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Thucydides411

• Thucydides411 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Thucydides411 is essentially a single-purpose account dedicated to obscuring the fact of Russian interference in the 2016 US election, most recently in respect of the GRU's use of WikiLeaks as a conduit for publishing stolen DNC emails. He was blocked for a week in Fen 2017 for violating AP2 restrictions and TBANned from all edits pertaining to US-Russia relations for three months in November 2017 - see Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive221 § Thucydides411 - due to disruption and personal attacks at Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections and its talk page. Rather than continue editing in other areas, he essentially did not edit during that period. He has under 4,000 edits in total but is the third most prolific contributor to Talk:Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections (and first by volume of text added), fifth most prolific to talk:Julian Assange (and second by volume of text added), third to White Privilege and second by volume added, and third to talk:Useful idiot, again first by volume of text added.

So for the four pages he edits most often, despite having a remarkably low total edit count, he dominates discussion. In as much as a POV can be discerned in the absence of a direct statement, his edits clearly show a personal rejection of the established facts of Russian interference in the 2016 US election (e.g. [1], which changes a statement of the Mueller conclusions to frame it as Mueller having "asserted" Russian interference or this in which he quibbles with the fact that Mueller "demonstrated" Assange's knowledge that Seth Rich was not the source of leaked emails by continuing to correspond with GRU operatives after his death, and, based on that asserted quibble with the wording, removes the entire paragraph noting the established fact that Assange did indeed continue to contact Russia after Rich's death). This is a fringe POV, and in my view his continued advancement of this POV through talk page statements that assume its factual correctness is unacceptable.

Basically, I think he's here to Right Great Wrongs. Reversions are a prominent part of his content editing, and lengthy comments on Talk are the norm. This can be fine in someone with wide interest in improving Wikipedia, but here it is narrowly focused on a handful of articles where he consistently dominates debate through stonewalling. Guy (help!) 10:57, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Pardon me for asking, but is there any actual indicent being reported here? Is there any actual misbehavior? It looks like Guy is just complaining about me generally, as an editor they dislike.

Guy cites precisely two diffs: one in which I restored long-standing, well-sourced and DUE material (an opinion article by Glenn Greenwald that received secondary coverage in the Columbia Journalism Review, the Washington Post and Salon); and another in which I removed a recent addition that I think was worded in a POV manner and was UNDUE. Neither of these edits is particularly noteworthy.

As for the accusation that I don't have a large enough edit count, I don't see what Guy is getting at. Yes, I don't edit Wikipedia for a living. Is that an offense? I've been editing for over a decade, focusing on different subjects at different times, including American history, astronomy and physics, and American politics.

I'm actually quite proud of some of the contributions Guy complains about. At Useful idiot, I worked to reorient the article around what reliable sources on etymology, such as the Oxford English Dictionary, actually say about the term. Before I began editing the page (November 2017 version), it prominently reported what is apparently an incorrect etymology of the term (attributing it to Lenin). Compare that with the page now: [2]. I think it's clear that the page is much better organized, has better sourcing (including the OED, which I added to the article), and that it gives a clear explanation of the status of the popular attribution to Lenin (i.e., that the attribution is often made, though there's no evidence for it). In other words, I left the page better off than when I arrived. This took a lot of discussion on the talk page (something Guy is faulting me for). Sources had to be evaluated and discussed. References had to be tracked down (for example, I tracked down the origin of a reference that another editor claimed was from the Soviet Union, showing that the book was actually written in France - the question was whether the reference demonstrated usage of the term "useful idiot" in the Soviet Union, which would contradict what the OED claims about the term: see [3]). In any case, this is all to say that Guy is faulting me for using talk pages to discuss sourcing, edits, etc., which is precisely what talk pages are for.

The background to this complaint is a content dispute at Julian Assange, about whether to mention an appeal by 130 of the most prominent figures in German politics, journalism and media calling for Assange's release. I criticized Guy for referring to "Assange cultists" ([4]) and "an unholy and toxic mix of militant free-speechers, MRAs, far-right conspiracy theorists and more" ([5]). It's still unclear whom Guy meant to describe with these epithets, but I felt they were out of place and said so. The current ANI complaint appears to be the result. I think Guy's complaint is vague (I'm not actually accused of any violations of Wikipedia policy or of any concrete forms of disruption), and should either be speedily closed or boomeranged. -Thucydides411 (talk) 11:48, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411, if it was specific it would be at WP:AE. My issue is more general: you are a single-puropose advocacy account pushing a fringe POV. You are also abusing Wikipedia process to gain advantage in content disputes, notable with respect to SPECIFICO and BullRangifer (and also Calton, who you managed to get blocked for three days). All three of these have massively greater contributions to Wikipedia than you do, yet you seem to think you have greater understanding of our policies based on your <4000 edits to a handful of closely-related articles. Guy (help!) 12:19, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

We don't rank editor value by the number of their edits. This is a volunteer project, and participation is not required. I interacted with this editor at the Casualties of the Iraq War page, where they made clear improvements. Bringing up Calton is irrelevant - they broke a sanction in place, were given ample time to revert, and were blocked after they ignored it. If you have a problem with that you should seek to have the sanction removed. Mr Ernie (talk) 13:08, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

This report alleges no wrongdoing. It is perfectly ok for editors to edit where they want to. Mr Ernie (talk) 11:55, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Mr Ernie, no, it is not "perfectly OK" for single purpose accounts to dominate articles. Guy (help!) 12:12, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree, but that's not what I said. Mr Ernie (talk) 12:16, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Guy's concerns are not frivolous, but are legitimate and very relevant right now.

A current issue is now at BLP/N, where Thucydides411 is making personal attacks against SPECIFICO and me in an abuse of the BLP/N drama board:

• #Unsourced claims about a living person being involved in a criminal conspiracy.

Thucydides411 has made seemingly false accusations against us but presented no evidence of wrongdoing. Now they refuse to respond to pings to resolve the matter. Accusations without evidence are just personal attacks, and unresolved personal attacks that are escalated, rather than withdrawn, demand sanctions.

What should have been a minor blip of no consequence was made major by Thucydides411 when he made it personal and actively escalated the attacks from Talk:Julian Assange, to User:Drmies's talk page, and then to BLP/N. At each step he was rebuffed by multiple admins who saw no BLP violation. Rather than retract the personal attacks, he escalated and expanded on them, and that is what made it serious.

As near as I can tell, SPECIFICO did not use the word "conspired", as accused. Thucydides411 is the one who did that in his seemingly false straw man accusation against him. And as for his accusation against me, he hasn't yet provided any evidence that I said anything that is not factual about Russian interference or Assange's involvement in the Russian interference. A BLP violation occurs with the statement of negative and/or false information that is unsourced, not the statement of "sky is blue" facts backed up by several whole articles exclusively on the subject that are based on myriad RS. That's where I'm coming from. I believe the narrative in those articles and RS. Thucydides411 has often made it clear he does not like the narrative in those articles or their RS.

Thucydides411's personal attacks seem to be rooted in his well-known denialist and fringe attitude toward the well-documented "sky is blue" facts that the Russians interfered in the 2016 elections and that Julian Assange was involved with GRU agents in their criminal dissemination of stolen documents and emails. The Mueller investigation established that Assange=WikiLeaks was a key player in the Russian interference. Twelve of those agents are now under criminal indictment for their crimes. The issue of Assange's culpability has not been addressed (by me in this dispute). He did not have to know he was dealing with GRU agents or know that he was involved in the commission of crimes to have been involved. I have made that plain. Mueller, OTOH, details how Assange and GRU agents planned, coordinated, and lied about their efforts to share and release the stolen documents and emails. They didn't just lie about it, they sought to shift the blame from Russia and the Trump campaign (which welcomed the efforts) to the Clinton campaign, Seth Rich, Democrats, Ukraine, China, and just about anyone other than the ones involved, which were Russia, Assange, and the Trump campaign, with Rohrabacher personally delivering (according to Assange's lawyers) a message to Assange from Trump that Trump would pardon him if he covered up Russian involvement by denying it. Assange obeyed, denied, and shifted the blame, but the pardon....well, that hasn't happened yet, but may well in the future.

I have repeatedly made it clear to Thucydides411 that I will gladly retract/revise any incorrect statements I have made, revise my thinking, and thank him for the enlightenment, if he will just explain what I did wrong, but he refuses to respond to pings or explain. He just made the accusations and left them at the three venues. The last one at BLP/N is a serious enough venue that it must be dealt with.

Do we want editors who still deny these facts editing in the AP2 area, especially after their previous sanctions and warnings? They just make trouble. We want editors who believe what RS say, not those who deny them. Such denialist attitudes strike directly at the RS policy itself and the heart of our required basic skill set, the ability to vet sources for reliability. Any editor who favors misinformation from unreliable sources and denies RS should not edit in the relevant areas, and some would say they lack the skills to edit here at all, at least on controversial topics. -- BullRangifer (talk) 15:57, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: Your description of what happened at WP:BLPN#Unsourced claims about a living person being involved in a criminal conspiracy is inaccurate. I raised concerns about editors using talk pages to imply that Julian Assange is involved in some sort of criminal conspiracy, by referring to GRU agents as his "accomplices". You then posted at length, explicitly stating that Assange committed crimes in 2016, for which he supposedly deserves to be indicted. You stated, "It is not just an 'implication', but a legal fact, that GRU agents did aid Assange in committing a crime. Why Assange hasn't been formally charged, unlike the GRU agents, is a question you'll have to ask Trump and Rohrabacher, who actually made a quid pro quo offer of a pardon, rather than a justified criminal indictment, to Assange, in exchange for a cover-up and denial that it was the Russians who hacked and leaked the emails" ([6]). I responded, "You should not be making these sorts of statements on Wikipedia. They don't serve any purpose related to editing the encyclopedia, and they violate our WP:BLP policy" ([7]). Your response has been to repeatedly ping me and post to my talk page, demanding that I answer your theories about Assange. As I told you at my talk page, I'm not interested in getting into political debates on Wikipedia.

Anyone is free to look at my edits to article space and see that they're almost always sourced to multiple high-quality reliable sources. For example, the content dispute that Guy and I are involved in at Julian Assange began with this addition that I made, which is sourced to three high-quality reliable sources. There is an ongoing RfC about this addition, in which a plurality of editors so far have supported my addition, which suggests that it was a reasonable edit. I take WP:RS very seriously. If you have any problematic diffs, you're free to raise them. So far, I don't see any in your complaint. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:08, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Let the battleground come to ANI, and the fighters take their corners. I'll be honest, I think ANI is the wrong venue for this. It really should be brought to ARBCOM. --Kyohyi (talk) 16:47, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

• Funnily enough, I was just writing up a topic ban warning for Thucydides. They have been trying to interest admins in what they call SPECIFICO's "very serious BLP violation" in using the word "accomplices" for GRU agents [8] at Talk:Julian Assange, then User talk:Drmies, then WP:BLPN. They don't seem able to find one that agrees with them. It's time you dropped the stick, Thucydides. Furthermore, while I know Drmies suggested you try WP:BLPN since you wouldn't accept the opinions of three admins (including Newyorkbrad of all people) on his page, it's time you stopped ascribing terms like "criminal conspiracies" to Bull Rangifer and SPECIFICO. You yourself are the only, single, solitary person who has mentioned conspiring/conspiracies in the context. Are you trying to exhaust your opponents by repeating it over and over and consistently ignoring both denials and questions about it? Your discussion style is disruptive, and you are coming close to a topic ban from Russian interference in the 2016 US election. Bishonen | tålk 17:08, 5 March 2020 (UTC).

Drop what stick? I stopped commenting at WP:BLPN two days ago, despite being pinged several times there (and messaged on my talk page) by BullRangifer. I only mentioned BLPN here because BullRangifer raised it. Given that I "dropped the stick" days ago, should I go further and bury the stick underground? What, exactly, am I supposed to do to avoid this topic ban you're swinging over my head? -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:23, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

I was talking about your dedication to denying Russian interference in the US 2016 election, not just about BLPN. I make it 19 hours since you took an opponent to AE for reverting you (on that subject) at Julian Assange. Bishonen | tålk 18:00, 5 March 2020 (UTC).

That AE report was in response to a straightforward violation of discretionary sanctions. I notified the user in question and gave them ample time to self-revert before filing the report. The user got blocked. Are you suggesting topic-banning me for filing a straightforward complaint that the admins at WP:AE decided was valid? Why would you criticize me for that, of all things? -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:09, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

• This is just a terrible edit and I don't understand why someone would raise this hill to die on, because it is the kind of edit that screams "topic ban"--and so does the edit summary, "Mueller Report could be mentioned with more neutral wording". It is hard to imagine more neutral wording than "This [Russian interference in 2016] was subsequently confirmed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller in his report on his investigation and summarized in his 2019 testimony before Congress". If the argument that this is part of a pattern is borne out (I know not if't be true), then a topic ban is in order. Drmies (talk) 17:42, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

"concluded" would be a more neutral wording. I didn't decide to "die on this hill", though you seem anxious to topic ban me for that edit. Part of that edit was restoring long-standing and well-sourced content: Glenn Greenwald's commentary on the Alliance for Securing Democracy, which was covered by Columbia Journalism Review, the Washington Post and Salon. Topic banning someone for restoring long-standing content and suggesting that more neutral wording could be used for another sentence is sort of an overreaction, don't you think? -Thucydides411 (talk) 18:16, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Don't deflect by focusing on what you restored. Drmies is talking about what you removed, which just happens to be something you don't want to accept, that the Russians interfered in the election. There was no justification for you to remove that content. None at all. They were not "POV edits". They were properly-sourced facts you don't like, so you removed them, with the source. That's an egregious NPOV violation. You allowed your personal fringe POV dictate the fate of properly-sourced content. Shame on you. BTW, that content was restored and is still part of the article, as it should be. -- BullRangifer (talk) 19:18, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Don't misrepresent my edit. I asked for more neutral wording, and said I was okay with inclusion of the Mueller Report. -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:56, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411, "dropping the stick" isn't exactly the right description of what you've done. You stabbed SPECIFICO and stabbed me, then you escalated the matter (repeatedly restabbed and twisted the knives). By refusing to withdraw your personal attacks, you have just left the knives in place, and only you can remove them.

Please do so by either providing evidence of our wrongdoing (repetitions of your objections above is not evidence) or by publically withdrawing your accusations. Right now you have just made them again, instead of withdrawing them. Do the right thing. -- BullRangifer (talk) 19:09, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

"stabbed me", "repeatedly restabbed and twisted the knives": Such violent metaphors! I didn't stab anyone. I suggest you move on. -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:58, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

I find Bishonen's and Drmies' commentary here to be highly partisan, if not dishonest. As admins you might expect them to intervene in defense of this biography of a living person, per our very clear policies at Wikipedia and protections for the subjects of those biographies. BullRangifer has stated plainly that Assange has committed a crime [9]:

It is a fact that GRU agents did aid Assange in committing a crime.

SPECIFICO has stated that the GRU were Assange's "accomplices" [10][11]:

The prosecution of his accomplices is entirely suitable for a brief lead mention.

In this context Thucydides411 is of course wholly correct to complain about Assange being described as a criminal, since he was accused in a court of law, and the accusation was dismissed with prejudice [12]:

The ruling terminated the DNC’s claims against... the document disclosure group WikiLeaks and its leader Julian Assange for releasing material stolen by the Russian hackers. [Judge] Koetl said the Constitution’s First Amendment protects those defendants from such a civil legal claim, just as it protects “press outlets that publish materials of public interest despite defects in the way the materials were obtained, so long as the disseminator did not participate in any wrongdoing in obtaining the materials in the first place.” Koetl dismissed the lawsuit, which was filed in April 2018, “with prejudice,” which bars the DNS from bringing the same claims against the defendants in another suit.

Without getting into details about Assange, Drmies has implied that SPECIFICO and Bullrangifer's opinions about Assange are correct [13][14]:

Sorry, but how is that controversial?

They're controversial because the Judge ruled that Assange did not commit a crime. Drmies can be forgiven for not reading the news. However as wallyfromdilbert and PackMecEng point out, it's hypocritical for Bullrangifer and Guy [15] to ask to sanction Thucydides411 for raising the issue at WP:BLPN right after Drmies told Thucydides411 to go there [16]:

you should consider BLPN.

There are strong indications that the very admins commenting here are not acting to enforce legitimate BLP concerns at Talk:Julian Assange and are instead encouraging departures from sources and policies. For instance JzG wrote recently at Talk:Julian Assange that

the Assange cult has promoted this letter of ocncern, but that it is just one letter of concern, a single incident in the news blizzard around Assange that is driven by an unholy and toxic mix of militant free-speechers, MRAs, far-right conspiracy theorists and more. There's no actual evidence that Assange was treated any differently form anyone similarly situated.

This kind of incoherent and unsourced language would be considered inappropriate from any editor on a BLP, but JzG is the most active admin on the page, having placed DS sanctions there. The sources editors were discussing in that case (including famous German investigative journalists and politicians, Die Welt, the Süddeutsche Zeitung and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) would be surprised to learn that their activities and reporting were being promoted, according to a Wikipedia administrator active at Julian Assange, by "an unholy and toxic mix of militant free-speechers, MRAs, far-right conspiracy theorists and more." Moreover, numerous American and international human rights groups have described Assange's treatment as extraordinary, directly contradicting JzG's assertion. For example here is the United Nations special rapporteur's recent description of Assange's treatment in the UK [17]:

[In the UK Assange] was suddenly dragged out and convicted within hours and without any preparation for a bail violation that consisted of him having received diplomatic asylum from another UN member state on the basis of political persecution, just as international law intends and just as countless Chinese, Russian and other dissidents have done in Western embassies. It is obvious that what we are dealing with here is political persecution. In Britain, bail violations seldom lead to prison sentences – they are generally subject only to fines. Assange, by contrast, was sentenced in summary proceedings to 50 weeks in a maximum-security prison – clearly a disproportionate penalty that had only a single purpose: Holding Assange long enough for the U.S. to prepare their espionage case against him.

As for Bishonen, they were quick to block Jtbobwaysf [18] for their 1RR violation at Julian Assange just days ago, and are quick to appear here threatening a topic ban against Thucydides411. However they said they would not block Calton for a similar, DS violation at Julian Assange introducing a long opinion piece quote against him without in-text attribution [19], and apparently believe that calling Assange a criminal or criminal accomplice is not a BLP problem, even if a US federal judge has ruled that Assange's actions and similar actions by news organizations are protected by the first amendment. -Darouet (talk) 20:24, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Darouet, that's the wrong case. That was the DNC's civil case. I have always been referring to Mueller's criminal case against the 12 GRU agents who committed crimes where Mueller found that Assange was an accomplice in the illegal dissemination of their stolen documents and emails. -- BullRangifer (talk) 20:57, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Darouet (and Thucydides411) object to what Darouet words as "calling Assange a criminal or criminal accomplice". They see that as a BLP violation. Maybe or maybe not, but I have not said that. I have not called Assange a "criminal" or a "criminal accomplice". Words matter. Exact quotes matter. I have mentioned the proven facts that crimes were committed and that Assange was involved with GRU agents in the commission of those crimes. That is not the same as using the words above. I did not use those words.

