rather, he was placed on indefinite probation - after which he chose to cease editing of his own accord.

My concern is that CSN is being used to simply dispose of editors who hold unpopular positions. IMO, Wiki needs the editors who hold unpopular views, because they help to keep the majority honest. Maybe it's the case that Ferrylodge is just a disruptive troll, I don't know - but the case you have presented here is rather long on accusations and short on substance. Permabanning is a radical step, and IMO it should only be used in the worst cases, and backed up by the strongest possible evidence - everything else should go through normal arbitration processes. And while Ferrylodge plainly has made few friends on Wikipedia, I've yet to see much evidence to suggest that he has in recent times been anything more than a minor nuisance for editors who don't like his views or his obstinate approach. Gatoclass 17:04, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you might examine that statement. Are you saying that I, and Severa, and Tvoz, and Pleasantville, are "using" CSN to "dump" someone we don't agree with? That's a fairly strong insinuation that someone is gaming the system, and as the one who started this process, I can only take it that your "concern" is that it is I who am most likely to be guilty of "using CSN". I take exception to your hint that this might be a method to remove an editor I disagree with. KillerChihuahua^?!? 17:52, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I have to agree with KC here. Tendentiousness is actually quite damaging to a project which functions on consensus, and in which one determined, obstinate editor can stall an article or discussion indefinitely. It's actually a far worse problem than vandalism (yet we keep hearing the arguments on this board that "well, he may be a tendentious POV-pusher, but at least he's not a vandal!") Lots of people hold "unpopular" opinions, but advancing those opinions in a disruptive or tendentious manner is the issue. MastCell ^Talk 18:06, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

No, sorry, that was intended as a criticism of the process, not of the person or persons making use of it. I just happen to think that the process appears to lack adequate safeguards for the protection of users who take unpopular positions, that's all. You are of course perfectly entitled to bring up another editor's behaviour at this page, and even to call for their permanent banning if you feel so inclined. It's just that I am concerned that users may not always get the kind of process here that I think is warranted by the severe penalties that can be handed down. Gatoclass 18:56, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support - I have had numerous dealings with Ferrylodge (including, but not limited to, the Freddie/Fred dispute on Talk: Fred Thompson referred to in the Sept 17 Washington Post article) and several times in the last 10 days he misrepresented my edits or comments. I called him on it each time, and he has yet to retract or apologize for any of them. None of them are grievous, or the end of the world, but it is the pattern that I am raising here:

-On September 9, here, he erroneously claims that I had previously "urged" that the name be rendered in the way that he preferred and claimed that all he was doing was advocating the same thing I had advocated (which I had not); when I pointed out here that he misrepresented my edit, and that I had not even addressed the rendering of the name in that edit - just provided citations for it - he neither retracted his comment nor apologized for it as an error.

-On September 10 he went to WP:MOSBIO and tried to modify the relevant section to support his position on Fred/Freddie, but neglected to say why he was so interested in that section, claiming to only be looking at John Edwards' name; in the middle of the argument he claimed here that "Tvoz suggested I visited here, and I have taken up her suggestion", including this diff of mine which clearly indicates that in fact I asked him if he was planning to go to John Edwards' page to advocate changing his name rendering to match - if indeed his concern was that saying that Thompson was named Freddie would make him look silly, then surely the same would apply to Johnny Reid "John" Edwards. I clearly was not suggesting that he try to reword MOS policy to conform to his position. (My position was consistently that Edwards and Thompson's names should be handled in the same way as they are virtually identical situations.) When I pointed out that he was again misrepresenting my comments, he ignores the comment and does not apologize or rescind it, but goes on to ask me to AGF - he's the injured party. This misrepresentation is important because I think changing policy or guideline wording should not be done to bolster one's position in a content dispute - especially in a stealth manner - and his prominent and incorrect claim that he was doing so at my suggestion is putting words in my mouth that I never said - this is unacceptable, and I've yet to receive an apology.

-The third instance of his misrepresentation of my edits in the last 10 days came on Sept 15, in regards to a sourced comment by George Will in the Washington Post where he compares the launch of the Thompson campaign to the launch of New Coke. Ferrylodge claims "The article has again been edited (by Tvoz) to reinsert this material" and goes on to say that editors should "work by consensus, and not insist on inserting material into the article when it has been removed and rejected by multiple other editors", citing SBowers3 as one of the "multiple editors". First, I only made that edit once, not "again", and second, SBowers3 made his comments opposing the Will quote after I reinstated it, and indeed SBowers3 did not remove the George Will material at all, because he, unlike Ferrylodge, correctly recognized that there was an ongoing discussion and did not choose to edit war, just to discuss. Ferrylodge doesn't do that - he'll discuss, but only if his preferred wording is in place in an article, and he'll revert to his wording repeatedly, even when several editors are changing it. At the time I reinstated the material there were three editors including me who spoke up for including the material, and only two, Ferrylodge and Rosspz, who opposed it. I pointed out to Ferrylodge that he had misrepresented me for the third time, asked him to correct his comment on both counts. No apology for misrepresenting me was given, and although he edited his comment here, he did it in a way that didn't really address my objection.

-The fourth problem occurred on Sept 19, when Ferrylodge, by innuendo, falsely accused me of wikistalking because I commented in support of another editor's point that disagreed with his; I objected to the accusation, and he disingenuously said that some editors don't know what wikistalking is, and that he wasn't making accusations. Meanwhile I brought the conversation to his talk page and asked him to point out where I was harassing him or disrupting anything - which as another editor also pointed out is the key point in identifying wikistalking. He has had no reply, as I have done no such thing, yet he again did not apologize or rescind his accusation, only implied that I was accusing him of harassment which I was not.

Although on their own, individually, these instances are not particularly grievous (except perhaps the MOSBIO manipulation), taken together I think this reveals a pattern that is very disturbing, and I am only speaking here of the recent instances where I noticed his misrepresentations and unwillingness to admit error and apologize. I also have observed that often Ferrylodge's edits express his POV, rather than neutrally approaching the subject of reproduction on the one hand and political candidates on the other, and he tends to use bully tactics, editing in a tendentious manner, making disingenuous arguments. For all of these reasons, and based on comments of the editors above, I think that a ban is in order. Short of that I would concur with Durova in support of at least a partial ban on editing all reproduction and political articles. Tvoz |talk 09:55, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: Regarding the MOSBIO issue, you have misrepresented the facts. As you can see in the history, Ferrylodge made only three edits, each time reverting Threeafterthree's attempt to manipulate the MOS to support their position on Fred/Freddie. The text after his final edit is identical to what it was before Threeafterthree messed with it. That's the exact opposite of your claim that he "tried to modify the relevant section to support his position". Now I'm not sure what he was thinking when he said that you had referred him there – maybe he confused you with Threeafterthree, since your names both start with T? – but your recounting of events is at least as flawed. (And to pick a truly minuscule nit, Ferrylodge's edits were on 9-Sep, not 10-Sep as you wrote - I point this out merely to demonstrate that memories aren't 100% perfect.) -- Zsero 18:35, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps I wasn't clear: I was talking about his proposal on Wikipedia talk:MOSBIO of September 10, not his edits of Threeafterthree on September 9. See the diff I posted last night. He proposed a MOSBIO change here and the objection I raised above was not about the substance of his proposal, but about his misrepresentation of my role in it. I have not misrepresented the facts, Zsero. Tvoz |talk 20:17, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment about edit warring on Fred Thompson regarding Fred/Freddie. Regardless of what one can conclude from reading the Washpo article, and contrary to what is asserted below, Ferrylodge, with 7 reverts in one day on this one point, accused me - with only 2 - of edit warring. I'll leave it to others to reach conclusions, except to say that "one inadvertent breach of 3RR" is not quite the situation - it's just the only time he was called on it recently:

These are diffs of relevant edits by Ferrylodge on September 9, all but one of which are haggling about word order regarding Fred/Freddie, the other one was removing Freddie altogether:

1st revert: 05:52, 9 September 2007

2nd revert: 06:05, 9 September 2007

3rd revert: 06:20, 9 September 2007

4th revert: 06:33, 9 September 2007 (this one completely removed "Freddie" despite the reliable sources that accompanied the name)

5th revert: 16:09, 9 September 2007

6th revert: 17:41, 9 September 2007

7th revert: 17:50, 9 September 2007

These are my relevant diffs on September 9:

1st revert: 9:21 9 September 2007 (putting "Freddie" and sources back in)

2nd revert: 18:08, 9 September 2007

Tvoz |talk 09:55, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support I have had only limited and very recent interaction with Ferrylodge, but overall his tone was hostile and I asked repeatedly that he adopt a more civil tone, with no particular effect. Also disturbing was his tendency to preemptive accusation: accusing TVoz of wikistalking and then (on another page) clarifying that she hadn't wikistalked him yet but that he (apparently) anticipated that she would; preemptively accusing me of making unsourced modifications to an article, when I had not yet made the modifications, etc. He gave no explanation for his position that "motherhood" begins at conception and not, as it is usually defined, at the birth of one's child, but defended it simply with hostility.

Checking into his history, I find that he is a Men's Rights activist who's focus is the abortion issue (see the bottom of this page). In keeping with that, his Wikipedia edits focus strongly on abortion and related subjects: 511 edits to Roe v. Wade, 297 edits to Fetus, and many edits to Abortion in the United States, Intact dilation and extraction, Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, etc. This focus and his abrasive manner has lead to his being blocked twice, and seems to underly his insistance that his description of gestation be featured in the lede of the article Mother.

In summary, he has a strong point of view and seems to be using intimidation tactics to defend it. --Pleasantville 14:37, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Ok, now that's interesting. I'm not sure if this is germane or not, but I just noticed that all four of the editors who have posted evidence of having been seriously harassed by Ferrylodge, and the one administrator whose block he has protested for months, are female. And clearly self-identify as female. He has maligned Bishonen endlessly since she blocked him; he has never offered a peep about his other two blocks, and even apologized for breaking 3RR. KillerChihuahua^?!? 15:53, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

  Ah, so now I'm a misogynist? If Pleasantville is female, I had no idea of that until just now. What I do know about Pleasantville is that she is a very unkind editor. I refer any interested readers to this discussion which is the only discussion I ever had with Pleasantville. KC has edited many abortion-related articles, and that mere fact does not imply anything about her POV; likewise, I fail to see how some DMOZ editor's POV can be deduced from a category that he or she edits. But apparently any shred of alleged information is fair game here.Ferrylodge 16:19, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

  I'm missing where "Ferrylodge, please maintain a civil tone" is unkind, although your accusations she was "condescending, psychoanalyzing, and pretending that [Ferrylodge's] tone is not civil" in response to that gentle request seems a bit confrontational. KillerChihuahua^?!? 16:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

  For clarification: My initials are also KC as in Kathryn Cramer; I presume for the purposes of this discussion,"KC" refers to KillerChihuahua. --Pleasantville 16:27, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

  Yes, sorry about that. If anyone shortens your name, it will probably be "PV" for Pleasantville, which I hope will not be unduly confusing for everyone. KillerChihuahua^?!? 16:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support - Obvious case of WP:TE and of exhausting the community's patience. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:14, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I would also consider a topic ban on Abortion-related and other articles in which these behaviors have been observed, and a strong caution issued so that repeating that behavior in other articles will result in a full ban. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:37, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose. The behavior is troubling, but it does not seem to rise to the level of an outright community ban. I would support a topic ban and some sort of behavioral probation. Maybe mentoring is also appropriate. Dean Wormer 16:38, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• I'm inclined to opine that I oppose this proposed ban. And rather strongly at that. I haven't had that much interaction with Ferrylodge, but it seems to me that Wikipedia would be better off if we were discussing something better than banning a contributor who, contrary to some people's opinions, does actually improve the encyclopedia. I can't comment on the uterus/womb dispute, but in a lot of cases, it does look like he is being railroaded because of his point of view. There is a content dispute that he is a part of. But it takes two (or more) to edit war. I've seen Ferrylodge be a helpful contributor on the Fred Thompson article, and agree with some of what he says below. I didn't follow Bishonen's 2nd RfC, but at first glance it does seem like people were just laughing at Ferrylodge. I don't know the full details, but community bans are not for useful contributors. If he was revert warring, block him accordingly. No need to deprive the project of a helpful contributor forever. He's not a vandal, he's not unhelpful, he participates in discussion (although sometimes not as well as we'd all like), and he's not creating a big enough disruption that it is shutting the encyclopedia down. He may deserve to be blocked, but he doesn't deserve this. Mahalo. --Ali'i 16:51, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Comment How about instead of an outright ban or a topic ban, a restriction to one revert per week (that is per 168 hours) per article? Or something like that, anyway. Perhaps that's too strict, perhaps that's not strict enough. Perhaps 2RR per week with a maximum of 3RR per month. This would seem likely to take care of many of the concerns raised above. --Yamla 16:58, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
  • That might be a workable solution. I think that the major problem here is indeed tendentiousness; Ferrylodge has often persisted in beating a dead horse when he's failed to convince anyone else of his argument. Restricting him from edit-warring (e.g. with 0RR or 1RR) would allow him to continue to contribute, but he would need to actually build consensus to see his proposed edits enacted. I do think that continuing the status quo is a bad idea, as there's clearly a problem here; I also wonder whether a full siteban without an intermediate step is overkill, though I'm not categorically opposed. MastCell ^Talk 17:07, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
    • That sounds more reasonable to me. I think an approach along these lines would probably be more appropriate at this stage. Gatoclass 17:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• • • (after ec) Which would be acceptable were it only his DE; however, its also the harassment and accusations he bogs people down with which is a massive problem. Did you not see his accusation that Pleasantville is "not nice" and when one looks, oh hey, she asked him very nicely and politely and delicately to be civil - which resulted in a response of him making further and FAR more hostile accusations. I don't know how anyone can see his history and the linked information and somehow conclude this has anything to do with his POV. No one cares what his POV is, so far as I know - I certainly don't, its irrelevant - its his nasty insinuations, false accusations, personalizing of any type of disputes, and edit warring as a minority of one which is the problem. He was blocked for 3RR, and his disingenuous argument below is that "there was only one edit on talk:stillbirth - conveniently ignoring the thirty or so on the previous articles where he was waging that little war before taking it to other articles. This is precisely the situation with his RCOG edit warring: everyone but he stated clearly there was zero reason to characterize RCOG as "pro-choice" - on talk:abortion. When he took the term off to the RCOG article that very same day, he stridently protested that there had been no discussion, because it hadn't been discussed on the RCOG talk page. Now, this is beyond nonsensical. If they aren't pro-choice, and there are no sources to say they are pro-choice, it really doesn't matter where that statement is made, its unsourced. Its not the revert warring. Its the approach and the treatment of others. I see some people are actually swallowing his story that there is some kind of dispute between the two of us. If the community wishes to give a topic ban, I selfishly would be happy enough, as if he's off the pregnancy and abortion articles I won't have to deal with him any more, and hopefully we won't lose Pleasantville as we lost Severa. However, from what I see here, Swatjester and Tvoz among others might object to continuing to deal with him on political articles. I have no idea about the legal articles, I don't edit or watch them. But if there is to be any kind of helpful resolution, it must address his behavior towards others. I cannot spend the hours of time it would take to refute and correct every spurious charge he makes against me, and it is wearing to the spirit to have to contend with that kind of character assassination day in day out. its why Severa left. Its why the other people who have been treated this way are here. Its not something "between me and FL" it is something about how FL treats others. Puppy has spoken, puppy is done. KillerChihuahua^?!? 17:37, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. All I know about is what happened at the Fred Thompson, and it's been completely misrepresented here. Ferrylodge was simply maintaining the status quo while a contention proposed change was being discussed. That's what's meant to happen, isn't it? If you want to make a change to an article, and it's strongly opposed, you're meant to discuss it on the Talk page and see whether a consensus develops for or against it. You do not keep re-inserting your change while the discussion is going on. The status quo should be maintained, and that's exactly what Ferrylodge was doing. Any blame for edit-warring belongs squarely on the shoulders of those who insisted on making their change without first achieving consensus for it.

