Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Badlydrawnjeff/Proposed decision

Arbitrators active on this case

• Blnguyen
• Charles Matthews
• FloNight
• Fred Bauder
• Jdforrester
• Jpgordon
• Kirill Lokshin
• Matthew Brown (Morven)
• SimonP
• UninvitedCompany

Recused

• Mackensen

Inactive/away

• Flcelloguy
• Neutrality
• Paul August
• Raul654

User comments on the proposed decision

Although I applaud much in the proposed decision that Kirill Lokshin has drafted, the editing restrictions proposed for badlydrawnjeff (which may be moot in any event if he does not return to editing) are draconian. If I am reading the proposed decision correctly, Jeff would not only be banned indefinitely from deletion debates concerning any BLP article (which in itself seems overbroad), but also from ever editing any mainspace article concerning any living person ("all articles covered by the [BLP] policy"). This ban would apply even if the subject was indisputably notable and even if there were nothing even slightly controversial about the edit (theoretically, Jeff could not correct a living person's middle initial). This remedy seems particularly unnecessary given the consensus in the Workshop that Jeff's own editing (as opposed to his position in deletion debates) has never raised any BLP-related issues. Remarkably, the scope of the ban actually exceeds even the most severe of the dozen or so varying remedies proposed against badlydrawnjeff in the otherwise compendious Workshop. I have been on opposite sides from badlydrawnjeff in several of the contested deletion debates that led up to this arbitration case but I am nonetheless extremely uncomfortable with this proposal. Newyorkbrad 04:32, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Agree with Newyorkbrad. In addition to obvious biographies (articles titled as a persons' name), there are plenty of un-obvious ones (articles titled as something else, but that include substantial biographical content). With the current remedy #1, we could talk in terms of percentage of Main space from which Badlydrawnjeff is banned. Combine these two factors with community feeling on this issue, and I fear it will quickly become unrealistic for Badlydrawnjeff to edit anything at all. If I may, I suggest the remedy be drastically reduced in scope to only cover POINT xFDs and DRVs (or POINT participation in such), as that was what led to this arbitration. — digitaleon • talk @ 09:26, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Jeff has made seemingly-reasonable edits to XfD/DRV as well as some obvious WP:POINT ones. Given that decided what is POINT may be as contentious as the issue itself, and a decision to that effect may only serve to anger him, I suggest that if any remedy is needed, Jeff be barred only from starting DRVs on living persons, which is easier to enforce - see my proposed remedy [1]. The way, the truth, and the light 10:25, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure where such a consensus in the workshop has come from; certainly badlydrawnjeff has made problematic edits in mainspace (e.g. this) as well as the ones in XfDs and such. And yes, the remedy I've proposed is draconian; but, quite honestly, I don't see any other option for a case of this nature. Jeff simply does not get BLP; until he shows some signs of doing so, it would be wildly irresponsible of us to allow him to continue screwing around with those articles. Kirill Lokshin 10:10, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The dispute was never about BLP, as it was, but about the new policy being implemented by some administrators without previous discussion; this has been expressed in the new additions to WP:BLP and WP:NOT. I don't think it's reasonable to blame this on Jeff. The way, the truth, and the light 10:25, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Apparently, my crime for sanctioning is that someone can find one edit that's debatably problematic. Otherwise, this is simply a sanction that a) restricts me for holding an opinion contrary to the people in charge, and b) completly ignores what got us here to begin with. Not that I'm even considering bothering with this project anymore, but this would certainly mean it's not even worth my considering it if I do change my mind. Which, of course, was the point all along. --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I would have to say that the isssues regarding Badlydrawnjeff are far less about BLP than they are about general disruption of deletions and deletion reviews. I supported a temporary ban on him from deletions and deletion reviews. Wikipedia is not a battleground. The drama he creates with his extreme inclusionism only happens to spill over into BLP.--MONGO 10:31, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

• Like NYBrad, I think that the proposal to ban Jeff from BLPs is excessive and unjustified and strongly urge its rejection. Bucketsofg 11:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
• Not nearly justified by the evidence, and effectively causing serious damage to the encyclopedia. The edit you describe isn't even vandalism, but a good faith edit, that had been discussed and supported on the talk page of that article, hardly a reason for such penalties. Compare that to Bdj's excellent contributions throughout: without his intervention, for example, Chase Headley, a BLP article, would have been deleted months ago, and I'm sure that is true of tens if not hundreds of other articles. In the end, folks, the encyclopedia is not the DRV discussion and the other forums, it's the articles, and Bdj has been nothing but a boon to the articles. --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 12:19, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
• MONGO is correct. Jeff is simply more trouble than he is worth, and he has no-one to blame but himself. Wikipedia cannot tolerate bulls in china shops, particularly when the china represents people's lives. The uncertainty over what he will do next, given his open opposition to BLP, is just as important, if not more so, than what diffs you can find over what he has done in the past. Wikipedia is one of very few organisations, and certainly the only organisation of its size and reputation, that tolerates people working within it that openly disagree with and actively attempt to subvert its fundamental principles in the name of openness and freedom. Even this decision won't reverse that, but it's a start. A strong signal such as this may encourage those seeking a career in amateur tabloid journalism to stop attempting to abuse Wikipedia's open-editing structure for that purpose, and go find a more suitable website with different ethical princples. 86.151.38.245 15:09, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
• I'm with MONGO and with the direction that the ArbCom seems to be taking. BLP has to be taken seriously; all of us have to "get it". I'm in favour of even more active and rigorous enforcement of it by admins. Metamagician3000 12:17, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
  • That makes adminship a big deal. There are some admins who I would trust to do regular clean-up tasks, but there are some that I would not trust to carry out BLP deletions. There are also editors that I would trust (including Tony Sidaway) to properly enforce BLP. I'm all for more rigorous enforcement of BLP, but why focus on admins and not allow the community as a whole to enforce BLP? This focus on admins being the ones to carry this out is an expansion of the roles of admins that many will not have foreseen. Many admins at their RfA were given the tools by community approval to carry out tasks such as speedy deletions, and determining consensus on AfD discussions. Making judgements on BLPs is a different mattter again. What you will end up with is a de facto group of self-appointed BLP admins, distinct from the rest of the admins (who will either on principle or in fear of getting it wrong, stay away from such actions). The basic questions are ones such as: (1) Are all admins suitable for BLP duty? (2) Should admins wanting to carry out BLP deletions go back through RfA? (3) Is a pool of BLP admins necessary or desirable? Carcharoth 12:28, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

To what degree is it appropriate to ban someone for the sole reason that they disagree with a policy (and note, please, that "all articles covered by the policy" covers any article that contains any mention of any living person)? More than a few editors believe that the BLP policy should not have or does not require a subjective ethical basis. Are they also to be banned? If failure to "get" a particular interpretation of a policy is to become the new standard for banning editors, then let's at least be consistent and not only target Jeff. -- Black Falcon ^(Talk) 15:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC) In case it wasn't clear, my call for consistency should be taken with a grain of salt. It's intended to be sarcastic because (a) a different response would either violate my ethical principles or would result in a (self-)block for incivility, and (b) sarcasm is really helpful, didn't you know.

Comment by The way, the truth, and the light

This issue isn't about Jeff. It never was. The other side have tried to make it about Jeff to avoid talking about the real issues and intimidate those that disagree. By deliberating leaving deletion criteria vague and attacking anyone that disagrees, they are imposing a new kind of censorship on Wikipedia. Now the standard to not having articles based solely on a brief appearance in the news is reasonable, though one can honestly argue against it; but it is apparent that this new secret standard goes farther in imposing a higher standard of notability on controversial biographies than on normal ones. This means that we will have biographies on semi-notable people except when they are necessarily negative or arguably so, which creates a systemic bias in our coverage.

Specifically, #4 of this proposed decision, about BLP deletions, does not decide anything. It leaves essentially what we have now, which has created this conflict. If there were consensus to delete an article it can be gotten at AfD; doing so after it has been deleted will not be representative. It is therefor not reasonable to insist that out-of-process deletions require consensus to overturn, especially given the difficulty of determining such. Note also that all the articles we have had disputes over have been ones that existed a long time, and one can reasonably suspect that something is wrong if long-standing articles are speedily deleted. Newly created articles can be speedied as usual, but those that have long been a part of Wikipedia should almost always go through AfD. The way, the truth, and the light 10:50, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Request to Digitaleon for clarification

Without commenting on the proposed remedy, I'd like to pick out a sentence used by Digitaleon that puzzles me: I suggest the remedy be drastically reduced in scope to only cover POINT xFDs and DRVs (or POINT participation in such).

I like to think that I'm familiar with the guideline in question, whose full name is Wikipedia:Do not disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point, but I don't understand that context in which it's used here. "WP:POINT" is about breaching experiments--disruptive acts that the author carries out, knowing that the consequences will be bad for Wikipedia, but believing that the actions are necessary to show the absurdity of a line of reasoning or a policy.

That doesn't sound like what Jeff has been doing at all. He has certainly believed that his actions are the best thing for Wikipedia as the most direct step available to right a perceived wrong. Such acts are sometimes disruptive especially when pursued to the lengths he is prepared to go to, but I don't think this is in any way a breaching experiment. He wants those discussions and he wants those articles resurrected.