For some reason, both Darouet and Thucydides411 fail to accept what I have repeatedly stated, and that is that it is possible for a person to not know they are involved in the commission of a crime, but that does not make it any less of a crime. Focus on the crime, not the person. That is my focus. It is not a BLP violation to state proven facts.

So far, neither editor has provided any evidence that what SPECIFICO or I have stated are counterfactual or not supported by the many RS used in our articles on these subjects, or the findings in the Mueller Report. This is "sky is blue" stuff, and there should be no objection to stating the facts that crimes were committed and that Assange was an accomplice with GRU agents in the commission of the crimes of disseminating those stolen documents. Mueller clearly proves that Assange coordinated these acts with those agents and lied about it. He didn't even have to know they were Russians. The crimes still happened, and Mueller has indicted 12 GRU agents for those crimes. -- BullRangifer (talk) 00:13, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

BullRangifer, you write I have not called Assange a "criminal" or a "criminal accomplice". What you said is [20]:

It is a fact that GRU agents did aid Assange in committing a crime.

I understand you don't want to talk about the fact that the DNC accusations against Assange — which you are asking us here to accept as truth, or be topic banned — were thrown out of court in the United States and declared to be false [21]:

“The First Amendment prevents such liability in the same way it would preclude liability for press outlets that publish materials of public interest despite defects in the way the materials were obtained so long as the disseminator did not participate in any wrongdoing in obtaining the materials in the first place.”

The judge specifically compared Assange and Wikileaks' publication to that of the Pentagon papers:

Citing precedent from the the Pentagon Papers case, Koeltl held that treating WikiLeaks as an accomplice “would render any journalist who publishes an article based on stolen information a co-conspirator in the theft.”

Perhaps User:Newyorkbrad doesn't think your statements about Assange are a BLP violation. That's fine. But if I agree with John G. Koeltl in his finding that Assange is not guilty of a crime for publishing DNC documents, should I be topic banned on Wikipedia?

Lastly, since you write that "Exact quotes matter," contrary to what you write I have not used the term "BLP violation." I have raised BLP concerns: part of our normal editing task if we are trying to improve a BLP. -Darouet (talk) 15:45, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Darouet, I already told you that you are linking to the wrong case. That is the DNC's civil lawsuit. I am talking about Mueller's criminal case against the 12 GRU agents.

Your statement is also misleading. The civil lawsuit was not dismissed because it was "false", but because "the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act foreclosed him [the judge] from holding it liable for the DNC server hack."

The judge even called the actions illegal: "The primary wrongdoer in this alleged criminal enterprise is undoubtably the Russian Federation, the first named defendant in the case and the entity that surreptitiously and illegally hacked into the DNC’s computers and thereafter disseminated the results of its theft."

So you're barking up the wrong tree.

As far as your "BLP concerns", what have I written that is factually wrong? Thucydides won't tell me. Will you? If you have such concerns, then you should be able to elucidate them. As I have repeatedly written, if you can show that my statements are false, I will gladly retract/revise them, revise my thinking, and thank you for the enlightenment. -- BullRangifer (talk) 16:07, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

@Darouet: I'm sure I am not the only one surprised to see your words above ..accusations against Assange — which you are asking us here to accept as truth, or be topic banned Topic ban us? Are you expecting to be TBANned along with Thucydides411 here? Are you now acknowledging the tag-teaming that you've long denied? Yes, your repetitious one-two punch in Russia-related threads has worsened the disruption, but my understanding is that this ANI is just about Thucydides411. SPECIFICO talk 17:22, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

SPECIFICO, you are casting WP:ASPERSIONS: I've long been active at Julian Assange, am proud of my work there, and will continue to improve the article. Anyone can similarly pull up editor interaction reports for you and plenty of other editors, e.g. a longer list of your interactions with me (100 articles) [22], or BullRangifer (319 articles) [23], or Bishonen (214 articles) [24].

BullRangifer, I'm not misrepresenting the sources. The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act prevented the judge, Koetl, from having jurisdiction over Russia or the GRU's actions. On the other hand the judge found no evidence that Assange or Wikileaks participated in any crime including the theft of DNC documents, and is like other media organizations is protected by the first amendment in publishing them. Koetl further ruled that Wikileaks is protected even if they know the documents are stolen, so long as the documents are in the public interest (he ruled they were), and Wikileaks did not commit a crime by stealing the documents themselves (he ruled they didn't).

I have real life work so I'm going to keep this brief, but my objection to your comments re Assange are straightforward. You have said that

It is a fact that GRU agents did aid Assange in committing a crime.

However a US court, without challenging (or at all times necessarily endorsing) the factual basis of the Mueller Report, has unequivocally declared that Assange's receipt and publication of those documents was not a crime and protected by the first amendment.

I don't personally think you should be sanctioned for your statement — and again User:Newyorkbrad is a better expert here than am I — however I do think that your false opinion has an impact on Assange's page. For instance, many editors at Talk:Julian Assange have been arguing that an entire lead paragraph in our biography of Assange, dedicated to the DNC and mentioning the GRU, is undue. If you don't acknowledge the ruling that Assange's publication is protected by the first amendment [25], that will contribute to your desire to give undue and misleading attention to this issue in the lead of his article. -Darouet (talk) 17:46, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Darouet, I have never said or implied that Assange or Wikileaks participated in the theft of DNC documents, or that WikiLeaks committed a crime by stealing the documents themselves. The theft of the documents was a crime committed by the GRU, and Assange was involved in coordinating how to use those documents. Trafficking in stolen documents is generally considered a crime, but courts waffle on that one and won't always convict. Since his coordination with the GRU involved much deception by Assange (read the Mueller Report), he might end up getting indicted and convicted for that. Time will tell. His statements to the public were obviously deceptive, but are likely not actionable.

BTW, I used to be sympathetic to Assange's efforts when he acted like a journalist, and journalists do need protection. When he started acting in a partisan manner by selectively releasing only content that hurt America, DNC, and Clinton, and not releasing the documents he had which could hurt the GOP and Russia, he started to act as a Russian asset who does not deserve protection or respect.

Now please explain what part of what I have said (from before the beginning of this thread at AN/I) that is not factual. Thucydides won't tell me. -- BullRangifer (talk) 19:31, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Wait a second: you're accusing me of not accepting established facts, but here you are trying to argue that Judge Koetl's ruling is incorrect and somehow amounts to "waffl[ing]". Do you understand the law better than the judge? Who's really denying facts here? -Thucydides411 (talk) 19:48, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411, I did not say that their ruling was incorrect. Courts deal differently with issues that might, in some way or another, touch on First Amendment issues. The case is complicated, and one judge might focus on one aspect of the facts and acquit, and another judge might focus on a different aspect of the same set of facts and convict. That's the way it works. Again, I did not say what you claim I said. Words matter.

This was also a civil case, not the situation I have been referring to the whole time.

Now explain what was so factually wrong with the statements I had made that made you attack me at BLP/N? -- BullRangifer (talk) 21:02, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

@BullRangifer: on the 29th of February you directly stated that the GRU helped Assange commit a crime [26]:

It is a fact that GRU agents did aid Assange in committing a crime.

Do you acknowledge that you made this statement at BLPN?

United States federal judge John G. Koeltl clearly ruled that Assange and Wikileaks, per clear precedent established in many cases including those surrounding the Pentagon Papers, did not commit a crime [27][28]:

Koeltl ruled that the U.S. Constitution protected them from liability related to disseminating stolen emails. “The First Amendment prevents such liability in the same way it would preclude liability for press outlets that publish materials of public interest despite defects in the way the materials were obtained so long as the disseminator did not participate in any wrongdoing in obtaining the materials in the first place,” the 81-page opinion states. Citing precedent from the the Pentagon Papers case, Koeltl held that treating WikiLeaks as an accomplice “would render any journalist who publishes an article based on stolen information a co-conspirator in the theft.”

Do you acknowledge that Koeltl ruled in this way, and that his ruling directly contradicts your assertion quoted above? Or, do you retract your statement and acknowledge you were incorrect, as you have repeatedly stated you would be willing to do? It's unclear what else you're looking for. -Darouet (talk) 20:03, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Darouet, I want to thank you so much for finally being the one to actually explain this, rather than like Thucydides411, who falsely asserted that SPECIFICO and I claimed "that Assange criminally conspired with GRU agents". That false claim still lingers at BLP/N.

But now, YOU are the one who has done the right thing, stepped up to the plate, and actually explained your exact concern(s), and for that I am very grateful. You have done the honorable thing. Why didn't Thucydides411 do this a long time ago? They were the one making all the accusations and implying that Assange is somehow innocent of any wrongdoing. Assange isn't innocent of wrongdoing. He did many bad things. Mike Pompeo said it well: "It is time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really is: a nonstate hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia." Assange is not a whistleblower or a journalist. He's a witting or unwitting Russian asset. the end result is the same.

My focus has always been the commission of proven hacking and theft crimes by the GRU (which Mueller has charged them with), and since Assange was then involved in the planning, coordination, receipt, and distribution of those stolen documents, and lied about it, that Assange's actions were (tangentially) involved in that crime, with the distribution being HIS crime, even if he did not commit the hacking crime itself. It was always in that sense my statements should be interpreted. The statement above is indeed my statement, and I can now, in the light of the judge's reasoning for throwing out the case, see what you mean. It does look like an overstep on my part, and I apologize for that. I see what you mean about how this civil ruling can relate to that, as the judge has applied the First Amendment to Assange's distribution of the stolen documents. A different judge might have ruled differently, but we do have this case, which was tossed, rather than tried. I wonder what would have happened if there had been an actual trial, a criminal one, rather than civil one?

I'd like to go back and look at my statements to see which ones should be stricken/altered. Will you help me by pointing to exact statements (with diffs)? I'd really appreciate that. I need your perspective to see it. I'm too close to the subject! Help me fix this. We should probably do this on my talk page, and then I'll go to BLP/N and fix whatever needs fixing. Fair enough? Thanks again. -- BullRangifer (talk) 22:41, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Please topic ban Thucydides411 from subjects related to Russia. I completely agree with the assessment by Guy. Thucydides411 does POV-pushing on pages like Useful idiot, Assange and some other pages related to Russia. He usually removes well-sourced information and edit-war in a "team" with user Darouet, who just commented above. For example,

1. removal of sourced info by T.,
2. removal by D.,
3. removal by another user (who is a Russian SPI [29], possibly a sockpuppet account, and again), then
4. removal by D.,
5. removal by IP (who was blocked), and
6. removal by well known user Altenmann.

Since then, I never edit this page, and I also stay away of page Assange after massive reverts of well sourced info by Darouet (he removes large section "Timeline of Julian Assange involvement in the United States elections"). Needless to say, discussing anything with Thucydides411 is nearly impossible. In my opinion, he should not edit anything related to Russia (like Assange). My very best wishes (talk) 05:28, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

MVBW, When you tried to add a massive timeline to the Assange article, four editors commented on talk [30]: JFG and Jack Upland and myself all opposed your addition. Your comment here suggests I was POV-pushing, when consensus roundly rejected your addition.

Similarly, at Useful idiot, dozens of editors have commented there over time, per the NYT [31] and Oxford U press [32] supporting the view that attribution to Lenin is false.

So having lost both content disputes, now you'd like to ban Thucydides411 for having both sources and consensus on their side? -Darouet (talk) 15:23, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose any sanctions this seems like a content dispute. I did some check to these diffs and I think Thucydides411 didn't do something sanctionable.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 06:20, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• I think this is strange. I was watching the Useful idiots page since 2005. Suddenly in 2017, a massive debate erupted, ostensibly about etymology, with editors like SPECIFICO arguing that the Oxford English Dictionary was not a RS. There were hints that the real issue was the Trump-Putin nexus, but I could never see the relevant. When Assange was dragged out of the embassy I started watching his page, and found the same groups of editors fighting each other: Thucydides411 and Darouet vs SPECIFICO and BullRangifer and My very best wishes. I think Assange has had a diverse life, and I don't think the 2016 election is the most important issue. I don't think JzG's intervention is helpful. I can see no sign of men's rights activists editing the page. Incidentally, Guy recently used the phrase "useful idiots" on the Assange page. However, it does seem that editors are using various articles as battlegrounds to fight over issues I don't understand.--Jack Upland (talk) 21:09, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

  Jack that's a pretty shoddy misrepresentation of the discussion at Useful Idiot. You started an RfC relating to whether a particular bit of article text should be cited to Oxford English Dictionary. Your misrepresentation of my view that I claimed OED is not a RS is just false, and in fact the RfC was closed as no consensus to cite fact to OED without attribution, as it related to the proposed article text. Don't misrepresent other editors' views, particularly in an ANI thread. Do better, especially when you refer to an article in which you participated so heavily. SPECIFICO talk 23:22, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

  I think editors can look at the "useful idiot" discussion and judge for themselves. It is clear that on 12 December 2017 you said "No", the OED was not a RS. No one was arguing we should cite the OED without attribution. I do think there is a WP:BATTLE going on here, where improving the articles is unimportant, where factions are warring over multiple articles only tangentially related to their cause, and where editors espouse completely irrational opinions, such as that the OED is not an RS, merely because they believe it supports their cause. Are these warriors are here to build an encyclopedia? However, my previous post was misleading, as I implied that this battle was raging at the Assange page in April last year. In fact, it has developed over time, and BullRangifer has only joined in recently.--Jack Upland (talk) 08:59, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Formal proposal

For being a single purpose POV account intent on obscuring the well-established fact that Russia interfered with the 2016 Presidential Election of the United States, and thereby making Wikipedia less factual and informative, Thucydides411 is indefinitely topic-banned from all subjects related to any Russian involvement in American politics, very broadly construed, including anything remotely related to Julian Assange. This topic ban can be appealed at WP:AN after a period of six months from its imposition has elapsed.

• Support as proposer. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:35, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• BMK, please consider changing the proposed wording per the comments of Creffpublic and Jayron32 below or changing to an AP2 TBAN, which is unambiguous and with much precedent. Editors can then revise their !votes if they wish, or by default just let them stand as currently posted. @Jayron32 and Beyond My Ken: SPECIFICO talk 22:41, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Nothing personal in this -- I don't know the editor from a hole in the ground. It simply seems to me to be a well-focused solution to the problem presented. If others have alternate proposals, they are free to suggest them in separate sections. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:04, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

• What is this proposal based on? You can't propose topic banning someone without any diffs showing any misbehavior. This proposal is transparently politically motivated. -Thucydides411 (talk) 06:45, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• The proposal is based on the evidence presented above. The politically-motivated behavior here is clearly yours, and we don't need it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:08, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose POV-pushing ≠ disagreeing with my point of view. Examining the diffs, none of them proves that the editor is POV pushing.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 07:06, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose There's a lot of editors here who only focus on political topics and have a particular POV. If they follow the policies they are perfectly entitled to edit where they want. This proposal does not document any diffs to back up what the proposer says. Mr Ernie (talk) 07:28, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose This is a rediculous proposal. The account in question was opened in 2006. Are we to assume they were a Russian sleeper account? A lot of the back and forth here looks like a case of editors using ANI to try to deal with content disputes. If there is a real issue here it needs to be made in a clear and concise way else this topic should be closed. Springee (talk) 19:44, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support I interacted with Thucydides411 on several occasions, and it was impossible to agree with him about anything. Hence I decided not to edit any pages that he edited. Please also see my comment with supporting diffs above. His behavior has nothing to do with using good sources or consensus building. Quite the opposite. He removes well sourced and relevant information and does not work towards building consensus. My very best wishes (talk) 20:21, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support. We have enough trouble in this area without single-purpose accounts. Oppose opinions above frame this as a difference of opinion. It's not. The facts are well-established. It would be equally bad if he were advancing any other conspiracy theory beloved of the left, such as the idea that GMOs cause cancer. Guy (help!) 20:33, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

What facts am I denying? There's an ongoing RfC about our current content dispute at Julian Assange - the one that motivated you to come here and try to get me banned. The plurality of editors currently agree with my proposed content in that RfC. Only a minority agree with your vote there. But if you're losing the content dispute because uninvolved editors find your arguments less persuasive than mine, I guess you can run to ANI and try to get me banned. -Thucydides411 (talk) 20:56, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Request rewording - we don't need a thesis statement in the topic ban or the emphatic "very broadly construed" bits. Suggest cutting it down to "Thucydides411 is indefinitely topic-banned from Russian involvement in American politics and Julian Assange, both broadly construed. This topic ban can be appealed at WP:AN after a period of six months from its imposition has elapsed." That shouldn't change the meaning and is more neutrally phrased. Alternatively, could change this to a standard AP2 topic ban, since everything here seems to be a subset of AP2. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 20:38, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Comment. As a note of order, user Thucydides411 has been previously banned on AE from all edits and pages related to US-Russia relations for three months. Please note his response: "@GoldenRing: What do I care?..." and so on. He was also previously discussed on ANI. My very best wishes (talk) 20:40, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose I am not seeing anything much worse than the people pushing for sanctions. MVBW gives diffs from a content dispute two years ago where several people disagreed is reason for a sanction? No. Heck JzG is pretty much forbidden from acting in American politics because of their bias so maybe not the best choice on dealing with bias in American politics. BullRangifer is basically a SPA at this point with anything to do with Russia. This is all just getting a little out of hand and silly. PackMecEng (talk) 20:50, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose this sanction as written. It seems personal and vindictive as written. Please propose something simpler and less attacky. Creffpublic has a better idea, IMHO. --Jayron32 20:58, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - this is a bitter, baseless, politically-driven proposal. - DoubleCross (talk) 21:32, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support First off, remember that Thucydides411 was already TBANned for this Russia-related disruption as an Arbcom Enforcement action. So it's all the worse that he still appears to be incapable of constructive interaction and discussion on articles or talk pages. He puts up walls of text, mostly devoid of meaning but full of insistence. He introduces personal disparagement and attacks, e.g. at @MrX: here or various Admins on the recent BLPN thread. Instead of responding to the views of other editors he repeats his own personal opinions over and over. And over. See e.g. that BLPN thread or the related thread earlier on Drmies' talk page. Typical of POV pushers, he often insists on cherrypicked, fringe, WP:RECENT or primary sources. A few editors have said they do not see any single diff that warrants a ban, but the problem is the hundreds of repetitions, disparagements, and WP:IDHT disruption on every article he edits, e.g. when he was promoting denial of the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections (see his nearly 100 posts in Talk Archive 8). I think it's actually broader than the Russia-related content. Please, see this thread. 76 repetitive, adversarial, and dismissive posts in a 9 day period. (Scroll down} apparently related to Marxist sensitivity over Critical Race Theory - the Russia thing again, maybe. SPECIFICO talk 22:15, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm not surprised to see you voting here, given that you've been stalking me for years now on Wikipedia. By that, I mean periodically looking through my contributions and reverting my edits. How else can you explain that you showed up at Near-Earth Object Camera, an article completely outside your normal editing area, to revert my contribution there? You've also followed me to Casualties of the Iraq War, Useful idiot and Alliance for Securing Democracy.