As for the 3RR that got him blocked, which is supposedly the trigger for this discussion, I disagree with Yamla's claim that the four reverts were all essentially the same because they all "serve to reintroduce "womb" each time in any case". At first he seems to have tried to revert the unilateral attempt to change "womb" to uterus, as was his right; when that encountered opposition, he seems to have tried for a compromise that would include both words. That's a substantive difference, and should not have been counted as a continuation of the same revert. He should never have been blocked in the first place, and this discussion should not have been initiated.

-- Zsero 19:26, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Say what you will about the community ban, but you're wrong about the 3RR block. Four edits in the space of a few hours which undo another editor's work, in full or in part, violate not only the spirit but the letter of 3RR. You may want to re-read WP:3RR, because this one was open-and-shut. MastCell ^Talk 20:40, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Strong support for ban For every reason supporting the ban that has been stated above. Whatever good FL has done on WP, it is far outweighed by his tendentious POV edits, his attitude, his victimisation game, his twisting of reality to suit his own agenda, his inability to follow consensus, his unwillingness to admit a mistake, his semantic games that do disservice to the value of semantics, etc., and on and on and on. •Jim62sch• 23:31, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Statement from Andrew c

I have interacted with Ferrylodge since roughly January of this year. Things got so intense that I had to take a wikibreak, and consciously avoided FL for a while. I think a good example of what many people find objectionable is this: Talk:Abortion#New paragraph and technical language. Reasonable objections to the proposal are ignored, and the replies are short, smug, and throwing back a strawman caricature of what the previous person had said. If this isn't patronizing, or an attempt to bait, then I don't know what is. So after 4 different editors objected the the proposal, FL makes a threat to "[slap] a POV tag on this article", which he later fulfills (and decided to make the same general arguments from 4 days before while attacking myself and KC). It is just frustrating to try to work with someone who is combative and defensive. While we can't make people be nice to one another, it sure is civil to have humility and sympathy with those you disagree with.

One of the issues is, the negative conduct only comes out during content disputes. From having interacted with FL, and reading all these others who have interacted with him on other articles, it seems clear that this is more than just a handful of people trying to get a user who they politically disagree with banned. It's about if you say something critical about FL, you are bound to get something worse and more hurtful thrown back at you (i.e. Pleasantville saying Please try to adopt a more civil tone. You seem to be extremely anxious about this and FL responding Please stop condescending, psychoanalyzing, and pretending that my tone is not civil. Thank you in advance for your cooperation in that regard. [55]), it's about an editor who behaves childishly when he doesn't get his way, and editor who leaves editors hurt after content disputes, and has no regrets or apologies.

So what will a topic ban do? Will it prevent him from getting in content disputes? Will it make him realize that his editing has hurt a lot of editors? That reasonably, he should feel guilt or remorse and apologize, even though that seems to go against his very nature. Clearly a topic ban will not solve these underlying issues. It will just help the editors with whom he spars feel more comfortable in the topics they regularly edit, knowing that they don't have a difficult editor to deal with anymore. Limiting the number of reverts wouldn't help because the main issue is how he handles himself on talk pages during disputes, not his excessive breaking of revert rules.

Now, I do not believe that those of us who have interacted with FL should be the ones to decide his editing fate on wikipedia. And because of that, I will not vote one way or another (at least not yet) in regards to a block or topic ban or whatever. It does seem a little suspicious that editors who have disagreed with FL in the past are now here in troves saying he be permibanned, while editors who have sided with him are saying he shouldn't (with a few uninvolved parties on both sides). I believe the ban was given out too early, and I believe we should wait for more uninvolved parties to examine this.

For those uninvolved parties, I'd say look at FL's recent edit history at Talk:Pregnancy, Talk:Abortion, Talk:Mother. There is a pattern of moving debates from one article to the next, even if (and perhaps especially if) consensus is not going his way. There is a pattern of boarderline incivility (and clearly patronizing) posts when consensus isn't going his way or if he is called out on his editing behavior. If anyone examining this case decided to look at FL's talk page, I recommend searching through the page history, because not all posts that were made to FL are represented in the linked "archives". Additionally, the RfC is an example of FL knowing that he can never be wrong taken to the extreme (just see how he still refers to this day). I'd be glad to discuss the conflicts from early 2007 that I/Severa were involved with, but I think the important thing is that concerns of FL's talk page behavior during disputes date back to then. And not a whole lot has changed. -Andrew c ^[talk] 22:11, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Reply to KillerChihuahua's Proposed Community Ban

I have been editing at Wikipedia since April of 2004. As KillerChihuahua knows, I was blocked today for the third time, so I have been blocked on average once per year. The current block was for 3RR when I reverted KillerChihuahua, and I have already apologized repeatedly for it at my talk page. As MastCell put it, I "did show contrition for violating 3RR." If anyone wants to read the details at my talk page, here's the link. Mastcell also noted that, "There's been incivility on both sides."

KillerChihuahua has taken this opportunity to build a case for banning me. I disagree with her, and would like to explain why.

KillerChihuahua has been uncivil to me today. At the abortion article today, she asserted that my words are "bullshit". At the pregnancy article today, she suggested that I am "naive and disingenuous." More recently, at the stillbirth article, she said that I am a "spammer". Actually, the "spam" to which she referred was a list of definitions of the word "womb" from reliable sources, and I had not previously listed those definitions (or any of them) anywhere else, prior to listing them in the stillbirth article. More examples of incivility abound. Here, KC said that my words are "inane." Here she said that my behaviour served no purpose, "unless your purpose is to convince others that you are congenitally dense."

Let's look at KC's allegations. She says that I have been waging a low-level edit war via attrition on abortion and related pages since December 2006, fading in and out like some kind of guerilla. It is true that I have edited those pages, among many many others, as can be seen from my contribution history. I have 271 articles on my watchlist, and I do not enjoy the hassles of continuously editing the abortion-related articles, so I revisit them now and then.

I will pass over KC's generalized allegations (which I deny) and go to her specific examples. She starts with the example of the stillbirth article, which involved the 3RR for which I have apologized today (involving my third block in as many years). KC says: "My count (and I may have missed some) is six editors supporting 'uterus' over 'womb' as a more accurate and appropriate term, and one or two 'no preference' editors, and one, Ferrylodge, edit warring to use the word 'womb' - the debate has been spread over multiple articles....Ferrylodge is maintaining his position that he alone is correct, that he alone is NPOV, that editors who disagree with him are disruptive edit warring POV pushers. No one supports his preferred phrasing and since his block, no one has reverted to his version or inserted the word."

But look at the actual discussion at stillbirth that KC emphasizes. Prior to KC's appearance at that article, a grand total of one single editor (ConfuciusOrnis) sought to completely remove the word "womb" from that stillbirth article. I wrote a talk page response to that one single editor, in which I pointed out that I was not seeking to introduce the word "womb" into the article, seeing as how that word had been in the article long before I ever touched that stillbirth article.[56]. Moreover, I explained that I was not advocating removing the word "uterus" from the article, but rather believed the article should contain both words, which are synonymous.

If there had been more than just one other editor trying to change the stillbirth article to completely delete the word "womb", then I would have acquiesced, with objections. But there was only one. KillerChihuahua then came to the stillbirth article today, and reverted in favor of ConfuciusOrnius here. I now quote her edit summary verbatim: "Ferrylodge I have no idea why you are so in love with the word 'womb' but please stop this silly campaign to use an inaccurate and non-specific vulgar term. Write a poem or something. 'Ode to the womb.'" I am not in love with the word "womb". Rather, I objected to the recent effort (of the last two days) to completely delete this word "womb" from all of Wikipedia's abortion-related and pregnancy-related articles. I have never suggested that either the word "uterus" or the word "womb" should be completely removed, but have instead contended that they are synonymous words so that neither should be eliminated from Wikipedia. After all, Wikipedia guidelines say: "Write for the average reader and a general audience—not professionals or patients. Explain medical jargon or use plain English instead if possible."

In addition to KillerChihuahua's rude edit summary (accusing me of a silly campaign and telling me to go write a poem), Killerchihuahua also commented very briefly at the talk page, accusing me of spamming the stillbirth talk page. Please look at what she erroneously called "spam": a detailed list of reliable sources stating that those two words ("womb" and "uterus") are synonymous --- at that time (14:13 on 20 September) I had not shown that list anywhere else but at the stillbirth talk page (I would later copy the list at 14:45 in the pregnancy discussion because people were similarly attempting to completely delete the longstanding word "womb" from that pregnancy article as well). Instead of replying civilly at the stillbirth discussion page, KillerChihuahua blithely called the list of references in the stillbirth talk page "spam", and reverted my edit without addressing that list of references whatsoever (beyond her insults in the edit summary and her accusation of spam at the talk page).

Killerchihuahua suggests that no one has agreed with me that the word "womb" can sometimes be used in addition to the word "uterus" in these types of articles. She is incorrect. Hoplon has agreed with me today. Also, Agne has also agreed with me that "'womb' is undoubtedly the more common term. Both Wikipedia policies and common sense implores us to look at the context of each usage and decide which one is one appropriate." I understand the need to acquiesce when outnumbered. I've done it a million times at Wikipedia (more than I would like). And I am prepared to do it here as well, though I detest the effort to completely delete the word "womb" from numerous Wikipedia articles where it has coexisted with the word "uterus" for years, without any fuss at all.

KillerChihuahua's next example is the POV tag that I added to the abortion article. In my entire three years at Wikipedia, I have never before added a POV tag once until this week. I do it twice this week and that's grounds for banishment? Killerchihuahua is incorrect when she says that I had no support at the abortion article; you can go to the discussion page and see the support. For example, LCP wrote today that his "main argument is that the lack of any image of what is aborted or any mention of how what is aborted is disposed of harms the credibility of this article."[57] When the POV tag was removed for a second time, I did not edit-war about its removal. And I stand by my contention that the abortion article is slanted; it contains virtually no description of what is aborted, and KC has insisted yet again this week that the article not even contain a single image of what is aborted.

KC also criticizes me because I "strongly recommended" (on Talk:Pregnancy) that an opposing editor on the Stillbirth article be blocked for disruption; she sarcastically writes: "of course it could not be a simple case of Ferrylodge editing against consensus." As I already pointed out, at that time there was only one single editor (ConfuciusOrnis) at the stillbirth article who wanted the word "womb" to be completely deleted from that article though it had been in that article for years. ConfuciusOrnis was edit-warring about it, as the article's edit history shows. If one editor supports a change in the article, and another editor opposes the change, how does that create a "consensus" for changing the article? KC is flat wrong about that.

KC also asserts that I should be banned because I asked her today to not post on my talk page. I have previously been accused of harassing KC at her talk page, and I have not gone anywhere near her talk page since that accusation. Am I under an obligation to allow her to post at my talk page? Is it grounds for banishment for an editor to politely ask another editor to post elsewhere than at the first editor's talk page? KC also complains that I cherry-pick her statements. I quoted her above several times, and I provided a link every time. Is it cherry-picking to mention that she characterizes my words as "bullshit"? If KC does not want such insults to be cherry-picked, then she should not utter them in the first place.

KC also asserts that "Ferrylodge showed himself resistant to the concept that he could possibly have erred at all." That is obviously false, and she knows it. Earlier today, I repeatedly apologized for my 3RR error. Likewise, yesterday, I specifically apologized to KC for another error here. When I make mistakes, I try to own up to them.

Lastly, KC complains about an RfC that I initiated against Bishonen. That was the only RfC that I have ever initiated against anyone during my entire three years at Wikipedia, although I did once join an RfC launched by someone else. KC is now seeking to dredge up that incident, and to get the last word. I feel compelled to briefly respond yet again. In my view, the harassment charge against me several months ago was inappropriate. Killerchihuahua never asked me to leave her talk page.[58] Bishonen asked me to leave KC's talk page, but Killerchihuahua did not. I did leave KC's talk page after denying the harassment charge, and I was blocked for denying the charge. How many other people at Wikipedia are blocked for harassing someone who never asked to be left alone? When I subsequently brought an RfC against Bishonen, Bishonen rounded up her friends, who proceeded to abuse the RfC, for example byposting images of food and the like. Neither I, nor the editor who joined me in the RfC, agreed with the outcome,[59] but I dropped the matter rather than going through a time-consuming and disruptive arbitration.