So could you explain what it is about these disruptive acts that makes you describe them as "POINT" acts? Do you just mean disruptive acts concerning the deletion process? --Tony Sidaway 10:35, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I think what he was referring to are comments that are based only on his extreme philosophy and not on the merits of the article. The way, the truth, and the light 10:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that sounds plausible I suppose. To clarify I don't think general philosophical opposition is necessarily bad, and in fact I and many other editors deploy such arguments regularly--not least in my own promotion of a certain view of the biographies of living persons policy in opposition to a more restrictive view. But there's a difference in the tone.

Comments of that type may be disruptive, but I think the reason is because of their vehemence, the assumptions of bad faith he brings with them (at several points in the workshop and in deletion discussions he accused people who disagreed with him of lying), and perhaps as Kirill suggests in his finding of fact and remedy, his irreconcilable opposition to the ethical component of Wikipedia policy. Denying the ethical dimension could perhaps be seen as disruptive if carried to extremes. --Tony Sidaway 11:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

My apologies for any confusion regarding my comments. The reasoning I went through to get to my statement was as follows:

Badlydrawnjeff has been pursuing the undeletion of an article, which contains substantial biographical content. There's actually no issue with this: he has used the correct forums (DRV and DR) and, at least initially, followed the correct process by moving to the next forum in line where he felt that the result was unacceptable. So far, so good.

These mechanisms are consensus-driven, and like anything that is consensus-driven, there is inevitably a proportion - whether a whole group of people or just one person - who won't be happy with the outcome. The process exists to ensure that those people have grounds to raise their concerns about consensus as established, but also to put a limit on how far this can go so that endless battles are not fought. Bringing the same dispute to the same forum again and again, to try and establish a different consensus, is defined as DISRUPTive behaviour for that reason.

The consensus established through these mechanisms (which, despite undeletion and re-deletion on several occasions) ended up with the article being deleted and remaining so. The grounds given for this consensus were based upon BLP; not just the black-letter verbiage of the policy, but the principles from which it exists. At this point, Badlydrawnjeff seemed to decide that either BLP - or the apparently widespread interpretation of it - was incorrect, and continued with the same campaign but with a new twist in trying to change how BLP was being interpreted.

This then extended into initiations of and comments on a number of other DRV and other DR requests (per evidence), where it seemed to become as much about a sea change in the application of BLP as it did about preserving biographies that were worth preserving (or if they weren't, resurrecting and fixing them). Such situations are covered by POINT, since Badlydrawnjeffs' views on these matters were, by that time, well known by regulars to those forums, and it would have been difficult for him to not know that pursuing this course would be disruptive.

My concern about the remedy #1 remains; the effect of it is to ban Badlydrawnjeff from swathes of the Main space, and in such a way that it is likely to make any editing by him at all impractical - even if the edits are not to biographies or articles with substantial biographical content. The reason I say this is that I find it likely his edits will be closely scrutinised by many other editors - based on what I have seen here and elsewhere - and any edit that has a possible BLP tangent is likely to be flagged for further attention. You can't edit productively if you have to constantly look over your back, and should this come to pass, it would not surprise me to see Badlydrawnjeff make a noisy, but entirely understandable, exit from the project altogether (if he hasn't already).

Thus, I believe remedy #1 needs to be drastically reduced in scope. Badlydrawnjeff should be able to edit productively on biographies and on articles with substantial biographical content, and be able to comment on them using the talk page; I have seen nothing to suggest he hasn't so far. Badlydrawnjeff should be able to get involved with the productive formation of the BLP policy; this is obviously an area of interest for him, and per Wikipedia Official Policy, "consensus, tradition and practice" are all used in the formation of policies. Badlydrawnjeff should even be able to initiate and participate in xFD and DRV processes surrounding biographies and articles with substantial biographical content; this is part of normal, productive editing and improving the encyclopaedia. The only thing he needs to be enjoined from is POINT abuse of these processes, being the reason (in my view) for this arbitration request; after all, if having exhausted the available process, Badlydrawnjeff had accepted the consensus and moved on, or else moved along to trying to re-form the policy, this arbitration request would likely never have occurred.

All of that said, I do have some sympathy for Jeff here; while he has been unCIVIL to others, many others have been uncivil back. Good-faith participation of his in other areas have been ignored or subject to derision because of this situation. He found himself blocked in very inappropriate circumstances, again with some apparent relation to this dispute. And, in spite of the way he ended up making them, Jeff does have some (what I believe to be) valid points regarding the application of BLP, which deserve further attention.

I will make a brief point only on that, since this isn't the correct forum for it: To my knowledge, we don't get into these kinds of situations with the application of our other policies (with the odd exceptions for NOT and NPOV). This is because the policies are straightforward to apply, and it becomes clear when one or more editors start operating outside the policy (indicating the issue is the editor(s) as opposed to the policy). Sadly, BLP seems to not be so straightforward to apply, and anecdotally, I have seen it lead to long arguments when invoked (where Jeff never had any involvement). It may be appropriate for a structured community review of the policy, to see if it can be made more straightforward to apply, and thus avoid future instances of this.

Anyway, that's my reasoning for using POINT. I am disheartened to see that the remedy #1 now has four support votes by arbitrators, but will hold out hope that this remedy will be altered prior to the motion to close. — digitaleon • talk @ 06:07, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Way too harsh

The way I read it, remedy #1 forbids Jeff from editing articles about people. First, this is way too harsh - why on earth would we want to forbid one of our more prolific editors from editing articles? Second, it misses the issue at hand, as I have not seen any evidence that Jeff's editing of articles is in any way problematic or disruptive. I hope the ArbCom would reconsider this. >Radiant< 11:54, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I have to agree here. This proposal, in my opinion, indicates that the arbitrator supporting it has totally failed to understand the problem and situation. The problem is the disagreement and wheel-edit warring over BLP deletion of articles. The evidence does not demonstrate that jeff is a problematic editor of articles, it demonstrates that he strongly disagrees with a small but vocal faction of admins that are themselves a problem because they act to prevent the formation of consensus. GRBerry 12:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Also strongly agree. Far far too harsh, and missing the point. Trebor 18:58, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Radiant as well. Seems Jeff is being made a scapegoat for BLP matters, when the real evidence of disruption is elsewhere. Arbcom needs to remember that Jeff is a prolific article starter and has fetaured level work as well, including areas that are in the scope of BLP. This BLP ban essentially is a Wikipedia ban for Jeff and that is unacceptable. Lets not run an otherwise excellent contributor out the door over a few comments about BLP, which are made only due to his efforts to prevent mass deletions of every single sourced negative aspect made in a biography. I definitely see Jeff as simply one who is very worried that we're going to sugar coat our bios to protect us from lawsuits, and what he is striving for seems to be the truth, even if that truth might be ugly to read about. Again, yes Jeff is disruptive but it is in deletions and deletion reviews, which only sometimes happen to be part of the BLP issue.--MONGO 19:29, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Let us see:

• "badlydrawnjeff is banned from all articles covered by the policy" (arbcom)
• "This policy applies equally to biographies of living persons and to biographical material about living persons in other articles." (WP:BLP)

I'm sorry but either that proposed remedy needs changing or you are asking for a site-wide ban. violet/riga (t) 19:36, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not censored

I'd like to repeat my call for a clarification of the real meaning of WP:NOT#Wikipedia is not censored, another editor at a DRV of a living person biography has made exactly the same comment as we have seen several times in respect of this case - see Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2007 June 17#Joel Hayward. There are two groups of editors with differing interpretations of how this relates to such cases (one group believing it allows the inclusion of tabloid-style articles on living individuals, the other believing it is designed to cover a much more specific situation, explicit content). Please do include a clarification one way or the other. Guy (Help!) 13:07, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

SPUI and I were involved in writing the earliest version of this in late 2004. This was to cement the result of a long debate that had decided that it was appropriate to display pictures of sexual organs in articles about them. It has (quite legitimately) mutated a bit since then, and acquired meanings I didn't foresee, and I'm okay with that because that's how these things work.

But it still doesn't mean that crap belongs anywhere on Wikipedia. --Tony Sidaway 13:14, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Tony. A number of editors seem to incorrectly interpret "Wikipedia is not censored" as meaning something akin to "Wikipedia is not edited." This is rather tragic. Nandesuka 18:43, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Tony. This case has nothing to do with censorship in the sense meant in the "Wikipedia is not censored" maxim. Maxims like that have to be read in the context of the mischief they are addressing. The issue of impacting negatively on the lives of living persons is of a completely different character from such issues as whether we might - shock, horror - illustrate on article called something like "Penis" with a picture of a penis. Metamagician3000 12:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

How to sanction overzealous admins? Roadmap to BLP admins?

"Any administrator, acting on their own judgement, may delete an article that is substantially a biography of a living person if they believe that it (and every previous version of it) significantly violates any aspect of the relevant policy..." - I'm fine with this, with one question: what if an admin (now or in the future), takes the opposite position of Jeff, errs a long way towards caution, and deletes lots of articles based on their interpretation of the BLP policy? In this hypothetical case, a significant number of admins and editors that were opposed to Jeff's stance also oppose this admin's actions. What then? The same amount of disruption would occur, but in reverse. Will we need an arbcom case everytime someone veers too far from the middle ground? Is there a case for a proviso that any admin having, say, 3 BLP deletions overturned at DRV, has been shown to have poor judgement on BLP issue and should be restricted from carrying out BLP issues? Surely that way lies a superclass of "BLP admins", which would be disastrous for the functioning of the encyclopedia, in my opinion. In fact, I recall a user calling for BLP admins not so long ago. Were they right all along? (Can anyone dig out the relevant ANI thread?) Carcharoth 14:21, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Found it. Wikipedia:BLP Admin (the rejected proposal). The editor in question, User:CyberAnth is still active (though some may remember the deletion discussions spawned), so I'll tone down my comments above (apologies for any offence caused). Carcharoth 14:27, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Those deletion discussions included lots of laughs about removing the inflammatory information that Hank Aaron was in baseball's Hall of Fame. [2] Which was a preview of the endless fun we're going to have after this case unleashes the BLP deletionists. But Jimbo is tired of people pestering him about their WP bios – which I can sympathize with – so get ready for much hilarity. Casey Abell 19:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Charles Manson after the BLP deletionists get finished with it

Charles Manson was involved in a legal case in the late 1960s. He denied certain allegations.