Despite how you describe my contributions, the consensus often ends up supporting my proposals, as opposed to yours. This is what happened at Useful Idiot, where you attempted to remove the Oxford English Dictionary as an etymological source; at Casualties of the Iraq War, where you attempted to downplay the most rigorous peer-reviewed research (the Lancet papers) on the subject; and is now occurring at Julian Assange, where you are arguing to exclude well-sourced material that I introduced, against what appears to be a forming consensus in favor of inclusion. If I'm such a fringe POV-pusher who uses weak sourcing, why do uninvolved editors so often back my views against yours? -Thucydides411 (talk) 23:24, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

I think this so-called "stalking" supports my point about WP:BATTLE. These people are warring over multiple article, and I think that is a concern.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:05, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

• Support a TBAN from AP2, as his influence everywhere has consistently tended toward denial of Russian interference, which is contrary to the facts. The Russians did interfere, and Assange was a key player:

"The report by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III released this past Friday amply documents that Assange, with the support of Russian intelligence, played a critical role in the 2016 presidential election. He is a potential missing link in the chain of understanding the extent to which foreign intervention affected the American electoral process."

He's basically an Assange SPA who blocks progress on that topic, guarding the Assange article with extreme zeal so that it's hard to make any improvements if they show Assange in a negative light. (He deleted the quote above, and it still needs to be restored.) His deletions of such content are often later restored and become part of the article, showing that he was on the wrong side of RS, consensus, and history. -- BullRangifer (talk) 23:10, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose as Thucydides411 (with Darouet's help) actually deserves commendation for staying polite and sticking to facts while being pounded like this. Peter Gulutzan (talk) 23:47, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Look, here is what had happened just a couple of days ago. In this edit, Thucydides411 removes the following info:

The report by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III released this past Friday amply documents that Assange, with the support of Russian intelligence, played a critical role in the 2016 presidential election. He is a potential missing link in the chain of understanding the extent to which foreign intervention affected the American electoral process.

This is correct, very important and well sourced view. However, Thucydides411 goes to AE to block a contributor who included this information. I do not think WP community should endorse such behavior. My very best wishes (talk) 00:53, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

May as well notify that contributor, @Calton:, now that you've mentioned that matter here. SPECIFICO talk 02:08, 7 March 2020 (UTC)'

• Oppose This looks like nothing more than a content disagreement about politics. Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 04:36, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

  Jauerback, it's not. It's a WP:SPA who is WP:OWNing articles to push a WP:FRINGE view. Guy (help!) 07:45, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree. But it matters what view, exactly. He cries "BLP violation" on pages like Assange and Maria Butina [33], and makes misleading comments in the process. For example, no one removed the fact that Butina founded "Right to Bear Arms.", etc. Same misleading claims about editing of "Useful idiot" where he just removed content of the subject sourced to highest quality sources like books by Yale University Press, etc. [34]. My very best wishes (talk) 16:46, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

The problem with the book published by Yale University Press was that it didn't mention the phrase "Useful idiot". The paragraph you added to Useful idiot that cited this source was synthesis: [35]. You used two unrelated quotes that the book discusses to make your own argument about the phrase "useful idiot", which the book does not mention.

Sloppy use of or disregard for sources was a recurring problem at Useful idiot. SPECIFICO created a talk page section titled, "Screw Saffire", in which they called William Safire a "NYTimes token Nixonite" and argued for disregarding Safire's article on the origins of the phrase "useful idiot". Just so that editors here understand, William Safire wrote the most in-depth article on the etymology of the phrase "useful idiot" that any of us editors was able to locate. The reason SPECIFICO wanted to "Screw Saffire" was that Safire came to the conclusion that there is no evidence linking the phrase to Lenin.

For anyone who finds all this back-and-forth bickering difficult to parse (I wouldn't blame you), I strongly recommend just taking a read through the talk archive of Useful idiot. Uninvolved editors can then form their own opinions on who reads sources carefully, who conducts themselves within the rules of Wikipedia, who tries to remain civil and reasonable and who doesn't. -Thucydides411 (talk) 21:09, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

No, this and all other sources you removed were very clearly on the subject of the page [36]. But it is meaningless to discuss anything here because any such disagreement will be regarded as a "content dispute". The only thing I can do is to stop editing any pages frequented by contributors like you (there are also a couple of others), and that is what I generally do. My very best wishes (talk) 15:52, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per DoubleCross – bitter, baseless, politically-driven proposal. -- Tobby72 (talk) 09:44, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose I havent seen anything out of the normal for this. I think unfair to call him a SPA. Assuming arugendo that he is a SPA I dont think a TBAN is acceptable unless TE or disruptive editing is shown, and I haven't seen either. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:01, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

• Well, have you looked at the threads at Assange, Drmies talk, and BLPN? Do you think that the purported BLP violation, personal disparagement, etc. were all about to be validated up to the last of those dozens of accusations, repetitions, and equivocations? If no, that is what's called disruptive and actionable, as JzG has explained. SPECIFICO talk 17:59, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Further, I happened to see a link to a similar thread of Thucydides411 abusing BLPN at this link.

And this thread, in which an RfC was posted to resolve Thucydides411's denials of Russian interference in the 2016 elections. As soon as a few editors rejected his view, Thucydides launches personal aspersions against several other editors.

Here he is scolding @MelanieN:, again over Russian interference. SPECIFICO talk 22:33, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose Whatever the rights and wrongs of his actions this proposal reads way to personal and politically motivated for me to support.Slatersteven (talk) 10:06, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - the more cases I see about content disputes, the more convinced I am that an AP3 is needed. Perhaps it is time for a fresh start in that topic area - wipe the slate clean, and hopefully get ArbCom to more closely review the issues that DS have created, not to mention unilateral actions and the imposition of tailor-made sanctions. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 12:23, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose The claimed 'facts' are not facts as such, but a disputed narrative. It'll be interesting in the long run to see, in retrospect, which editors turn out to be the heroes and villains.     ←   ZScarpia   16:35, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
  • ZScarpia, contrary to your claim that this is "a disputed narrative", there is no disagreement among RS. We document that there are those who dispute the fact that it was Russia, not Ukraine, that interfered in the elections, but we do not give any weight to fringe conspiracy theories and false claims, where deceptive propaganda is substituted for the contrary facts. You should read this section and its sources: Conspiracy theories related to the Trump–Ukraine scandal#Adoption by Trump. There we document the factual narrative, the one backed by RS. It is important to not engage in forbidden advocacy of fringe claims and repeat the conspiracy theories documented in that article as if they were fact. They are not. -- BullRangifer (talk) 21:45, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
    • BullRangifer, incorrect. We have one narrative that is made by the U.S. government's own investigation and it is denied by the Russian government. We don't have a UN investigation. That's what reliable sources say. They attribute what they say to the Robert Mueller report. You seem to be pushing one side POV.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 23:43, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
      • User:SharabSalam, if you somehow think that the Mueller report is a "narrative" that is one way or another endorsed by the US government, you are seriously, seriously misunderstanding how the US government works. If anything, the report proved there is no (single) US government. Do you need to be reminded that president Trump claimed the Mueller report was just a hoax? (Which also, of course, he said exculpated him--a strange contradiction only Trump could entertain.) This "both sides" kind of equivocation is detrimental to...well everything. I don't subscribe to many conspiracy theories, but the facts laid out in the Mueller report, the information uncovered by other intelligence services (including the Dutch), they make this clear enough. That the Russian government denies this is par for the course; that the US executive branch doesn't act on it is a. a denial of your "narrative" theory and b. sad. At some point, "the sky is blue" is not a POV anymore. Drmies (talk) 14:40, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
      • SharabSalam, please read what I wrote more carefully. RS, as in "the RS used at the English Wikipedia," (somewhat different than the Russian Wikipedia!!) are not in doubt about who interfered. Both Russian intelligence and Western intelligence agencies cannot be right. One side has to be lying, and our RS say that Russia is lying to us, and Trump sides with them and repeats their lies. Dutch intelligence literally filmed and recorded Russian hackers as they did it. Western intelligence actually found the stolen emails on Russian intelligence servers. They were then passed to Russian cutouts Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks, and from them to WikiLeaks/Assange.

I suggest you read these articles and their sources:

Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections

Conspiracy theories related to the Trump–Ukraine scandal#Adoption by Trump

Editors should be familiar with those sources and that narrative. That is the narrative of the RS used at the English Wikipedia. If an editor doesn't agree with that narrative, they can still edit here, as long as they don't advocate the fringe ("wrong") narrative and oppose the information from our RS. We/Wikipedia don't "take sides" in the usual sense, but we do side with RS, so we side with the narrative of those RS. We also side with RS when the narrative changes, even if it ends up changing the narrative completely. Anything less would mean we abandon dependence on RS now (thus betraying our duty as editors) in favor of a hoped for, and later, confirmation of currently held "fringe beliefs." ("Fringe beliefs" here means "POV contrary to RS", IOW beliefs based on unreliable sources.) Editors who hold fringe beliefs and depend on unreliable sources should find other topics to edit, topics where they can comfortably depend on the RS we use here at the English Wikipedia for those topics. Otherwise, they would probably feel more comfortable editing these AP2 subjects at the Russian Wikipedia. -- BullRangifer (talk) 01:40, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

It's a good thing that whoever closes this will not just be counting votes. SPECIFICO talk 02:09, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• Support Of course Thucydides should be TBANNED for being a disinformation SPA, and I wonder what facts ZScarpia thinks are up for debate? The reality of Russian meddling in US elections? Can we just TBAN all the accounts that would dispute that here? The sourcing leaves no doubt about this reality, anyone that would try to debate that here is being disruptive. I don't care if your "politics," which I take to mean, your personal politics, are different, here we follow sourcing. Going against that is sanctionable. Geogene (talk) 21:57, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

The reality of Russian meddling in US elections? Can we just TBAN all the accounts that would dispute that here?

This comment above shows that the issue is not Thucydides but content disputes with editors who are trying to silence other editors who they dispute with through ANI reports.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 22:10, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

That's incorrect. Thucydides411 pushes WP:FRINGE POVs with filibusters and disparagement of other editors. Those are behavioral disruptions, not content disputes, and when necessary, we block and ban editors to allow the community to get on with its work. Please read the links to evidence that have been provided in this matter. Yes, it's a huge amount to read, but that only reflects the monumental and longstanding extent of Thucydides411's misconduct. SPECIFICO talk 22:17, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

The U.S meddling is only confirmed by the U.S. government, not by the Russian government. The U.S. government is not a source of "undisputed facts", in fact, every time we mention their allegations we should attribute, like we shouldn't say it in Wikivoice but in attribution to the U.S. Meuller report. The fact that we have editors calling for Tban for those who they dispute with is astonishing and disruptive. The editor in the comment above has admittedly said that he thinks all editors should be Tbanned because of content disagreements, "[t]he reality of Russian meddling in US elections? Can we just TBAN all the accounts that would dispute that here?"--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 22:38, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

That's your fringe personal opinion. Reliable sources accept that the meddling took place, and editors that try to argue otherwise are POV-pushers. That's sanctionable. Geogene (talk) 22:44, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

That's not my personal view. That's the other side view, Russia and other countries who don't trust the U.S. investigation. Also, your view is the U.S. view, it's one sided. This has nothing to with fringe views. The only confirmation for the Russia meddling comes from one side, the U.S. side. The issue here is your comment calling for a Tban for other editors who disagree with your government point of view/allegations against Russia (assuming that you are American). You said "[t]he reality of Russian meddling in US elections? Can we just TBAN all the accounts that would dispute that here?" This sounds like something that should raise concern here.-SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 22:51, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Of course Russia disputes that they meddled in the election. Reliable sources don't care about that, so neither do we. By the way, why are you indefinitely blocked in Arabic Wikipedia? 22:54, 8 March 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Geogene (talk • contribs)

Reliable sources do say that the Russian government denies the U.S. allegations. Reliable sources say that this is the U.S. allegation. You have called for a Tban to all editors who present any dispute to the U.S. allegations, you said, Can we just TBAN all the accounts that would dispute that here?. Also my Arabic account isn't related to this discussion, don't try to change the subject here.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 23:06, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm aware that Russia denies meddling. What is your point? Reliable sources say that the meddling took place. Also, there's a chance your indefinite ban from Arabic might just be relevant to your advocacy of POV-pushing here. Geogene (talk) 23:08, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

You have literally called for a Tban to all editors who disagree with your point of view, who is POV-pushing here? Your words speak for themselves "Can we just TBAN all the accounts that would dispute that here?". Also, RSs say that this is what the U.S. own investigation says. --SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 23:17, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

RS's say that Russia meddled, you are POV pushing, and I look forward to the day that that TBAN comes down on you. Geogene (talk) 23:21, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

RSs say that this is what the U.S. own investigation says, the Mueller report is the result of the U.S. investigation. The U.S. is not a neutral actor here. Russia says that it's investigation says it didn't meddle in the U.S. election and said that they are welcome to evidences. There is no investigation by a neutral actor. Think of it the other way around, if in the Russian election, Russia said that the U.S. meddled in its election and that the Russian version of the Mueller report concluded that the U.S. was meddling in their election, should we Tban those who disagree with Russia as fringe POV-pushers? This is how you sound to me. Your comment, "I look forward to the day that that TBAN comes down on you." shows exactly what this ANI report is for. Content dispute/disagreements.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 23:38, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

You're just full of IDHT, aren't you? Geogene (talk) 23:47, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I'm going to lay this little egg right here as it demonstrates the ambiguities and uncertainties we're dealing with regarding this content. Read it carefully. The criticism against this editor is clearly centered on what content should/should not be included. We have 2 equal forces, "push & resist", debating each other and neither belong here. RfCs determine consensus, not ANI. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 00:05, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks to Atsme for the good source. User:SharabSalam, both sides cannot be right. I think you'll agree that one has to be lying. The controversy isn't just some "misunderstanding". I suggest you read Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, the sources in it, and the articles listed in its "See also" section. The conflict described above isn't about personal POV, but about one's attitude toward RS, but, of course, the sources we use form our personal POV, so indirectly our personal POV can end up becoming disruptive if it constantly wars with what RS say.

On the Russian Wikipedia, their evaluation of RS is likely quite different than here, and your views might be in line with their policies and not disruptive there. By contrast, at the English Wikipedia, your views are directly against our RS policy and the content and RS in myriad articles here, so please study the subject at the English Wikipedia and bring your thinking, or at least your public statements, into line with the sources we use and the articles we write. It is entirely possible for an editor to privately/secretly disagree with the content in our articles without it causing them any problems here, but if they publicly and persistently advocate fringe POV (=POV against RS and consensus) in their discussions, that becomes problematic. I know this is a huge and complex subject, so I wish you well in your research of the subject. Feel free to come to my talk page if you have questions. -- BullRangifer (talk) 00:33, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps both sides cannot both be right, but both sides can most certainly be wrong. And even if one side was wrong, that does not mean that they must be lying. There are many, many disputes which have boiled down to two sides looking at primary and secondary sources and coming to different conclusions; that is the very definition of a content dispute. In addition, I'll note that others have said this account is SPA towards certain topics, and this proposal bans the user from topics - therefore it behaves like a sitewide ban. --Mr. Vernon (talk) 07:01, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

We TBAN single purpose accounts. Please review WP:SPA. SPECIFICO talk 07:19, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

It would be better to review policies rather than an essay. SPAs aren't banned for being SPAs, they're banned because of conflicts of interest, advocacy or non-neutral editing. I would say that it's not clear who the guilty party or parties are, as far as pushing points of view goes. Various references above to 'truth' should be ringing alarm bells.     ←   ZScarpia   09:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I did not say that we ban them merely for being an SPA. I should have been more clear. We do not give special dispensations to disruptive accounts because they are SPAs. Thucydides411's disruptive behavior is evident in the diffs, talkpage, and noticeboard threads cited in this ANI. We don't allow that kind of behavior merely because it's in a single topic area. In fact, the disruption, NOTHERE, and SPA profiles frequently overlap in editors whom we ban. At some point, this one will be banned. Maybe now, maybe later. SPECIFICO talk 12:48, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm looking at your edit history, SPECIFICO.You have over 1300 edits to Talk:Donald Trump and over 1000 edits to Talk:Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. I'm not sure how you get to accuse someone of being a single-purpose account by looking at your recent edit history which is nearly all on Trump, Bloomberg, Hunter Biden, etc. Also on this comment: "at some point, this one will be banned" - I'm not sure what your point is. That we just ban now? As an aside, you were topic banned because of your behavior; you seem to be equally incivil here, in this editor's humble opinion. --Mr. Vernon (talk) 14:00, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, in my experience, SPECIFICO is close to a SPA account focussed on the USA-Russia nexus and is very aggressive to other editors.--Jack Upland (talk) 08:54, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose Proposal throws around a lot of accusations/labels without any specifics, thread indicates content disputes. A proposal for one of the harshest available sanctions shouldn't pass muster without convincing evidence, which is lacking here. Wikieditor19920 (talk) 10:38, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Renewed behavioral issues re: Julian Assange talk

Thucydides411 ongoing stalking and bludgeon - After prolonged discussion on the article talk page, where Thucydides411 now has over 120 posts and counting, the discussion is clearly going against Thucydides411' point of view. Thucydides411 starts an RfC to rehash the question yet again. After JzG posts his view, Thucydides411 goes to JzG's talk page to insistently "suggest" that JzG strike his remarks. This is not just a content dispute. This is the sort of disruption that prevents other editors from doing the work of article improvement. We routinely sanction editors who behave this way. SPECIFICO talk

@SPECIFICO: Please stop misrepresenting things. At the Julian Assange talk page, I proposed an edit, which a majority of editors agreed with. You yourself acknowledged that a majority agreed with me, arguing that we should disregard the majority opinion: "we do not count votes around here". In other words, when you state (directly above) that "the discussion is clearly going against Thucydides411' point of view", you know this to be untrue.