So, those are my responses to KC's initial post here. I may or may not have further comments, depending upon whether time permits, although I will be travelling on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday (September 21-23) and therefore will not have internet access.

I would like to very briefly respond now to Swatjester, who mentions a recent article in the Washington Post, which mentioned me. No objective person could read that article and conclude that I was edit-warring, anymore than they conclude that the other mentioned editor (Tvoz) was edit-warring. The fact of the matter is that there was a lot of controversy at the Fred Thompson article, and the majority of editors agreed with my position. Why should I be banned from Wikipedia because a majority of editors agreed with me about a particular matter?

You know quite well that's not why you're being requested to be banned. Don't attempt to hide this in a content issue; this is about your disruptive behavior. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 17:22, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I will also briefly respond now to Severa. KillerChihuahua accuses me above of "using claims of having been wronged to attempt to gain leverage over others." Then Severa posts her comment that she "stopped editing Wikipedia due to having to deal with Ferrylodge's tendentious editing." I wonder if KC will criticize Severa for "using claims of having been wronged to attempt to gain leverage over others."

Severa is upset about a comment that I made at a talk page over six months ago, and here is the entire comment: "I have posted a general comment about reverts, and the need to explain them, here." That's it. I have little recollection of it, but if people really believe that such a brief comment six months ago supports banning me, then I will investigate further, and try to reconstruct why Severa could have been so offended by such a brief remark by me. My understanding of "wikistalking" is that it's done to harass, whereas it's perfectly OK to monitor a user if one believes that the user's edits are suspect and need another eye. I hardly think that that one brief sentence over six months ago is even remotely related to wikistalking.

I have no grudge against anyone at Wikipedia, including KillerChihuahua. But that does not mean I should relax and accept being called a "bullshit" artist, or the like, does it? My goal is to calmly develop a neutral and well-referenced incredible encyclopedia. If anyone looks at my contributions in toto, I believe you will find that they have helped reach that goal, including my edits to abortion-related articles. Among other things, I brought the Roe v. Wade article through a featured article review, and have done much else to improve Wikipedia, and I am proud of it.Ferrylodge 05:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Given your repeated claims that you will not apologize ever to KillerChihuahua, you most certainly do have a grudge. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 17:22, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I will tell you what the concern is, Ferrylodge. Had you responded in a manner that shows some kind of understanding and acceptance that your behavior has been disruptive, I would have reconsidered my support for a community ban or a topic ban. We all make mistakes, and can learn not to repeat them, if willing. That is a choice we all have. But your response is a defense in which you claim that you have not erred, when the evidence is overwhelming that you did. That's a pity. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:44, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Reply to Tvoz

Tvoz has made some pretty extensive comments above, and so I should respond. Tvoz and I were both honored to appear in a Washington Post article together recently. The subject was the rather trivial matter about how Fred Thompson's name should be presented in his Wikipedia article. Ultimately, the position that I supported prevailed (at least for the time being), and Tvoz is understandably not happy about that.

I am neither happy nor unhappy with the result, Ferrylodge - it was never and still is not important enough to affect my state of mind. I disagree with the decision but have completely gone along with it and done absolutely nothing to disrupt or even complain about it; I have pointed out that several other editors have commented subsequently that they supported the position I preferred, and I've said that the subject can always be revisited in the future. I do wonder if the outcome had been otherwise what your response would have been, but more importantly I object to your implication that my comments in this discussion come from my "unhappiness" at the outcome of that very minor dispute. I am not a petulant child. Tvoz |talk 05:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Tvoz now charges me with four separate "misrepresentations." However, she mischaracterizes all four of those matters.

Tvoz, please look at this edit of yours on September 9. When a person (such as yourself) footnotes a proposition, the implication is that the person supports the proposition. You are wrong to seek my banishment merely because I inferred your support for a proposition that you yourself footnoted. You’re entitled to correct the misimpression left by your edit, but please don’t demand apologies from me for drawing a perfectly reasonable inference. People do not normally footnote propositions with which they disagree.

I'll quibble with that: in that very same matter, I introduced a link to an image of Thompson's first marriage certificate, and argued for retaining it, although it tended on the whole to support Tvoz's position rather than ours. OTOH, Tvoz expressed surprise at my action, and seemed to think I didn't realise that it tended to support her position, which tends to support your claim that this behaviour is unusual. But it's all a bit murky. -- Zsero 18:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC

You misunderstood me, Zsero - I don't recall being surprised about anything (have no idea what you're referring to, in fact), and I said more than once (here and here for example) that your inclusion of the marriage certificate pdf supported my position, but that even so I thought it should be removed or given context - that it might be flagged as a problematic source by others because it had no provenance - we don't know where it came from - and I asked if you could find some wording in the source document that gave it context. Nothing murky about my position at all - Ferrylodge, I added footnotes to the inclusion of "Freddie" at a time when it was being suggested that it not be included at all. The conversation then was not how to include "Freddie" but if to include it, and since I thought it should be included, I was merely giving a better source - two newspaper articles - rather than the blogpost that was originally posted by someone else as a source for his birth name. We were not then discussing which name should go first - or at least I was not addressing that. Again, you are being disingenuous - it was perfectly clear at the time from my edit summaries and Talk page comments what I was saying about the name, and I called your misrepresentations to your attention at the time that they happened, yet you ignored my comments. And the reason I am commenting here is not because of your inferences, but because of your refusal - including here in these comments - to acknowledge that you did anything wrong,or apologize and be more careful about the way you quote people or characterize their positions. Tvoz |talk 05:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Regarding Tvoz's suggestion that I crept over to the wp:mosbio and supposedly neglected to say why I was so interested, please look again. Before I ever suggested any change to the mosbio, I loudly and plainly announced at mosbio that I was concerned about Fred Thompson.

Tvoz also says that I “misrepresented” her suggestion that I visit the John Edwards page to argue about how Edwards's name should be presented. I visited the MOSBIO (instead of John Edwards's page) and mentioned that Tvoz had suggested I do so. What difference does this miniscule error make? Tvoz was suggesting that I argue about how John Edwards’s name is presented, so what difference does it make if I ended up making that argument at MOSBIO as opposed to at the John Edwards article? Why is this more than splitting hairs? What possible benefit could I derive from this incredibly slight imprecision? Tvoz keeps saying that I “misrepresented” her, but there was no dishonesty on my part, only an extremely slight imprecision.

Then Tvoz piles on with alleged misrepresentation #3: that I said “The article has again been edited (by Tvoz) to reinsert this material.” I only meant that the article had been edited to reinsert the material more than once, and that Tvoz was the person who did so the last time. After Tvoz requested that I clarify, I did here, in order to emphasize that the material was previously reinserted by another editor instead of by Tvoz. What more could I possibly do than correct myself? These are extremely slight matters, and not relevant to a proposed ban.

Then Tvoz alleges a fourth misrepresentation: she says that I falsely accused her of wikistalking. But I told Tvoz point blank: “I am not making accusations. Some users are unaware that it is bad form to follow other users around. If you are following me around (from Fred Thompson to abortion to mother), then I would kindly ask you to please stop.” Do you want me to engrave that in gold and send it to you, Tvoz? How can I say that I am not making accusations any better than that?

And as for the other events at the Fred Thompson article, here’s a link in case anyone’s interested.Ferrylodge 10:59, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Your point? I was in the WaPo article as well. Doesn't dismiss Tvoz's evidence that you have been edit warring on the FredThompson page. The fact that your tendentious editing rose to the level of finding its way to the FRONT PAGE of the Washington Post due to your edit war over Fred Thompson's name, should be a telling sign of your tendentious editing tendencies. That Pleasantville suggests that you may also be misogynist only makes even more sense; the weight of the evidence apparently supports it, and it is pretty widely known that my history with Pleasantville has been less than stellar. At your fourth "misrepresentation" it does not matter how you couch your words in the illegitimate form of a question. You were accusing Tvoz of stalking you. Saying "I'm not making accusations. Stop stalking me." is itself a clear accusation. At your second "misrepresentation" you say "Tvoz keeps saying that I “misrepresented” her". Your entire freaking argument is about how she's misrepresenting you. Which is it? ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 17:20, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

This is completely wrong. The WaPo piece was not about Ferrylodge's "edit war"; it would be just as fair to say that it was about Tvoz's "edit war". Tvoz was the one who insisted on making a change without first achieving consensus for it.

Pleasantville's accusation of misogyny is contemptible, and there's nothing at all to support it - we generally don't know each other's sexes around here. I only learned that Tvoz was a woman from the WaPo.

And no, Ferrylodge did not say or imply "Stop stalking me", which would indeed be an accusation; he said, in effect, "please don't stalk me". When asked about this, he made it clear that his warning was preemptive, not an accusation of misconduct that had already happened.

Zsero 19:09, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I advocated following MOSBIO and discussed the point; Ferrylodge reverted the same point seven times in one day and tried to get agreement to change MOSBIO to reflect his POV. Not equivalent. Tvoz |talk 05:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Where have I allegded that Ferrylodge is a misogynist? I have pointed out (correctly) that he is the editor of a "Men's Rights" page concerning reproductive rights. If in Zsero's opinion, "Men's rights" are misogynist, he is entitled to his opinion, but that is not my opinion. --Pleasantville 21:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Pleasantville didn't. Ferrylodge accused Pleasantville of alleging he was a misogynist. Or he accused me, that part is unclear. I think it was probably me. However, it was a fairly typical case of Ferrylodge inflating and twisting what someone else said, so that now Zsero is left with the impression Pleasantville alleged something she didn't. KillerChihuahua^?!? 22:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Summary so Far

So, it seems that there are a few choices after some discussion:

• - Outright ban (seems excessive)
• - Topic ban on reproduction and US politics
• - Edit Warring parole (1RR or similar)

After reading this I think that an edit warring parole is the place to start, and that the specifics of it should not be limited to reverts of article space. The parole should include all facets that have been discussed of tenditious distruptive behavior. --Rocksanddirt 17:47, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

1RR per week site-wide in all namespaces and topic ban from reproduction-related and U.S. politics articles, per Yamla. Also, an immediate, total site ban if Ferrylodge is discovered circumventing his restrictions with sockpuppets.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.195.94.194 (talk • contribs) 18:01, 21 September 2007

• I support an outright ban. Reading his comments and viewing his history he's not ammenable to change. Odd nature 18:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I think that this matter, seeing opposition (including my own) to the outright ban, should be requested to be discussed by the Wikipedia:Arbitration committee. The top of this page reads, "Complex or ambiguous cases should go to dispute resolution." This isn't the type of case that should really be handled by the community sanction noticeboard. I know some of you have said, "I don't think dispute resolution would work", but you never bothered to try the next steps. Bans are supposed to be a last resort. Please consider taking this to the ArbCom. Mahalo nui loa. --Ali'i 18:07, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Banned

Based on the overwhelming consensus for a ban seen here, I've blocked Ferrylodge idedfinitely. FeloniousMonk 18:26, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Concur. (See Tom Harrison's quote on my user page.) Raymond Arritt 18:30, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose this (in my opinion, premature) indef block, as I don't think you can determine "overwhelming consensus" after less than 24 hours of discussion. (However, I have no opinion on the overall merits of the case against Ferrylodge yet, as I haven't had the chance to fully review his contributions). JavaTenor 18:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

He can appeal it if he wants. But this was approaching snowball's chance in Tahiti of not happening. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 18:48, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I object to such a quick decision, and also object to this being characterized as a WP:SNOW situation. There are numerous objections above, which, if you read WP:SNOW, is not a snowball. - Dean Wormer 18:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support Odd nature 18:38, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strongest Possible Support Filll 18:54, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong Support OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 19:00, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support. He can show some contrition and appeal. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:02, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support (obviously, but just for the record) KillerChihuahua^?!? 19:05, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose - "overwhelming consensus"? I make the vote thus far 9 to 6 in favour of an outright ban versus a lesser penalty measure. That doesn't seem very "overwhelming" to me. Gatoclass 19:04, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

  comment: Its not a "penalty". Please feel free to ask me about this on my talk page, but blocks are always preventative, not punitive. That you so clearly misunderstand the purpose and intent of blocking and banning leads me to be concerned that your reasoning in other areas concerning this may be somewhat faulty as well. KillerChihuahua^?!? 19:07, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Quite frankly, the difference seems semantic to me. You may throw someone in jail as a "preventative measure" rather than a "punishment", but I doubt the terminology makes much difference to the timeserver. Gatoclass 19:16, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• I object, strongly. This was a fucking terrible call. See my statement above this section for my reasoning. Mahalo. --Ali'i 19:06, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: After months after months of low-level disruptive editing, this editor has to be dealt with, IMHO. If there are not enough people to support this ban, and/or if this editor successfully appeals, then of course he should be welcomed back to WP. For now, this gives the community time to look at his egregious and shameful record of past abuses and consider if this is the kind of element we support having here. And we can do so without his excessive interference and personal attacks on those considering the situation while we contemplate his record, as he has done in the past when corrective measures and guidance were suggested or offered. If it is decided this was done with excessive alacrity, then it can of course be reversed, right?--Filll 19:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support -Severa 19:09, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support a full ban (though I do think the implementation of it was premature). I read all of the evidence (and more) yesterday and waited until Ferrylodge had a chance to respond (perhaps others did the same?). I found his response lacking in both remorse for his incorrect actions and truth. I looked at the things he claimed supported his position, and his misrepresentations of what actually happened were clear, which is in keeping with all of the other evidence presented I'd love it if a parole or topic ban would help, but based on his past, I don't think either will. It's a fundamental issue here. —bbatsell ¿? ✍ 19:10, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