Casey Abell 21:24, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

That's a remarkably poor example you chose there. That is a case where the article lists over 20 books and films and documentaries on the subject, expanding the sources beyond just newspapers. And this has continued for a period of over 30 years. It is clear that notability has been established there. Unlike cases where a single news story is picked up and repeated by different newspapers for a week, and then nothing is ever heard again. Carcharoth 22:00, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

And it takes one (1) admin to make such a finding on any BLP article, under the proposed policy. Of course, it's a ridiculous example, chosen for humorous exaggeration. But the logic will quickly be applied to examples that are far from ridiculous. For instance, I expect Essjay controversy will disappear sooner or later, which will set off an amusing round of wikidrama. After all, an admin nominated it for deletion here.

I think the above comments reveal a severe lack of perspective. There may well be grounds for deleting certain articles, but some are more likely to be deletion candidates than others. I haven't read Essjay controversy, but it's certainly conceivable that the article may be unbalanced and need to be edited somewhat--like any article about a living person. The same could apply to the Charles Manson article. The abundance of reliable sources on the latter, however, as well as the importance of the story, makes it easier to produce a well balanced article. What's the problem with regarding it as our duty to get articles about living people right? --Tony Sidaway 22:30, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The problem is giving any single admin, out of more than one thousand, the power to unilaterally delete any BLP article, and then stacking the deck against the article's restoration. Look, I know the policy is going through. Jimbo and other WP insiders want it, so it's a done deal. But we will have plenty of high-larious wikidrama when editors start noticing red links cropping up because some admin on some distant planet in some distant galaxy thought BLP was infringed in some distant way. Casey Abell 22:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

My proposal for courtesy blanking, instead of deletion, might help. This also moves the wording away from making adminship a big deal, since such a blanking can be carried out by any editor. See Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Badlydrawnjeff/Proposed decision#BLP blanking. Carcharoth 22:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Blanking would be better, but that's not the policy that will be enacted here. Neither will your proposed checks and balances on deleting admins get anywhere. The articles are going to disappear from the sight of ordinary editors, with no appeal against the deleting admins except the incredibly cumbersome desysopping process. Which means you better get ready for lots of annoyed editors and downright wicked wikidrama. Casey Abell 23:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm

I'm not overly impressed with this. This could easily be used as carte blanche for a small and vocal minority of sysops to carry out their particularly anal (no offence meant) interpretation of BLP. While I'd call myself a 'deletionist', should one choose to speak in those terms, there's been articles that've had all kinds of things done to them out of process and without consensus and without valid reasons under BLP as it stands.

I appreciate the existence of BLP, and as evidenced by my edits to "What wikipedia is not" agree that a certain amount of the news-coverage related material here is not relevant to an encyclopedia. I feel, though, that using BLP as an extension of IDONTLIKEIT can only be harmful to the project, let alone muting and suppressing the good-faith concerns of a great number of users (and admins).

I've been editing here for many years under many different names (as it says on my userpage, one at a time). I have never believed in a cabal. Sanctions like this, though, against a user who has spoken up against a group consisting partly of 'insiders' (a term that I'm sure not many will disagree too heavily with), will give the impression to some users of: 1) Censorship and 2) Oligarchy, and this case should be treated with particular care.

I'm sure the best and least divisive solution would be to generally warn everybody involved as to their civility, and suggest that debate should not be muted, provided it doesn't become disruptive for disruption's sake. We're trying to write an encyclopedia here, not rid ourselves of nuisances we 'don't like'.

DrumCarton 15:13, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Bear in mind

At no point has any article I undeleted been shown to violate BLP. There has been enough time for supporting statements to be given about any of the articles but nothing has been forthcoming. I carefully checked them and they did not fall under BLP guidance so it is my opinion that I was undoing deletions that went against policy. I would urge the arbcom to be very wary of any ruling that would encourage or condone an admin to delete an article without backing up their claim of BLP (note that the edit summaries of the deletions were not clear enough). violet/riga (t) 16:33, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm looking at the list of articles that you deleted and I would like to know how you could possibly believe that these articles were not covered by the biographies of living persons policy. Every single one was of a minor and every single one was in the name of the child. It is because of the kind of "I can't see any problem here" attitude that the onus must be on the challenger to prove that the article passes all Wikipedia policies. We can't afford to leave this policy at the mercy of "Jack the lad" any more. --Tony Sidaway 16:42, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Please quote the part that says that sourced, factual articles about minors must be deleted. Or the part that states that we must not have their names. It is because of your attitude of "We can just delete it and forget about it" that we have had all of this problem. Rather than delete things it's better to fix them. violet/riga (t) 16:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Every biography of a living person falls under BLP. The dispute here has always been between one faction that sees nothing important in WP:BLP except the need for reliable sources, and another faction that sees a requirement to do no harm, and to respect basic human dignity. (And some of the participants in this case, including Violetriga just above, have proven over and over again through their edits to the case itself that they continue to refuse to see any validity to the expansive view.) Perhaps the disputed deletions did not run afoul of the very narrow interpretation of BLP that only respects the source requirement. If passed, this decision will send a strong signal that ArbCom takes the more expansive view of BLP, and I suspect would also signal that they are willing to enforce that view in the future when necessary. I won't attempt to characterize either viewpoint as majority or minority, but the expansive viewpoint is clearly held by every member of ArbCom that has commented on the workshop, as well as by Jimbo (see for example his actions on 2006 Gdansk school suicide incident (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), or his recent logs). If passed, this decision will indeed send a strong signal that admins like Doc, who defend an expansive view, are encouraged, while admins like Violetriga, who defend the narrowest view, are in danger of future ArbCom action if they do not change their approach. Thatcher131 16:58, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I love it when people pigeon-hole my views. BLP did not allow for the deletions of those articles. This "expansive view" is a load of rubbish because it is simply not supported by the policy. The deletions were therefore incorrect and needed to be restored.

You say about my reading of BLP being the "narrow view" but you really don't have a clue what I think. I never campaigned for the articles to survive AfD or suchlike, and indeed believe that their removal has been the correct course of action. It's just that the way they were originally deleted was unacceptable and out of line with policy. Sure, arbcom can go ahead and suggest the "expansive view" will be the way forward but it cannot be retrospectively actionable and I fail to see how I have violated any policy or guideline. Tell me off for not discussing it first, sure, but I tried to do so after undoing an incorrect action and Doc glasgow refused. violet/riga (t) 17:11, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Try to forget about rules and guidelines, they're only there to help us. We are supposed to ignore them when they hinder us, remember? Think about the overall goal: how did you help the overall goal by, without discussion, undeleting articles, deleted by an admin in good standing, who clearly labelled them as having serious enough biographies of living persons problems to merit deletion? --Tony Sidaway 17:26, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

By restoring information that is useful and worthy of inclusion, as proven by various AfD results to merge. Further, the articles clearly didn't violate BLP and were in no way disparaging to those involved. Sorry but it just appears that IDONTLIKEIT is being accepted here under the guise of BLP. violet/riga (t) 17:31, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I get it now. I get to be the scapegoat so that the people who couldn't get their way via consensus can force it. No fucking wonder. Great play, guys, I commend the gamesmanship. --badlydrawnjeff talk 17:17, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The section Presumption in favor of privacy has contained the phrase "do no harm" for at least a year, and the clarification from Jimbo ("Real people are involved, and they can be hurt by your words. We are not tabloid journalism,") has also been around for more than a year. Thatcher131 17:26, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Thus my being the scapegoat. At no point have I ever "done harm," at no point have I ever come close to violating that in any way shape or form, period. What I did do is disagree with people. That is apparently a crime in the eyes of ArbCom, which means that things are even worse than I thought. Disagree with the insiders, the cabal, whatever you want to call them, and they'll find a way to fuck you over. Reap what you sow, people - this simply can't end well. --badlydrawnjeff talk 18:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

What needs to stop (from my point of view) is the hounding of admins who delete sourced articles on the basis of "do no harm" and "Wikipedia is not a tabloid", the multiple passes at AfD and DRV, and the wheel warring. (See below where Violetriga insists that only articles that are unsourced and disparaging may be deleted per the BLP policy.) Maybe it would be sufficient for ArbCom to say, "This is our view of these principles, and we will rapidly ban and/or desysop to uphold them" but give a general amnesty for all prior actions and arguments. Thatcher131 18:26, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Bullshit. What needs to stop is the nonsensical point of views that certain administrators hold, the lack of accountability, and some actual building of consensus by people who actually contribute to this project as opposed to trolls and liars. Violetriga, per policy, is absolutely right. Want Violet to get on board with this new expansion of policy (and yes, it is new - at no point was the policy ever interpreted to mean what is being advanced here in regards to removal the way these articles have been removed) - then fucking change it. Don't allow incompetent people to throw the competent ones to the wolves to make a point. --badlydrawnjeff talk 18:29, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Again, I ask, as I did in the section above, what happens when someone with an extreme expansionist viewpoint comes along and deletes lots of borderline stuff that (after lots of DRVs) gets restored? The whole problem is that this is a continuum of viewpoints, not a yes-no problem. The battleground (for that is what it is, despite pleas for Wikipedia not to be a battleground) will shift to the new borderline, but if there are still people on either side of the divide unwilling to discuss things or compromise their principles (like in this case), then the battle will go on. I still think the ArbCom should send out a strong signal about how they expect the deleting admins to conduct themselves in cases like this during and after a Deletion Review. Where is the deleting admin left when they are overturned at DRV? They may still think they are right, in which case they will have no option but to wheel-war to uphold their interpretation of BLP policy. Chaos will ensue, and won't die down until an admin is desysopped for ultra-conservative deletion and wheel-warring over BLP policy to keep something deleted. Carcharoth 17:17, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Let me rephrase this. If there is no evidence provided that the deletions were acceptable under BLP policy rather than just citing that as a reason to delete then there cannot be evidence of my wrongdoing. Nobody at any point has shown where the articles are "unsourced and negative in tone, where there is no NPOV version to revert to". violet/riga (t) 18:07, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