I launched an RfC only after three different editors in the discussion proposed that I should do so. Guy: "Try an RfC with a few options" and "I suggest that is best resolved by an RfC with a couple of different options." Slatersteven: "either an RFC or DR is needed." Jtbobwaysf: "I too support an RfC".

I posted on Guy's talk page to discreetly ask them if they would correct a in important but factually incorrect statement that they had made.

SPECIFICO, you know all this context. Please stop misrepresenting it. -Thucydides411 (talk) 16:28, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Thucydides411: It is disruptive and disrespectful to this ANI process for you to to misrepresent me by cherrypicking words out of context without diffs. That alone is grounds for a ban.

I wrote: Because we do not count votes around here, "support per XXX" is irrelevant to the discussion. I said that after a flurry of your group arrived in rapid succession to state "Remove content per Darouet" and @Snooganssnoogans: pointed out that repetition without valid argument provides no rationale for the removal. In fact, you yourself, Thucydides411, made a similar comment repeatedly last month in polls that rejected other edits of yours. "The closer should discount votes that make these sorts of uninformed and unserious comments.""To whomever closes this RfC, please discount votes that claim this is one person's opinion"

Your views and your defense here have been joined by single purpose accounts and editors who advocate a false equivalence between the consensus of world RS reporting on the 2016 U.S. election and Russian disinformation, abetted by Assange. Insistent disruption of article improvement, delivered with your style of misrepresentation and personal aspersions is exactly why editors get banned. At best, your account is WP:NOTHERE SPECIFICO talk 17:26, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Anyone can judge for themselves if you were being dishonest here. I laid it out above with a link to the relevant talk section and quotes from it. In the meantime, I suggest you stop bludgeoning this section. -Thucydides411 (talk) 17:50, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Sources

Boomerang Question

Going nowhere
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I think there are WP:BOOMERANG issues that need to be looked at here. It appears me that Guy JzG (talk · contribs) is too close to this Assange issue (or maybe AP2?). Is he using admin privileges to frame an already battleground ridden article, or simply acting as an impartial admin? He warned me on my talk page with this warning which I felt was unusual. I felt it would be normal for an uninvolved editor or admin, but for an involved admin, I felt it was a bit much. Thoughts? Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:21, 7 March 2020 (UTC) I don’t think JzG (talk · contribs) is subject to WP:BOOMERANG? 207.38.146.86 (talk) 13:30, 7 March 2020 (UTC) What actions has Guy taken in this issue as an admin? Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:44, 7 March 2020 (UTC) All of them, possibly. An admin’s status affects the wikiteurs around them, with a very few honorable exceptions. The recent debacle with Kudpung underlines this. Persons in authority are often quite clueless about the power imbalance spilling over to unrelated things. Qwirkle (talk) But that's not Guy; that's other people. As long as admin—any admin—doesn't misuse their tools, it's up to other people how they react. ——SN54129 19:37, 7 March 2020 (UTC) We’ll have to agree to disagree on this, I think. Any case of power imbalance leaves the person on the lower side more conscious of it than the one on top, and that’s a common problem here. While i’d disagree strenuously that there is something worth a boomerang here, that has nothing to do with actual use of admin tools. Qwirkle (talk) 20:03, 7 March 2020 (UTC) FWIW, I heartilly agree with you about power imablance, and I'm certainly not saying it does not exist—far from it. But a lot of the time editors perceive (operative word) admins as more "powerful" than they actually are. Anyway. Happy Saturday! ——SN54129 20:12, 7 March 2020 (UTC) Serial Number 54129, 2 of the last 3 arb desysop cases demonstrated no misuse of tools. Mr Ernie (talk) 20:06, 7 March 2020 (UTC) We're talking about how people react to admins, not arbcom judgmenets which are (thankfully) two very different things. ——SN54129 20:12, 7 March 2020 (UTC) Basically, the argument appears to be that JzG is respected as an admin and therefore his editing of articles should be limited because respected editors hold too much sway. So, we should limit admin editing (and perhaps any editor that is respected) and make admin recruitment more difficult. O3000 (talk) 20:30, 7 March 2020 (UTC) No, that argument would be your strawman. Mine differs on three points. First, this isn’t about this particular admin, but a generalization about them, or a perception of them, as a group. Next, it has nothing to do with respect, but with power. Finally, it says nothing about restricting scope of writing, but that those in power should be taking care not only to not abuse one’s powers, but to be seen as not doing so. Qwirkle (talk) 20:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC) Admins don't use their tools on articles in which they are involved. O3000 (talk) 20:41, 7 March 2020 (UTC) No. Admins aren’t supposed to use their tools on articles in which they are involved, a substantial difference. Qwirkle (talk) 20:51, 7 March 2020 (UTC) I have had very few limited interaction with this admin but he makes inflammatory comments and he does that with the intention to be provocative. My first interaction with this admin was in this deletion discussion the admin made many comments saying "oranges" instead of origins just to mock Trump, here is some examples, an editor says it is POV fork, Guy response with POV fork of what, exactly? I mean, I know the "oranges" theory is a POV fork of reality, but of which Wikipedia article is this a POV fork? My second interaction with this admin was in this ANI thread here he calls other editors OK, so the RT fanclub is out for Philip Cross' blood again. Cool, cool. [37] totally provocative comment only just to provoke. My third interaction was yesterday, the editor made a totally uneutral invitation to an RfC in WP:FTN, you can see the discussion, I have explained there how it is uneutral invitation while the admin didnt respond and ignored what I am saying. Note, this is just with the limited interaction, imagine if I was an editor who has to deal with this provocation all the time. Recently many admins were reported in AE and their adminship was removed and I feel that what they did was nothing comparing to this.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 20:06, 7 March 2020 (UTC) Ironic to see all this Wiki-identity politics chat -- what might be called "Admin privilege". As cited, one of Thucydides411's many disruptions is on the White privilege article, in which he has bludgeoned the talk page with 76 posts on the current version, including Marxist and other denials of the phenomenon. SPECIFICO talk 20:16, 7 March 2020 (UTC) Maybe its time for special DS for all material related to Assange. No edits with out consensus, 1 edit per day period, Zero PA's (even of the mildest kind, in fact no commenting on users period), and a zero tolerance approach, one infraction and its a TBAN?Slatersteven (talk) 10:17, 8 March 2020 (UTC) Slatersteven, seems like a sensible idea. Guy (help!) 23:36, 8 March 2020 (UTC) All the, ahem, productive discussion above Slater's comment should be hatted, and a new section opened to discuss instituting GS for Assange along the the lines Slater suggests. We can get that done here and now. Separately, someone should launch an RFC about whether we do or do not say in Wikivoice that Russia meddled in elections (if that RFC hasn't been run already). That way, editors not editing in compliance with the RFC could be sanctioned under GS. Levivich [dubious – discuss] 00:34, 9 March 2020 (UTC) Levivich, that RfC is an excellent suggestion. Whenever it happens, a notification should be placed at the Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections article (and the myriad related articles). BTW, do you mean DS where you write GS, or am I forgetting something? -- BullRangifer (talk) 01:17, 9 March 2020 (UTC) BullRangifer, I thought WP:AC/DS can only be instituted by Arbcom, but WP:GS can be instituted by the community. Levivich [dubious – discuss] 01:33, 9 March 2020 (UTC) Thanks for the informative links. -- BullRangifer (talk) 02:12, 9 March 2020 (UTC) A better idea would just be to move this complaint to AE, where we have a more orderly process and Admins do their best to decide based on policies and guidelines. Guy, I think you could make that move as OP. I don't think we want to have as many sets of page restrictions as there are topics. It's too complicated, and we already have plenty of policies against TE, FRINGE, PA, and other relevant behaviors. 1 edit a day? I've never seen that. Sounds like it would lead to thousand word posts on the talk page. SPECIFICO talk 01:11, 9 March 2020 (UTC) The problem is enforcement. There are already several Arbcom motions and site policies that require a block or TBAN for Thucydides and possibly others. Additional complex or unusual restrictions are not going to make enforcement more likely. The current case needs to be resolved conclusively one way or the other. AE will provide a resolution. Nobody's going to be able to read this ANI thread, discount the POV and unsupported !votes, and arrive at a resolution all editors recognize as correct. SPECIFICO talk 01:30, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

We have nothing but baseless accusations here against Guy, and odd statements like "An admin’s status affects the wikiteurs around them" does not add up to anything. For one thing, I don't know what Guy's "status" is (I think his is comparable to mine--we haven't gotten a raise in years, and I see him outside the chair's office often enough to know he's in as much trouble as I am), nor do I know what a "wikiteur" is. And I really don't need to have that explained: my brain is full. Drmies (talk) 14:44, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Drmies, That is a masterful summary. Guy (help!) 15:32, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Extended DS

t has been requested that this be discussed as a new section, so here goes.

On articles related to Julian Assange DS are extended to include No edits with out consensus, 1 edit per day per user, no commenting on users in any way, and a zero tolerance approach, one infraction and its a TBAN?Slatersteven (talk) 09:21, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Shouldn't this suggestion be proposed at AE or perhaps AN since it involves DS that need to be imposed by an admin at their discretion? ANI is for incidents and it appears to me the above portion of this discussion should be closed before opening yet another. I have seen far more controversial reports get closed within a day of opening, yet this one lingers on. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 14:00, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

It has been suggested that this might only confuse the ANI.Slatersteven (talk) 17:48, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, this is ANI ^Atsme _Talk 📧 14:51, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

.

Atsme, I agree with you, although I thought ARCA might be the better choice. At any rate, in the case of Thucydides411, his behavior was blockable without any DS. We don't tolerate incivility, disruption, etc. on such an extensive and egregious scale. His POV pushing, and fringe cherrypicking, etc. is just what motivates him. When an account behaves that badly for that long, on that many articles, it shouldn't require special rulemaking to let the rest of us get on with our work. SPECIFICO talk 18:22, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

SPECIFICO, you know I like you, so I’ll just give it to you straight: I think you’ve said enough here. One of your main complaints about our Athenian friend is how they’ve a tendency to comment frequently. I think by now all of us get your point. Mr Ernie (talk) 20:19, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Oh gee thanks, Ernie. Yes, you and I are pals. SPECIFICO talk 20:29, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

IP editor using multiple IPs for vandalism

IP from Hungary keeps removing "present" from people's current relationships on the infobox in several articles without any explanation. They get reverted, warned and come back with a new IP the next day. I've found 21 IPs so far. They're also removing sourced portions of the article[38] and adding past boyfriends to the infobox, which is not allowed.[39][40][41]

In December, another editor warned one of the IPs (2A02:2F07:D60D:7300:8CE7:8E3C:4941:8907) to not use multiple IP addresses to disrupt Wikipedia,[42] and they got blocked for 72 hours for persistent vandalism on December 22, 2019,[43] so they may be using more IPs than these 21 listed below.

IPs:

• 178.164.217.248 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 37.76.111.131 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 37.76.45.94 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A02:2F07:D60D:7300:8CE7:8E3C:4941:8907 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:E38:6D79:9025:D012:AA04 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:8820:A155:D4A0:E784:B075 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:2A38:B1C6:F75B:95AF:5C4C (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:49B:191F:BAA6:3238:D772 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:879D:B485:7AC5:8221:73D4 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:2A38:4CDA:3856:AB7E:6422 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:2031:95CB:93E4:73F2:9D69 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:2031:B1A6:A3ED:9764:438E (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:2037:640C:AA56:98CB:2C45 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:2037:3C97:EDD:4ABD:FD2E (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:E38:F84D:FD37:F670:DE7E (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:879D:288B:E1E3:E141:2CA (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 2A01:36D:119:879D:893E:2073:9FA:3B43 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 37.76.2.69/20 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 37.76.89.110 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 37.76.64.0 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))
• 37.76.125.11 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log))

Diffs:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=929455705&oldid=928175499
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=prev&oldid=932010888
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=932010888&oldid=931865085
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=937336919&oldid=937335261
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=943580145&oldid=943505147
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=943325968&oldid=943311890
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=943215660&oldid=943171533
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=943071472&oldid=942916154
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=940010164&oldid=939814044
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=939703062&oldid=939050102
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=938712049&oldid=937688254
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Marion_Cotillard&diff=937529614&oldid=937365853
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Renée_Zellweger&diff=prev&oldid=929505294
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ren%C3%A9e_Zellweger&diff=941676039&oldid=941633009
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ren%C3%A9e_Zellweger&diff=943579994&oldid=943405760
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ren%C3%A9e_Zellweger&diff=943859906&oldid=943679071
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jenna_Dewan&diff=prev&oldid=943860086
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rachel_McAdams&diff=prev&oldid=943864112
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Enrique_Iglesias&diff=prev&oldid=943863306
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Brenda_Song&diff=prev&oldid=943859448
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rachel_McAdams&diff=943864112&oldid=943313527
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rachel_McAdams&diff=943071320&oldid=942732838
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Diane_Kruger&diff=943580491&oldid=943313377
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Diane_Kruger&diff=941145528&oldid=940496640
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Diane_Kruger&diff=940496433&oldid=940341136
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Diane_Kruger&diff=prev&oldid=940010530
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eva_Mendes&diff=943580608&oldid=943313234
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eva_Mendes&diff=941674552&oldid=941298959
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eva_Mendes&diff=prev&oldid=940010643
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Goldie_Hawn&diff=prev&oldid=932010571
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kurt_Russell&diff=prev&oldid=932010669
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Norman_Reedus&diff=prev&oldid=940010399
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Guillaume_Canet&diff=943580403&oldid=943313477
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Guillaume_Canet&diff=941145898&oldid=940948248
• https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Courteney_Cox&diff=prev&oldid=940497389

Zoolver (talk) 13:02, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: I have looked through the diffs and the links in your statement. I am not seeing vandalism. I am seeing a formatting issue. Regarding removing sourced material, you link to one instance - that is a content issue which should be discussed on the talk page. Lightburst (talk) 14:41, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• @Zoolver: If you want any action taken here, you're going to have to present this in a simpler way. First, create ranges of IPs, not singles, and make sure that those ranges are all doing similar activity, meaning no collateral damage if the range is blocked. Second, at least some of the IPs in a range must have edited recently. I don't care about edits that occurred last month, let alone last year, but I'm willing to consider blocking a range for longer if the activity is recent and has been going on for some period of time.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:40, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

• What else is necessary for you people to consider something as vandalism and block several IPs from the same editor doing the same thing for months after being warned several times by different editors and refusing to stop? First I reported it for sockpuppetry but you guys said that there was no sockpuppetry and suggested that I should take it here, now there's no vandalism, so what should I try next? @Bbb23: Did you even check the damn diffs and 15 IPs listed here? there are diffs from this week on that list. If that wasn't clear, the first diffs showed how it started last year and were followed by the most recent edits from this week showing the same pattern. No wonder Wikipedia is this mess when the admins aren't willing to resolve such an obvious vandalism and expect regular editors to be experts and do their job for them. @Lightburst: nobody is checking those talk pages, let alone the IP editor who started it all and got warned to stop it several times. They won't stop, that's why I took it straight to ANI instead of taking it to 50 talk pages and wait for an admin to check it someday when they feel like it, but now I see that it was useless anyway. Zoolver (talk) 02:06, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
• Hey EEng, I can't find what MOS says about the desirability of "2007–present" vs. "2007–" (diff). Wasn't that talked about recently ... somewhere? Johnuniq (talk) 02:19, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

  MOS:TOPRESENT. I don't recall any recent discussion on this and a lazy look at MOS and MOSNUM archives didn't find anything either. EEng 02:57, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

  Thanks, that confirms that the IP is wrong and style is "2007–present" while omitting "present" is wrong. Persistently unhelpful edits waste good editor's time. I'll try to have a look later. Johnuniq (talk) 04:03, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

The 2020 contributions of the IPs listed above are covered by Special:Contributions/2A01:36D:119:0:0:0:0:0/48 and it looks like it's one person. Their last edit was 08:23, 5 March 2020 which is a bit long ago for a block. @Zoolver: Please monitor the /48 link and let me know if it continues. An attempt should be made to engage them on their talk (not a warning but a friendly 'please stop removing "present" from infoboxes because the manual of style (MOS:TOPRESENT) requires "present"') but there's no point doing that unless using the talk page of a recently active IP. Johnuniq (talk) 06:59, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

• @Johnuniq: They came back today.[44] [45][46] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zoolver (talk • contribs) 21:25, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

• @Zoolver: I left a message at User talk:2A01:36D:119:879D:893E:2073:9FA:3B43 in the hope that they will discuss the issue or at least stop removing "present". Please notify me again if you see more. Johnuniq (talk) 04:22, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

• @Johnuniq: They keep removing "present" with a new IP: Special:Contributions/37.76.2.69/20: [47], [48], [49]. Zoolver (talk) 15:00, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

It's not clear that "2007-present" is a good thing to have in an article. It would certainly not do for a person's lifespan, for example. It also implies that if the qualified item expires it will be updated immediately, whereas "2007-" is clearer that it's a time of writing statement. In prose it could be cast "Foo started in 2007,, and was coninuting as of 2020" (wiht or without {{As of}}.

Having said that if there is consensus that this is vandalism, or even just undesireable, the place to look for help may be WP:Edit filters. All the best: Rich Farmbrough (the apparently calm and reasonable) 20:13, 10 March 2020 (UTC).