  I concur. It did happen rather fast, but apparently was driven largely by his own response (based on edit summaries.) And it was much longer than the time it took for Theodore7's ban, for example. KillerChihuahua^?!? 19:12, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support ban Ugh, just finished going through his responses and some of his earlier talk page contribs. The user is incorrigible, a ban is the only way to stop his disruption. ornis (t) 19:14, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong oppose and object. There's hardly been time - I only learned about this last night. Of course there's an initial surge of support for a ban, because those users knew about it first. It's especially unfair since Ferrylodge's ability to respond to accusations has been extremely limited (his IP at work remains blocked, and he's already said he'll be away from the net over the weekend). This block is completely unfair, and all on its own justifies Ferrylodge's claim to be the victim here. It looks to me like a lynching. I demand that it be reversed at once. -- Zsero 19:18, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the IP not working... it was a lingering autoblock from my 3RR block. I used our autoblock-finding tool to undo it when I unblocked Ferrylodge's main account, but it didn't show any autoblocks, so I was confused. As it turns out, the autoblock finder was malfunctioning, so I was unable to find and undo the autoblock on Ferrylodge's work IP. I apologize for this technical problem. MastCell ^Talk 20:46, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• • Especially when the one doing the final deed is involved in the discussion. Like I said... this has all the appearances of a railroading. Oh, the irony. --Ali'i 19:24, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree, it does not pass the smell test. It should be reversed for further discussion, to allow an actual "overwhelming" consensus to form. Several options were proposed, and were not discussed fully. Dean Wormer 19:35, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

2.5:1 in favor of a ban passes my smell test, pal. Odd nature 20:06, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Your use of the word "pal" in this context is decidedly uncivil. Please reformulate your response. 2.5:1 is certainly not an "overwhelming" consensus, nor a snowball. The discussion isn't over yet. Dean Wormer 21:17, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

At the moment it is running 4:1 in favor of a ban, so if something is rotten in Denmark here, it is not the consensus for a ban. It must be something else. Hmm...I wonder what that might be?--Filll 20:52, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

And what exactly is it you are implying with that thinly veiled lack of AGF? Dean Wormer 21:20, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Come now, this can easily be reversed if the situation is as unfair, biased and one-sided as you assert it is. What this does is, create a breathing space for the community to consider this festering DE problem that has polluted WP for at least 9 months in an unimpeded manner. Past evidence suggests that in some cases, pre-emptive measures are appropriate and prudent since those considering the record of this editor do not themselves want to be subjected to intimidation and harassment and wikilawyering. If in a calm, contemplative atmosphere, it is determined by the community that some mistake has been made, or some rules violated, or some element of protocol applied inappropriately, this decision can be revisited and reversed, of course.--Filll 19:33, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, let's tape the defendant's mouth while we all discuss which tree to hang him from. This is a f---ing travesty. -- Zsero 19:38, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

This is more like taking the defendant's gun away from him while we discuss his fate, when the defendant has previously fired his gun at those who dared suggest he had done anything inappropriate.--Filll 19:50, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

What gun? You're assuming what it's up to you to prove. All he's done that I can see is defended himself when attacked, and pointed out that he has not in fact done the things people have accused him of. And now you're taping his mouth shut to prevent him from doing so. Verdict first, trial after. In any case, he's already said he'll be away from home over the weekend, and he can't edit from work, so what are you afraid of? That he'll get a word in edgewise when he can manage a net connection that isn't blocked? -- Zsero 20:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I suspect Zsero is unaware of this editor's past behavior when challenged, which goes well beyond "defending himself". I suggest you review the record carefully before making such statements.--Filll 20:10, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Zsero here is a frequent revert-partner (I'd go so far as to say an accomplice) in Ferrylodge's tendentious editing. Zsero should probably be on revert parole himself.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.174.171.187 (talk • contribs)

Please do not make personal attacks. It is not productive, and your reasoning is flawed. We are not all in cohoots with Ferrylodge. Dean Wormer 19:54, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose block (for now at least) per Ali'i and the lack of time. As I read more about Ferrylodge's action, I became more incline to advocate a strong topic ban (including contact with KC) with 1RR but action was taken far to prematurely without clear consensus to do so. This was far from a WP:SNOW situation. Agne^Cheese/^Wine 19:40, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Oh, I don't know about that, there was a clear consensus and whatever support for Ferrylodge there was was weak and scatered, and none made very compelling arguments for not banning. Add that to his total lack of contrition and the additional evidence presented by Raymond Arritt, and I don't see how he wouldn't be banned. He practically begged for it in his response. Odd nature 19:49, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
    • I agree there was consensus for some kind of sanction but I don't see how you can read the above small sampling of response and see anything close to a WP:SNOW consensus for indef ban. Couple that with the incredibly short time frame and it clear that the block was premature and (right now) inappropriate. Agne^Cheese/^Wine 19:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Object I am adding my objection here, as my objection above is nested within a sub thread. Dean Wormer 19:43, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support, we must always protect our project and its volunteers from chronic harassment and abuse. How much longer do we accommodate Ferrylodge's disruption? 84.174.171.187 19:46, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support, for reasons argued in the initial discussion; Ferrylodge is an activist with an unremitting agenda. --Pleasantville 20:15, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Hold on there, are you saying that there are political motivations at play here? Then I object even more strenuously. This is starting to sound like a content dispute. Dean Wormer 20:17, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I have no objections to his contributions. I have severe objections to his past behavior, which is well beyond what should be allowed in the project. And this is true no matter what is personal political position or agenda might be on any particular issue.--Filll 20:34, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Dean Wormer: I was summarizing my initial statement. See above in the first discussion. My remarks pertain to behavior rather than to the specifics of his opinions. --Pleasantville 20:48, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support ban. Guettarda 20:22, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support a full ban – dave souza, talk 20:27, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• CommentA pre-emptive block during an ongoing discussion is very poor form, especially when it undermines the actions of another admin - Mastcell specifically unblocked Ferrylodge so that he could participate in this discussion. See Wikipedia:Wheel war. I note that FeloniousMonk has also tagged Ferrylodge's userpage with the community ban template, without closing this discussion. Very poor choices for an admin. Banno 21:08, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I do not pretend to know all the niceties and protocols that hold here. However, I do know what the past record shows. And I for one, would not welcome a personal attackod or having an RfC filed against me for no good reason, or other tactics this editor has employed in the past. Enough is enough.--Filll 21:16, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

It's not preemptive block. FM's block summary implies just the opposite, that the block was instantiating a ban which had consensus, both true BTW. Odd nature 21:19, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: FeloniousMonk didn't add the tags to Ferrylodge's page. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:20, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

FeloniousMonk wasn't wheel-warring. I unblocked Ferrylodge so he could contribute to this discussion. FeloniousMonk blocked him in consequence of this discussion. He wasn't undoing my administrative action; regardless of what you think of the propriety of the block, he was not wheel-warring. MastCell ^Talk 21:30, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

FM and Swatjester both added templates, but where is it written that the person issuing the block has to close the discussion here? I don't see anything that says FM should have done that. Odd nature 21:30, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

My error, I only saw Swat's. Thanks for the correction, ON. I have to say I don't see why FM should be criticised for not closing this, as clearly some contributors feel more discussion and input is needed. That seems to conflict with the concerns that this was a "too rapid response". I'm perplexed by the contradictory assertions. And no, the blocking admin doesn't have to close, nor is it written anywhere that he does. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:55, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps Banno was being ironic? •Jim62sch• 12:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment. I supported sanctions short of a full community ban, and questioned the speed with which a not-yet-formulated consensus was carried out, and characterized. For that, I have been treated uncivilly, and had my good faith questioned. I have more important wiki work to do, so I will participate in this drumhead court no longer. Dean Wormer 21:27, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support per KC. ⇒ SWATJester ^{Denny Crane.} 23:39, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support GRtBR. •Jim62sch• 23:58, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
• Note due to the conflation of opposing the ban due to a perceived lack of due process, this section became unclear as to whether people were supporting the ban in principle or not; etc. Please add your voice to the section below, Proposals, rather than here. KillerChihuahua^?!? 00:06, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Unblock please

I'd strongly urge FeloniousMonk to unblock Ferrylodge at least until the conclusion of proceedings here, and until stronger consensus for a ban appears, a simple vote count (I know, evil) reveals something around 65% support for a ban at the present time, not really a firm enough consensus to warrant a definitive, final ban. Nick 21:29, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually its a 4:1 consensus in favor of the ban. Why on earth would should FM unblock him? Odd nature 21:32, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree completely with KillerChihuahua's formulation of the problem here. Yes, Ferrylodge is a tendentious editor; yes, interacting with him has driven at least one highly valued contributor from the project, a significant loss for Wikipedia; yes, I personally feel that a siteban is a reasonable, if somewhat strong, remedy. But I don't think anyone can dispute that some significant objections have been voiced here, and there's been some support for discussing alternative remedies like 0RR/1RR or topic bans. I think that if we enact a siteban in the face of real, good-faith dissent, then we're undermining the credibility this process in the long run. Far more tendentious editors have been given a last-chance topic ban or revert limitation. I don't think anyone has seriously disputed that Ferrylodge's approach is problematic; why not take the opportunity to discuss our options in dealing with it a little further and try to bring some of the editors who have opposed a siteban into the consensus? If we block him now, then the discussion is going to be viewed as closed, for all intents and purposes. Like Nick, I'd just rather see a little more before we take that step. MastCell ^Talk 21:40, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Despite what you may have read in the Washington Post :-P , I have seen Ferrylodge be a helpful contributor at Fred Thompson, and would support a topical ban from abortion/pregnency articles or a revert limit if that is where he is being disruptive. But I've been maligned enough in this "discussion", so I'm taking a break. Mahalo. --Ali'i 21:45, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

(ec)I strongly feel that eventually it will have to be a site ban, as I just don't see Ferrylodge ever seeing anything problematic about his behavior. I think unblocking him will simply take more time and waste more virtual ink. However, I do not object to unblocking him if anyone feels his lengthly diatribe against those who presented evidence here and supported his block has afforded him insufficient response. Meanwhile, the "ban" section above seems to consist of those supporting the block, and those opposing it as enacted too quickly. I again point to Theodore7's ban, as precedent, that "fast" isn't always the wrong choice, and suggest that merely opposing on the grounds of rapidity is unhelpful. Fast is sometimes better than slow, if it merely serves to prolong the agony. I suggest if anyone wishes to make an argument for another remedy, such as 0RR, 1RR, topic bans, and the like, that a section be created for that purpose. However, as opinions are split, care will have to be taken not to conflate opposition to the ban with support of Ferrylodge's behavior. One puppy's opinion. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:50, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

While I agree with KC that Ferrylodge will end up with a site ban as he cannot learn, I do not like implementation of such a ban prior to the completion of this discussion, unless there was disruption somewhere else. I agree with Mastcel that it undermines the integrity of this forum, which is part a way to speed up the process of dealing with disruptive editors. --Rocksanddirt 21:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

at the risk of sounding dense... you think he should be site banned, but you object that its been done? I'm sorry, that reads like "we should spend lots of time discussing it, then do it." Rather than "its going to happen anyway, why waste everyone's time?" KillerChihuahua^?!? 22:00, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

What's the rush? 24 more hours isn't going to change consensus for banning him amongst the community he's pissed of. --Rocksanddirt 22:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

If the editor is going to be banned, sit back, relax and wait for consensus to emerge, don't cut the guy off and stop him from mounting a defence, no matter how ridiculous or an attack on others, if he is to avoid being banned, he deserves every change to do so, and if he is going to be banned, allowing things to run to their conclusion isn't hurting anyone. If it takes another few hours, a day or more before everyone is happy to close the discussion and ban the guy, so what. Rushing everything through is just causing more problems than it solves, as we see here. I don't see any reason to block the guy while there is still discussion ongoing about a ban or other measures though. Nick 22:05, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Under normal circumstances, I would agree. However, this has gone on for 9 or 10 months at this point, with repeated problems along the way. Also, this editor has shown a strong propensity to attack those who question him. So I see no particular reason to give this person more rope to hang us with.--Filll 22:27, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I"m sorry, but why do we have to walk gently around an editor like this one. Who cares how fast this went? He's not at all useful to the project (look at how long this thing has gotten). And frankly, why don't we get rid of people like this and spend equivalent or more energy in supporting individuals who actually work on this project in a productive manner. I don't know you NIck, but why do you even care about a tendentious editor like Ferrylodge? How does he help the project? It's time to move on. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 22:25, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think we are walking gently, I think we are trying to have a process that will stand up to community scrutiny. I don't care about ferrylodge, I care about the process here. leaving him unbanned to contribute here only is hardly walking gently. If he edits out side of this discussion or in any manner disruptively then it doesn't matter. --Rocksanddirt 22:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Nick, are you seariously saying he didn't have an opportunity to defend himself? Did you read his long-winded non-responses above? He mounted a defense, and it consisted of blaming and re-attacking others. And he'd apparently stopped editing prior to the block. So I'm not quite sure what you're getting at with the claim that he was given the bum rush. Odd nature 22:32, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

<RI>Rocksanddirt, the process was followed. What you're asking the community to do is give him another chance (and counting official and unofficial chances, we're at 10 or so). Look at how much time we've spent discussing this person? Have your read the RfC he brought against Bishonen? What a grand waste of the community's time!!! We spend so much time giving numerous chances to useless editors. How about we spend more time giving support and growth to the editors that work on a broad number of articles, bring articles to GA and FA status, who improve writing and references, and who growth this article. Who cares about Ferrylodge? He focuses on one or two articles, is tendentious, and is ridiculous. Time to move on. .OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 15:44, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

(Outdenting) As I've been the subject of an RfC brought by Ferrylodge, which he discusses in his response above, I think it best not to register an opinion at all in the section below. I agree with Andrew c's point that Ferrylodge's Wikipedia fate ought to be decided by uninvolved editors, not by those of us who have interacted or clashed with him. So I'm not here to opine, so much, as to really, really recommend these uninvolved editors to read that RfC/Bishonen and most especially its talkpage. No, I do know that you already have enough to read! In fact the amount of information in this thread is becoming quite forbidding. But that's exactly my point: the RfC talkpage is a kind of easy-to-access concentrate of the thing at issue here, which is Ferrylodge's demeanour and argumentation technique in debate and disagreement. Going straight to that page could save you some time. And if you need a really lightning-quick mini-fix, try going straight to the last section on the RfC talkpage, the discussion of the closing procedure. Bishonen | talk 23:26, 21 September 2007 (UTC).