We went over this on the workshop, I think, so not a good idea to rehash it here. --Tony Sidaway 18:19, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

And still no proof was forthcoming? Yeah that'll be my point proven then. violet/riga (t) 18:20, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Comment by CBM on "Summary deletion of BLPs"

The final sentence of this proposal is too strong – in practice, with the flexible nature of WP policy and consensus, no editor can show that something does agree with every policy. A lower burden of proof, but still high enough in my opinion, would be to obtain consensus that the article should be restored. Also, the proposal would be more useful if the final clause was reworded to say "can be made compliant with every aspect of policy." — Carl (CBM · talk) 17:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Let DRV decide whether BLP deletions need an article at all

A better way to do this, rather than have those arguing for restoration after a BLP deletion being required to show that the deleted article is compliant with BLP policy (difficult when you cannot see the article, or have to rely on unreliable caching), might be to say that those contesting BLP deletions should instead be asked make a case for any article about that person existing. Once the principle that there should be an article is established, then those who deleted the old version under the BLP would be asked to restore an edited version (probably a stub) that was acceptable to them, and those editing or defending the article would be allowed to continue editing, while being strongly reminded to adhere to the BLP policy. Also, a default question at a DRV should be whether the deleting admin looked through the article history to find a version that was acceptable. ie:

• Admin deletes an article on subject X citing BLP concerns.
• Any user can then open a DRV and argues that an article on subject X is required.
• The deleting admin confirms that they looked at the article history and were unable to find an acceptable version of the article to rollback to.
• Discussion ensues and a consensus position is reached (no consensus = no article) on both the existence of an article or redirect and an appropriate title name and the appropriateness of various redirects. The content of the deleted version is not discussed (this is the key point).
• If consensus is that an article or redirect should exist at that title, the deleting admin restores the article as a stub, or creates the redirect.
• Editing resumes with a general caution sounded to all editors of the article and, any article it redirects to, over BLP issues.

Would that work in practice? Carcharoth 17:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Possibly, but only assuming that the article meets BLP deletion rules. I would like to see a template used to replace the article similar to that used for copyvios. violet/riga (t) 17:43, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

You missed "the content of the deleted version is not discussed" bit. The first discussion is whether any article should exist at all, regardless of what the deleted version actually said (this is designed to focus discussion). Then, if consensus is to restore a stub/blank page, a second discussion ensues on the talk page (as it should have done all along) on how best to write an article on the subject. But with people now aware that there are BLP concerns. Carcharoth 17:47, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I didn't miss that bit. I'm saying that articles can only be speedy deleted citing BLP if they are unsourced and disparaging. If they are deleted on those grounds they should be then replaced with a template stating what has happened, at least for a few days. violet/riga (t) 18:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

This narrow view (only articles that are "unsourced and disparaging" may be deleted citing BLP) is the heart of the matter. I foresee a number of rapid desysoppings for whgeel-warring if proposed principles 2 and 3 pass. I do not favor this, and hope that editors and admins are flexible enough to adapt to the decision. Thatcher131 18:08, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

It is written very clearly in the policy. Sorry but this talk of "well we don't go by the letter" is rubbish and is really the cause of the problems. If people want to delete for other reasons then the policy must change to reflect that. violet/riga (t) 18:23, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I assume you are simply ignoring the written policy where the section Presumption in favor of privacy has contained the phrase "do no harm" for at least a year, and the clarification from Jimbo ("Real people are involved, and they can be hurt by your words. We are not tabloid journalism,") has also been around for more than a year. What I don't understand is why you choose to ignore this. Thatcher131 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Which applies to articles that are disparaging to people and I agree that they should be removed. Is it really hard for people to understand that I actually support the ethics behind BLP?! I just don't want people abusing it as a way of removing articles when it doesn't apply. violet/riga (t) 18:31, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Of course, you could skip the deletion/discussion/restoration cycle, and just have "BLP blankings". But the intervening discussion and disruption should help shock the more entrenched editors out of their failure to understand BLP. Carcharoth 17:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I can summarise BLP in eight words: We're not in Kansas any more, Toto. --Tony Sidaway 17:54, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

If this passes, it won't take that many. How about Any admin can delete whatever he likes? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:20, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Yep, how can you ever prove that an article is compliant with every aspect of the policy. Does reporting on a scandal complies with "an ethical responsibility" or "when in doubt, do no harm" (at first only intended for non-public figures, and only on June 1st changed to include all BLP's [3], change by Tony Sidaway)? How can you prove that it does? Are we sure that it does no harm to mention the O. J. Simpson murder trial in the opening paragraph of his article, instead of focusing on his sporting and acting career? It was already in the very first version[4], so if I delete this article now, under the ArbCom proposition, it can't be recreated until you demonstrate that it does no harm. Or Robert Mugabe, who has been accused of corruption from the very first version[5] until the current one. Never mind that it is true: is it ethical, doesn't it harm him to be portrayed here in such a way, don't we even have the "legal responsibility" to leave out such allegations against a foreign head of state? So thanks to this proposed Arbcom decision, I can delete this article and it will be pretty hard to recreate it. This will make a mockery of Wikipedia, and will indeed give any admin the chance to delete whatever he likes. Please, I urge the arbitrators to reconsider this proposed principle and to either reject it or to completely rewrite it to make clear that it is only intended for e.g. people who have no active part in their notability (victims) or whose sole notability is based on one minor episode. The way it is written now is way too extreme and will lead to many new problems between admins, I fear. Fram 20:18, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Or perhaps, "Adminship is, as of now, a big deal?" MastCell ^Talk 20:18, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Comments from the audience - I hope this comes out okay

I’m not a contributor to Wikpedia, I’m an occasional user of the encyclopedia who’s managed to stumble into this section and get drawn in by the drama (yeah, I know exactly what you don’t want people to be drawn to Wikipedia for). But now I’m here I’d just like to add a couple of comments because I can’t believe what I’m seeing here.

Problem in a nut shell : Your policy doesn’t say what a bunch of you, including arbitrators, would like it to say.

Maybe you honestly can’t see how the policy could be read any way other way than to say what you apparently think it says. But you’ve got this wonderful “assume good faith” principle you’re all supposedly following and you’ve got apparently serious contributors (not just one) telling you that it really doesn’t read that way to them. It really isn’t that difficult to see where the problem is here.

All you have to so is 1. Change your policy to say what you actually think it should say (discuss the wording with the people who don’t think it does say that now) 2. enjoin BadlyDrawnJeff to follow the new policy or make it clear he’ll be on a fast track to <whatever> if he doesn’t. Maybe he’ll leave because he hates the newly explicit policy so much (or because he’s had enough of the process that’s led here) or maybe he’ll stick around and accept it or maybe he’ll break it and get banned but either way you’ll be acting constructively and reasonably and giving him a chance to do the same,

And whatever else you do don’t try to combine prescriptions like “The burden of proof is on those who wish to retain the article to demonstrate that it is compliant with every aspect of the policy” with vague “policy isn’t prescriptive” stuff that basically amounts to “you must prove it is compliant with the policies, but you can’t know what the policies are until later”. If you’re serious in wanting to apply ethical standards then one group you’re going to need to treat ethically are the people actually working on your project. That means fair-warning of what standards they'll be held to, for a start.

Yeah, I know, “Wikipedia isn’t an experiment in online legal systems” or something. How about adding “Wikipedia isn’t a novel by Kafka” to your list of stock phrases? Seriously, try to maintain some sort of balance or semblance of sanity or something.

Now if you’ll excuse me I’ll return to the audience.

Oh and I really should say thanks for the encyclopedia; I appreciate it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 87.254.65.67 (talk • contribs) 19:26, 18 June 2007.