The IP's edits are strongly opposed by MOS:TOPRESENT. I requested a temporary filter at Wikipedia:Edit filter/Requested#MOS:TOPRESENT but blocking the IP might be needed if that doesn't work. Johnuniq (talk) 23:56, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• I checked all the IP's contribs listed by the OP. They're all tagged "mobile web edit". The reason this user is unresponsive to warnings is possibly because mobile IP editors are not given the slightest hint that they have new messages. So blocking might be the only way to get this user's attention. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 02:30, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

  Man, fixing that should be an absolutely top priority. EEng 13:54, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

  Agreed, it's amazing how dumb the WMF and some of the people at phab:T240889 are. Maybe an indignant demand at User talk:Jimbo Wales? Johnuniq (talk) 01:09, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• New IPs: Special:Contributions/37.76.89.110 and Special:Contributions/37.76.64.0, and the range Special:Contributions/37.76.64.0/18 has some questionable and unsourced edits and obvious trolling such as this [50]. Zoolver (talk) 04:24, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Many new accounts replacing articles with redirects

I've noticed many accounts that were created very recently are replacing various articles with redirects, with claims that they are "non-notable" or similar. I'm not sure whether the articles actually are non-notable or not, but I feel something is off with so many new accounts doing the same kind of thing, and if I remember correctly, there should generally be discussion before replacing an article with a redirect. Examples below. Diamond Blizzard talk 18:46, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

[51] [52] [53] [54] [55] [56] [57] [58] [59] [60] [61] [62] [63] [64] [65] [66] [67] [68] [69]

• I've looked at the first five of these and they're all completely reasonable redirects - non-notable people / albums in their own right, some unsourced BLPs, but for who a redirect to their "parent" article (usually a band or a relative) is perfectly OK. Black Kite (talk) 19:19, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Okay then. I was just wondering why there were so many new accounts doing the same thing, but I guess if the redirects are fine, it's okay. Diamond Blizzard talk 19:21, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
    • Yes, it's a bit weird, but I've been through them all now and can't really see any issues. Indeed, I've PRODded a couple because they didn't even have reasonable redirect targets. Black Kite (talk) 19:36, 8 March 2020 (UTC)
• I looked at six accounts in Diamond Blizzard's diffs. They were all created today, within minutes of each other, and the redirects were their first edits. BlackcurrantTea (talk) 19:37, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

List of accounts with similar redirects:

Some of the accounts have been locked. I also noticed two, not mentioned here, that haven't redirected but have removed content, so I don't know if these are related. Peter James (talk) 23:37, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Not all. There's definitely a pattern, accounts with two edits (including redirecting the talk page...) --Mr. Vernon (talk) 00:24, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

This looks like someone going through the older Category:Articles lacking sources categories and redirecting them as a backdoor deletion method. I don't know why this would be necessary, a lot of these articles are unlikely to survive AfD. —Xezbeth (talk) 07:37, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I have now reverted most of these, with the exception of some albums that were redirected and a couple of BLPs that were redirected to sensible locations. The rest made little sense so I have restored unreferenced BLPs in a few cases. Deletion is preferable to hiding them within a redirect to an unrelated topic. —Xezbeth (talk) 07:53, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I've just posted on your talk page - basically you've just restored a pile of unsourced BLPs (not to mention stuff only sourced to IMDB etc). Yes, deletion is preferable, so why haven't you nominated them for deletion? Really, that's not good at all. Black Kite (talk) 11:14, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

• Hi. These accounts are made by my peers for a classwork our teacher told us to take on. We were asked to redirect unsourced articles to a proper target. He did not open a WikiEdu project because he thought there wouldn't be an issue. If there is an issue I could ask my teacher to make a comment here. Spanishgirlswantmypesos (talk) 10:20, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

  Spanishgirlswantmypesos, yes, please open a WikiEdu project and/or have your teacher comment here - we're happy to have you all help, but we need to make sure everyone's on the same page with regard to policies and procedures. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 13:04, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

  Creffett, just note that not all of these were done right. Monstove redirected Averatec, a manufacturer of laptops that has gone out of business, to a specific model of a laptop made by another company that Averatec apparently rebranded. Mr. Vernon (talk) 08:04, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  Mr. Vernon, sure, I didn't mean to suggest that their actions were correct, just that we welcome well-intentioned new users (probably could have made that clearer - re-reading it, I can see that the way I wrote it could suggest that what they were doing was okay). AGF and all that. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 17:28, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

User:HumbleOctopus has been blocked for block evasion. This might be worth careful review to ensure we are not inadvertantly being bitey. All the best: Rich Farmbrough (the apparently calm and reasonable) 20:25, 10 March 2020 (UTC).

This set of users seems to be related to Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Zawl. Whether this is an intersection, subset, or two similar groups with different motivation but similar patterns I don't know. All the best: Rich Farmbrough (the apparently calm and reasonable) 20:29, 10 March 2020 (UTC).

I was just going to point out the similarity to Veganlover1993 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log); see the SPI/sock category and behavior of some of the accounts. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 21:21, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I've had little time for Wikipedia lately aside from monitoring selected things on my watchlist. I just wanted to note that I saw an instance occur with stubs on geographic places which are exclusively or primarily sourced to GNIS. The edit summary I saw in one case of a stub conversion to a redirect claimed that the entry failed WP:GEOLAND, which is contrary to the outcome of multiple AFDs I've directly participated in within the past several years. RadioKAOS / Talk to me, Billy / Transmissions 22:16, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I have started a sockpuppet investigation at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Bigbulletfeels. All of the accounts listed above are now populated into the report. I was not aware of the extent of the issue when I filed the report. — Newslinger talk 11:00, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Prior to filing the SPI, I had blocked Frenchgirlswantmypesos for being a vandalism-only account. In Special:Diff/945169160, Frenchgirlswantmypesos redirected Granit Xhaka to Sexual harrasment [sic], a blatant violation of the policy on biographies of living persons, when the Granit Xhaka article had 84 citations. — Newslinger talk 11:03, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

DeltaQuad has completed the investigation, and blocked a total of 99 accounts. — Newslinger talk 13:43, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

GDX420, take 2

• GDX420 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

A month ago this same user was taken to ANI and blocked over their bad behavior - which included bad faith accusations and general trolling. It appears they're not willing to drop the stick as all of their edits appear to be a continuation of the same, baseless accusations which don't appear to have ever been substantiated. I am struggling to find a single edit that would demonstrate this user is anything but a net negative. All of their edits from the start have been inciting drama and even outright trolling editors. Enough is enough. Oh and see this frivolous COIN report as well.Praxidicae (talk) 20:24, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Oh and in case it isn't clear, I'd suggest an indefinite block. Praxidicae (talk) 20:56, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

A block would prevent this casting of WP:ASPERSIONS. This edit is bumping into WP:NLT territory. MarnetteD|Talk 20:37, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I must admit that I ignored the comment about indictments because it was so bizarre that I didn't take it seriously and thought they meant bans (of the alleged paid editors). But they did write "indictments", and so maybe a ban (of the editor idly yelling about paid editing) may be in order. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:39, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

The community has urged WMF to take more aggressive action against abuse and this is the sort of case where millions of dollars in profit could be used to make an example of bad actors like GDX420. Chris Troutman (talk) 20:54, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment I would support a formal warning for this user. I am not seeing the need for an indefinite ban... it seems rather draconian since the editor is discussing matters and using the proper venues to report COIN. The disruption to the encyclopedia is not to that point. We cannot divine the intentions of the editor, but the problematic/accusatory behavior can likely be stopped with a formal administrator warning. Wm335td (talk) 21:39, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

you mean the three he already received, plus the one at the last ani and the block wasn’t warning enough? They’re making absurd claims about good faith editors with no such evidence. Praxidicae (talk) 21:41, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I have at least two comments.

1. User:Llemiles has been templating User:GDX420 with increasingly severe warnings for vandalism. What GDX420 is doing is not vandalism. Not all disruptive editing is vandalism. The actions to which Llemiles took exception included a questionable, possibly bad-faith PROD and a questionable, possibly bad-faith AFD, and the latter was snow closed; but bad-faith deletion tagging is not vandalism. I understand that Llemiles was angered and insulted by the edits, but they were not vandalism, and idly yelling vandalism weakens the ability of Wikipedia to contain real vandalism. Two wrongs don't make a right.

2. User:SlimVirgin and I have assisted User:GDX420 in setting up the ability to send and receive email, and GDX420 wants to send me off-wiki evidence of paid editing. To whom should they instead send any evidence of paid editing? It should preferably be an admin or group that can if appropriate return the boomerang. We should provide an opportunity for editors to provide real evidence of paid editing, and we should strongly discourage idle accusations of paid editing.

Robert McClenon (talk) 22:34, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Supportive of a ban - GDX420 seems to consider himself a lone saviour trying to take out paid editing and malpractice on Wikipedia. His contributions show he is not interested in the nuance, discussion, and fair practice that Wikipedia requires. I worry that Robert McClenon's comments severely understate the bad faith and abuse of process demonstrated by him. Firstly, I'm pretty sure deletion of content from articles is vandalism, so I fail to see how that is different to (seeking to) delete entire articles from Wikipedia. Secondly, if the vandalism template was not appropriate I apologise, but clearly a template of some order was required on a number of occasions.

User:Llemiles - I think that a disruptive editing template was in order for the content removal. The usual approach to bad deletion nominations is to topic-ban the editor, which is in order if they are not site-banned.

I seriously question his judgement and ability to make reasoned accusations - he accused me of editing the article Starling Bank despite the fact I had never even made an edit to that page. He then decided my articles, including one about a not for profit wildlife centre, were also paid edits. If he, after an initial ban, is continuing to make baseless accusations against editors, I can't see how we can continue other than to make a longer/permanent ban. Regarding his evidence, I would be very cautious. He uploaded one example onto Wiki Commons which was nothing more than a corporate Google Doc with talking/messaging points and with no names or usernames. If there is substantive evidence then it should be heard, but I am not confident that GDX420 can do so without intimidating and falsely accusing editors in his profane manner. At his worst, he could make libellous accusations against well-financed companies with good legal teams. Llemiles (talk) 23:15, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

You should not be encouraging them to send PII to anyone but arbcom. I can't believe that needs to be explained. I'm not sure where the support for this editor is coming from either considering they've made exactly 0 positive edits and came here swinging right from the start. Praxidicae (talk) 23:35, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Also, Robert McClenon you appear to be misunderstanding Llemiles role in any of this. I don't see any mis-templating and every edit GDX has made, has been an attack, trolling or pointy. Praxidicae (talk) 23:41, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

User:Praxidicae - Thank you for answering where to send the supposed evidence to, as being ArbCom. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:39, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

User:Praxidicae - Llemiles applied three vandalism templates to User talk:GDX420. Two of them were for bad deletion nominations, which were either stupid or trolling (I do not know which), and were disruptive, but not vandalism. One was a content removal that, in my opinion, was not vandalism, because it was accompanied by a superficially plausible but invalid reason. I simply do not like to use the term vandalism for disruptive editing that is not intended to harm the encyclopedia. The problem is in this case that GDX420's idea of what is good and bad for the encyclopedia may be absurd. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:39, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

The user hasn't edited in three days. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:42, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Alexa Megan Curtis Unblock page creation

Unless there is something I don’t know about, I have an article in draft form for this topic, and it seems notable with close to two dozen reliable sources... Again if I have missed something please let me know, but otherwise I request this page be unblocked and allowed to be created. Thank you! Integritas888 (talk) 22:53, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

As a WP:PAID editor, aren't your new articles required to go through WP:AFC? The AfC reviewer will take care of it. John from Idegon (talk) 23:35, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Oh ok, thank you! Integritas888 (talk) 23:41, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Courtesy ping for MER-C, who just deleted this article under the title of Alexa M. Curtis. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 23:48, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Definitely not me! I was just posting more disclosures on my user page lol. Integritas888 (talk) 23:50, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

By the way, when I follow the steps of Articles for Creation, I still arrive at the blocked page, so I have no where to post the draft for review. Where do I put the draft when the article is blocked? Thank you... Integritas888 (talk) 23:58, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

User:Integritas888 - Create the draft in a sandbox and submit it for review with a comment to the reviewer that the title is on the Title blacklist. Of course, a reviewer will then review the draft skeptically, which is appropriate, and the reviewer can decide whether to request to edit the title blacklist to allow the draft. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:46, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

User:Integritas888 - I am reviewing User:Integritas888/sandbox4, which is the draft about which you are asking, but am not promising whether I will complete the review within 48 hours. Robert McClenon (talk) 00:49, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I moved the sandbox to Draft:Alexa M. Curtis, and it has been reviewed and declined by another reviewer. Robert McClenon (talk) 20:22, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• See https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?prefix=Alexa+Curtis&title=Special%3AUndelete&fuzzy=1 - someone is very determined to advertise this person's brand on Wikipedia. Why did this blacklist entry not stop these creations, by the way? Guy (help!) 16:07, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
  • If you mean the newest draft, it's because page movers can bypass the title blacklist. Before it was moved, the current draft was just a generic user sandbox. The other stuff existed prior to the blacklisting. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 23:07, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

    NinjaRobotPirate, ah yes, that makes sense. Guy (help!) 23:36, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

User:The Rambling Man and User:190.233.207.10

• The Rambling Man (talk · contribs)
• 190.233.207.10 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

The Rambling Man is clearly proxying for the sock of the blocked IP cluster 190.233.207. The block of one of the IPs is good through at least mid-March. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 23:42, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

No, as discussed at length with Rubin, the rambling guy is not "clearly proxying for the sock", he's actually trying to make articles better by including decent images and requesting Rubin to stop making fake edit summaries such as "bad images" en masse. To be accused of "proxying for a sock" is deeply offensive and I demand an apology and perhaps some remuneration for my time. Let's call it £5,000. To whom do I send my invoice? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 23:50, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I blocked the IP for block evasion. But policy says that anyone can restore the sock's edits if they want to. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 23:52, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

I could be wrong. It seems possible that The Rambling Man is editing in good faith. However, he has, in the past, reverted my edits for no apparent reason, other than that I made them. That would be even worse than proxying for the sock. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 23:56, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

The IP-evading sock hasn't actually uploaded those images and certainly in the case of File:General Marcos Evangelista Pérez Jiménez, Venezuela.jpg, for example which was uploaded by a regular Commons contributor, the image is indeed far better. You need to look at TRM's edits and say "is this an improvement?" and if it is, then there's no issue here. Black Kite (talk) 23:59, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Arthur Rubin is actively working in bad faith here. We discussed this on his talk page and he said if I didn't review each image he would report me. So I reviewed each image, and he still reported me, and then accused me of being a proxy for a banned editor. I am disgusted. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:03, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Is there a diff in our future here about any of your accusations? If not, I suggest you review WP:NPA or otherwise, perhaps, expect a boomerang heading your way. - Nick Thorne ^talk 00:05, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

(ec) And while we're here, please Arthur Rubin show me the edits that back up your casting of aspersions that I simply revert your for no apparent reason, other than that I made them. Making such an accusation without evidence is a personal attack and we need to get that sorted straight away. People making such assertions are routinely blocked if there is no evidence to support such accusations. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:06, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

The Rambling Man is clearly proxying for the sock of the blocked IP cluster 190.233.207. this is the kind of crap which leads to disharmony and upset here. Seriously. After 15 years? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:08, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

disharmony and upset? Them's fightin' words! PackMecEng (talk) 00:12, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

And now this harassment which states among other ramblings, And you have, in the past, either proxied for blocked editors or reverted my edits for no apparent reason. Please could someone ask Arthur Rubin to either substantiate these accusations or remove them with an apology, or block him for a bright-line violation of NPA. Cheers. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:11, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• OK, I've looked at the rest of the images and indeed, TRM appears to be correct. Apart from the one I've mentioned above, this isn't a "bad image", it's a better and correctly licensed one. Ditto this one, and this one, etc, etc. Arthur needs to back up pretty quickly here. Black Kite (talk) 00:13, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  He has now repeated the unfounded accusations on my talk page. I'm sick of this, please could someone do something about this? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 00:15, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: unfounded aspersions being hurled at the Rambling Man. Perhaps an apology is in order. If not.. a boomerang. Lightburst (talk) 00:53, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  Thank you Lightburst but I think we're beyond just a simple retraction/apology now. Arthur Rubin has been desysopped for not providing evidence for his accusations in the past, and this just seems like more of the same. I think the ongoing unfounded accusations need more attention and probably some kind of restriction going forward. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 01:15, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  I provided evidence in the past that The Rambling Man was following me around and reverting my edits. However, with only one exception among the edits of mine he reverted on this round, the last time I checked, the edit The Rambling Man reinstalled is no worse than what had been there before, so I now believe he is editing is in good faith. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 01:44, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  So you brought him here...on the basis of one edit? Which you now believe to have been made in good faith? ♠PMC♠ (talk) 01:49, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  I brought him here on the basis of 5 edits, all but one of which I can now see as being an improvement or one of equivalent quality. That one, I still think is replacing an image by one of lesser quality, but, due to the compression algorithm, the images in the file appear comparable. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 01:55, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  @Arthur Rubin: I'd withdraw this report if I were you. It is at a stage were it can only turn negative against you and stir up unproductive drama. I say this as neither a friend of TRM nor you. With 1 out of 5 edits not being improvements, your odds of seeing any sanctions occuring are slim-to-none with a 20% chance of a boomerang instead. Practically every single commentator here has disagreed with your assessment on this matter. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 14:34, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  @Arthur Rubin: Please provide a link to "evidence that you have provided in the past". Stephen 02:52, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

  Indeed, but more importantly please retract your bad faith accusations that have become a timesink here and apologise for your edit warring. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 10:55, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment - Seems to me that Rubin is just using ANI as an open forum to air his long-held grievances against TRM. Waste of administrative resources, and thus at best this should be closed. At worst -- well, I think Lightburst put it better than I could.--WaltCip (talk) 12:33, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment - it's no secret that I sometimes butt heads with TRM, but I highly doubt he's socking, he's an important member of Wikipedi and has been here for many years. The accusation reeks of personal attack. --Rockstone^{[Send me a message!]} 16:53, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment - Quite frankly I think this treatment of TRM is disgusting and pathetic. You're wasting valuable time trying to drag him through the mud with wild accusations of socking/proxy editing/whatever the hell you want to obfuscate in order to get him penalised. Quite frankly, if it were up to me I'd be tossing Rubin out on his arse already - maybe put it to the community to ban him over this behaviour. You're setting a poor example and it makes prospective editors like myself unwilling to give it a shot if this is what we're going to face. Get out. 86.140.87.97 (talk) 10:59, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Treatment of IPs

Looking at the above, and ignoring (for this section) the TRM / Arthur Rubin issues, the main issue seems to be a GF IP editor getting blocked over and over again for making good faith, correct, but not optimal edits. Yes, this means that by now they are block evading, which is a handy excuse to block people. But looking back, I see an awful lot of warnings and blocks of the IP for what are basically correct edits. Evidence of this are not just the image improvements leading to the above discussion, but also things like:

• [70] is a series of correct but unsourced additions of TV series ending on the date indicated by the IP edit. This is not sensitive BLP material or anything else that needs to be immediately sourced, but material that can be sourced by others or tagged as unsourced if necessary. Still, it lead to a "final warning before a block" warnnig[71]
• [72] a final vandalism warning by Arthur Rubin, for these 3 edits: the edits were not even reverted, and contain no vandalism Ariel Winter is an actress and voice actress, and the two image changes replace other (acceptable) pictures with the pictures actually in the infoboxes of the articles.
• For this edit, the IP got another vandalism warning from Arthur Rubin[73]. The IP added Jay Moloney to the deaths in 1999, on the date 14 November. As the article on Moloney makes clear, he was born on 1 November 1964 and died 16 November 1999, so the IP made an understandable minor error here. But such an addition is not vandalism and should never get a vandalism warning.
• Another vandalism warning by Rubin for this, because the IP editor added images of two people with an entry in the list. Vandalism???