This is the first time I saw that RfC, and all I can say is ouch, ouch, ouch. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:41, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you could clarify; what did you learn from this Rfc? KillerChihuahua?!? 23:12, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

That you can pretty much get away with murder at Wikipedia, as long as you have a big pack of people to back you up.Ferrylodge 23:58, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

That sums it all for me. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:46, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I participated in that RfC. I knew FL would someday go overboard again (and he did). OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 01:27, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know that someone read all that mess I typed :þ And thanks for commenting here. I believe the word is recuse.-Andrew c ^[talk] 00:23, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I added a sectionheader, I read it but I think it might be a little lost in the sea of posts here.

Regarding recusing: I respect your view; however, while I agree that input from those who have not interacted with Ferrylodge is welcome, I don't see that those who have experienced interacting with him over the long term is somehow undesirable. My view is that the opinions of those who have interacted with him is as valid as any other, and better informed than most. One puppy's opinion. KillerChihuahua^?!? 00:41, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment on Ferrylodge closure

While it appears as though Ferrylodge was headed inexorably for the door in any case, I wasn't especially pleased to get up this morning and find the discussion has already been closed without an opportunity on my part to participate in the final vote. I can't help but wonder how many others may have been deprived of a say due to the early closure.

It seems incongruous to me that an article AFD is by default open for five days to give people plenty of opportunity to participate, but a discussion of the much more serious topic of an indefinite ban on a user - one that in this case attracted significant debate - can be wound up after a mere 30 hours, if that.

Whether or not Ferrylodge actually deserved any support I'm still not sure, but I thought the evidence presented against him here was rather thin. Regardless, the manner in which this case has been handled has been less than exemplary in my view, and only confirms my sense that there is something amiss with the CSN process. Gatoclass 06:20, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

The user was indefinitely blocked and labeled as banned when I saw that this was devolving into another vote, afterwhich I closed everything. A "community ban" is also an indefinite block that no administrator will undo, which may also be the case in this situation. Voting to ban someone is not how you go about doing things on Wikipedia (save for deletions) and CSN should never become AFD which it appears you are stating. Bans can be discussed in less time, particularly when some pressing issues are brought up such as how things were done when ANI and AN were the forums for such discussions. Just because this page has a different name doesn't mean that things shouldn't work any differently.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 07:08, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Ryu closed it, then after the post above, modified so that discussion could continue, but left the "Proposals" archived, with the summary "the blocking off of the voting should stay"[60] To me that is exactly backwards. If you're going to selectively archive, leave the proposed remedies (voting) open; to archive them so people can discuss what to do but not place that in a remedies section is senseless. KillerChihuahua^?!? 09:09, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I've un-archived the lot; simply because having the discussion open but archiving the Proposed remedies seems pointless to me. KillerChihuahua^?!? 09:22, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for that. But I don't actually like the available voting options. Can I start one of my own? "Zero tolerance of WP:TE" is so vague he could end up being blocked for practically anything. And I don't see the need for a topic ban, I just think he should be disallowed from restoring any edits of his that have been challenged by another user, or something. Gatoclass 11:36, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely - the first two were entered by Jossi, the third by me (based on Joshuaz's post buried up there in the mass of discussion somewhere). Bear in mind that the more options, the less likely any one will get significant support. KillerChihuahua^?!? 11:47, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Adding, what you're talking about sounds like 0RR, is that what you had in mind? KillerChihuahua^?!? 11:48, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that's it, basically. I just added my proposal to the section above, thanks :) Gatoclass 12:10, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

You are quite welcome. I'd just like to comment that your proposal addresses only one of the two issues which has brought us all here - the edit warring. It does not address his propensity to escalate hostilities by inflating and misrepresenting others' views, and to over-personalize disagreements and respond to any such disagreement by attacking the other party(s). As such, it is unlikely to gain significant support. KillerChihuahua^?!? 12:14, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

True, but then when an editor is deprived of his ability to make a nuisance of himself in the mainspace, one is no longer obliged to struggle with him on talk pages. You can entirely ignore him if you are so inclined. So his nuisance value in both departments should be vastly reduced. Gatoclass 14:35, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how I can agree with you there. If he's limited to 0RR, his only option is to discuss his edits on talk in an attempt to gain consensus. This works well with editors whose only fault is one of edit warring without discussion. However, if he is limited to 0RR and people ignore him on talk pages, then how can that work? Further, as the issue with his talk page content is inflating and misrepresenting others' views, this merely limits him to doing that more, hence making it worse rather than addressing it at all. KillerChihuahua^?!? 15:03, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Because then the onus is on him to engage in a constructive and civil way. If he's incapable of doing so, you can just ignore him. The point is that you are no longer obliged to engage with someone who is being unpleasant or obstreperous. You are in control, you get to decide whether or not his concerns are valid ones, and if you want to ignore him altogether, that's your prerogative too. Gatoclass 15:29, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

All of which misses the point that this issue should not be decided by voting, but by providing evidence sufficient to convince the community that a ban is needed; sufficient to ward off any admin who might consider unblocking Ferrylodge. Banno 12:20, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

don't be so officious, Banno. The vote !vote debate is certainly not going to be resolved here, and as that has been ongoing for at least two years, bringing it up here, in what is already a lengthly and complex series of posts, is inviting yet more unnecessary verbiage and confusion, which can have nothing to do with the matter at hand and will serve only to cloud the issues. Your assertion that the "point" is to "convince the community...sufficient to ward off any admin" is quite frankly argumentative and erroneous. The "point" is to provide evidence and have discussion concerning the nature, extent, and validity of the concerns; and for the community to discuss and determine appropriate sanctions (if any.) Your phrasing that this is some kind of "campaign" to "convince" and "prevent" is a bizarre and unsupported interpretation, to use the term very loosely, of what CSN is for. One puppy's opinion. KillerChihuahua^?!? 12:28, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I find objections from Banno based on "procedure" to be singularly ironic. &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 12:37, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

This is twice now Banno has introduced confusion on this page with off-topic complaints and introduction of non-pertinent issues (1. Accusation of wheel warring 2. The vote !vote perennial discussion). I'd prefer not to follow his bad example and introduce a third off-topic subject, namely, Banno. I suggest anyone who wishes to discuss Banno's process-wankery here do so on his talk page. KillerChihuahua^?!? 13:08, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

You are certainly right about the unnecessary verbiage and confusion. What was once a fairly straight-forward case is becoming convolute and unworkable. Any claim of a consensus must now appear questionable because of the premature block, the misleading tags on Ferrylodge's pages and the attempt to turn this into a vote. If it had been better handled, this case might already have been closed with an outcome you would have found satisfactory. As it stands, I fear that it will be difficult to reach a consensus, and that even if one is reached, an appeal to arbitration may well follow. It's a shame that you feel the need to attack me, instead of focusing on the problems with this case. Banno 13:16, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I find it highly ironic that we had to file an RfC about you because you blocked someone without consideration of facts--now you are criticizing others for the same thing, but once again without consideration of the facts. In legal issues, one must consider the facts and the law. The facts have been addressed above, and you do not appear to be arguing against them. The law was following what was presented in the facts, and you seem to be arguing about some minor and technical violation of the law (OK procedure) by a couple of admins, completely ignoring the vast body of evidence of procedural and other violations by Ferrylodge. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 13:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

I think noting the irony in the objection is a valid point to raise lest anyone should be swayed by said objection.

Nonetheless, the issue remains that FL is a highly problematic and disruptive editors, and his few positives are greatly outweighed by the negatives. (see one of my previous comments). &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 13:51, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by G-Dett (talk • contribs) 20:38, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Isarig

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Isarig (talk · contribs)

After being caught last month using abusive sock puppets to circumvent 3RR, Isarig was very nearly perma-banned.[61] A compromise resolution was worked out whereby he would edit under the mentorship of two well-respected editors, with a topic ban on Middle-East-and-media-related articles [62] (note also Fayssal's clarification – "It was made clear that we are talking about a set of articles. Israeli-Arab and media-related articles" – here). The resolution was rather generous in that Isarig was given a clean slate (any other abusive sockpuppet accounts of his would be his to disclose to his mentors, or not, as he chose; so long as he forswore their continued use, they would not be investigated or revealed to other editors), with the possibility of the topic ban being revisited and/or lifted after six months.

After a couple of weeks of abiding the terms of his topic-ban, Isarig has crept back to editing (and edit-warring) in Middle-East-and-media-related articles: Norman Finkelstein, Joel Beinin, Joan Peters, Independent Jewish Voices, and Board of Deputies of British Jews. This lapse has roughly coincided with his mentors being on wikibreak (Avraham from September 12 to the 17th for the Jewish holidays, FayssalF from September 13 to the present, due to a car accident). I left a note for Isarig regarding his violations yesterday; he responded by focusing on one edit and disputing whether it fell under his topic ban. Following our exchange, he has continued without interruption his editing of contentious Israel-Palestine-related material. His latest edit (to Joel Beinin) is outright disruptive, edit-warring to restore over-the-top, very obviously non-neutral material about Beinin's "hatred of Israeli society": "Beinin has been involved in spats and disputes almost since his arrival at Stanford. In spite of his political views, he was made part of the Stanford's new Jewish Studies program. He carried placards of protest on Israel's Independence Day in White Plaza. He carried out a public quarrel with Daniel Pipes with many exchanged personal attacks on each side. He was criticized in the Stanford Review for teaching canards as facts...Among the misteachings were a videotaped lecture citing the amount of total aid Israel has received from the United States since 1948 as a trillion dollars, more than a tenfold inflation of the true number. Beinin eventually apologized for the mistake in a Stanford Daily interview, but only after sending out the videotapes for a period of several years, in spite of ongoing student complaints about them. Beinin did not admit to other errors...While factually based students have expressed reservations about his teaching, he remained a popular teacher among the politically correct crowd..." etc. etc. [63]. Note that none of these astonishing phrases (hatred for Israeli society, spats and disputes, misteachings, errors, canards, factually based students, politically correct crowd) is in quotes; they represent the voice of Wikipedia.

"Isarig has been given a last chance by the community," wrote one of Isarig's mentors regarding the resolution of the sock-puppet affair. As he is abusing this last chance by violating the clear terms of his topic-ban, I suggest he be perma-banned.

Relevant disclosures: (i) I have clashed with Isarig on several Middle-East-related articles in the past; (ii) I have defended Isarig when a user (whose views I roughly share) complained on AN/I of Isarig's "incivility, disruptive editing, and stalking-like behavior," which I thought was a misleading and overstated accusation [64]; and (iii) I recused myself from last-month's discussion whether to ban ("as I have had a number of feisty exchanges with Isarig"), and applauded the lenient resolution once it was hashed out ("Excellent solution. Banning really should be a very last resort"). In short, I am not a neutral party, but I have made a point of being scrupulously fair to a sometime adversary; Isarig's contempt in the present pass is, in my view, a step too far.--G-Dett 20:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

None of the article listed above are, as far as I understand, 'Middle east' or 'media-related' articles. In my response to G-Dett on her talk page, I explained why the article she linked to (Board of Deputies of British Jews) was not a Middle East article. That edit was made 10 ago, was uncontroversial, and elicited no comment from either of my mentors, at least one of whom was actively editing at the time. The latest edit on Joel Beinin, far from being disruptive, is a revert of a vandalism edit, by an anon IP (who is most likely Beinin himself) , which removed well sourced information regarding a lawsuit filed by Beinin against Dershowitz, with a false edit summary of "correcting errors". It has nothing to do with the 'Middle east'. The other articles listed by G-dett include a minor formatting edit (removal of a "see also" when the referenced article appears 2 lines below) on Independent Jewish Voices, which again, is not a 'middle east' article; a similar minor formatting edit (removal of a "see also" when the referenced article is already wikilinked a few word earlier) on Joan Peters, which again, is not a 'middle east' article; and an edit (supported by several other editors) on the lead of Norman Finkelstein related to his tenure denial controversy - again, not a "middle east article". None of these edits involved "edit warring", as I have scrupulously limited myself to 1RR on every article eI have edited. Most of these edits were made more than a week ago, while both my mentors were actively editing, and neither of them saw fit to comment on these edits. This smacks of an attempt to silence good faith edits that G-Dett doesn't like. I don't believe this was the intent of the CSN decision. Isarig 21:32, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

For those unfamiliar with the territory: (i) Independent Jewish Voices is "a network of Jews in Britain who share a commitment to certain principles, especially with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in mind"; (ii) the sourced material Isarig deleted from Board of Deputies of British Jews related to the Board's having organized "a pro-israel rally during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict"; (iii) Joan Peters is notable solely for having written an infamous book about the Middle East, From Time Immemorial, which was famously debunked by a number of scholars, most notably Norman Finkelstein – a political scientist who in turn is notable for a number of controversial academic books about the Middle East, and for his recent tenure denial at DePaul University, which itself is controversial due to the widespread perception that the process was politicized by domestic controversy over Israel-Palestine; (iv) Joel Beinin is another well-known scholar controversial for his positions on the Middle East; the wildly tendentious material Isarig added to that article focused on Middle-East-related controversies, as can be ascertained by even a cursory glance at the italicized material in my initial post above.--G-Dett 22:21, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

After seeing this report, I looked into Isarig's contribs and found these two edits [65] [66] at Gilad Atzmon as well. I believe this article also falls within the scope of his topic ban. (Perhaps a clarification is in order?) Tiamut 22:59, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Before I make any remarks on this case can somebody post a diff or a link to the topic ban resolution, so uninvolved editors can make-up their own minds of whether this violates the ban or not sorry missed the diff--Cailil ^talk 23:38, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

