User talk:Tristessa de St Ange/Archive 7

Archived talk page messages: Archive Vol. I / Archive Vol. II / Archive Vol. III

Good To See You Back

Hey!! Good to see you back. Actually, things have been rather crazy for me so I haven't had much WP time let alone MedCab time, I would have no problems serving as Deputy Coordinator or Co-Coordinator or something if you wanted to step back in again. I'd be happy to mentor/help in any way I can through the tough times because I've had my share. My current wiki-break is totally RL induced but I'm reachable. Let me know. Also, I like your AdCab proposal as well, very cool. Will try to give some more feedback when I get a chance. --Wgfinley 05:06, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Persian people

I'm glad there is an advocate involved in this case. I'm the cabal mediator for this case. Unfortunately Zmmz is partly right: I haven't yet managed to do much that deserves the title mediation because people on the Talk:Persian_people page create a lot of noise.

That is unfortunately what most of it is: Noise. There are many links brought as evidence against User:Aucaman but many seem to point to arbitrary edits which provide no evidence whatsoever. This is not to say that there is no evidence of misconduct by Aucaman but the group to which Zmmz belongs seems to create an inadequate amount of complaints, see:

• Talk:Persian_people#Mediation
• Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#.5BUser:Aucaman.7C.5D
• Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User:Aucaman_and_User:Heja_helweda_and_User:Diyako
• Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Aucaman

I'll further check the provided references and try to mediate between the groups. The claim that the mediation process has failed is something I have to reject at this time. --Fasten ^talk/med 12:29, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Barnstar

Thank you so much! May I have your permission to reformat it to fit on my User page? :D RadioKirk talk to me 02:16, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh I am so sorry for the delay in responding; I missed that amongst the various other things on my talk page! Why of course, there's no need to ask. :-) All the best, --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 20:51, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

No problem, and, thanks again! RadioKirk talk to me 20:58, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Office Instructions

I would like to know how the OFFICE policy applies specifically to the Justin Berry article. It seems that anytime things are inserted into the article, even with citations, an admin invariably removes the inserted information, claiming that it is a violation of WP:OFFICE.

So, how exactly has the direct application of WP:OFFICE changed the guidelines for the creation of the Justin Berry article, and how do these guidelines differ from the normal guidelines regulating the content of an article? Are a certain number of citations needed? Are certain facts, no matter how verifiable, not to be allowed? Since you are one of the many administrators who have been reflexively clearing the article of what appear to be perfectly factual pieces of information, but who have not justified this removal besides making a vague allusion to WP:OFFICE, I think you owe not only me but every other user who has tried to reconstruct Justin Berry a clearly articulated, detailed answer. I will also be posting this to the talk page of the article, in the hopes that other admins engaged in the reverting will respond. Corax 02:33, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

I have unprotected Justin Berry. Semi-protection is not to be used to enforce content except in cases of vandalism. Feel free to fully protect it if the edit war warrants it. —Guanaco 02:44, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Blocking of User:Waya sahoni

I hope you are aware that Waya is currently a party to a request for arbitration. (I'm one of his targets.) At least one of the arbitrators has expressed a desire to hear the case. You might want to reconsider your block until the arbitration is over. (Not that I pretend to understand Wiki policy. I thought the account should have been blocked weeks ago.) — MediaMangler 04:51, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Please unblock Waya sahoni until the arbitration has concluded. --Bookofsecrets 05:31, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Please leave waya sahoni blocked until after the arbcom proceedings. Let arbcom deal with the WP:NLT, WP:NPA and WP:SOCK allegations before unleashing him on wikipedia again. [[1]] should be reason enough to leave the lid on. Vigilant 05:34, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Please, please, please leave the block in place! We can finally get some productive editing done without his constant disruption. If Arbcom decides it is best, they can let him back with appropriate restrictions. Lulu of the Lotus-Eaters 06:16, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• yada yada yada. --Bookofsecrets 06:37, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

• Minor FYI: the {sockpuppet} tag you used is missing any evidence. —Steve Summit (talk) 14:11, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I added an link to the CheckUser request as evidence. There are several alternative pages of evidence which could be used. — MediaMangler 15:46, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I have unblocked Waya sahoni so he can continue to contribute outside the Jeff Merkey pages and respond to allegations in his RFAr. —Guanaco 15:42, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