Were other warnings (and perhaps blocks) justified? Could well be, there are too many to check them all. But if one adds unjustified or totally wrong warnings as well, then you get some nasty effects:

• the talk page looks like a sea of warnings, indicating some terrible editor who needs long blocks, instead of having a much shorter list of justified warnings (or warnings with the correct tag)
• the IP editor involved will be more likely to ignore warnings and blocks, as they are not based on reality anyway and just are typical "bullying" editors and admins which either drive editors away and give enwiki a bad name, or cause GF editors to sock

Never mind that attempts to actually discuss the issues with the IP seem to be missing as well. Can we at least get some guidance for Arthur Rubin (and others if necessary) about what is and what isn't vandalism? Fram (talk) 15:04, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

All things being equal, it's kind of odd that an editor of >14 years tenure and ~130K edits really needs guidance in something so...pretty much at the heart of what we do here. ——SN54129 15:15, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

"I have been here >14 years and have ~130K edits" may be part of the problem. --Mr. Vernon (talk) 15:20, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree completely with what Fram says here. I'm not sure what we can actually do with Arthur Rubin aside from indef blocking, which is kind of like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 22:27, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I always want to put over-aggressive wiki "police" under revert restrictions. Maybe that could work here. 73.93.154.97 (talk) 01:16, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

While I like the idea here, the problem is that subject to the usual exceptions would mean reverting vandalism would not be covered, and here we have an editor that, at least judging by past behavior, seems to be under the false impression that's exactly what they've been doing, so I'm not sure this would fix things. I do agree that while an indef would be a definite overreaction, I don't think shrugging is the best response either, a formal warning may be in order however. 2604:2000:8FC0:4:68BA:3B32:8613:8B6D (talk) 04:05, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Well I'd suggest that misleading edit summaries, personal attacks, casting aspersions, editing in bad faith, edit warring and the general treatment of these IPs is very much worthy of investigating how to deal with Rubin going forward. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 07:26, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

And as noted by Fram below, the problematic behaviour continues as Rubin makes more such edits while refusing to redact the personal attacks and evidence-free accusations. Something needs to be done about this user. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 09:25, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

You have a point, I only checked the diffs provided above earlier, but the fact that this behavior is continuing while it is under discussion at ANI is very concerning. A short term clue-block may be in order, or perhaps a partial-block from mainspace to encourage participation in this thread. 2604:2000:8FC0:4:68BA:3B32:8613:8B6D (talk) 13:14, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Meanwhile, today, Arthur Rubin is reverting good edits from a non-blocked I editor "per WP:EVADE": [74] (typo correction), [75] (changing an acceptable image to the image actually used in the infobox of the article) [76] (adding a birth entry to 1920, for a person whose death is included in the 1967 article since at least 1 January 2020 and perhaps a lot longer).

Looking at his older reverts: the "evade" reason may be correct, but the end result is that as far as I can tell, nothing vandalistic is reverted, only a lot of good edits and some which Arthur Rubin (and perhaps others) disagree with, but which are a case of editor consensus (which names to include in a list, whether to "U.S." (the IP) or "United States" (Arthur Rubin), ...), which should be discussed with the IP. By not discussing these issues, but giving them in the past incorrect vandalism warnings instead, Arthur Rubin can now revert the IP and get them blocked without any problem, without having to deal with the actual merits of the edits.

It looks to me that by doing this, Arthur Rubin is actively making enwiki worse, not better. These are all not major issues, but in each case the IP version was better than the Arthur Rubin version: [77],(why the easter egg on Disney Channel, by the way?), [78], [79] (the end date for the client is right with the IP, and wrong in AR version), a president of Brazil seems important enough to include in a year list, ... Fram (talk) 09:08, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I looked at the history of 2001. Oh my word. Can somebody explain to me why I shouldn't block Arthur Rubin for persistent edit warring and assuming bad faith? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 11:17, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

@Ritchie333:. No. No such reason can ye be given or hope to receive. ——SN54129 11:26, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Yep, support block. It's clear there are serious issues here and Rubin needs to mend his ways or face an indef block, because this conduct is incompatible with the goals of the project.  — Amakuru (talk) 11:31, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

May be someone can propose a topic ban on reverting all IP edits with the exception of obvious vandalism.--Ymblanter (talk) 11:42, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Except judging by the warnings being handed out by Rubin, they incorrectly believe they are reverting obvious vandalism. The appearance judging by the evidence presented so far, and there is no nice way to put this, is of serious and ongoing WP:DE and WP:CIR issues. I would prefer to hear back from them and allow an opportunity for a defense before advocating for a long-term/indef block. The preferred option should always be to cut some slack and forgive, the key thing is that the community have confidence that disruption will cease, sanctions after all should only ever be preventive and not punitive. But it's very difficult to have that confidence when an editor refuses to acknowledge that a problem even exists. Also @Arthur Rubin: I humbly advise you to stop editing in mainspace and focus your efforts on engaging here until this thread is resolved. 2604:2000:8FC0:4:68BA:3B32:8613:8B6D (talk) 13:41, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

In 2001, I couldn't see the difference. If someone says he added a space which belonged there, I believe it. As the IP uses VE, odds are that he doesn't know whether he is adding or removing spaces. I am now checking each of his edits, and will try to revert only those which have errors, although I will still mention WP:EVADE. If consensus is that images used in the article are more appropriate than better images, for the birth and death images, I will comply, but, it seems contrary to guidelines. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 14:46, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

This still doesn't address the ongoing profoundly offensive personal attacks and accusations of socking which have made in various locations. Nor does it address your abuse of the rollback tool. Not good enough. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 15:24, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

WP:EVADE is specifically listed as an allowed justification of rollback. If you want to suggest editing the rollback guideline, go ahead. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 15:35, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

When are you going to redact and apologise for your unfounded and shameful personal attacks? The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 16:15, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes WP:EVADE is listed as a reason, but it clearly does not apply in this case. Phil Bridger (talk) 16:34, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

It also appears I was wrong; the IP isn't using WP:VE; he's using the mobile interface. I've tried to prevent my editing through the mobile interface, because of difficulty in avoiding errors. It also explains why the IP doesn't see warnings. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 15:38, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

"I am now checking each of his edits, and will try to revert only those which have errors", and then 40 minyres later you go and revert one where the image you prefer is changed to the image used in the infobox of the article involved[80]. Whether your or their preferred image is better is debatable, but neither is an "error" by any stretch of the meaning, it is a "preference". Fram (talk) 15:42, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Astonishing

Rubin continues to edit without responding to the multiple requests to redact his accusations of bad faith and direct brightline violations of NPA. Please could someone actually do something about this, or just close this ANI thread down in the understanding that certain editors are entitled to repeatedly attack me with impunity. Cheers. The Rambling Man (Staying alive since 2005!) 20:32, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment I would expect the community to ask for sanctions against an editor who casts unfounded aspersions. As a group we cannot make the editor apologize.... but the reverting, and accusations are a disruption to the project. If someone can propose a sanction for the WP:IDHT editor perhaps we can consider.Lightburst (talk) 22:32, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

  @The Rambling Man: I see the editor has just been blocked Lightburst (talk) 22:39, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

  I have blocked User:Arthur Rubin from editing the mainspace until he responds properly to issues raised in the sections above. Stephen 22:42, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• I think a one-way Iban might be in order. At least it would be a better result than permabanning AR. See: this case has a curious echo from this mammoth ANI thread of nearly two years ago. That also focussed on poor treatment of TRM by AR (the leitmotif of the day was "Request for diffs"), and was also sabotaged by AR refusing to participate further than a couple of opening comments. Yet again, the only way the community was able to encourage AR to join the discussion was the drastic step of community banning him until he responded, and this was noted by ArbCom: Arthur Rubin did not adequately respond to concerns raised by the community was a finding of fact.
  Yet, his failure to respond to questions seems, with hindsight, and in light of the current thread, to be more in the way of an instinctive response than a one-off lapse of judgement. ——SN54129 11:53, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Is there such a thing as a ban from edits relating to the filespace? The trouble with one-way ibans involving two such prolific editors is that genuine mistakes can arise so easily and policing the Iban is so laborious.—S Marshall T/C 12:12, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Topic ban

Arthur Rubin seems to me to be a self-appointed one-man "year page police force". Therefore, to prevent further disruption to these pages, I propose that Arthur Rubin is permanently topic banned from editing all year pages. Mjroots (talk) 15:34, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

J. Johnson using WP:INCIVIL language despite repeated requests to stop

J. Johnson has been warned several times for escalatory incivil language and has been told to comment on content instead of contributors, both recently and in the past.

Here is the most recent incident at Talk:1976 Tangshan earthquake#"Ceased to exist" and Talk:1976 Tangshan earthquake#RfC on "Ceased to exist" over the course of the past two weeks.

Repeated abuse at Talk:1976 Tangshan earthquake

Please note that all of the bolding below is what MarkH21 has added to show the passages he complains of. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:02, 10 March 2020 (UTC) Please do not delete my comment, which was in place before you added the following line. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:32, 10 March 2020 (UTC) The note about bolding was in the post from the beginning above your comment before you made it, and now you’ve moved it below. Redundant. — MarkH21talk 23:34, 10 March 2020 (UTC) Not redundant, as your ownership of the bolding was not near nor as prominent as the bolding itself, and lead to misperception. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:54, 11 March 2020 (UTC) The bolding in the following quotes (except for the quote about blindness) is mine to emphasize the precise comments that are incivil or about the contributor as opposed to content. Initial comments on contributors The second half of this comment by J. Johnson's is very strange, but their reaction in the discussion afterwards demonstrates that they have a very narrow definition of commenting on contributors: I don't what you mean by "more standard neutral wording", other than utterly bloodless. I imagine that for most residents the experience was F...ING DEVASTATING!, and a plain statement of cessation seems quite bland, and even colorless. You seem to be most opposed re dramatic, but that seems like a personal feeling that you just don't like it. Perhaps (to the extent this is historical writing) you have always thought history is boring, and therefore WP must be boring? Sorry, I don't agree. — 00:32, 1 March 2020 (UTC) My initial reaction to the comment: It's not a personal feeling and I don't understand where you're drawing these bizarre and incorrect personal inferrals. — MH21 00:56, 1 March 2020 (UTC) J. Johnson's response about me characterizing it as bizarre: Incidentally, it is not helpful to characterize my explanation as "bizarre", or "ceased to exist" as a "cheap idiom"... The concept of WP:I just don't like it is where you have opinions, but can't base them on any standards or polices or such. Why am I having to explain this to an experienced editor? — JJ 21:25, 1 March 2020 (UTC) My explanation that both are comments on contributors and first warning: What is "bizarre" was your inferral that I personally find history and WP boring because I find the wording overly dramatic, idiomatic, and non-encyclopedic... That, plus your quip "Why am I having to explain this to an experienced editor?" are commenting on the contributor instead of commenting on the content. Stop. — (MH21 07:07, 2 March 2020 (UTC)) J. Johnson's's denial that it is a comment about the contributor and tries to play off the Why am I having to explain this to an experience editor? comment as a genuine non-rhetorical question: I made no "inferral" of your beliefs; I only questioned whether you might have a certain belief or attitude (about history), which might in turn explain your view. If you don't have such a belief, fine, just say so (a simple "no" would suffice). My "quip" is a straight-forward question of why we don't seem to be on the same wave-length; it is your "inferral" that this is a comment about the contributor (distinct from the contributor's behavior).}} — JJ 00:37, 3 March 2020 (UTC) My response and second warning: Your comment about "whether you might have a certain belief or attitude (about history)" is literally a comment about the contributor and not the content. The possible belief or attitude of a contributor is a property of the contributor. That and the other comment are both inappropriate. — JJ 01:20, 3 March 2020 (UTC) Continuation in RfC In the RfC, J. Johnson continues to comment on contributors instead of on the content: But if "entity" is not in your vocabulary I suppose we could replace it with "city". Is that clearer? — JJ 23:07, 4 March 2020 (UTC) I followed this with the third warning: Your inclination to comment on contributors, what you think they like, what you think they find boring, and what you think is in their vocabulary is grossly inappropriate. Cut it out, you’ve been warned multiple times now. — MH21 23:17, 4 March 2020 (UTC) J. Johnson's response mocks the earlier protest about commenting on contributors instead of content, tries again to play off the Why am I having to explain this to an experience editor? comment as a genuine non-rhetorical question, and is dismissive of any complaints as petty squabbling: In the second instance ("Why am I having to explain this to an experienced editor?", @ 21:25, 1 Mar), that seems to be a very reasonable question, given that we seem to have a disconnect in our understandings of basic WP concepts. At any rate, it seems that you have missed that I allow this could be as much a misunderstanding on my part as anything to do with you. That in both instances you have claimed these as comments about you seems to me to indicate a failure of WP:AGF. I could as well complain that in your comments at 02:45, 29 Feb. ("Can you see what I mean here?", bolding added) and 00:50, 1 Mar. ("Do you not see...", ditto) you are saying that I am blind. (GAWK! A PERSONAL COMMENT!!!) Can you see why such a complaint would be just petty squabbling? — JJ 22:43, 5 March 2020 I respond with the fourth warning: Your comment Why am I having to explain this to an experienced editor? comes off far stronger as a pointed vent of frustration at me than a genuine question. Do you really expect anyone to interpret it as a genuine question and to somehow answer with a oh you have to explain it to me despite my experience because I don't understand WP policies like you do! It's a pointed comment about another editor that doesn't help anyone. I never pointed to AGF, but I pointed out that those two comments, in addition the comment my vocabulary, are about contributors and not content. These don't help anyone. If you can't acknowledge that, you should still stop making such comments because you'd be hard-pressed to find an editor to whom those comments are useful. — MH21 23:57, 5 March 2020 (UTC) Final warning and continued incivility J. Johnson has described me several times in the discussion as disputatious several times. At first, I did not react to avoid making it more heated than it already is, but I found it particularly insulting when combined with obtusely / obtuse: That you are so inconsequentially disputatious is totally unuseful. — JJ 21:25, 1 March 2020 (UTC) Because of your disputatiousness I am disinclined to discuss this any further with you — JJ 00:37, 3 March 2020 (UTC) All very disputatious — JJ 00:38, 3 March 2020 (UTC) Since you are so obtusely disputatious — JJ 23:01, 8 March 2020 (UTC) My last warning: Again, tone down your aggressive language. "Obtusely disputatious" is language for escalation and is not helping resolve anything. It's WP:INCIVIL and inappropriate. This is your last warning from me. — MH21 21:29, 9 March 2020 (UTC) I called for a cessation of incivility several times and gave five warnings to J. Johnson over the course of two weeks. However, after I pointed out that J. Johnson previously said that I am rather neutral, so any continued heated debate is an unproductive use of both your time and my time (21:29, 9 March 2020 (UTC)). But J. Johnson continued and doubled-down by calling all of the unproductiveness a result of me being disputatious and obtuse. 5. I attribute the unproductivity here to your many mis-interpretations and "inferrals", and general tendency to disputation... Your rejection of the engineering interpretation as being inferred and not explicit does seem obtuse — JJ 23:50, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

General trend of incivility

J. Johnson has made far too many incivil comments about me over the course of two weeks despite five explicitly worded requests to stop. This isn't the first time that J. Johnson has been brought to ANI over incivility over articles relating to earthquake prediction (JJ was nearly topic banned twice in 2014, and had another incident in 2013, all of which were for WP:INCIVIL, WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior, and WP:OWNERSHIP) or otherwise warned for incivility (trouted just last month by Femkemilene for escalating another discussion by calling RCraig09's comments here as your weasely bitching), twice warned by NewsAndEventsGuy in September 2019 and August 2019, and warned by Dmcq for making threats in June 2019). To my awareness, J. Johnson has not accepted that they have overstepped boundaries, apologized, nor retracted the offending statements in any of the non-ANI warnings linked above, which are only just scratching the surface.

The latest incidents at Talk:1976 Tangshan earthquake do not really rise to the level of personal attacks, but demonstrates a clear tendency to speculatively comment on contributors and dismiss requests to stop even after 5 warnings there alone.