It's the second link in my initial post; here it is again [67]. The first link in my initial post is to the discussion that led to that resolution. Finally, I gave the diff for a clarification from one of two editors who drafted the resolution, and who are Isarig's mentors.[68] After reading the initial draft of the resolution, another editor asked Fayssal and Avi, "Does "articles where he misused his editing privileges" mean that he can now edit Arab-Israeli/Israel-Palestine articles he simply hasn't touched before? I believe the community was very, very clear on the specific terms of the topic ban -- all Israel-Palestine/Arab-Israeli articles." Fayssal responded by making "clear that we are talking about a set of articles. Israeli-Arab and media-related articles."--G-Dett 23:49, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Sorry G-Dett I scanned the top of the discussion a bit too fast. Having considered the resolution I can't say that Independent Jewish Voices and Board of Deputies of British Jews fall within the parameters that Isarig is banned from "Israel-Palestine/Arab-Israeli" articles -these two are British Jewish organizations. I do note Israg's last edit to Board of Deputies of British Jews but I think he's just about okay here. Also Isarig's edit to Joan Peters is very very innocuous [69] and I don't think that article can really be said to fall within the topic ban either.. It might just fall within the ban but the issue there is negligible However, Norman Finkelstein & Joel Beinin would be included in the topic ban and I'd recommend that Isarig not edit these pages again. I really don't think this is a big issue, it's more of an infringement rather than a violation in my book. If Isarig accepts that articles like Norman Finkelstein & Joel Beinin fall within the topic ban and simply does not edit them again for the duration of his ban then that should be the end of this--Cailil ^talk 00:05, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Being no huge advocate of banning in general, I won't contest your decision in that regard. But for the record, I'm not suggesting that Jewish groups are by definition "Middle East and media related" topics. Dear me, far from it. The IJV, however, was formed explicitly in response to media discourse about the Israel-Palestine conflict, specifically to counter the charge that strong criticism of Israel was indicative of a "new antisemitism," and that Jewish critics of Israeli policies are "self-hating." The group marked their inauguration by a major statement in the London Guardian and a week's worth of editorials in the same paper. It would be difficult to imagine a subject more squarely within the purview of Isarig's topic ban, "Israeli-Arab and media-related articles." I would also suggest you look closely at Isarig's disruptive edit to Joel Beinin; it is a middle finger in the face of WP:NPOV.--G-Dett 00:17, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll leave the decision to include IJV in the topic ban to Isarig's mentors. His edit to the page is nothing extraordinary either[70] I just don't see an issue here. As far as I'm concerned the topic ban covers the Benin article. Full stop. But if we go into the edits we see that the one he made on September 22 was a revert and unless User:Corvus cornix is being accused of violating WP:NPOV then there was "no harm" (to use BLP speak) in the Isarig's edit. The September 11th edit I'm not sure of[71] - I'll leave that to others to call it an NPOV violation or not. As far as I understand the topic ban these edits may have infringed it but they aren't blatant violations nor are they disruptive edits. That said Isarig should consider articles like Norman Finkelstein & Joel Beinin included in the ban--Cailil ^talk 00:39, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, I can't say I follow your reasoning here – a topic ban does not apply only to non-"innocuous" edits, and all of the listed articles and edits are self-evidently Middle-East-related. Whoever initially wrote the quoted Beinin material has grossly violated WP:NPOV, indeed to the point of disruption ("factually based students"? – come on), and anyone who restores that material is equally responsible for it. I've endorsed your decision not to ban, but let's not forget that Isarig is editing on the "last chance" conditions of a generous resolution, and should abide by it with greater candor, honesty, and respect.--G-Dett 01:25, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

If this is the community's opinion, I will not edit the Norman Finkelstein & Joel Beinin articles. Isarig 01:42, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you should add Independent Jewish Voices, and Board of Deputies of British Jews, and take care with other related articles as well. If that is agreeable to G-Dett, I move to close this discussion. Banno 02:12, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I think both of them are a bit of a stretch, but again, I will not edit those if that's the community's opinion. Isarig 02:16, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

comment - both G-Dett and Tiamut are POV editors (as i am - disclaimer: albeit i'm not sure if i like the comparison i just made) and i don't think it should be in their discretion to choose what articles to ban Isarig from. I do think his mentor (the one who is well - get well wishes to the other mentor) has that discretion to go over the edits and decide on his own regarding the steps to follow... if G-Dett has notes and complaints, i believe they should be referred to him. Jaakobou^{Chalk Talk} 02:38, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree this should be left to his mentors, and I think we should take him at his word here when he says he did not feel those articles fell within his topic ban. Bigglove^talk 03:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

As a neutral party who's intervened in this conflict since last fall, I was aghast to see checkuser confirmation of Isarig's long term manipulative sockpuppetry and supported a siteban during the last discussion. Topic banning was exceptionally accommodating in this situation. I propose we siteban this editor. The usual offer I extend to any community banned editor would apply here: respect the ban and don't try to sneak back on sockpuppets or bash Wikipedia offsite, then come to me in half a year and I'll support reinstatement. Durova^Charge! 03:25, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I have no comment on proposed disciplinary action at this stage but I must disagree with the notion that these are not articles related to the Middle East. They are clearly related in my opinion. From the articles in question:

Norman Finkelstein - Norman Gary Finkelstein (born December 8, 1953) is an American political scientist, specialising in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, on which he has written extensively.

Joel Beinin - Joel Beinin, Ph. D. is a professor of Middle East History on extended leave from Stanford University, where he taught from 1983-2006. He currently serves as Director of the Middle East Studies Department at the American University in Cairo.

Joan Peters - Joan Peters (born 1938) is a former CBS news producer and author best known for her controversial book, From Time Immemorial, published in 1984. Norman G. Finkelstein alleged in his book Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict that much of Peters' scholarship was fraudulent. From Time Immemorial later became the central issue in the Dershowitz-Finkelstein affair.

Independent Jewish Voices - Independent Jewish Voices (IJV) is an organization launched on February 5, 2007 by 150 prominent British Jews such as Nobel laureate Harold Pinter, historian Eric Hobsbawm, lawyer Sir Geoffrey Bindman, film director Mike Leigh, and actors Stephen Fry and Zoë Wanamaker. The organization is reportedly "born out of a frustration with the widespread misconception that the Jews of this country speak with one voice –– and that this voice supports the Israeli government's policies."

These extracts are all from the intros of the articles in question, so one can hardly claim that they are merely peripheral references to Middle East politics. IMO, if Isarig has been banned from articles on the Middle East, he should not be editing articles like these. Quite frankly I find it difficult to understand how anyone could conclude these articles are not ME related, perhaps Isarig could explain his reasoning? Gatoclass 07:40, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

On reading through the previous resolution, I see that Isarig was only to be topic banned for six months, which in my opinion is a remarkably lenient measure for sockpuppetry. Given that Isarig has been identified by multiple users as an edit warrior, and that he is already breaking his terms of agreement by editing ME related articles, I don't think that a mere siteban for six months as Durova has suggested would be adequate. I propose that either in addition to or instead of a six month siteban, Isarig simply be indefinitely limited to 1RR. It's his apparent edit warring that IMO is of most concern (and which led to the sockpuppetry in the first place) and neither the current restrictions nor a six month siteban are likely to fix that. Gatoclass 09:37, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I am already limiting myself, voluntarily, to 1RR. Allegations that I have been violating the terms of the CSN decision by edit waring, are quite simply untrue, and are part of the reason I described this most CSN discussion as being motivated by a desire to silence good faith edits that the nominator did not like. Isarig 15:04, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not proposing a six month siteban; I'm proposing an indefinite siteban with the possibility of review and reinstatement after six months. Durova^Charge! 14:47, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Okay, but what I am saying is, if he is reinstated following such a review, what exactly is stopping him resuming "business as usual"? He has six bans in his block log over the last 15 months not including his recent ban for sockpuppetry. Clearly he's a serial offender. And since his offences relate overwhelmingly to edit warring, surely it makes sense to do something which actually addresses that problem, rather than potentially allowing him to resume his disruption at a later date? Gatoclass 15:34, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment - I think there is a problem here. There is massive ambigiuty in Isarig's topic ban. I really can't say if IJV is part of the ban or not because Isarig's mentors extended the ban to cover "Middle east and media topics" which is open to interpretation and that's a problem. I understand the ban and the reasons for it but I think the resolution is very unclear. What I propose is that the community should topic-ban Isarig from all articles in Category:Israel, Category:Arab, Category:Palestine, Category:Non-governmental organizations involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Category:Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Arab-Israeli conflict. This would cover all sites mentioned here (as long as Norman Finkelstein and Joel Beinin are added to Category:Israeli-Palestinian conflict or a sub-categoy of it). If we get punitive after that then I suggest a block of maybe a week or a month, but as an uninvolved I don't see the justification for a full in-def ban. And personally I'd prefer to extend the topic ban for another 3-6 months rather than temporarily site-ban Isarig for these edits--Cailil ^talk 14:09, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I think a suggestion such as the above could go a long way toward resolving possible ambiguity. when my mentorship began, I discussed the terms with my mentors, and specifically asked if I should ask them for permission before editing any article, and they responded with "no - just stay out of contentious things". As described above, the edits which irked G-Dett were far from contentious -they were 2 formatting edits, one reversion of IP vandalism on a page which has since been semi-protected (per my request), etc... The only contentious edit was on Norman Finkelstein, which was not related to any Middle east issue but to his tenure denial. In retrospect, I probably should not have edited that one due to its contentious nature Implementing a clear policy delimited by article categories would remove any future ambiguity. Isarig 15:24, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

No. Trying to do it by article categories would be clumsy and unworkable in my view. And as for your mentors' advice, it appears you took the most liberal interpretation of that advice and then promptly went and exceeded it in any case. So I don't find this excuse of yours terribly persuasive. Gatoclass 15:45, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

why would it be "clumsy and unworkable"? Simply look at the bottom of the page, if any of the above listed categories is there - it's off limits, otherwise, its ok. It's simple, easy and does away with any ambiguity. Isarig 16:03, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Except of course that categories themselves are constantly edited and changed. And then, such an approach would give you far too free a hand. It would practically make a mockery of the ban altogether, because you could find a host of pages not in those categories which nevertheless deal extensively with ME controversies, the Finkelstein/Beinin/Peters pages being obvious examples to hand. Gatoclass 16:17, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm sure you appreciate the circular logic nature of your argument above. If an article really does "have ME politics as a major focus" -I'm sure it is (or should be) in one of the categories. If it is ambiguous whether or not it has such a focus, then that category might be missing , or edited and changed form time to time, and that is, to my thinking, proof that it does NOT "have ME politics as a major focus" - at least not a clear one. Isarig 17:11, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't see any "massive ambiguity". If you're banned from the topic of the Middle East, then strictly speaking you are banned from any article which touches upon the topic. But most certainly you are banned from articles which have ME politics as a major focus. It should be obvious that articles on Joan Peters, Norman Finkelstein, Joel Beinin, IJC etc. are off limits. The one topic cited above which might arguably be borderline is Board of Deputies of British Jews, but even that contains numerous references to the Arab-Israeli conflict. The rest of them in my view are squarely and unambiguously within the purview of the ban. If there is any doubt about a particular topic, then Isarig should be consulting his mentors or asking for permission on talk pages. But the fact that he is off making tendentious edits in violation both of his topic ban and WP:BIO mere days after his mentors become unavailable, doesn't speak well of his ability to reform. Gatoclass 15:24, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Let me explain the ambiguity to you. Interpreted in the manner you describe above, just about any article can be construed to be "touching the topic'. Finkelstein? why, a couple of his popular books were about the ME conflict, so I can't edit the sections that deal with his tenure denial controversy. The Board of Deputies of British Jews? They are too pro-Israel, according to their critics. How about George Bush? Surely he can be described as touching the "Middle east". As is Condi Rice, or just about any member of the Bush administration. Looking at my other recent edits, Oliver Kamm? A known pro-Israeli who's criticized Chomsky, a critic of Israel - is that off limits, too? Facebook? It has been criticized for allegedly supporting or allowing some anti-Israel campaigns by having groups that call for a boycott of Israel. There's really no limit to the ways this can be stretched, and that is obvious from your own comment above, which starts with "you are banned from any article which touches upon the topic", but immediately switches to "articles which have ME politics as a major focus". None of the articles that I have recently edited "have ME politics as a major focus" - they are, at best, somewhat related to the topic, but they are now being stretched to allegedly "have ME politics as a major focus", and because of the ambiguity, there's no easy way to say if the do or don't. I'd argue that Finkelstein, for example, while certainly having some relation to the ME conflict, is primarily known for his work on the 'Holocaust Industry', and more recently for his tenure denial controversy. The Board Of Deputies of British Jews is primarily about a British Jewish organization, not the ME etc... Having the topic clearly delimited by well defined categories would eliminate the ambiguity. Isarig` —Preceding signed but undated comment was added at 16:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

There's really no limit to the ways this can be stretched - Isarig

Um, no, I don't think so. It really isn't too hard to figure out. Articles which include words such as "Israel", "Palestine", "Middle East" or "Arab" are off limits. There are well over two million articles on Wiki. Are you seriously suggesting to me that you can't find an article to edit that does not include any of the above? Gatoclass 16:31, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

So, would Jajah, an article about a VOIP company which is another of my recent edits be off limits? It includes the word "Israel", more than once. How about Eli Eshed, a writer about Israeli pop-culture? Before this recent fracas, I created a new article about Adriaan Reelant, a 17th century cartographer of Palestine - should I have been site banned for that? Isarig 17:18, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I think topic bans will always have some ambiguity at the edges; the issue here is that by editing articles such as Joan Peters, Norman Finkelstein, Independent Jewish Voices, etc., the topic ban was obviously violated. Taking the spirit of the remedy, my suggestion would not be to narrow it down, but to acknowledge that this has been a violation, and that future wikilawyering won't be accepted. If Isarig wants to edit completely unrelated articles, I think that is what the remedy encourages. Of course, the point of the remedy is also to see if Isarig continues to push the rules. Mackan79 17:28, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Let me put it this way Isarig. If you are banned from ME topics, then strictly speaking, you should not be editing any articles which include words like "Israel", "Middle East", "Arab" and so on. At the same time, no-one is going to drag you in front of CSN for making an innocuous edit on, say, George W Bush, just because it might happen to mention the word "Israel" somewhere. However, if you made an edit that was to do with the topic of Israel within that article, you would have broken the terms of your agreement.