The RfAr can proceed with him blocked. All comments have been made in the dispute, and it's now up to the arbcom to decide on the facts. Unblocking this user is a huge mistake. He's made repeated legal threats on multiple users here, has on-going litigation on the wikimedia foundation, and has harassed me and other users, including Jimbo Wales. Unblocking this user so that he can continue his drama and tie up my time and time of other editors is a huge mistake, in my humble opinion. I hope that you reconsider. --BWD ^(talk) 16:55, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Waya is blocked. —Guanaco 19:10, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Jeff is now using another IP sockpuppet. [[2]] Vigilant 09:19, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Just for grins, I've been scanning the wikigadugi.org site. Here's a note from someone who professed *not* to be Jeff Merkey and professed to be living in Texas. Enjoy.

"== SQL Update ==

I have had to increase the mysql tables to 128 TB in MAX ROWS in order to import all of the images and page revisions. I had the server offline Sunday while the merge compeleted. I have it backup now. I have setup and tuned the DB parms to allow 500 MB key caching, so we now are equivalent to Wikipedia in terms of capacity. This setup will be moved to a facility with dual T3 lines later this month and ont a server with 4 x Xeon processors, which will speed things up even more. For now, I seem to be able to handle users and crawlers hitting the site. So its up. I am still downloading the images files, they are huge. Imports will run through the next several days. Waya sahoni 12:37, 27 March 2006 (MST)"

And we're back to the user named sockpuppets to avoid showing an hsd1.ut.comcast.net. [[3]] Another day, another sockpuppet. Vigilant 06:50, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

[[4]] Jeff needs a hobby that takes him out of doors. Vigilant 06:52, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

And another 67.182.238.38 (talk · contribs) Vigilant 19:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

afd closing

Thank you for closing that AfD early. I seriously was about to be bold and delete more than half of the anon-ip comments on there (and a couple of the registered users ones who would have been taken out of context by the deletion.) That article deletion was a disgrace to wikipedia, glad it's gone. ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 20:41, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Swatjester. Good move. Bucketsofg 21:00, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Just so you know, WP:DEL states, "Please do not remove any statements from a deletion discussion." :) --David.Mestel 21:53, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Premature closing of AfD?

Could you please explain your reasoning behind the premature closing of the AfD on Innatheism (please note that I was not the author of that article and am not acting on his behalf, but in the interests of fairness) - you gave the reason that it was "descending into a cesspool". This is in clear violation of WP:DEL, which states that the only reason for an early closing for an early closing is "clear consensus", which clearly did not exist (only 12-5), and that "Any substantial debate, regardless of how lopsided the keep/delete count may be, implies that an early closing would be a bad idea." Since I was engaged in a debate with another user (his reply to me was just one minute before you guillotined the debate), substantive debate was clearly occuring. I'm sure that you have a perfectly valid explanation for this, and I am curious to hear it. --David.Mestel 21:07, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

I have filed a Deletion Review - there's a principle at stake here. --David.Mestel 06:45, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Impressed

The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar To Nicholas Turnbull for explaining the facts of life to newbies with great patience and skill. Herostratus 09:05, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Hi Nicholas Turnbull. I was extremely impressed by your taking the time to write a lengthy and cogent response atUser talk:David.Mestel#Re: Innatheism deletion. Especially considering that the guy was being a bit provocative. I was so impressed that even though I don't much know your work otherwise, I am confidant that you deserve this. Herostratus 09:05, 20 March 2006 (UTC) }Thanks for you kind reply,and yes of course. Herostratus

Can I second that? Thanks Nicholas - although I didn't quite agree with some of the allegations of fact in your little guide, it was useful to learn that policies are really only more like guidelines. By the way, doesn't a barnstar count as a userbox? --David.Mestel 06:19, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

P.S. Provocative? Moi?

Biased deletion of userboxes

I don't know why you could possibly think it's any of your business to go and delete userboxes that you don't agree with for personal reasons. Please restore the feminist userboxes immediately, or at least explain why you have deleted them. Did a feminist piss you off once? Or do you just hate women? Regardless of the reason, there is no justification for thinking that it is your right to control what userboxes other individuals choose to use. I await your response, and the restoration of the userboxes that you have stolen. Romarin 17:07, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Romarin. I am myself a male supporter of feminism and have the corresponding userbox. Strangely enough (and fortunately) you did not think of deleting it. Please explain why you think that feminist is in any way a form of "discrimination on the basis of gender". That statement is most utterly flawed; the aim of feminism is to promote equality between sexes in a world that certainly needs it. It is in no way a discrimination against anyone. If you don't understand a movement that has proved its worth and has helped to shape our society then don't interfere with others' beliefs and userboxes. I see that you are very involved in Wikipedia and am sure that you will answer this without delay. --IronChris 17:18, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Dear Romarin: I am sorry that you disagree with my deletion of those userboxes. Wikipedia works on the principles of collaboration and discussion, and no deletions except for images are irreversible; I am always willing to reconsider and re-evaluate decisions that I make, especially where others have an interest in them. I am grateful for your feedback.