Despite J. Johnson's portfolio of positive contributions to the project, it's overwhelmingly clear that there is a greater long-term trend of J. Johnson not being aware when they're stepping over boundaries of WP:CIVIL and reacting negatively, dismissively, or with greater fervor when confronted about it. — MarkH₂₁^talk 04:34, 10 March 2020 (UTC); penultimate paragraph added 05:25, 10 March 2020 (UTC); link third old ANI discussion in third-to-last paragraph 05:55, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• This complaint seems ridiculously overblown. I see no substantive incivility on J. Johnson's part. Carrite (talk) 05:21, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
  • Because calling someone's comments your weasely bitching or saying that another editor is so obtusely disputatious is civil language?
    How about the threat And you're starting to annoy me enough that if someone were to suggest changes I'd be more likely to support them. Your interests would likely be better served if you just drop this discussion.?
    Maybe why are you being such a jerk? here followed by yes, you are a jerk here is civil?
    There are so many examples from JJ over the past several months, like the above and Bullshit. Perhaps you should put on your reading glasses when you read. (here), that are rude, offensive, belittling, etc. and have no place here. — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:27, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
• I disagree with Carrite here. J. Johnson's odd hostility and excessive markup thatbolds and emphasizes words to be LOUD is rather disruptive and uncivil. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 14:44, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

MJL: Please note that all that bolding in the comments MarkH21 provided are his augmentations, and do not correctly reflect the tenor of my original comments. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:38, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

@J. Johnson: [Thank you for the ping] I'm referring to comments like the one in the diff I provided.
No offense to MarkH21, but I skipped over most of the report and just looked at the talk page sections in question myself.
To your credit though, you didn't begin the discussion with WP:SHOUTing, but you started to only after you lost your temper but to the detriment of following that talk. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 00:02, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't think I lost my temper, but I was venting some over-pressure. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:56, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) MJL was clearly talking about JJ's markup in the diff that he they linked, wherein you italicized/emphasized 8 words and bolded 11 words. — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:04, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

@MarkH21: I use they/them pronouns btw. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 00:07, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

@MJL: Sorry! Slip of the mind. — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:12, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

The use of the plural "they" and "them" is confusing. I am okay with the male pronoun. For other single individuals where gender is unknown I would suggest something like "s/he". ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:59, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Singular "they" is at least as old as Shakespeare. That is a perfectly acceptable choice when an individual's gender is not known and, in this case, it is their preferred pronoun. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 18:28, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

• I agree with MarkH21 that many of JJ's contributions are useful and appreciated. Unfortunatly, I also echo the perception of incivility. While most of the incidents are not grave, I do think they form a consistent pattern that may make it less attractive for other editors to participate in discussions. I find that very worrisome especially in the article space I'm most active, climate change, where neutrality and quality are best achieved with a larger set of contributors. Some smaller examples spring to mind; [81] In this diff J. Johnson alleged that other people are unwilling to consider their proposal, after three people had given an argumented response already, while not responding to the arguments. Here J. Johnson accuses me and quite a big group of editors of bad faith, claiming that we had changed global warming in scope (instead of merely thouroughly updated). And here JJ dismisses a newer user by saying they should 'start a blog', because JJ assumes they are activist. Each of the incidents smaller than MarkH21's examples, but pointing to the same problem; JJ asserting things about the editor which deteriorates the atmosphere. As such, I think the editing would improve if J. Johnson wasn't allowed to comment on other people's behaviour or beliefs any more, but only on content. Femke Nijsse (talk) 18:08, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

The "quite a big group of editors" would be, what, five? At any rate, the "bad faith" point is a red herring, which I will comment on below. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:11, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• I would not comment if the worst occurrences were mere breaches of etiquette. However, J Johnson's perennial hair-trigger incivility reflects deeper problematic attitudes and habits that frustrate others' attempts at amicable collaboration in a complex subject area. I concur with MarkH's characterizations and Femke Nijsse's observations, but I think the underlying problem can't be solved merely by improvements in language and etiquette. Some history:

¶1 → JJ "introduced" himself to me by sending me straight to ANI—without prior discussion—asking someone else to investigate his suspicions re supposed "linkspamming" in the then-new Warming stripes article. (diff of closer, 2 July 2019)

¶2 → After I had spent an hour or two trying to understand one of his suggestions and I cited references and asked for clarification/confirmation of what he meant, JJ responded with "Get a better grip". (diff of 22 Jan 2020) (His suggestion was not adopted.)

¶3 → Even a cursory review of Talk:Global warming#Second discussion on titles for potential move request (which followed a now-archived month-long Preliminary Discussion,) will show numerous of JJ's needlessly verbose tangential lectures. These discussions followed his claim that the Move/Renaming discussion for Talk:Climate change (general concept) (implemented Oct 2019 after ten full days and 14 laptop-screenfuls of discussion, and after extensive preliminary discussions there), were supposedly closed "prematurely": see Femke Nijsse's link, above, re JJ's claim that the year's-long trajectory of this family of articles was made in "bad faith".

¶4 → JJ's comments show a difficulty grasping the context of others' arguments. Example: when I cited references (a NASA page, and the vice-president of Associated Press Media Relations) to prove that "global warming" and "climate change" are often used interchangeably by the public and press, JJ responded, with typical sarcasm "AP Stylebook applies to AP staff, and (hopefully this is not too simple for you) we are not AP staff" (italics added re sarcasm, boldface in original). (diff of 19 Jan 2020) — Same post as JJ's "weasely bitching" retort that MarkH quotes above.

¶5 → Similarly, JJ went to great length (citing five references saying "global warming" and "climate change" are scientifically distinct terms—which no one had disputed), in his refutation of an argument that was never made (classic strawman argument). He later sarcastically refers to his five references "did you perhaps miss that big, grey box just above?".

¶6 → Likewise, JJ posted a claim that "This entire debate on name and naming criteria" was based on {an argument JJ manufactured: See diff of 7 Jan 2020} for which he has provided zero examples—a classic strawman. Yet he has accused me of not WP:HEARing: 13 Jan 2020 diff: "do you have a hearing problem?"

In summary, whereas JJ has contributed to low-level tasks such as citation formats and arrangement of blocks in a block diagram, his inability to grasp complex or subtle arguments and reconcile different points of view, will not likely improve though admonishment over his use of language. Any corrective action should deal with deeper issues that energize JJ's incivility. —RCraig09 (talk) 22:31, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I object to RCraig09's "his inability to grasp complex or subtle arguments ...", which is an outright slur, and false. I also object to his characterization of my work at Global warming as being "low-level tasks such as citation formats and arrangement of blocks in a block diagram." The block diagram was actually his, where I (and others) made various suggestions for improvement. The "low-level" work I have done is foundational, being the basis of verifiability, and some of it has been on working out some difficult issues of citation (see WP:IPCC citation).

I also object to his (and Femke's) statement that I alleged bad-faith. The "year's-long trajectory" refers to the planning to rename and refocus Global warming, much of which was arranged on personal talk pages. My comment was not that there was bad-faith, only that their process smacked – that is, gave some appearances – of bad faith. Apparently these erudite thinkers did not grasp that subtlety.

He falsely states that I sent him "straight to ANI". I saw possibly questionable editing, which I did not feel informed enough to judge, so I asked if anyone else thought it warranted looking into. Nothing came of that, and that was (for me) the end of the matter.

I dispute these other points, but unless someone wants to explore them I'd rather not spend time on them. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:17, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Just another example of JJ making an uncivil comment about other editors in this very discussion: saying that Apparently these erudite thinkers did not grasp that subtlety in reference to RCraig09 and Femkemilene just adds further hostility. The points that you haven't covered — I dispute these other points... I'd rather not spend time on them — are your actual comments of incivility from across various discussions. Continued abstention from addressing the fact that these are escalatory and uncivil demonstrates a serious problem here. — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:50, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

MarkH21 is correct. Hopefully it will be apparent to any admin/closer that JJ's replies here embody the very behaviors of which he is accused. His unrepentant attitude and his deflections endure. What he calls a slur (23:17, 11 Mar) are observations that I supported with three gross examples (¶4, ¶5, ¶6). He admits that it was "possibly questionable editing" that motivated him to send me without prior discussion to ANI—which is supposed to be "for discussion of urgent incidents and chronic, intractable behavioral problems". And he appears unwilling or unable to recognize that, in this context, saying other editors' "process smacked...of bad faith" is does not differ from accusing those editors of bad faith. etc. etc. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

That would be your interpretation. I have tried to be clear on the point, but it seems you reject any possibility of good-faith on my part. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:08, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

JJ: you state that we reject the possibility of good faith, among other things, because we don't interpret the phrase smacking of bad faith to mean gave some appearances of. But that's significantly weaker, with The free dictionary giving a definition of the former as to give a strong indication or implication of something. As such, I don't think RCraig09's interpretation is completely off here. Femke Nijsse (talk) 12:39, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

This is a good sample of what is going on here. In a strict and narrow sense, yes, MarkH did own-up to the bolding. But buried in text, not set out very visibly in stand-alone text as he has done here, and outside of the box where he repeatedly quotes me. And in no way as prominent as the bolding itself, thus failing to prevent misperception as to who did the bolding. I call that misrepresentation. I added a more prominent note, inside the box, to clarify the matter. Mark then removed my note on the grounds of being redundant. If he had any issue with that a more civil approach would have been something on the lines of: 1) He asks why I added the note, 2) I explain, 3) if he demurs we discuss it, 4) he shows that no harm was intended by immediately replacing the bolding with something less, well, bold, and then 5) we move on. But no, he wants to argue that I made a false statement re misrepresentation. Not unlike the beginning of this little affray, where, having different interpretations of a phrase, he must argue why his interpretation is right, and mine is not. All of which has gone well beyond the original issue with the article. His complaint of incivility quite overlooks his tendency to battle. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 22:25, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Reply

It should be noted right off that Mark has misrepresented my comments: all that bolding in the box is entirely what he has added, without attribution.

I have previously been reproached (by Femke) that I could speak more gently, and I allow there is something to that. But in the present case I think the more significant factor is that MarkH21 tends to misinterpret things. In particular he has been quicker to take offense based on his understanding of my language than to inquire whether the offense is in my language, or in his understanding if it. In that respect he has failed to assume good-faith. And I would note that his own comments are not without fault.

A problem with Mark's complaint is that he has not provided the full story. E.g., what he complains of actually arose on 28 Feb., where I said:

Your view of continued existence seems to be based on having some fragment of the city's physical fabric surving intact, while Dr. Housner's view was that it no longer existed as a functional, living entity. This would be clearer if you would read the source (your "even if" suggests you have not), where he describes the failure of practically all city services.

He replied: "I'm not sure why you think I didn't read the Housner & He source..." (02:45, 29 Feb.), to which I replied that his use of "even if" came across to me "as questioning whether Housner wrote that" (which I view as entirely indubitable). My comment was not intended to be uncivil, but to clarify whether we were (literally) "on the same page". I then suggested that perhaps "despite" better resolved what he meant to say with my understanding, and at that point I thought the matter was resolved. Even on a parallel issue (regarding "ceased to exist"), where I proposed a way of dealing with a concern of his, I thought we were close to a resolution. But in his following comment (00:50, 1 Mar.) he wants to argue that he is right regarding his use of "even if" (which I regard as immaterial). At that point the situation goes down hill, especially when he states (threatens?) that "If you refuse to consider any proposals or alternatives, we can just go to RfC", when I had not refused to consider any proposals or alternatives, and which I consider a very uncivil insinuation. This is where I deem him to be warrantably disputatious.

The rest of the affair is pretty much on similar lines. I will elaborate if anyone has questions. My take on this complaint is that MarkH21's broad reach and canvassing of other editors shows how weak his own complaints are. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:17, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• J. Johnson clearly favors the passive-aggressive approach to talk page editing, which isn't particularly conducive to cooperation. I completely agree that all comments should be required to be content-based. His belligerent personal attacks don't serve him or anyone else well.Ames86 (talk) 23:47, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) Your accusation that Mark has misrepresented my comments: all that bolding in the box is entirely what he has added, without attribution is plainly false. From the very first posting here:

  The bolding in the following quotes (except for the quote about blindness) is mine to emphasize the precise comments that are incivil or about the contributor as opposed to content.

  — MarkH21 04:34, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Your accusation of canvassing is plainly false.This ANI is about your general long-term incivility. The editors to whom I gave ANI notices are editors who have given you warnings about your incivility over the past several months and were mentioned in the subsection on your long history of incivility; therefore they are user[s] mentioned in the discussion and editors who have participated in discussions on the same topic both of which fall under appropriate notifications.

Your only response to the demonstrated long-term incivility issues is to 1) deflect onto the issue of whether it was appropriate to open an RfC after you said Because of your disputatiousness I am disinclined to discuss this any further with you and 2) state that you thought the issue was resolved by your comment ending with That you are so inconsequentially disputatious is totally unuseful.

You have nothing to say on whether these are inappropriate?

• your weasely bitching
• you're starting to annoy me enough that if someone were to suggest changes I'd be more likely to support them. Your interests would likely be better served if you just drop this discussion.
• why are you being such a jerk?
• yes, you are a jerk
• you are so obtusely disputatious
• Bullshit. Perhaps you should put on your reading glasses when you read
• Why am I having to explain this to an experienced editor?
• I attribute the unproductivity here to your many mis-interpretations and "inferrals", and general tendency to disputation
• But if "entity" is not in your vocabulary
• Get a better grip
• (hopefully this is not too simple for you) we are not AP staff
• do you have a hearing problem?

Even after being told that you use incivil language and create an atmosphere of hostility by at least five different editors at least nine times over only the last nine months, do you still only want to deflect the question and focus on others? — MarkH₂₁^talk 23:57, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Not to mention that your quote is another example of you focusing on the other editor; here you repeatedly assert and speculate that I haven't read the source, e.g. This would be clearer if you would read the source as above on 28 Feb & Another reason why I sometimes wonder if you have read any more of the source than the Overview (or perhaps just the Prologue to the Overview) 10 March, to which I have to repeatedly respond that I have read the source. — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:19, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• @J. Johnson: Whom do you believe Mark canvased here and how? If onwiki, then please provide diffs for context. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 00:05, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

All of the editors he notified (as he lists below) except EdwardLane, who would have been advised if Mark had put an ANI notification in the Talk page (which still has not been done). Note that I am not making this an issue (Femke has some pertinent comments, and I allow that RCraig09 feels agrieved); but it does show that Mark is trying to broaden the issue and involve editors beyond his specific complaint. Mark has linked to WP:APPNOTE, but I don't see (I'm blind?!) that any of the criteria listed there apply. It does say that the "audience must not be selected on the basis of their opinions", and Mark does seem to be angling for editors that might have complaints. (There is also something about neutral titles – see also WP:TPG – which the title here is not, but I don't know what can or should be done about that.) I do see Nil's point that someone mentioned should be notified, but, as he says, that just pushes the issue of selection into the discussion. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:21, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

WP:APPNOTE says (not including all bullet points):

An editor who may wish to draw a wider range of informed, but uninvolved, editors to a discussion can place a message at any of the following:

• On the talk pages of a user mentioned in the discussion
• Editors who have participated in previous discussions on the same topic (or closely related topics)

All of the editors in question satisfy one of those two criteria. In fact, only EdwardLane does not satisfy both simultaneously. I am not angling for editors that might have complaints. Some of them might have complaints because they previously warned you for the exact issue brought up here, i.e. precisely what qualified them for the second bullet.

I'm also not aware of any requirement or standard of posting ANI notifications on article talk pages. I have never seen that done before and Nil Einne's point about pings (similarly, informal notifications elsewhere) being insufficient for ANI still stands. — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:34, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

• • @MJL: Here are all of the editors that I notified about this ANI discussion: J. Johnson, Femkemilene, RCraig09, NewsAndEventsGuy, Dmcq, and EdwardLane. I mentioned all of the editors in this list in the original report except EdwardLane, whom I notified because they commented and suggested arbitration at Talk:1976 Tangshan earthquake in an attempt to find mediation. — MarkH₂₁^talk 00:11, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
    • @MarkH21: That's a few too many tbh. Imo a ping for any editors you mention in a report is all that's needed (either in the report itself, or in a subsequent comment with an explanation as to why they are being pinged). Otherwise, most editors when they see a notice like that will assume the report is about them. I know that's how I'd feel at least. (edit conflict) –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 01:16, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
      • @MJL: Perhaps I take a discussion about an editor and an issue with which you may have been involved (Template:ANI-notice) too literally then, in that they were involved in the same issue recently and are mentioned in the discussion. At least I've seen the notice applied that way sometimes. I'll be happy to adjust this for the future.
        But either way, it's still not canvassing by virtue of WP:APPNOTE with them having given warnings / been involved recently regarding the same issues. — MarkH₂₁^talk 01:37, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
      • @MJL: I strongly disagree. If you're going to specifically mention someone in your ANI thread, you should notify them even if your thread is not mainly about them. Pings are not sufficient, the same as always at ANI. Just because you were not criticising their actions doesn't mean someone else won't in the thread. And that person may reasonably assume that the person they are criticising was already notified since their actions were already being discussed. It's hardly uncommon that this happens after all. If you feel editors may misunderstand why they are being notified, there's no harm in offering a clarification as part of the notice. I've done it on occasion. Note also that pinging and notifying people equally raise canvassing concerns, so there's no differences in that regards. If the only reason you mentioned someone seems to be to canvas them, then yes it's a concern whether you pinged or properly notified. If there is a reasonable reason why you mentioned them, then it's fine. Nil Einne (talk) 09:57, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
        • @Nil Einne: Agree to disagree. However, as my friend Wander has pointed out to me, WP:CANVAS actually does not say anything about pings (and it has been argued that they're fair game). Idk, this might be better for my talk page since we're getting a bit off track. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 12:53, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
        • @MarkH21: Not sure if I have any contribution to give really - I stumbled onto the Talk:1976 Tangshan earthquake page because of the Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Earthquakes#RfC_on_wording_in_the_lead_of_1976_Tangshan_earthquake - everything I've seen related to this is in the tangshan earthquake talk page. It seems like one side of the squabble for wording is more reasonable than the other, but I guess that's what this incident is about, i've not been following the whole thread, I was hoping this would be settled amicably without having to read it all. EdwardLane (talk) 16:42, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

You're an otherwise uninvolved witness, and presumably neutral, so your observations and assessments are possibly of great value. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:24, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough - if I had power I'd probably archive the talk page squabbles, block the two of you from editing the page(s) in question for 3 months, get someone to rewrite the section so that this wouldn't be left as either one of you wanted it (if it got left one way or the other it would remain as a bone of contention), the idea being that the two of you could take a time out - and probably would not then be grumpy after 3 months had passed (and so wouldn't go straight back to an edit/talk page war) Also to get the two of you to agree somewhere in writing to try and act in a more civil manner toward each other in future, and recommend that both of you 'let it go' a bit more. Incidentally I'm not the person who has the skill/knowledge/understanding of the subject enough to do that particular rewrite, but an opinion could probably be acquired in a couple of hours of reading. Apologies if this is out of line or seems harsh, it is just how I would try to handle it in real world rather than in the virtual world which is obviously a trickier situation as people frequently misinterpret even the slightest error in punctuation/sentence construction to read more into a phrase than may originally be intended. Best of luck to the admins - I am sure they have a difficult time of itEdwardLane (talk) 11:33, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

@EdwardLane: The issue at hand here is JJ's several incidents of incivility across multiple discussions on different articles (as attested by the multiple warnings from different editors and the quotes above) and JJ's failure to acknowledge any of them; this ANI thread is not about the content dispute itself. I opened an RfC on the actual content dispute so that it could be resolved by uninvolved editors, and any other issues raised were my protests at JJ's repeated inappropriate personal comments. Honestly, civility and DR (like the RfC) were all that were needed from the start. — MarkH₂₁^talk 12:35, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Have a look here, too, by JJ: I call bullshit on your "I just updated the literature.".   ManosHacker ^talk 02:30, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Also have a look at JJ's distortion of a Wikipedia article: These statements, that have been tagged, make a false claim of sources that do not directly support the content, and are part of a slow edit warring.   ManosHacker ^talk 02:41, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I dropped by ANI to check on another editor's situation and saw the section heading. My immediate, unfiltered thought was, "So what's new?" J. Johnson used to be much less abrasive (evidence, just in case anyone doubts it) and more interested in collaboration. I do sometimes wish we had the old editor back. JJ, maybe it's time to re-calibrate your approach? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:35, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi, W., good to hear from you again.