The bottom line is that while you are topic banned, you edit articles pertaining to the topic at your own risk. We wouldn't be here discussing the matter at all today if the edits you had made on these articles did not themselves relate to the topic from which you have been banned. Gatoclass 17:41, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

With all due respect, I think think this is exactly what is being done here: I am being dragged in front of CSN for removing a "see also" on Joan Peters and Independent Jewish Voices, when the "see also" I removed appears either 2 lines lower, or wikilinked 3 words earlier. On the Finklestein article, I have not edited anything to do with the topic of Israel or his involvement in it, but rather his tenure denial controversy. These edits are being construed as 'drifting back into ME editing', with wikilawyering about "a topic ban does not apply only to non-"innocuous" edits". I have already agreed not to edit the peripherally-relevant articles, and have voluntarily adopted 1RR. If you are truly concerned about ending improper edit warring (rather then silencing a political opponent), we should be working on how best to define what a "ME topic" is, rather than inventing baseless allegations of edit warring.Isarig 17:55, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

comment2 i see now that as far as Norman Finkelstein is in concern, Gatoclass is involved also.^[72] all we'd be missing is Nishidani, and we'd have a perfect assembly of a gang-up.
p.s 1 to 2 edits per month^{Norman Finklstein - 2, Joel Beinin - 2, Joan Peters - 1, Independent Jewish Voices - 1} doesn't sound like edit warring to me. Jaakobou^{Chalk Talk} 15:35, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The difference being of course, that I haven't been topic banned for edit warring and sockpuppetry. Gatoclass 15:47, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I wish to clarify that although Isarig has clearly been flouting the terms of his topic-ban by drifting back into ME editing – including adding ME material that grossly violates core policy – he has not been edit-warring. I was mistaken about that; my apologies to Isarig. The pattern that I saw (and continue to see) in Isarig's edits in the ten days or so is that he was getting his feet wet in ME articles again, trying out some innocuous edits, making some talk page posts, and then drifting towards more contentious material. When I saw that I contacted him directly. He gave me a couple of rather evasive replies, and then proceeded to carry out the grotesque Beinin edit, which confirmed my sense of where things were headed with Isarig, prompting me to post here. That edit, once again, was the one where Isarig inserted material that spoke of the subject's "hatred for Israeli society," the "spats and disputes" he's been involved in "almost since his arrival at Stanford," the numerous "misteachings," "errors," and "canards" he traffics in, and the dispute between "factually based students" and the "politically correct crowd" over the value of his teaching – none of this in quotes or attributed, all simply in the "neutral" voice of the encyclopedia. I have edited on a lot of contentious pages and have seen a lot of contentious editing, but as a simple example of a middle finger being shoved brazenly in the face of WP:NPOV, the Beinin edit is, in my experience, unparalleled.--G-Dett 16:37, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid that is not entirely correct. He has been edit warring - at Norman Finkelstein, here and here. He said above that he took the advice of his mentors to "just steer clear of contentious topics", but as you can see, he is not only editing on the highly contentious topic of Norman Finkelstein the well known anti-Zionist, but diving straight back into content disputes and accusing others of "POV-pushing" as he goes!

Basically, he's gone right back to his bad habits the minute his mentors disappeared. Gatoclass 16:56, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Above you suggest that the main issue with my behavior was edit warring, and argue for 1RR as a solution for that problem. 1RR is exactly what your above diffs display - I made an edit, discussed it extensively on the talk page, edited again a day later to support a compromise version suggested by another editor - and then backed off. If this is edit warring, I don't know of any WP editor who is not guilty of it. (Incidentally, this is on an article where you have been extensively edit warring, some might say possibly gaming the 3RR rule, so you might not want to belabor this point too much). Isarig 17:18, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but the point is you are already edit warring to your maximum allowable limit on pages you should not be editing in the first place. That completely violates the spirit of your agreement, both with CSN and your mentors, to "avoid contentions topics".

As for your accusations against me - I guess you are feeling a bit under siege right now, but making false accusations is not going to help. I have not engaged in "extensive edit warring" at NF, I have made a couple of reverts and extensively consulted with other editors at the talk page at the same time, the result of which has been a successful compromise. I might also point out that I actually concurred with the edits you made, so you and Jaakobu can scarcely accuse me of sour grapes. The issue in this case is not the substance of your edits, but the fact that you involved yourself in a content dispute on a page you should not have been editing in the first place. Gatoclass 18:01, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Look, can we drop the claims of edit warring, which are false? G-Dett, who brought up this claim, has already dropped it, and apologized for it, and someone who's made 4 reverts on that page (regradless of if it was in support of my position or not) in a 38 hour span should really not be the one to pick that battle. The only issue is whether or not I should be editing these articles. I believe it is stretching the intent of the CSN ban to include them, but I am certainly open to that, and have already agreed not to continue editing them, per the suggestion of the 2 neutral editors who first commented on this. Isarig 18:14, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

To G-dett's point above - the Joel Beinin edit was, upon review, done rather heavy-handedly on my part, and I apologize for that. It was not my intention to restore the material that described him as displaying "hatred for Israeli society," etc,.. (which I agree is not encyclopedic), but to undo the IP vandalism which removed well-sourced material about a copyright infringement law suit initiated by Beinin against Dershowitz. This material was previously removed by another editor, who labeled it vandalism (which it is), and I restored that previous editor's version without taking the time to weed out the justified removal of unencyclopedic content from the unjustified vandalism. Please note that the admin who semi-protected the page agreed that this material was removed without explanation and with a misleading edit summary. Isarig 17:31, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment - I don't know how much later I am likely to stay up, so lest I go to bed and wake up to discover Isarig has already been banished as occurred with Ferrylodge last night, I want to reiterate that I oppose Durova's proposal for an indefinite site ban for Isarig over this matter, if only for the fact that the mentors who were supposed to have been assisting him have not been available - for which he is obviously not to blame. My suggestion, as I said above, is for an indefinite 1RR limit with or without a temporary ban. Part of the reason I prefer 1RR is that I think it's unrealistic to expect a user like Isarig, who obviously has a keen interest in the ME, to successfully abide by a topic ban without close supervision, as I think his recent behaviour demonstrates.

Having said that, I will try to refrain making further comments on this case as I think I've said more than enough already. Gatoclass 18:19, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I appreciate that, and as I have written before, I have already voluntarily adopted 1RR, and have been editing according to that policy for a while now. Isarig 18:30, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

' I'm diametrically opposed to virtually all of Isarig's viewpoints, and in fact, he once got me blocked for 3RR after "conveniently" intervening in an edit war after somebody else's self-revert to avoid 3RR. This being said, I originally urged the community not to ban him, asking why mentorship and conditions could not be adopted. I think it's clear now that Isarig has played fast and loose with the conditions imposed. Norman Finkelstein, Joan Peters, and Independent Jewish Voices are clearly identifiable as Israel/Palestine articles. Finkelstein is known mainly for his work on the utility of anti-semitism to defenders of Israel, Peters is known solely for her (fraudulent) work on the origins of the Palestinian refugee problem, and IJV is an activist group which deals with British policy towards Israel and the Palestinians. Furthermore, Isarig's reaction when called on violating his ban was to dissemble and deflect, rather than simply acknowledge his mistake and pledge to stay out of things till his mentors return. If that's his attitude; fine. Block him until his mentors get back. < eleland // talkedits > 18:59, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Mentor block

Sorry, the Jewish High Holy days have just ended and Succos is beginning soon, so I will have limited availability to oversee Isarig. As such, and in light of the, at best, rather severe misjudgement, that was exhibited, I will be blocking user:Isarig until after the holidays. If user:Fayssal returns earlier than that and can resume oversight, he may unblock Isarig, but I request no one else unblocks Isarig until either he or I return. -- Avi 00:21, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

As an aside, the presence or absence of distinct partisanship on the part of those bringing this complaint to the CSN board is irrelevant in this instance. This is about Isarig. If there are specific complaints about other wiki editors, the dispute resolution process, WP:ANI, and this board are always open, and everyone's edit history (including that of all of the above contributors') are easily accessible. -- Avi 00:26, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/COFS

The above arbitration case has recently concluded. COFS (now Shutterbug) is asked to refrain from recruiting editors whose editing interests are limited to Scientology-related topics. Anynobody is prohibited from harassing Justanother, and Justanother is urged to avoid interesting himself in Anynobody's actions. All Scientology-related articles are placed on article probation. For the Arbitration Committee, Cbrown1023 talk 03:13, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Mrs random et al

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Please don't fork the discussion; it is already at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Case_of_abusive_sockpuppetry_by_Mrs_random. Discuss there, it's why I posted. Dmcdevit·t 09:17, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

---

Based on this Checkuser finding, I propose that the above sockpuppeteer be community banned. The various accounts...

• Mrs random (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Yeshivish (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Truest blue (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• LAZY 1L (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Miamite (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• AmerHisBuff (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Macallan 12 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

... have been used to votestack on Number 57's RFA - [73], [74] and [75]. Some of the accounts have significant afd participation, for example Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/AJOP: [76], [77] and [78] as well as Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Messianic Jewish organizations - the nominator, [79] and [80]. I'm sure this would only be the tip of the iceberg. MER-C 09:07, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Jmfangio-Chrisjnelson closed

The above arbitration case is closed. Jmfangio has been blocked as a sockpuppet of banned user Tecmobowl. Chrisjnelson is restricted to one revert per page per week (excepting obvious vandalism), and is required to discuss any content reversions on the page's talk page for a duration of six months. If he exceeds this limit, fails to discuss a content reversion, or makes any edits which are judged by an administrator to be uncivil, personal attacks, or assumptions of bad faith, he may be blocked. For the Arbitration Committee, Picaroon (t) 15:17, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Naacats (talk · contribs)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Consensus to ban user whose fundamental approach to Wikipedia is at direct odds with our policies

---

Naacats (talk · contribs) is the apparent operator of a website (http://naacats.com) which argues that the harms of tobacco are exaggerated. Using the above account, he has come to Wikipedia to advance this POV. In a short time he has created several POV forks to advance his POV (see Smokers Rights and History of Smoking), engaged in tendentious editing ([81], [82], [83], [84]), defined editors who have disagreed with him as "anti-smoking bigots" ([85]), systematically labeled reliable sources as "biased" without evidence ([86], [87]), tagged articles as {{POV}} if they say that smoking causes lung cancer ([88], [89], [90], [91], [92]), redirected long-established pages to POV forks of his own making ([93], [94]), removed other editors' comments from article-talk space on very dubious grounds ([95]), decided to "dismantle" the smoking article ([96]), defined the idea that smoking is harmful as a "fringe theory" ([97]), and rapidly exhausted the patience of editors on a wide range of smoking-related articles (see Talk:Smoking, Talk:Health effects of tobacco smoking, etc). The final straw, though, was off-wiki canvassing for meatpuppets ([98]). Lest I be accused of biting a newbie, please take a look at the efforts on User Talk:Naacats by a number of editors to gently bring Naacats around, yet he persists in viewing Wikipedia as a battleground to push his minoritarian POV. Oh, yes, he did also state explicitly that his group was "created SPECIFICLY (sic) for fighting falsehood in places like wiki."

I propose a topic ban for tendentious POV-pushing, disruptiveness, WP:BATTLE issues, COI, and off-wiki solicitation of meatpuppetry; Naacats would be banned from all smoking- and tobacco-related articles (loosely construed), including the creation of articles on these topics. We all have our POV's and pet issues, but I'd like to see evidence that he has something to contribute to Wikipedia beyond tendentious editing of smoking articles. The topic ban could be reconsidered in 6 months to 1 year by the community.

I will notify Naacats (talk · contribs) of this thread, as well as post a notice on the talk pages of smoking-related articles where he has been active. MastCell ^Talk 18:31, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

• Topic-ban sounds appropriate. Pseudoscience-pushing is a major problem and we shouldn't have to put up with any more than we have to. We can review this in six months or so and hopefully by then he will have realised that Wikipedia is not the place for his personal, and highly original, POV. BTW, should he violate this ban, I would propose the usual: blocks of up to a month, after 5 blocks this can escalate to a year's block, blocks to be logged here. Moreschi ^Talk 18:51, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
• Based on the sheer amount of tenditiosness in less than a month and the solicitation of meatpuppets I think the topic ban is appropriate. The user does appear to be able to learn, but may need some horizon broadening to get there. --Rocksanddirt 18:53, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support topic ban for now, since this user obviously has confused what he wants wikipedia to be with what it actually is. A 6 or 12 month topic ban will allow him to gain experience editing in other areas and hopefully learn about and accept wikipedia for what it actually is. Note this user hasn't made many edit during the time in between my posting of this advice and my vote here. If the users' behavior significantly improves over the next few days, I may change my position to neutral or even oppose. It's really up to him. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yilloslime (talk • contribs) 20:27, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
• I agree there are massive problems with their behaviour but has anything else WP:DR-wise been tried before looking for a ban? I certainly think they should be blocked (perhaps even indefinitely) for meat-puppetry but I really think WP:ANI was the venue for this rather than here--Cailil ^talk 20:54, 26 September 2007 (UTC) I take it back, see comment below-->User:Cailil12:22, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment: The first step (discussion) in WP:DR has been tried. I don't think an RfC would shed any additional light; his conduct is clearly inappropriate and he's already received feedback on it from a pretty broad section of editors without any change in behavior thus far. WP:DR is most useful for serious good-faith content disputes rather than out-and-out disruptive or blatantly inappropriate behavior. For those things, this board or AN/I are the best places to go, I think. I could see a block being appropriate for disruption or off-wiki canvassing, but I actually view the proposed remedy here as less severe than a block - it's only a topic ban. I considered bringing this to AN/I or asking a neutral admin to look it over, but the end result would likely be a block. I think that a topic ban would be a more constructive way to give this user a chance to reform, and thus proposed it here instead. MastCell ^Talk 21:01, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong support - tenditiosness & meat-puppetry, but to his credit has remained polite and civil on wikipedia. Certainly there has been some backlash against anti-smoking policies, and clearly could be a useful editor to add information about this. However the learning curve has not climbed high and needs have far better grasp of NPOVing his own personal viewpoint. A topic ban is warrented, but I'd be generous and state that 12 months seems too long. 23:31, 26 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Davidruben (talk • contribs)
• Support. The sad thing is that if he hadn't pushed his agenda so zealously, he may have been able to write-up a good piece on the issues surrounding the smokers' rights movement, and that could have been informative... TeamZissou 23:34, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

• Stongly Does Not Support.Oh joy. Yet another attempt to stifle my voice on this subject. I have admitted that I am somewhat biased - but not as biased as the author of the smoking article. If you just look at his Edit history you can see that much. I am innocent of the charges that you are levying against me. Never once did I say that smoking did not cause lung cancer, and do not support changing the articles to say otherwise. What I have proposed the artcles say is that "according to some studies, smoking causes lung cancer" - the studies in question are hotly debated, and the articles (listed below) only show one side of the story. Any (including attempts by other users) attempt to improve the article to include information on the other side of the issue are reverted and end up in these editing wars.