A lot of sense is spoken here - it's the sensible route to take. Thanks for that contribution. violet/riga (t) 19:32, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Some sense needs to be added around here. When the audience are moved to comment, everyone needs to step back and look at the larger picture. Everyone. Carcharoth 22:50, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Remedy "Badlydrawnjeff banned from BLPs"

The remedy says, "badlydrawnjeff is banned from all articles covered by the policy". Every article is covered by this policy. Under WP:BLP, inappropriate statements about a living person can and should be removed from anywhere that they are found. The policy explicitly says all articles, project space, and talk space. So this remedy is effectively a ban from the project. I strongly encourage a rejection of the current language and that the language be revised to use the term "biographical articles and deletion discussions" and specifically state that he is permitted to suggest changes on talk pages. I further encourage that the ban be only for a predetermined period of time, rather than indefinite, or, at least, that it be explicitly stated that arbcom will entertain lifting the ban after some period of time, like six months or a year. --BigDT 20:33, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

It could be clearer, but bottom line, if he insists on adding negative information regarding a living person or engages in a dispute about it, he's breaking the ban. Fred Bauder 20:39, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I take it you mean unsourced and NPOV-violating negative information there. violet/riga (t) 20:46, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Regarding duration, what evidence do you have that he would change over a shorter period. His attitude is stable and unresponsive to feedback. Fred Bauder 20:41, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Because I've done nothing wrong, Fred. I'm very responsive to feedback when the feedback's legitimate. Do you think you're proving anything about me here? The point of all this was obviously to get me off the project, and it succeeded. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:45, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

This is the key. By now, Jeff has had legitimate feedback from almost every single editor who routinely handles complaints from members of the public. In my experience he regards none of our comments as in any way legitimate, and he repeatedly refers to us as liars simply for disagreeing with his interpretation. Only his own reading of policy dictates what is and is not legitimate. That reading, to my knowledge, is held not by Jimbo, not by any arbitrator who has commented in this case, and not by any of us who have been vilified in the event leading to this case. --Tony Sidaway 20:56, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The fact that they let you anywhere near OTRS is one of the reasons I'm gone, Tony. I have received no legitimate feedback regarding this issue, just a lot of disruption, condescension, and hatred. No one should have to put up with that, and no one should be penalized for daring to speak up. --badlydrawnjeff talk 21:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The feedback has been extensive, you have just chosen to ignore it. How many different ways do you need to read it before you get it? However, you are right, I think a BLP ban on you is a bad idea. I see you as disruptive to deletions and deletion reviews, some of which just happen to be regarding BLP issues.--MONGO 21:13, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Feedback can be extensive and worthless, like much of the crap I put up with here, including your BS about my alleged disruptiveness. --badlydrawnjeff talk 21:23, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Sorry you feel that way. If I had been on arbcom, the remedy for you would have been to ban you from deletions and deletion reviews completely for one year. I definitely feel that would have enticed you to resume creating articles, lowered yours and others blood pressure levels and made deletions and DRV's less of a battleground. I do not concur with the BLP ban that is now likely to be passed. Best wishes.--MONGO 21:46, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

And you'd be just as wrong. --badlydrawnjeff talk 22:09, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

It needs to be a lot clearer. Right now, there are featured article's I've written that I can't edit because I might fall afoul of this absurdity. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:45, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Fred, if that's what you think it means, then why don't you modify the language to say that. As it is now, he can't edit articles about people, which is a lot of what Jeff does.--Chaser - T 20:43, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't, actually. Most of my editing was in articles that were about things, but people are involved with things, and I'm not allowed anymore. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:45, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Fred, thanks for replying so quickly. There are several issues here. First and foremost is that right now, the language says, "all articles covered by the policy". The policy explicitly says that means "all articles". If you mean that he is banned from "editing controversial information about living people", then that's what the ruling should say ... because right now it doesn't mean that. --BigDT 20:48, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

It was my intent, at least, to use "all articles covered by the policy" to mean all articles containing BLP material, not all articles that could potentially contain BLP material. As far as I'm concerned, badlydrawnjeff is perfectly welcome to write about rocks, or butterflies, or ancient Romans; it's only the BLP stuff that he can't touch. Kirill Lokshin 21:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

So you mean any articles that contain anything related to a person? Thereby including the discovery of certain types of rock by John McJohn, the eponymously-named butterfly Butteri McJohneri, and the mention of Julius Caesar (who's ancestors may be offended). Yes I know I'm being flippant here, but I find it very difficult to see how this can be properly implemented. violet/riga (t) 21:36, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I think you mean descendants, not ancestors - I doubt Caesar's ancestors care one way or the other. Even if Jeff is editing an article on, say, George W Bush, I don't think there is an issue - this is a solution looking for a problem. Jeff has edited articles about plenty of living people and done a fine job. The problem isn't with an article on George W Bush - the problem is with the article about Alphonzo Bush, who is the nephew of the guy who makes Bush's Baked Beans (no, not really). Alphonzo is not a public person and we need to respect his privacy. I don't see any evidence that would suggest that a ban on Jeff editing George W Bush is warranted. I don't even know that a ban on Jeff editing Alphonzo Bush is warranted. What probably is warranted is a ban on deletion discussions pertaining to Alphonzo Bush - that is the only place that I can see that the evidence shows an issue to be resolved. --BigDT 21:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I... Yeah that'll be what I meant! Ta. violet/riga (t) 21:54, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"So you mean any articles that contain anything related to a person?" — What? Where did you get that idea? BLP stands for biographies of living people. We don't have quite the same ethical issues with biographies of dead people, and this motion wouldn't prevent Jeff from editing those articles. --Cyde Weys 01:50, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Re-read the policy. The policy applies to all articles, even if the main topic is not about a living person. In other words, if the article is about Greek mythology, it is possible that the article might mention a book that a now-living person wrote on the subject. It might mention an archaeological dig that a now-living person performed. Whatever the topic is, articles about topics other than living people still mention living people. If an article on Greek mythology claims, for instance, that researcher John Doe falsified his study of Zeus and that claim is uncited, we would not hesitate to remove it. The BLP policy applies to every page on Wikipedia ... this really isn't in dispute. As the text of the remedy reads right now, it says "all articles covered by the policy" (bad), rather than "all articles about living people" (not as bad). --BigDT 05:19, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

That's exactly why I am saying that it should be renamed Wikipedia:Biographical content. violet/riga (t) 07:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

No, not every article is covered by that block. Freeze-dried ice cream comes to mind, as does Bluegill, and possibly Geography of Namibia. Plenty of articles for anyone falling under the block on this decision to still edit. But this is seriously one of the reasons that I try to stay the heck away from editing any mainspace article that has anything but a passing mention of a living person in it. And why WP has fallen a few notches in my mind to find information about living people. I can understand the importance of BLP, and why information about living persons needs to be treated somewhat delicately. But decisions like this may well have a chilling effect on persons trying to improve articles that have any living person mentioned in them. I hope that has been taken into consideration, and I hope that badlydrawnjeff may find other articles to edit (if he stays.) Edit to add signature: LaughingVulcan 05:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I feel the same way. I'd like to bring Greater Vancouver Gateway Program to Featured Article status, but I had to think twice about it because I might have to make the Minister of Transportation look bad. I'm not being facetious. This is how chilling effects work. Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 06:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

The "BDJ banned from the project" message might not come across so strongly if ArbCom passed the proposed principle that BLP does not apply to dead people. Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 07:09, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Leave it be, people

ArbCom wants me permanently banned, and I decided long before this complete absurdity that I wasn't going edit here anymore. Means to an end. The cabal wins. Good luck. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:45, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I do not want you permanently banned. You are a good editor most of the time. You are spun up over this issue and need to rethink your approach to discussing BLP policy and deletion. Banning you from editing articles about living people should absolutely a last resort, I think. Hopefully you can calm down and reassure ArbCom that you will work collaboratively FloNight 21:06, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Jeff, I truly don't understand your attitude that Wikipedia isn't worth contributing to if we decide to take some reasonable steps to consider the impact of what we do on living people. We are arguing here about a tiny portion of our content, and even if you truly believed that it should be present here, it's absence doesn't invalidate everything else. If your boss at work doesn't buy a book you recommended for the collection, you don't quit your job, nor do you burn down the library.

I also wish that you wouldn't imply that everyone who approached these issues has done so as part of a cabal or in an antagonistic fashion. Some of us, who are slow to use harsh language or push our admin buttons, have been agonizing over these issues for a very long time.

But I'm not going to argue if you've really decided to leave. Be well. Newyorkbrad 21:11, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Reasonable steps are fine. This is not reasonable. Be well as well, NYB, you're one of the good ones. --badlydrawnjeff talk 21:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

FloNight, I need to do nothing of the sort. I've never had an issue once and I would never have an issue in the future, and those paying attention know this. This sort of nonsense was concocted from nothing, and ArbCom has appeared to have taken the bait. If it's a last resort as you say, then I expect to see changes here, if anything, to keep what's left of the reputation the most vile of the group has sullied. --badlydrawnjeff talk 21:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

If you're going to leave, please try to do it without spewing (more) insults on your way out the door. Thanks. Nandesuka 21:31, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Why? I'm not afforded the same courtesy, after all. --badlydrawnjeff talk 22:07, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Because it's the ethical thing to do. Hope that helps. Nandesuka 22:29, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Utterly laughable, as if you or anyone else in this charade has any moral standing. --badlydrawnjeff talk 22:30, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

(ec; to NYB) I understand Jeff; I'm tempted to join him. The proposed decision is an imposition of policy by ArbCom; a policy more extreme than the one Tony added to BLP in order to jusitify his actions. Its effect would be to permit arbitrary deletions of any article about the last half-century by solitary admins, reviewable only by admins - and by them with difficulty, given the language of the censures of VioletRiga. It would silence Jeff from making a case against applications of this policy, to the point of prohibiting him from editing the articles themselves.