In response to the above, I would like to make it perfectly clear to you that I have no like or dislike of feminists as a consequence of their views - nor do I as a consequence of any other political methodology - and that I consider equality across gender to be of paramount importance in society. I have absolutely nothing against feminists as individuals, and most emphatically do not hold discriminatory views against women. I cannot stress that point to you enough. I would say that your ad hominem accusations that I had any personal agenda on the matter, or indeed that I hate women, are beyond the realms of acceptability on your part and are quite unjustified. Please assume good faith of other Wikipedia editors, especially where bad faith is not evident. I'd like you, if it may perhaps place your allegations of misogyny on my part at rest, to please check through my contributions and determine for yourself whether any discussion or other editorial participation that I have engaged in demonstrates evidence of such a charge. I am confident that this is not the case. I must also aver that Wikipedia editorial decision-making should never be taken as a basis on which to accuse someone of holding a particular viewpoint.

As a Wikipedia administrator, it is my duty to maintain an environment for the creation of articles that conform to the NPOV policy, and also to create an environment where editors are not personally discriminated against on the grounds of gender, beliefs or opinion. I consider that a userbox to advertise feminism has specific undesirable connotations in regard to the promotion of discrimination against Wikipedia users who are not female; in addition, the potential for the userboxes to be misused in POV bloc voting via the "What links here" button on the templates is too great to ignore. Feminism does not in my personal view have any place on Wikipedia, except in encyclopaedic articles describing the subject. Likewise I do not consider my personal views to have any bearing on the work that I do, and would never allow my own personal convictions to affect the way that I would either treat other users nor as to my level of conformance with Wikipedia policies. It gives the incorrect impression that the maintenance of discriminatory points of view is acceptable when editing Wikipedia to allow such templates to exist, which is not the case. As the founder of Wikipedia, User:Jimbo Wales, wrote:

"Userboxes of a political or, more broadly, polemical, nature are bad for the project. They are attractive to the wrong kinds of people, and they give visitors the wrong idea of what it means to be a Wikipedian."

On that basis I believe userbox templates that promote feminism would clearly fall under the CSD T1 criteria of being "divisive or inflammatory", and thus consider my action in deleting those userboxes to be perfectly justified for the good of the project. Regarding that you consider I have no justification to take the act of deleting userboxes into my own hands - as a Wikipedia administrator, I consider it to be my duty to keep levels of discrimination and POV bloc voting as low as possible, as I am entrusted with the maintenance of the good of the project by the community. I have "stolen" nothing; indeed, if a harsh description was necessary, "destroyed" would perhaps have been more apt. I do hope I have perhaps clarified my decision somewhat to you. Please do feel free to contact me on my talk page, or indeed via e-mail, should you have any further concerns. Best regards, --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 19:31, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your response, which is indeed elloquent. However, your agruments and reasonings do not seems to me to be entirely logical. First of all, if you are, as you state, against userboxes that promote POV, and not against feminism, then why pick on feminism alone? Why are the pacifist, environmentalist, and anti-racist userboxes still available? Why are political boxes and religious boxes still available? These topics are all just as subjective, and as potentially "divisive and inflammatory", as feminism.

Secondly, how can the useage of a feminist userbox be discriminatory againt users who are not female? Feminism is, as it explains in the Feminism article, a movement for equality between the sexes. There is a userbox for males who support feminism. This one, I have just noticed, was deleted since my first message to you earlier. I would ask why you did this in hindsight; why not from the beginning? Do you (or did you, before you were called on it) feel that it is ok for men to support feminism on Wikipedia, but not for women to do so?