• Regarding the PRIVATE post (which can only be seen by 1 category of registered members) on naacats.com requesting EXPERT assistance on the smokers rights page, I don't see what the problem with that is. The group NAACATS (as opposed to me) has several experts on the subject in its membership, and requesting their assistance with writing the article hardly seems like it would be a problem.

• You state yourself: Pseudoscience-pushing is a major problem and we shouldn't have to put up with any more than we have to. -- That is exactly my point. The wiki articles all are listing the various health effects as if they have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt. I still have a lot more points that need to be made, but I was hoping that you guys would be reasonable and willing to compromise on the issue, so that I didn't have to go and dig for more facts. Instead 3 editors (Davidruben along with the 2 below) have done everything they can to muddle the issue, and stifle my comments claiming them to be "wrong" despite strong scientific evidence to back them up. Even so on the major issue of debate I have offered a concession, but apparently that is not enough.

• Regardless, I stated that I was willing to concede the issue, but they STILL won't leave it alone. I have come up with multiple solutions to the problem, and have polietly requested comments and discussion on the matter.

• There was one instance where I removed a comment by a user, regarding a private note on the website that he was somehow able to see, and regarding an article that was being worked on at the time. I let the user know about it, and requested that he repost the comment. Perhaps I should have handled it differently, but as you have stated I am still somewhat new to Wiki and made a small error there that was quickly and professionally corrected.

• Regarding the following users: Peter (sorry forgot his last name) and TeamNizziou- I have been in discussion with admins about getting THEM banned for 3RRs and several other violations. They continuously revert changes being made without discussion, including the removal of POV flags from articles that are OBVIOUSLY biased (health effects of tobacco smoking for example).

• Regarding my own statement about why the group was founded. Yes, I did speak truthfully. NAACATS main mission objective is to remove the public perception that the antismoking lobby is the only POV (or even the leading POV which it is not), and since Wiki is one of the #1 sources of information people look to today, wiki is a large part of that. By simply DENYING OUR EXISITANCE as you are trying to do, I feel this goes against the very heart of Wiki.

• Regarding the claim that my POV is the minority, even if you use the Surgeon Generals own facts (who admits to being biased against smokers, and supports the banning of tobacco in the USA - i'm not going to bother citing this one, as it would just be a waste of time since you guys call anything I cite as psudoscience) we still make up a sizable portion of the population. http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/secondhandsmoke/report/chapter10.pdf -- shows peoples beliefs according to these numbers.

• We are not a fringe minority as Mastcell has stated (although I personally do believe that your POV is a fringe theory and holds little basis in reality). Even according to the polls shown here (which if you read the way many questions were asked will show the polls had some bias in them) we are still around 40-60 % of the population.

• Now about the individual articles:

• Smokers Rights - This was a stub when I found it - I'm still heavily working on this article and I admit at the current time it is biased. I myself put the POV flag on this article, as I know I have not yet balanced it. Banning me from working on this article is (in my opinion) yet another attempt to prevent any information on the other side of the issue from being . If you look at the categories on this page you can see that I am working to balance the article, and have invited criticism, discussion, and editing by both sides of the issue.

• Smoking - This is the article all this stems from. I offered to concede my point for the time being, but thats not enough for them. Now they want to ban me to prevent me from "Spreading lies" as they have stated. I am doing no such thing, but have merely asked that the article mention that there is another side of the issue (similar to how evolution mentions the scientific design). Some of the numbers here are wrong, even if you take the antismoking side of the issue. This article is biased, but as I said I offered to concede on this issue numerous times.

• health effects of tobacco smoking - This entire article is a showboat of the antismoking lobby. It is ridiculously POV in so many ways I can't count. The POV flag needs to stand there and HEAVY work needs to be done to make it accurate. Even from the antismoking side of the issue, almost all the facts are enlarged, it cites clearly biased sources (for example the WHO who actively promotes and encourages smoking discrimination http://www.who.int/employment/FAQs_smoking_English.pdf), and is just a poor example of a Wiki article.

• Richard Doll - It states in the FIRST PARAGRAPH that he PROVED that smoking causes lung cancer. He did no such thing. He proved that there was a link between smoking and lung cancer - that is weasel wording in all its glory.

• Before closing I would also like to state that this ban was requested by MastCell, about 2 hours after he messaged me regarding the issues. Instead of waiting for my response and been willing to talk about the issue, he instead chose to than request this ban (even after stating that "should I continue...he'd request the ban". (meanwhile I was asleep during this whole time) - you can see this on my talk page.

• Finally in closing, I'd like to again state that a ban at this time would be pointless. I have been polite, willing to discuss issues (even made offers to concede my point!), and have made relatively few changes (since my first couple of days) without discussing the issue first. The few changes I have made include putting POV flags on issues in discussion (which are always reverted as soon as I put them up- without discussion in most cases), and putting various suggestion (expert, fact, and suggested merge) tags to improve the articles. Yes I made a few newbie mistakes along the way, but all of these were corrected and apologized for. At a bare minimum leave the Smokers rights article unaffected at this is an important article that needs to be completed. I have invited everyone who has an interest in the subject to assist, and I promise a fair and unbiased article when it is completed.

Naacats 00:50, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Naacats, on a different note, it would appear that your username violates username policy in that it promotes a group. Is there some reason why your account shouldn't be blocked on that basis? Ronnotel 02:07, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support topic ban or stronger measure. I started reading this thread from the top, and was prepared to oppose until I saw Naacats' spectacular act of self-immolation above. Wikipedia does not need more people who are to push their own agenda, casting aside WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:BATTLE, WP:TE and any other policy that happens to get in the way of spreading The Truth^TM. Raymond Arritt 02:42, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Arrit - Could you please explain what you mean by self-immolation? I'm not trying to push an agenda - I'm in fact doing the exact opposite. These articles were written by people who have an agenda (antitobacco), and apparently people who support that POV are preventing ANY attempt to remove (i'm not just talking about my own attempts - if you look through the history theres plenty of other examples to back this up) the POV Pushing thats on those articles. Even attempts to soften the bias, and cite related science have been blocked. This ban is not being requested on the basis that i'm trying to put my POV into the articles, but rather because i'm trying to remove theirs and make the article neutral according to Wiki's own guidelines.

In regards to Ronnotels comment- you are correct. I did not read that article when creating the account. Tommorow I will request a change in username. To do so now would likely cause other problems (people would claim that I was trying to "hide" from the ban for example).

Wiki is not a Battleground and shouldn't be used to POV push. Thats why I'm so opposed to these articles only showing one side of the story, one set of data, and one conclusion. Even still as I have stated so many times now I can't even think straight - I was willing to CONCEDE THE POINT on smoking -- how is that not enough for you guys? How can you support banning someone for simply trying to discuss clearing up infactual information?

As a courtesy I am not touching any articles related to the subject while this discussion is going on.

Naacats 03:26, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• It's pretty clear that no benefit will be gained from someone who insists that any organization which is against smoking is an unreliable source. -Amarkov moo! 03:40, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Any orginization that activily promotes and practices discrimination (such as the WHO http://www.who.int/employment/FAQs_smoking_English.pdf) against another POV in my opinion is an unreliable source. But thats what discussions are for, and thats why I brought those points up in DISCUSSION rather than simply editing them into the documents (the only edits outside of discussion and request flags I made were to clear up points where they stated information as fact), and refusing to discuss them as the other side had been doing.

Adding this - Imagine someone trying to cite a study done by The KKK in civil rights. Its the best comparison I can make to the WHO being cited for an article on Smoking - its a biased source (in my humble opinion)Naacats 03:47, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Erm, you realize that analogizing the WHO to the KKK isn't helping your case? -Amarkov moo! 03:56, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Prolly not, but its a good analogy none the less. They admittedly practice discrimination (like the KKK), and as such they are taking a side politically in this debate. For that reason, their results are suspect. -- again I did state in my own humble opinion. I did not make such a comparison in the articles discussion pages, but did so here only. Such a comparison in the discussion page WOULD be POV pushing, and thats something I've been avoiding like the plague. Naacats 04:07, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

After re-reading this I figured I should add that I'm not COMPARING the KKK to the WHO, but am simply stating that both groups actively practice and encourage discrimination. Naacats 04:09, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Support — it's clear this user doesn't understand what is wrong with his behavior, and isn't inclined to change. The above is a clear demonstration of this problem. --Haemo 04:43, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

How is DISCUSSION wrong in any way? Naacats 04:44, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment: I was going to add on-wiki canvassing to the list of user-conduct issues here, but apparently Naacats has been username-blocked. I'd prefer to wrap up this discussion anyway, though, because if he returns with another username the same issues will still exist. I'd like to get them sorted, though the username block throws a monkey wrench into the equation. MastCell ^Talk 05:17, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support - a topic ban. It was actually that diff on delldot's page that drew my attention here, as this noticeboard isn't on my watch list. I cleaned up one of this user's edits to World Health Organization, but by the weight of the rest of them, it's clear that they are here only to push an agenda, fringe or otherwise. Oh, and for the record for anyone that looks at that diff, of course delldot did not vandalize the page. To the contrary. Into The Fray ^T/C 05:23, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Support What's most bizarre about Naacats' behavior is that he seems to be utterly oblivious to the fact that the very POV he represents, that of an upset smoker who feels patronized by health moralism, is actually well-represented in the article. For example, the section "Social effects" treats smoking as a highly varied and popular activity, and contains the following passages:

The rise of the modern anti-smoking movement in the late 19th century did more than create awareness of the hazards of smoking; it provoked reactions of smokers against what was, and often still is, perceived as an assault on personal freedom and has created an identity among smokers as rebels, apart from non-smokers.

Until the mid-20th century, the majority of the adult population in many Western nations were smokers and the claims of anti-smoking activists were met with much skepticism, if not outright contempt. Today the movement has considerably more weight and evidence of its claims, but a considerable proportion of the population remains steadfast smokers.

There's even a sub-section of "History" on the 20th century which bears the heading "The social stigma", a description which would be flat-out ridiculous to describe as decidedly anti-smoking. And on top of all this, Naacats is accusing myself and Zissou as "antitobacco" despite us both being smokers. I think a 6 month ban from any smoking-related article is a good solution, and if Naacats returns, I believe he should be given a chance to better himself. I wouldn't mind having a pro-smoking advocate writing about the resistance to smoking that does exist, but if that is going to happen, he will have to drop the mind-twisting style of argumentation and the staunch conviction of his own self-righteousness. Peter ^Isotalo 09:13, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support - not the worst I've seen, but still. ←Ben^B4 09:48, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• Strong support for siteban. All the reasons listed above, plus attempt to subvert this discussion by canvassing. For the record I'm posting late because I was undecided and leaning toward opposing any community remedy when this thread began. Durova^Charge! 09:54, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• I had my reservations last night but on reflection and after Naacats spectacular performace I support a complete ban (with the usual caveats of review after a few months).--Cailil ^talk 12:22, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• support complete ban per the above really. Canvassing just tips the iceberg. -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 14:22, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• oppose While personally anti-smoking, it does seem like a pro-smokers rights POV would be useful input to the project. I agree that behavior has been poor in many areas, but I'd like to see how he performs after some time to reflect. I think 6 months is too long and would suggest one month, which I think would send the right message. Ronnotel 14:33, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

  It isn't the POV that's an issue; it's the tendentiousness. One intractable editor can stymie progress with unending debates over the obvious, such as whether the World Health Organization is a reliable source. Durova^Charge! 14:48, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

  In that case, he just needs to be taught the definition of WP:RS and he'll be much more useful. Perhaps a one month ban can do that as effectively as a six month ban? Ronnotel 14:52, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

  Comment: I don't think this is someone who simply misunderstands WP:V and WP:RS; more someone whose fundamental approach to Wikipedia is at direct odds with our policies. His edits, up to this point, have been met with unanimous disapproval, efforts to steer him in the right direction, and ultimately exasperation. I've seen a lot of initially problematic editors turn into good contributors, and I don't come to this board lightly, but this is exactly the kind of editing that is detrimental to the encyclopedia, frustrates and drives off good contributors, and indefinitely stalls article improvement. MastCell ^Talk 18:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support topic ban and possibly a forced username change. Behavior is clearly unacceptable, and shows little evidence that change is desired. RyanGerbil10(C-Town) 15:23, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

  For clarity, I would not be opposed to a siteban, as per Durova. RyanGerbil10(C-Town) 15:25, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support, obvious WP:TE and WP:SOAP ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:25, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• This appears to have repeated examples of tendentious edits, many of which are in defiance of WP:NPOV especially the undue weight clause. I see little hope for someone editing this topic if they think that the CDC and the WHO are not reliable sources. JoshuaZ 15:36, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

• Hang on a cotton pickin' minute. This user has been editing for just two weeks. He clearly doesn't understand policies like WP:RS. I haven't had a chance to look at his edit history yet, but talking about an indef siteban sounds totally over the top to me.

I'd suggest giving the guy a three to six month topic ban to give him a chance to get some experience on Wiki and come to grips with some of the basic policies. For goodness sakes, I've been on Wiki a good 18 months now and I'm still struggling with policy nuances. Gatoclass 15:52, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: I think most of the support was for a topic ban of 6-12 months, rather than a siteban. This does go well beyond a simple learning-curve issue, though, as detailed above. MastCell ^Talk 18:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

• Comment - Just to be clear, though it was referenced above, the username was blocked. There doesn't seem to have been a return of this user since that point. Into The Fray ^T/C 15:58, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support, just in case this issue isn't moot at this point. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 16:11, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.