Now, Jeff can be annoying; I've felt tempted to tell him "Shut up; you;ve made your point already." when I agreed with him. But the proposed decision is bad policy, imposed when there is no consensus, by people not authorized to do so. It will encourage the worst and most overbearing admins. I supported most of the present ArbCom; I will have to consider whether I regret doing so. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:31, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Does Jeff remind anyone of Karmafist? Just a little bit? --Cyde Weys 01:51, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

No. Newyorkbrad 01:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Nice try Cyde. I just moved here in April. Curious you'd bring that up... --badlydrawnjeff talk 01:57, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm not accusing you of being Karmafist, merely saying that your persistent claims that you are always right (and anyone who disagrees with you is wrong, vile, and evil) remind me of him. --Cyde Weys 02:01, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, certainly just some wild coincidence. --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:01, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Alternative remedy

I've proposed an alternative remedy to that proposed by Kirill. Because I'm not an arbitrator it's on the workshop page. Comment welcome on that page. --Tony Sidaway 21:42, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Badlydrawnjeff banned from BLPs

This is absolutely ridiculous. Consensus means that everybody has discussed it and most agreed upon a solution. If there's consensus for a policy, that does not mean we should ban people who disagree with that policy from going anywhere near it! It means we should note their concerns in discussions, preferably by having them comment themselves, and then, if most other people disagree with them, as should happen in most cases if the policy actually had consensus, the discussion is closed with a result that goes along with the policy. If necessary, ban BDJ from violating BLP, but don't ban him from articles that are covered by it if he's not going to break the policy, and don't ban him from discussions, because that completely goes against everything Wikipedia stands for regarding consensus. --Rory096 21:12, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Banning for arguing, not acting?

The justification for the ban is "Because of his rejection of the fundamental ethical principles that underlie the BLP policy". The evidence for that is the statement "We should discard ethics..." How is merely arguing that we should do something ban-worthy? If I argue an unpopular position, am I suddenly subject to being banned? Surely that takes action, not just argument.

Note that other people have made similar or more harsh arguments on this very issue. For example, User:Walton monarchist89 (recently made an admin) in Wikipedia_talk:Biographies_of_living_persons/Archive_8: "it's not our problem whether this person's life deteriorates as a result of their Wikipedia article, as long as they don't have grounds for legal action. Wikipedia isn't here to be nice to people." That seems to be at least an equal rejection, in fact it's a stronger one, Jeff is merely writing "we should...", Walton is writing in the present tense.

There isn't evidence showing that Jeff is an unrepentant edit warrior. He is merely a vocal proponent of how we should write articles. Same for Walton, by the way. Surely that isn't something either of them should be banned for. --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 21:20, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

He's not just a vocal opponent. He has acted to sabotage the policy by personal attacks, assumptions of bad faith, and provocative article edits. --Tony Sidaway 21:44, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm, that sounds familiar for some reason Tony. --MichaelLinnear 21:59, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm not trying to defend him here but other people on the opposite side of the argument have done the same thing. I hope that they will feature on this page too. violet/riga (t) 21:47, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

If civility is the issue (which I agree it is an issue), how is banning him from editing articles addressing that issue? It seems to me that an article ban (as opposed to a deletion discussion ban) is strictly punative. --BigDT 21:53, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Bullshit, Tony. --badlydrawnjeff talk 22:08, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Summary deletion of BLPs

"This deletion may be contested via the usual means;" The usual means in this case would require you to prove that the admin is acting in bad faith since it would be the only situation where a deletion would not be legit under that type of policy. Aditionaly the second part of the sentance contradicts the first (waiting a few months then trying again is "usual means").Geni 22:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

No, you only have to show that an assessment of the article as irretrievably compromised would be incorrect. Some of the early principles on the workshop, many of them proposed by arbitrators, illustrate this, particularly the idea of there being "no rush to undelete". An admin may in this way of thinking use deletion as a precaution to avoid seemingly irretrievably damaging material being published on this top ten website. Alternatives can be discussed without publishing the material. --Tony Sidaway 22:40, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

nope read what is there "if they believe that it (and every previous version of it) significantly violates any aspect of the relevant policy" you would have to prove that the admin does not in fact belive that.Geni 22:43, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

You have misread the proposed principle. It says that the admin may perform the deletion under these conditions. It also explicitly states that the deletion may then be contested "via usual means". It also says "The burden of proof is on those who wish to retain the article to demonstrate that it is compliant with every aspect of the policy." Nothing about proving that the deleting administrator was being dishonest, just that his belief was incorrect. --Tony Sidaway 22:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

you are failing to think about how this meshes into other policy. "via usual means" is pretty much talking about DRV. DRV is about process not content and unless the admin is acting in bad faith they have followed process.Geni 22:56, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

An example of how imposing stuff from the top-down conflicts with organic policy grown from actual practice. Why not deal with BLP issues in exactly the same way as we deal with copyvios. See Template:Copyvio for a nice example of a template that will make editors sit up and take notice. Carcharoth 23:12, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Anybody who thinks deletion review is about piddling process hasn't been keeping up. It's about policy and product. --Tony Sidaway 23:22, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

anyone who thinks it should be about anything else has an irrational fear of xfd.Geni 23:25, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Re Geni's earlier comments: remember that DRV only requires one to demonstrate that the closer was mistaken in his belief that there was consensus in one direction, not that he closed it maliciously; similarly, this remedy would presumably only require one to show at DRV that the deleting admin was mistaken in his belief that the article was a BLP violation. David Mestel^(Talk) 15:54, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

DRV is also about whether all necessary facts were available at the time of the AfD. Sometimes AfD closures are overturned because all participants in the AfD were unaware of the presence of certain sources which didn't appear in Google, or the person's name was misspelled, etc. An overturned AfD closure is not necessarily a criticism of the closing admin. Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 16:48, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

BLP blanking

Some of the discussion and suggestions here are getting lost in the noise. I am going to try and present another bullet-pointed step-by-step suggestion for a process that could avoid the chaos that may ensue if some admins feel they can delete anything based on their interpretation of policy (and there will be some admins that go too far, and arbcom will have to deal with the fall-out from that as well):

• Institute a process for courtesy blanking of article with BLP concerns. (This is similar to the courtesy blanking of certain AfD discussions.)
• Allow any editor (not just admins) to blank an article and put a BLP template on it the article (similar to how suspected copyvios are treated) and for the editor to request that the article be protected in that state.
• Start the normal discussion somewhere, where both admins and non-admins can participate (unlike when deletion occurs, which restricts meaningful participation to admins), with reference to versions in the page history.
• Once consensus is reached (or not), on whether an article should exist, and what the merits or not are of the blanked version, then proceed to either deletion or restoration and heavy pruning. If no consensus, then the default (unlike normal AfD discussions) should be deletion.
• Allow DRV as normal.

How does that sound? Please try and avoid dragging discussion off on a tangent and discussing your personal wiki-philosophy, as happened in the other section I posted here. This is a clear way to move forward on the issues. Please comment on the details I've provided above. Thanks. Carcharoth 22:35, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Discussion

Add discussion here. Carcharoth 22:35, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Blanking, or (my preference) quick editing by a small focused team, sometimes works, but some articles have to be taken out of circulation at once while we decide what to do with them. Both methods are useful. Blanking, less so. If you think the article is sick, mend it. --Tony Sidaway 22:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

So what happens when admins get lazy and delete articles instead of taking the time to mend them? Where do you draw the lines between immediate deletion, blanking, or mending? Oh faff. No wiki-philosophy I said. :-) Let's stick to technical details. (1) Why precisely is blanking more or less "taking it out of circulation" than deletion? For something that has made it to the mirrors, deletion is no more efficient at removing stuff from circulation. I've been following something on the mirrors that was deleted over two weeks ago. It is still there. Blanking at least extends the courtesy to non-admins that they are welcome to review the article's content and participate in the discussion. (2) For stuff that hasn't made it to the mirrors or caches yet, I believe blanking will ensure that only the blanked template warning will go up if the updates happen while discussion is in progress (and that will only lead people to a disucssion, that should equally be courtesy blanked when it is over, similar to how DRVs are hidden at the moment). (3) If you are worried about people linking to earlier versions in the page history, well, there is a clear notice warning people that they are looking at an archived version, which may differ significantly from the current version, and directing them to the current version. In any case, sites that link to archived versions will likely already have made their own copy of the article. (4) Really serious issues could obviously still be dealt with as speedies or via oversight. (5) This is exactly the same system that is used for copyvios. It works there. Why can't it work for BLP issues? Carcharoth 23:07, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Side discussion about mirrors and stuff

I think we're in basic agreement here, though obviously deletion is often best. As an example I'd give trash like the Crystal Gail Mangum article.