Having a userbox for feminism is, in my view, an educational tool. The userbox links to the article Feminism, and so anyone who is interested in clicking on the link from someone's userbox is then taken to the article where they can learn for themselves that the feminist movement is about political, economic and social equality for women and men. In my opinion, people who consider feminism to be a "divisive and inflammatory" topic are doing the movement a grave disservice. Regardless of your feelings toward feminists or toward women, your negativity toward the education of both women and men about what feminism is will only further a general negativity toward the movement itself, and toward those who identify with it. This, not the presence of userboxes, creates a devisive and inflammatory environment. I would therefore argue that by censoring access to educational information regarding the feminist movement, you are, despite what you say, demonstrating a personal bias against it.

Let it be stated for the record that I appreciate your efforts as an administrator to do what you believe is right for the Wikipedia community. However, I do not feel that you are on the right path, for the reasons stated above. I would also warn you that in your quest to eliminate POV, despite what you say, you may be seen as furthering your own biases by many more in the community than just myself. --Romarin 20:57, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

OK Nicholas, I see that you also deleted the male supporter of feminism userbox. Thanks for backing up your position honestly. Really, I find that it is an interesting position that you have on userboxes. You believe that they are suceptible to promote inflammatory reactions or even POV bloc voting. Then why not delete all user boxes (I think this is your point of view)? Deleting only a few specific userboxes is not consistant with your anti-userbox policies in general and doesn't support your position.

I really don't understand why a userbox encouraging gender equality is more at risk of causing these kinds of reactions than any political (communist, anti-communist, anti-capitalist, republican, democrat, just to mention a few) or religious ones (catholic, pagan, creationist, anti-creationist, spaghetti-monster follower, etc.). Come on, there are even some promoting the consumption of drugs and alcohol! I don't see you (or anyone) deleting those. Personally, i think that any non-insulting userboxes should be allowed. But I can understand why some people might argue that userboxes promoting drugs, sex, alcohol, etc. are a risk, not only for the reasons you have stated, but, for example, in case young users of Wikipedia come across them.

So I think that until a decision has been taken on allowing or deleting all userboxes, you should let others decide what user boxes they want to use (again, unless they are directly insulting a minority, belief, political opinion, etc., even though I'm sure some of those exist). My point on that is that whether userboxes are allowed or not, nothing is stopping users to write the exact same thing as figures already in the userboxes on their page. The only difference is that it is faster to set up, nicer (little pictures, colours) and humourous. But this is getting into the whole dilemma about keeping or deleting userboxes.

If you think a feminist userbox is dangerous, tell me what you think about these : {{User Slut}}{{user antireligion}}{{user satanist}}{{user antitheist}}{{user antiatheism2}}{{user creationist}}{{user evol-0}}{{user flat earth}}{{user evol-X}}{{user religion flying spaghetti monster not really}}{{User All Drugs}}{{user Anarchist}}{{User conservative}}{{user Communist}}{{User conspiracy}}{{user No Marxism}}{{User beer respect}} (Added nowiki tags for brevity of message length --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 18:23, 27 March 2006 (UTC))

Please tell me why a feminist userbox is more divisive than any of the ones I have put as examples above. As I said earlier, I support userboxes, since nothing can stop users writing their content themselves. I just put these as examples of ones that I find way more divisive and often less justifiable than the ones you are attacking. Regards, IronChris 21:55, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Dear IronChris: Firstly, I'd like to thank you for taking the time and trouble to discuss this issue with me, and for explaining your rationale as to why you feel my actions were incorrect. I greatly appreciate your feedback as to my decision to delete those userboxes. I must sincerely apologise for not having replied to you personally about this matter; my workload has, alas, somewhat limited my time available for Wikipedia editing.

In your message above you raise some very pertinent and astute points about the deletions that I carried out (as User:Romarin likewise did) which I admit I had not considered specifically when I carried out the deletions. Allow me to respond to your points individually:

Why I have not deleted all userboxes - you are right, there is a certain pattern of thought that would dictate all userboxes should be deleted under such a rationale. However I believe there is a distinction to be made between userboxes which clearly promote a particular political or otherwise polemic POV; personally I see less concern with those userboxes that are not related to politics and ideology than those that are simply because of the fact that where less contention is present surrounding the issues, POV bloc voting would seem far less probable. Where contention is not held on issues, there is less motivation towards skewing Wikipedia process in order to achieve the outcomes of the viewpoint held - since the vested interest in doing so is far reduced. I would concede however that this does not mean there would be no interest in vote canvassing of this variety; it is my interest to reduce the amount of bloc voting where possible, but it would be quite unrealistic to expect the problem to be remedied by deleting all userboxes (since POV bloc voting definitely occurred before userboxes even existed, back in 2004 when I first joined Wikipedia and the only boxes available were those Babel boxes indicating one's spoken languages). It is my view that it is reasonable to permit people to use userboxes which are not liable to give rise towards campaign-type issues. Indeed, I see far less of a problem with people simply using raw userbox code on their pages versus a transcluded template without an associated category, even for contentious issues; this is because the bloc voting concerns would be greatly mitigated, although ideally I'd prefer Wikipedia to be free of advertisement of points of view completely. However I do have a specific concern with the transclusion of userbox templates where contentious POV issues are being expounded by those userboxes, due to the "What links here" and category bloc voting issues.

Why I considered a userbox that was "promoting gender equality" to be a risk, as you worded it - In fact, I do not have an issue with a userbox that promotes gender equality, as you will note by the fact that I deliberately have not deleted the {{User Gender Equality}} userbox. I don't think it is valid to consider the term "feminism" as synonymous with "gender equality" - feminism, as the term suggests, is clearly advocating discrimination in favour of women versus being in opposition to discrimination against either gender. Thus it is expounding a specific partisan point of view, often forcefully and emotively pressed in society, which I think must clearly fall under the T1 speedy deletion category of being divisive, the division being the advocation of discrimination in favour for a particular gender. I would treat a userbox in favour of masculism in an identical manner to one in favour of feminism - as in, I would speedy delete it. I doubt if such a userbox were to exist you would be likely to consider it as being in support of "gender equality". I expect that in response to such reasoning you would likely reply that I have misunderstood the feminist movement; if I may be so presumptious as to preempt that response, regardless of what the Wikipedia article - or any other source - defines feminism as, the intrinsic bias of feminism as being in specific support of discrimination for women's interests as opposed to equality for both genders is not removed regardless of the definition of the movement.

Regarding why other POV-related userboxes have not been deleted - it is more that I am yet to sort through the whole load of userboxes and determine which ones should be deleted, which would as I'm sure you can appreciate be a mammoth undertaking, especially since taking the decision to delete userboxes related to a particular subject should not be taken lightly. In response to the examples you gave, a number of those I would agree should indeed be deleted ({{user antireligion}}, {{user antitheist}}, {{user antiatheism2}}, {{User conspiracy}}, {{user evol-X}}) as they clearly propound a POV that is discriminatory towards other users, or otherwise inflammatory. As for the others, such as those relating to religious beliefs and sex, I would consider that since they are not directly propounding potential discrimination against Wikipedia users it would not be reasonable to speedy delete them, although the political and religious userboxes I would like to see deleted entirely (these could not, however, be speedy deleted, as they would not technically fall under the T1 criteria of being divisive or inflammatory).

I hope perhaps the above makes my rationale slightly clearer, perhaps, and that you might be able to better see why I made the decision to delete the feminist userboxes. If there's any way I can be of assistance, either in this matter or in the future, please do ask me, either on my talk page or via e-mail; I am at your service. All the best, --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 19:29, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the very detailed answer. Indeed, you anticipated my response well, and make your points very clear, except for one. Does feminism favour one gender (women) over another (men) in your opinion, or just in the opinion of others?

Indeed you seem to be aware of the Wikipedia article (and maybe of other sources) on the feminist movement, and I expect you know as well as me that feminism strives to reach gender equality. I suspect that being a reasonable person, and aware of the situation in the world, you will concede that such a movement is necessary. I won't go through all of the countless examples of situations in which women are discriminated against (salary, finding a job, etc.) as this is not the place, and, again, I imagine that you are aware of them. In any case, you aren't aware of these facts or disagree with the definition of feminism as opposing gender discrimination, this would clearly mean that your deletion of the userboxes were motivated a personal POV.

But of course, I assume good faith on your part, and therefore I imagine that the justifications behind feminism aren't an issue, nor are you a victim of the prejudice that the aim of feminism is to favour women over men (for this to be even possible, equality would have to be reached first).

So let's move on to your argument that other people see feminism in this way, and that this is precisely why the userbox might appear as divisive and lead to POV bloc voting. It seems to me that deleting the userbox is acknowledging this prejudice. Using a satanist or pagan userbox is also a source of prejudice on the part of the opposers of such movements. Same for queer userboxes. Same for political userboxes. Once again, if you wanted to delete every userbox which could be a source of prejudice on the part of people who do not fully understand or who oppose such movements/beliefs, you would end up deleting all userboxes.

Like User:Romarin, I believe that this userbox is actually informative. People who have a prejudice on the feminist movement can click on the link and read about it. Just hushing a belief/movement on the grounds that it is controversial is a threat to diversity of thought, learning, open-mindedness and even individual freedom. As I said, other movements such as satanism or homosexuality have many deep-rooted prejudices working against them, and deleting access to them, indeed hiding them away will not solve the problem. By deleting these userboxes, I think that you are doing great disservice to the movement, to its followers and to the general public. If this line of thought was to be applied world-wide, we would have to hide homosexuality, religion, conflicts (etc.) from the TV news, internet, and streets to avoid controversy.

There will always be people who oppose movements/beliefs. Some people believe in modern geocentrism. I imagine that they oppose the belief of heliocentrism, and some of them are most probably biased against its supporters. This is most obviously not a reason to eliminate their userboxes. There are countless similar examples. Just because people oppose feminism (out of ignorance about the motivations of the movement or otherwise) doesn't seem to me to be enough to delete the userboxes. Regards, --IronChris 22:16, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

feminism, as the term suggests, is clearly advocating discrimination in favour of women. So in other words, you ignored what feminism is. I can't imagine why people aren't assuming good faith here...I would consider that since they are not directly propounding potential discrimination against Wikipedia users The bible says homosexuals should be put to death. If that is not discriminatory, I don't know what is. Crumbsucker 06:28, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

NicholasTurnbull, are you going to delete the gay supportive userboxes as well? How about the drug-supportive ones? Anti-religion boxes? If you are, I want to prepare for getting angry next time. Crumbsucker 15:11, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Hello, I think your speedy deletion of Template:user antireligion was not quite thought through. By reading the respective articles, you could have known that this is not quite the same as Template:user atheism. BTW while I am hardly a feminist, I think that deletion of template:user feminism was pretty much over the top, too. I would welcome the restoration of the templates, or as an alternative, the speedy deletion of Template:user christian, template:user muslim, template:user male, and so on, as I do regard them as no less inflamatory. There is no rationale why religious users, or users who think that being male is something to boast with, should be allowed to display their worldview, while others are not. I have to say that imho your very own selection of boxes to delete shows biased views and motivations in itself. -- 790 10:21, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Mediation

Hello, I wanted to let you know I "stole" some of the suggestions you made during a mediation to use at my own mediation that I'm running at Wikipedia:Mediation_Cabal/Cases/2006-03-12_Clay_Aiken_page_dispute_regarding_the_John_Paulus_allegations, so thanks!! Tufflaw 19:41, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Template:User evol-x

This userbox was not intended to be divisive or inflammatory. It was intended to be a joke for wikipedians tired of Evolution/Creationism userboxes.--The ikiroid (talk/parler/hablar/paroli/说/話) 01:36, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Feminism userboxes undeleted

Dear Romarin: Based on discussion with yourself, User:IronChris and others, I have undeleted the feminism userboxes. I did so primarily because although I do not personally believe that POV userboxes are desirable, there is a legitimate case to be made for a feminism userbox having some value as regards encyclopaedic work for feminism-related articles, so in the interest of assuming good faith unless all similar userboxes are deleted it would not seem justifiable to speedy delete the feminism userboxes. I'm most grateful for the time you took in elaborating to me the specific issues in play relating to this matter. Best regards, --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 00:15, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, Nicholas, for replacing the feminism userboxes, and for letting me know the reasoning behind your decision. I greatly appreciate the time you took to respond to my arguments, and to those of User:IronChris; I also appreciate the civil manner in which such responses were delivered. It is a difficult task at times to pass judgment on what constitutes as acceptable or unacceptable POV, without falling into the POV trap oneself, and it takes strength to admit when one has made a mistake in that regard. In my opinion, it is always safest to air on the side of access to information, because learning furthers understanding. There are few cases that demonstrate this point as clearly as that of the feminist movement, which is extremely stigmatized, and consistantly boxed into a discourse of divisiveness and extremism, due to a lack of general access to unbiased information. Yes, identifying as a feminist is an expression of a point of view, there's no denying that fact. But identifying as a feminist for the purpose of helping to educate interested others about the reality of a movement that is generally hidden from the public eye is, in my opinion, a necessary step in the long journey toward gender equality. Again, thank you for taking the time to think this matter through, and for your restoration of the feminism userboxes. --Romarin 01:06, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Please don't speedy any userboxes until there is policy consensus; as there is not now. TfD nominations are another thing, and right now are not only less divisive than speedying, but also faster (considering that any speedied userbox can, and probably will, be taken to Wikipedia:Deletion review/Userbox debates); thank you for restoring the feminist ones.