On mirrors, those are not our concern. We cannot call back what we have already published. --Tony Sidaway 23:19, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Practically, you are right about mirrors, but ethically, hmm, I wonder. As ethics is driving a lot of this, why not try and enforce, or propose to enforce, a more ethical stance with respects to mirrors? Legally, as we've released stuff to them, it may not be possible. But ethically, well, that is another matter. Surely restricting ethics to only Wikipedia content, and not downstream content, is, well, to put it bluntly, hypocritical? It seems very similar to the stance that if we ensure we only repeat what "reliable" newspapers say, we don't need to care about the effects on living people. It is the fault of the newspapers, not us. Similarly, you would be saying, it is for the mirrors to worry about, not us. Does that make sense? Essentially, the ethics of closing the barn door after the horse has bolted, rather than closing the barn door before the horse enters the stable. Carcharoth 23:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm not ruling out doing something about mirrors at some point, just saying that it isn't the problem before us. What may appear to you as hypocrisy , I see as maintaining focus on developing the ethical policy wiki-wide. We should not let worries about the mirrors stop us from doing the right thing on the wiki. --Tony Sidaway 23:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

OK. Cool. Forgive me if I close this with an exhortation for anyone who has read this far to not get distracted, but to comment on the courtesy blanking proposal this section should be about. :-) I noted Casey Abell's edit summary "Carcharoth's proposals are better but they won't get enacted", though of necessity I must take a more optimistic view than that! Carcharoth 23:46, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Some common sense from the audience

Also, please don't lose sight of what was said by a member of the audience here. Everyone needs to step back and look at the wider picture. Everyone. Carcharoth 22:53, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The readers of the encyclopedia are not the most important part of this picture. There are living subjects. --Tony Sidaway 23:20, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree. The bit I was referring to is: "If you’re serious in wanting to apply ethical standards then one group you’re going to need to treat ethically are the people actually working on your project. That means fair-warning of what standards they'll be held to, for a start." - now, the fair-warning bit is off-beam, as the warnings have been around for at least a year. But I agree with the bit about how the right way to do this would have been to change policy properly, not through a battle involving numerous AfDs, DRVs and ArbCom cases. A sane, sensible discussion. Then moving forward. There will be many admins, unaware of all this, who will undelete articles and then unwittingly find themselves up for desysopping in front of ArbCom. At the very least, a widely advertised community notice is needed to make sure no reasonably active editor and admin remains unaware of this. Carcharoth 23:34, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Sane, sensible discussion has been difficult while reasonable, sensible moves have excited such controversy. That's really been because of a fundamental disagreement about what this project is for. Well, time to reassert the basic principles.

Above all, this is a working project. Things have to be taken out of sight sometimes, before any discussion is held, and sometimes it is even damaging to hold any discussion at all. This is the way it is. Wikipedia administrators are expected to keep themselves acquainted with policy and honest errors aren't penalized. No sanctions have been proposed (yet, at least) upon those administrators who really should have known better. --Tony Sidaway 00:04, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

One of the problems is that there is serious disagreement about what "reasonable sensible moves" are. Some people have changed policy in the last month to make it similar to what they feel is sensible and reasonable, and then try to impose this "policy" on all other editors and admins, as if such policy is written in stone and can not be changed. This is not the way to keep this a "working project" at all. We are here to cooperate, both in editing and administrating as in creating and adapting policy. No one disagrees (or so I hope) that the old version of the BLP policy (old meaning, up to May 2007) should be followed. Basically, articles about LPs should be sourced (all articles should be sourced, but for contentious material in a BLP, a "fact" tag is not sufficient, the material has to be deleted on sight and only replaced when sources are available), and articles about non-public figures, certainly those who have been the victim (be it of crimes or of youtube videos), should be handled extra carefully and can in many cases better be deleted or renamed so that the personal life of the person doesn't suffer. No problem there. However, they way this is implemented (with a lot of "we are the sensible, ethical people, and we know better" attitude), the way the policy has been rewritten recently (e.g. the move of "do no harm" from non-public figures to all persons, meaning that we can't technically write anything harmful about politicians or criminals either, even if sourced), and the way that ArbCom is proposing that deleters will get a free-for-all, while those wanting to keep or restore an article will have to jump through near-impossible hoops, is clearly not supported by a large group of editors and admins (no idea if it is a large minority or a majority, it is not a vote anyway). To imply that all these people are (in these cases) not "reasonable and sensible" and "should know better" is really not helping either the discussion or the project and only works to antagonise people, something which this whole BLP fiasco has already done more than enough.

Please, everyone, don't rush to make proposed principles, policies, ...: think about this, try to understand the position of the others, and don't ridicule the opinion of other editors. It is clear that opinions are divided and that there isn't one option that is clearly the better or the generally supported one. We need a BLP policy and we need to enforce it, but there are different ways to do so, and the one currently advocated by some people (including, apparently, the ArbCom) is unnecessary strict and harsh. Fram 07:39, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

The most important question still has not been answered...

Should the articles under dispute, such as QZ, stay deleted, or be undeleted? Maybe ArbCom could start a page where a discussion like AFD/DRV will take place, except that instead of an admin, ArbCom will close it. --Kaypoh 23:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Um. No. They stay deleted. A lot of articles will probably follow them. That's my guess of what will happen. I think using blanking will reduce the drama, but the ArbCom seem set on their course. Carcharoth 23:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

They're dead, Jim. --Tony Sidaway 23:57, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I mean, ArbCom should make a decision on whether the articles will be deleted or kept. If not, we may be back here again. --Kaypoh 23:59, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

The community decided. They're dead and buried. --Tony Sidaway 00:06, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Is this what it's come to?

Did I read this correctly, or are my eyes deceiving me:

Because of his rejection of the fundamental ethical principles that underlie the BLP policy, badlydrawnjeff is banned from all articles covered by the policy, as well as any associated discussions. (emphasis mine)

Are we really suggesting banning someone from discussing articles? Even IP vandals don't get that kind of treatment!

And they wonder why people say there's a cabal... ATren 00:17, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia isnt and hasn't ever been a free speech zone. --Tony Sidaway 00:33, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Disruptive people have always been prevented from disrupting. This is nothing new. ^(H) 00:35, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I've seen IP vandals post disgusting, vile stuff on living persons articles - for which they get warnings and an occasional temporary block. After the block expires, they invariably resume the same destructive behavior, adding stuff that has the potential to be much more damaging than anything Jeff has done. I cannot reconcile how passionate, good-faith disagreement on non-article pages gets an indefinite ban, while repeated outright destructive behavior to the articles themselves rarely gets more than a slap on the wrist. ATren 01:33, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with your claim that repeatedly abusive anonymous users get a slap on the wrist. I'm always very harsh on them, much more so than established users. --Cyde Weys 01:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I think this remedy definitely needs a rewrite. The problem is Jeff's incivil comments during deletion discussions. Jeff has never, to my knowledge, abused his editing privileges in an article. I don't see any reason to ban him from all BLP articles and certainly not the current language - all articles where BLP applies, because that's every article. The remedy needs to address the issue. The issue is incivility in deletion discussions, so the remedy needs to relate to that. Banning him from all BLP articles is punative. --BigDT 02:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

• I note that several of the arbiters have admitted that the remedy is badly written. That strikes me as a good reason to change it. The issue at hand isn't BDJ's editing of articles; he has written way more featured articles than most of the other people involved here. The issue is deletion discussions. It is therefore rather odd to have a remedy about editing articles. >Radiant< 08:40, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
  • I agree. Unfortunately, one of the voting arbitrators has gone on an indefinite wikibreak (Flonight), which is rather inconvenient (or convenient, whichever way you look at it). I would much prefer that arbitrators are available until the end of a case. Anyway, Morven has opposed the remedy against Jeff, so hopefully that might swing the tide of opinion. Carcharoth 10:28, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

General Protest

It looks as if ArbCom is about to pass this horrible set of decisions and the community may not be able to do much about it. So I guess this is a protest vote. Reading the proposed decision page is making me feel ill. How long will it be until an admin speedies Robert Pickton and others have to prove that the article (which they can no longer see) complies with BLP? How long will it be until Michael D. Brown is rewritten to be more favourable to its subject, in order to make it less likely to be deleted and its editors less likely to be banned? This is a sad day for the credibility of Wikipedia. Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 02:47, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

What do any of the proposed decisions change? An admin has the technical ability to speedy any article right now and the text is, for the moment, unavailable for review. In borderline cases (ie, not a blatant attack page), you can always get someone to restore the article text behind a SALT message or email you the text for review. I don't see what is changed here. I think there's a horrible problem with the remedy on Jeff, but the principles on BLPs look fine. --BigDT 02:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Proposed principle 4, "Summary deletion of BLPs," changes a lot of things. First, it shifts the consensus requirement from consensus required to delete to consensus required to keep. Furthermore, the "burden of proof" part essentially excuses the deleting admin from having to present any reason to delete other than "I think it violates BLP." Instead, people in favour of keeping will have to demonstrate that the deleted article meets BLP. I don't even know what this kind of demonstration would even look like, as BLP is essentially defined as a set of requirements for what an article should not contain. People trying to argue in favour of keeping will, of course, also have to do so under the Monty Python-esque handicap of not being able to repeat alleged BLP violations, even if necessary to make the argument that they are not BLP violations. The community has repeatedly rejected proposals to modify the deletion methods for biographies which were substantially similar to proposed principle 4, such as Wikipedia:BLP courtesy deletion. I read the principle to mean that undeleting means undeleting; if it's OK to undelete history behind a template:Delrev screen, then the proposed principle should be clarified. Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 07:00, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Instead of courtesy BLP deletion, I have proposed courtesy BLP blanking (see above). Instead of the article, people would see something similar to the DRV notice, directing them to the deletion discussion, but because the history is present, they would be able to review the disputed version of the article. I fail to see why this is not acceptable. Several people I have spoken to on talk pages, including one of the arbitrators, have pointed out problems with blanking, but some have agreed that it could work. Look at the process used for suspected copyvios, which use {{copyvio}}. The presumption that a disucssion is needed is still there, but the offending text is replaced by a notice until the discussion is concluded. Deletion sends a strong message and prejudices the discussion, in my opinion. Carcharoth 10:20, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I would like to join the "protest" not because I disagree with the intepretation of WP:BLP but because this outcome appears to completely ignore the fact that a) Jeff was heavily provoked by statements like fuck off and inappropriate blocks and b) it completely ignores the wheelwarring at deletion review and AfD. Yes, admins may speedy articles found to violate WP:BLP but at no point does WP:BLP allow the same admins to speedy close AfD's and deletion reviews. On the contrary, WP:BLP specifically states that such speedy deletions may be contested through the regular channels. This outcome is far more than simply a ban on editing BLP's and cations not to revert BLP deletions. It is an endorsement by ArbCom of the kind of behaviour that provoked Jeff to make uncivil remarks. If ArbCom is unable to realize this then the project is indeed in big big trouble. MartinDK 10:09, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

• OK folks, it was fun while it lasted. Take care and good luck. Stammer 10:29, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Much more effective than a protest vote would be to actually come up with an alternative process, such as BLP blanking using a template like {{copyvio}}, see which process the community supports and which generates less drama, and go with the better process. Also, the community could instigate an oversight process to list all articles deleted by "BLP deletion", and to keep track of how successful this turns out to be in practice, and which way the wind is blowing. One big problem will be people innocently recreating the articles, which may lead to a big rise in salted titles. There is a process to keep track of PRODs, a process to keep track of AfDs, but speedies are less easy to track. I suspect that if this works, BLP deletion will be added to the criteria for speedy deletion, and non-admins will be able to add speedy tags for admins to review. Is there any way to get a feed from the deletion log and analyse the edit summaries to see how many have "BLP" (or something similar) in the edit summaries? Carcharoth 10:37, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Use a similar system to copyvio process?