My interest here is the peace of WP; I have no boxes. Septentrionalis 01:23, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Question about a case in the mediation cabal list

Hello, I am a contributing editor who requested mediation from the cabal on the Francis Schuckardt article. I was hoping it would go into mediation before my spring break was over, but mediators appear to be passing over the article and selecting others. I am wondering if you could tell me if there is something innately undesireable about the article or about how I phrased my request for mediation. The party I am having difficulty with is now threatening to have me banned and it is over issues that are in the request for mediation. I appreciate your point of view if you have a chance to reply. Bernie Radecki 21:29, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Template:User antitheist and Template:User antiatheism

Both these templates have been restored per the exception clause of the undeletion policy. Both templates have previously been deleted, claiming a T1 candidacy, but they were part of a series of templates whose deletions were disputed at this DRV debate. That debate overturned the speedies and determined that they were not T1 candidates. If you want these deleted, please bring it to TFD, neither of them have received individual treatment yet. Sjakkalle (Check!) 09:50, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Block of Grue

Hmmm... Isn't 48 hours a bit too long for a "cool down" penalty? Misza13 ^{T C} 19:59, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Following on from the discussion at WP:AN/I, I'd really like you to consider reducing the block to 24 hours. If it's about 'cooling down' then that should usually happen after a good night's sleep, and because of this I believe a block longer thjan 24 hours for the purposes of 'cooling down' looks punitive. --Sam Blanning (formerly Malthusian) (talk) 22:42, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Update: Sjakelle unblocked, Kelly reblocked citing the lack of discussion with you, and as I have attempted to discuss it with you I am unblocking Grue, as I believe consensus is that a 48 hour block for this is excessive. (Copied to Grue's and Kelly's talkpages and WP:AN/I. Please take discussion there to avoid forking this further.) --Sam Blanning (SQUIDWARD!!!)^(talk) 20:44, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Blu Aardvark's talk page being blocked

Is it really a good idea to block Blu's usertalkpage from editing? Isn't his userpage is the only thing he can edit while blocked?--The ikiroid (talk/parler/hablar/paroli/说/話) 02:56, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Dear Ikiroid: Yes, a talk page is the only thing a blocked user can edit; you're right, and indeed it is a shame that it was necessary. However, he was basically using the talk page to carry on his prior arguments with his adversaries, which can't possibly be good for either him or his opponents, and after all talk pages aren't meant to be a soapbox to espouse one's point of view. I don't see any further purpose in entertaining the argument there on the talk page, hence I removed it and protected the page. So I personally think it was justified in the same way as bars are in zoological parks - they are there to keep both the inhabitant animals away from the visitors, and the visitors away from the animals. Protecting the talk page thus means people can't goad Blu Aardvark on his talk page while he's blocked, nor can they keep the debate stoked up with him; likewise Blu will no longer have an opportunity to continue his calls of dissatisfaction relating to Wikipedia on his talk page. Best regards, --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 03:03, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

OK, I can understand that, it just seemed kind of weird—you erased his comments and then blocked the page, but I get where you're going now. You had to stop this thing from spinning out of control. It's a shame, really, both Blu and the many arguing against him will keep going in circles with their viewpoints until one of the two sides finally accepts some idea that the other one has, or until arbcom decides one of the two ideas is better. They're all good people, you know, but I guess situations can change attitudes.--The ikiroid (talk/parler/hablar/paroli/说/話) 03:12, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Removed message by sockpuppet of banned user User:Blu Aardvark --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 04:10, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm not banned, I'm blocked. WP:BAN doesn't apply. --Don't Slam The Door 04:17, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

He didn't do it to silence Blu, if you read his statement. He did it because the discussion was going in circles, and it was probably further going to damage the reputation of all involved if it continued.--The ikiroid (talk/parler/hablar/paroli/说/話) 03:21, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

• You are aggravating the situation, not helping it, Nick. Quit wasting my time and your time. Is your power trip really worth it? --Don't Slam The Door 04:17, 2 April 2006 (UTC)