Have a look at {{copyvio}}, which would put most editors off edit-warring if that was placed on an article. It also says: Do not edit this page until an administrator has resolved this issue. Is this not a sensible way to deal with BLP issues rather than deletion? Carcharoth 10:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Another solution would be to use WP:OFFICE which sends a strong and clear message to both editors as well as admins that the article in question should not be touched until someone who actually knows what they are doing have looked into the issue and made a binding non-disputable decision. MartinDK 10:31, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Yep - that's what I've been saying for ages, but a certain section of admins simply refuse to even acknowledge the comments. violet/riga (t) 10:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Actually not all OTRS volunteers are part of the Office. I think there's nothing wrong per se with deleting apparent BLP violations and discussing them on DRV if contested. All admins can look at the deleted revisions at need, and if a deletion turns out to be spurious, it will be objected to. >Radiant< 10:55, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

How many active admins look at all DRVs? I feel that this makes adminship too big a deal. Blanking would allow non-admins to understand what was being discussed in cases where there was no Google cache or mirror copy yet. Otherwise you will get people writing stubs and pasting them into the DRV to ask admins to compare the stub to the deleted article. Carcharoth 11:03, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Then I would suggest that the community encourages Jimbo to grant a group of people/admins the right to make non-disputable decisions regarding BLP's. Wikipedia is not an experiment in online democracy and this case clearly shows why. As long as policy allows people to contest such deletions then naturally they will choose to do so in good faith. This outcome does not solve the issue at all since it doesn't deal with the bureaucracy and incivility that follows from it. MartinDK 11:12, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Why not just revive a revised version of: Wikipedia:BLP Admin? None of these ideas are new, not mine, not yours. But it seems that one option has been chosen, and this option is being implemented by fiat without sufficient discussion of the alternatives. Carcharoth 11:16, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

One of the things that Wikipedia does so well is discuss and analyze every aspect of the project. That is a good thing. However, what this dispute has shown is that at times process fails. Dispute resolution failed too. Excellent editors like Jeff and excellent admins are drawn into disputes with each other that cannot be solved through process. This hurts the peoiple involved as well as the project. To avoid this we need a way to end these disputes once and for all. Your idea could work too, especially if there was a limit to how many times a BLP could be sent to DRV. Whatever solution gains community support is not important, what matters is that the solution puts an end to the bureaucracy that caused all the incivility on both sides. MartinDK 11:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Another concern is there will often be relevant discussion on the article's talk page. Some will itself fall foul of BLP concerns, but some of it will be relevant deletion discussion. I have little hope that deleting admins will make the effort to preserve relevant discussion or copy it to the DRV. Again, blanking resolves all these concerns, and if the result is delete, then it all goes anyway. Blanking also avoids harm to the BLP subject. As far as I am concerned, it is a win-win situation, whereas deletion will drive a wedge between admins and the editors who don't understand why they can't see the article that is being discussed. Carcharoth 11:07, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Completely, totally ridiculous

So far, the decision has realised all my worst fears. The arbitrators seem to have completely endorsed the idea of arbitrary out-of-process deletions, and are "cautioning" the admins who correctly reversed such inappropriate deletions. They're effectively putting a gag order on Jeff (pointless, since he's left anyway) - preventing him from even discussing BLP articles because he "rejects the ethical principles that underly the BLP policy". What??!! So ArbCom now has absolute power to decide what is ethical and what is not? Sadly, my faith in the ArbCom is destroyed. Saying "Wikipedia is not a democracy" ought not to be a mandate for authoritarianism. Like any other large community of human beings, Wikipedia needs to be governed by process and rules which allow everyone, regardless of their status, fair participation in the decision-making process. I think this is a sad day for Wikipedia. Walton^{alternate account} 11:13, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I could not agree more. This is persecution and a fucking disgrace. Evidence does not seem to matter in this case and the heretics with "wrong" ethical ideas must be burnt so that the "right" ideology can stay uncontested. So far, the ArbCom decision seems to aim at changing policy and supporting that when dealing with biographies of living persons, 1. abuse and misuse of admin tools and causing disruption is allowed, if it is done "per BLP", 2. obviously out-of-process deletions can not be quickly overturned in-process per the deletion policy, 3. any admin can claim ownership of an article by deleting it and then refusing to point out how it violates the relevant policy, 4. any admin can overturn a community decision such as the result of an AFD discussion, 5. consensus is not important, 6. reliable sources, notability and neutrality are not as important as "basic human dignity", 7. adminship is a big deal, 8. articles must be censored if the facts can be harmful to the subject ("victim"). This would be the end of a neutral encyclopedia and beginning of this project turning into a joke like the "trustworthy" Conservapedia. Prolog 14:27, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Amen. ATren 14:42, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Do no harm

Great - so it would seem that the red flag of WP:BLP is now a magic bullet in cases of dispute, which can be reinforced by the contentless mantra of "do no harm", and that disputed material has to be removed until "a decision to include it is reached" (by whom? how?). And, indeed, Violetriga is being "cautioned" for reverting deletions that are baldly claimed to be pursuant to WP:BLP without any supporting justification, because, we now find out, after the event, that the onus is on her to initiate such prior discussion.

Perhaps we need a page setting in more detail the ethical framework within which we are supposed to be operating. I'm sure it will not be too difficult to hammer out a shared system of ethical values among the billion or so people who speak English. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:57, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Interpreting this decision

This decision should be seen for what it is: a ringing endorsement of WP:BLP. ArbCom is making plain that WP:BLP is there for a reason, and will remain there for a reason. Those who persistently refuse to recognise the legal and ethical responsibilities that come with writing about living people will not be permitted to edit in relation to living people. Behind the grandiosity, the melodrama, the grandstanding and the martyrdom, badlydrawnjeff is simply a user who refuses to accept the letter or the spirit of WP:BLP. Wikipedia is an evolving project, and one of the directions in which it is evolving is toward greater awareness of the responsibilities that come with writing about living people. This decision does not at all change WP:BLP. What it does is make clear that the policy must be read carefully, taken seriously, and enforced. Those who cannot accept this would we well-advised to rethink their place in Wikipedia. BCST2001 12:17, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, the decision will give more strength to the arms of admins who take BLP seriously, and that's a good thing IMHO. Metamagician3000 12:29, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

This ignores those who take BLP seriously, but think there are less authoritarian ways of enforcing it. In a few months time, we will see how this turns out, I guess. Carcharoth 12:31, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps the Arbitration Committee will be so kind as to tell us whose ethics and moral systems we should be using to arbitrate BLPs. You know, so we don't get pagans blanking St. Patrick or Muslims blanking Mohammed for "undue weight" concerns. This decision is completely unbalanced and ill-considered, and I'm ashamed of the project's supposed Arbitrators for endorsing such a one-sided hatchet job. nae'blis 15:18, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Some years ago I was involved in many long policy discussions for non-profit groups. One comment that's stuck in my mind since then was, "Don't try to get everyone to agree on philosophy. Get consensus on policy. People who will never agree to the same philosophy will often find common ground on policy." We would be wise to take such a pragmatic approach here instead of trying to regualte how people think. Kla'quot (talk | contribs) 16:44, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

New remedies are insufficient

Flonight has added two new remedies concerning Badlydrawnjeff to the proposed decision. In contrast to the original remedy (complete ban from BLP articles and discussion), these new remedies are significantly more lenient and (IMO) barely address the problematic behavior.

1.1) Badlydrawnjeff is cautioned to adhere to the letter and spirit of the Biographies of living persons policy.

Maybe I'm just cynical, but I don't think a caution is going to affect Jeff's behavior. Jeff believes that he is adhering to the BLP policy, which is why this ended up at ArbCom.

1.2) Badlydrawnjeff may not initiate or reopen any deletion review concerning an article deleted for BLP reasons for three months.

This remedy at least recognizes that the problem isn't the editing of BLP articles, but Jeff's behavior in discussions concerning deletion. However, this behavior will only be affected minimally by restricting him from initiating DRVs. There's nothing in this remedy to restrict the disruption in DRVs opened by another editor.

It seems like we've seen "too harsh" and "too lenient", so hopefully "just right" will be coming along soon. Chaz ^Beckett 16:46, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

When we reach too leinient, let me know. I'm still being held accountable for something with no supporting evidence and no record to support it. --badlydrawnjeff talk 16:50, 19 June 2007 (UTC)