User:ManosHacker is a relatively new user who seems to be channeling a WP:SPA user that has been try to promote a fringe theory at VAN method, the latter having added an unreliable source, and removed two "fringe theory" tags added by another editor. The details were discussed at Talk:VAN_method#Current_work_(2020). The other comment probably refers to the same long-running problem we're having at Earthquake prediction; see Talk:Earthquake prediction#Update on "mainstream claim" for VAN. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 00:18, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

SPAs and the tenure of ManosHacker aside, the quote I call bullshit on your "I just updated the literature" is fairly confrontational and hostile language in response to a mildly worded talk page post. Whether or not the other editor uses potentially unreliable sources or disproportionately represents fringe theories, WP:CIVIL still applies. Inflammatory language is not useful to anyone. — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:33, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Does 10 years of editing and 800 hours of teaching Wikipedia count as relatively new nowadays? — MarkH₂₁^talk 08:47, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Sometimes people count the number of edits in that account (1,932 in this case), rather than the number of months. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:44, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

The problem discussed here is JJ's manners in order to keep the articles the way he wants and the cost of this behavior to Wikipedia (retain of editors and content credibility). It is easy to attack people using Wikipedia policy, there is an argument given for any case of another's edit if you act in bad faith and JJ seems to be unable to set limits to himself (building a case on me here is another example yet). JJ had the last word after JerryRussell announced he was leaving Wikipedia in October 19, 2017. In November 25, 2017 an article (in which JJ has great interest)'s balance built on consensus thanks to Jerry's presence in Wikipedia was ruined by JJ. Add the persistive distortion of the sources by JJ, reflecting to bad Wikipedia content as shown above, and the lack of recognizing his way is inappropriate for colaboration, to get a wider picture.   ManosHacker ^talk 05:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

The slow edit war ManosHacker refers to is the long term issue of certain VAN WP:SPA partisans to promote a discredited topic at WP:VAN method and Earthquake prediction, which MH seems to favor. (His "distortion of the sources by JJ" is from one of those SPAs.) His "JJ had the last word" diff, and the insinuation that I ran Jerry off, is misleading, a rank misrepresentation, and I suggest that anyone inclined to give that any credence should read the entire discussion at User_talk:JerryRussell#Going_on_Wikibreak. MH's "ruined by JJ" diff (which is a merge of two edits) is a bit baffling. In the first edit I removed a paragraph about a supposed technique from VAN ("natural time") that simply is not notable (other than for its promotion). In the second edit, I removed a paragraph about a 2008 earthquake VAN claims to have predicted (including a criticism of the claim of prediction) on the basis (as stated in my edit summary) of failing a criterion that had been previously applied to mention of other claimed EQ predictions. It is difficult to find any "incivility" in this, other than certain SPA parties partial to VAN not liking my edits.

To be continued. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 23:56, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

For what matters in this ANI discussion I see no apology for violation of the community established consensus without any talk from JJ.   ManosHacker ^talk 07:40, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Proposed sanction

It has been more than three days since this ANI thread was opened. During this time, a clear consensus has emerged that J. Johnson has repeatedly crossed the line of WP:CIVIL and created unpleasant hostile environments for multiple editors in multiple discussions. Femkemilene and Ames86 suggested above to impose a limited community ban on J. Johnson from commenting on the behavior and beliefs of other editors, but this may be difficult to implement in practice.

So far, J. Johnson has still not acknowledged the incivility in any of the recent incidents quoted/diffed above despite several opportunities to do so across the multiple recent warnings, relevant discussions, and the thread above. Additionally, J. Johnson has continued this behavior within this ANI thread itself, remarking that Apparently these erudite thinkers did not grasp that subtlety and deflected the issues of J. Johnson's incivil language onto the editors raising the objections.

In light of these facts, a community ban consisting of a three month block, during which time J. Johnson is encouraged to review the principles of WP:CIVIL and WP:NOTBATTLEGROUND, will serve to prevent further escalation and hostility in the near future. This will enforce a cooling off period for J. Johnson, after which we will hopefully see the editor whose non-abrasive collaborative spirit appeared so prominently in the 2009 diffs posted by WhatamIdoing above. — MarkH₂₁^talk 05:19, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

• Support (proposer): The separate incidents of incivility by JJ have been brought up by several editors in several different discussions. JJ has failed to acknowledge the incivility and has failed to stop the regular occurrences of hostile tone.
  Such a sanction would prevent further occurrences in the near future while also providing a cooling off period. — MarkH₂₁^talk 06:09, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support? (involved editor): I'm not sure how appropriate it is for me to comment here as involved editor. Also, I'm also not familiar with precedent here. J. Johnson is an experienced editor, who should know better than using incivil language, even if fellow editors are clearly wrong in his/her/their eyes. For the sake of having the lowest sanction possible to remedy the behaviour, a shorter block in combination with a prohibition to comment on other people's behaviour and beliefs may be more effective and less impactfull. Femke Nijsse (talk) 07:27, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support (involved editor). As proposed. JJ's uncivil behavior is not new 1, 2. Failure to address all previous incidents has escalated his uncivil behavior.   ManosHacker ^talk 08:40, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support (involved editor). The fact that JJ's behavior and unrepentant attitude endure—even within this very discussion (see diff)—warrants strong action. Given his long history, I'm not optimistic that a "kinder, gentler" prohibition from commenting on other editors' behavior and beliefs, would be effective. We would likely end up spending hours at ANI, again. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:13, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• Support (uninvolved editor) - I hadn't meant to come to AN/I and got here on a misclick. Don't know this editor at all, and am glad because the quotes I'm reading and the utter lack of contrition are over the line of decency and civility I need in a collaborative effort like Wikipedia. Three months off will preventatively protect users from abuse, and give this manners-challenged editor some time to reflect on the the reality that actions have consequences, sooner or later, even here. Jusdafax (talk) 22:37, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

  got here on a misclick – I'm tempted to add a phab ticket urging that an Are you sure? dialog box be inserted as a firewall to protect people from inadvertently ending up at ANI. EEng 00:32, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose JJ has a wealth of knowledge about earthquakes. His lack of civility is sort of refreshing actually. There's never any doubt what he thinks of you. Unlike so many other editors here, who hide their feelings behind a veil. So all you fragile flowers out there, get used to it. I don't always agree with JJ. But, I feel it would be a big loss to the encyclopedia if he's forced to take a long break. Antipocalypse (talk) 01:10, 14 March 2020 (UTC) — Note: An editor has expressed a concern that Antipocalypse (talk • contribs) has been canvassed to this discussion. (diffs: [82], [83], [84], [85])

I was only kidding about fragile flowers. Please don't be insulted, anyone. And I know that you're supposed to hide your feelings behind a veil at this site. Has never been easy for me. My point is still the same: JJ is a great asset to the project. Antipocalypse (talk) 01:47, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

You were not kidding. You came in ANI. And you continue. Are you thinking of striking out "refreshing" or "flowers"?   ManosHacker ^talk 05:34, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

@Antipocalypse: You may find a lack of civility to be refreshing, but civility is one of Wikipedia’s five pillars and breaches of the policy are not refreshing for others. — MarkH₂₁^talk 06:23, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Antipocalypse: one of the reasons why civility is a pillar, is that other editors with a wealth of knowledge may leave the project because they don't enjoy editing in a hostile environment. Making good contributions doesn't shield you from having to follow policy. You can make it abundantly but politely clear what you think about other edits, without commenting on the editors, no veil needed. Femke Nijsse (talk) 08:21, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

unsure Is there a way to do a suspended sentence for these things? If not then just taking a 'gradualist' approach - the encyclopedia will get the benefit of JJ's knowledge eventually - and I think the examples in this Wikipedia:Assume_the_assumption_of_good_faith might be useful for the people reading back through the conversations they have had with JJ - which may take some of the emotional tone out of the threads (people make mistakes about intentions all the time - and I'm not convinced JJ intends to end up in conflict with other editors, but it does seem to have happened, and once it starts then obviously that naturally escalates to a stage where JJ does sound a bit harsh/unyielding). EdwardLane (talk) 14:11, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

JJ canvassing

This is blatant canvassing by JJ: JJ’s recent user talk page post linked to this ANI thread called Hi, and I could use your help and stating I could use your help here. Such wording is clearly non-neutral and prohibited by Wikipedia:Canvassing#Inappropriate notification.

That post was immediately followed by Antipocalypse’s !vote and reference to that message, and the connection between the two accounts is only confirmed by the dating of the former account retirement and the new account statement.

Sorry to connect a clean start user with their former account, but canvassing is a serious issue. — MarkH₂₁^talk 07:18, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Non-issue. ManosHacker made a claim, JJ requested the editor in question to address it. It's within reason for JJ to do so. You're really fishing here. Mr rnddude (talk) 07:32, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

The point is that I could use your help is non-neutral in a notification to a centralized discussion, unlike a post that would hypothetically say something like There is an ANI thread with competing claims about why you left WP. Could you clarify?

This is not the main issue in the thread but it is something to note. — MarkH₂₁^talk 07:38, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

JerryRussel is a polite editor who chose to leave Wikipedia. I doubt he connects to Antipocalypse. The connection here is only the time.   ManosHacker ^talk 07:29, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

@ManosHacker: The connection is also through Antipocalypse mentioning JJ’s greetings and heads-up while JJ’s only recent user talk page post is the one made on JerryRussell’s page a few one hours before Antipocalypse commented here. I’m not claiming misconduct by JerryRussell nor commenting on their editing history; I have had no interactions with them before. — MarkH₂₁^talk 07:35, 14 March 2020 (UTC); correction on number of hours 08:52, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

User's contributions speak for themselves on the case here.   ManosHacker ^talk 08:40, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, it's me, the editor formerly known as user:JerryRussell. Since you all are so smart at following breadcrumbs, maybe you also can realize that Swiss Propaganda Research is entirely correct when they say that Wikipedia administration and editorial policy is now completely dominated by paid editors who are working for giant corporations and governments. I have tremendous respect for the many, many true volunteer editors here, but you've been out-maneuvered.

If you all want to waste your time trying to block an honest, valuable editor like JJ; or for that matter, tracking down former editors with new names; I think your priorities are misdirected. But, that's for you to decide.

I can assure you that JJ was not responsible for my departure from Wikipedia. I too would appreciate it if JJ would tone down his comments about other editors and about their contributions. But he's done great work with his contributions to earthquake-related articles, making sure that they correctly articulate mainstream views, while also allowing appropriate coverage of reliably sourced but unorthodox views.

The Wikipedia policy against canvassing has never made any sense at all to me. What is wrong with JJ asking me to reply to false claims made here, that he was the cause of my departure? Why wouldn't it be OK for him to ask me, a long term collaborator, to stand up for him at this ANI? For that matter, why shouldn't he be able to ask my opinion about the lede to the Tangshan earthquake article?

I registered this account so as to make hopefully non-controversial, fact-based contributions to the knowledge base here, and with no intention of getting involved in any administrative drama. But before I left, I promised JJ that I would be available if he needed me. So when I received his request, I then studied the rules at wp:validalt and regarding fresh starts in general, and determined that I could not answer using my old name. So now that I've been unmasked, I will open another new account in good time.

Best wishes to you all.... Antipocalypse (talk) 18:26, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Personal attacks in edit summaries by Velvet-twenties

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

This turned up via my watchlist. Two summaries in particular, "niggas mad" and "Make an account if you're so gung-ho about this you retard.", strike me as something that should never be happening on WP. ThatMontrealIP (talk) 12:19, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

@Velvet-twenties: Dude, come on. You've been here for long enough. You know better than to address an editor that way. I don't care if they have an account or not.--WaltCip (talk) 12:36, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Note that Velvet-twenties [86] to revert to their preferred version, without any discussion on the article talk page, although at least without the uncivil edit summaries.Nigel Ish (talk) 15:12, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't understand how anyone could make the first edit summary cited by ThatMontrealIP and still not be blocked five hours after it was reported, and the second was almost as bad. Where are all the admins? And, on the underlying content issue, I have removed identification of de Mérode's father from the article. It should not be replaced until consensus has been reached on the talk page. I have no idea who her father was, but know that that edit summary is totally unacceptable. Phil Bridger (talk) 17:41, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Calling the IP a "retard" is clearly offensive, but I don't understand what V-t meant when he said "niggas mad".--Bbb23 (talk) 19:20, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Really? Don't you understand that "nigga" is just a misspelling of "nigger"? And that there was either an apostrophe or an "are" missing? And that while admins watching this fail to see the obvious Velvet-twenties is continuing to edit war Phil Bridger (talk) 19:35, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Can someone just do something about this? It has been reported here and at WP:RFPP and now warrants a report at the edit-warring notice board, but I'm buggered if I'm going to look up how to do things there when it was obvious from the start that this editor should have been blocked. Someone do it. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:53, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• (edit conflict) I see a lot of people saying the word "nigga" in the movies but they are all from African ancestry. I heard that this word is offensive when someone from European ancestry says it. Velvet-twenties says in his/her user page that he is a native German so that means he is European. That means it was offensive.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 20:02, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Are you implying that there are exactly zero people of African ancestry who were born in Europe? Why are you edit warring to include this ridiculous comment in a closed thread? Eagles 24/7 (C) 20:46, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• That's beside the point. The word is offensive if it's ever used before a public audience. Phil Bridger (talk) 20:57, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Well yeah, and it shouldn't be used on Wikipedia regardless of a user's ancestry. Eagles 24/7 (C) 21:00, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• Alright, I have crossed my comment. I am sorry.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 21:03, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

• As soon as this editor came off this block the reverting started again. It also seems that she magically changed from being a native German speaker to a native Portuguese speaker a few minutes ago. Why on Earth was an editor who made those edit summaries blocked for only 31 hours rather than indefinitely? I'm not going to involve myself in this any more because it is clear that our admins are not taking the worst form of incivility seriously. Phil Bridger (talk) 14:54, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

You're all in the wrong. You have no idea who Cléo de Mérode is and are just editing her page for brownie points (even said, "I have no idea who her father was), meanwhile I've researched Cléo for nearly two years and was able to determine who her real father was. The editors have also accused me of not ever reading Theodor Christomannos' biography - indeed I haven't, I can't afford it, and there are sadly no scans of it online. But there's a substantial amount of proof that he's her father.

These people were also previously convinced that Cléo's mother was not Vincentia de Mérode, I proved them wrong. Vincentia's brother is documented as being the landscape artist Karl von Mérode, and, despite the fact that I've published a document from 1874 displaying the fact that they are siblings, these editors still don't believe me. They're obviously not interested in Cléo, the Belle Epoque, and Victorian/Edwardian era, all of which I am skilled in. I'll continue to edit Cléo's page as I please, as it was neglected until I stepped in and fixed it.

P.S. No, I'm not of African ancestry, I'm half Portuguese and half Czech. I'm not German at all, and don't live in Portugal or Germany. I don't feel the need to give out personal info about me on wikipedia, especially since you all are stalking me immediately after I get off postblock. I won't involve myself in this anymore either, since none of you even know what you're talking about. Phil Bridger wishes.

P.P.S. - If you hate geni websites so much since they're "inaccurate" despite being crafted by family members who know way more than anyone else would, please edit these pages too:

Mabel Normand Cecile Arnold Wilhelmina Cooper Lien Deyers Gabrielle Réjane Valerie Boothby

• Methinks a WP:NOTHERE block is in order here. They've reverted to their preferred version again today, with no attempt to engage on the talk page. They're here defending the use of clearly non-WP:RS sources in a manner which suggests they don't understand what a reliable source is or don't care, they've already been blocked for racist comments in edit summaries, and today they also went to the talk page of an IP editor blocked for serious personal attacks to say their targets "deserved it". I have reverted their edit and full-protected the page, anyway. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:45, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

"Methinks" you don't know anything about Cléo nor understand how much time and effort I put into researching this woman. Men always wanna discredit a woman's research. Have fun having an inaccurate wikipedia page!

There are simple solutions that will allow you to productively edit the website without getting blocked or continually reverted - 1) Cut out the racist comments and personal attacks - if you make comments like the one's you made in the edit summaries then you won't be allowed to edit. 2) Discuss what you want to say on the article talk page - if you want to persuade other editors then you need to talk to them. Note that the article talk page already contains several requests for you to do this. 3) Read and understand Wikipedia's policys on reliable sourcing. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a personal, family website, so sourcing should be limited to Reliable Sources - if things aren't reported in reliable sources then they shouldn't go in the article. If you have carried out extensive research then this should enable you to identify sourcing that meets Wikipedia's requirements and convince people on the talk page.Nigel Ish (talk) 19:30, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Actually, your point (3) is probably not going to be fruitful. This kind of research is typically based on primary sources, and we can't base an article on those either. EEng 05:33, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• Comment I do not like the flippant remarks, inflammatory edit summaries and reverts. The editor is being a disruption and WP:IDHT. I think Ivanvector understands the situation - but the Velvet-twenties needs a stronger wake up call. Thanks for reporting Montreal IP. i will endorse stronger sanctions for any editor who disrupts the project. Lightburst (talk) 00:36, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• Agree with Lightburst - Velvet is refusing to hear what the problem is here. Their use of unreliable sources is an issue, but the real problem is the repeated use of insulting language (and the statements to the effect that some editors deserve to be personally attacked). I'm not sure this is a NOTHERE case, since they appear to want to improve our content, but escalating blocks for any furthur lapses in AGF and CIVILITY would seem to be a minimum starting point. GirthSummit _(blether) 16:34, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
• I'd also endorse escalating blocks. The user does not understand that their block was about civility. The seem to think it is about content.ThatMontrealIP (talk) 18:41, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Unethical behavior

• Devlet Geray (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

[87] This phrase by Devlet Geray is quite abusive. Каракорум (talk) 08:16, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

The user should have been indefblocked a long time ago. They are already indefblocked on their former home project, the Russian Wikipedia.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:52, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Ymblanter, the name of the page and the name of The user being reported also looks very similler. COI as well? LakesideMiners^{Come Talk To Me!} 13:12, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

The subject of the article lived in the 16th century, so no. I see some recent issues with POV and a mild personal attack in response to being hounded, but many constructive contributions prior to this month. Doesn't merit a block in my opinion, and it doesn't matter in my opinion that they're blocked on ruwiki, this is not the Russian Wikipedia. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:17, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I do not know where you see constructive contributions before March. In fact, most of their contributions were reverted. This[ is a representative example of their editing.--Ymblanter (talk) 13:31, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Drawing one edit out of that edit war doesn't help demonstrate anything, and Devlet Geray's contributions in that conflict mostly were not reverted. They had added unsourced information about minors, but they removed it themselves. As for the Daily Mail, it is not common knowledge that we locally forbid it as a reliable source, and the editor conflicting with them made no effort to explain; I mean, we have a WP:DAILYMAIL shortcut for that purpose, but they just kept linking to WP:RS which mentions this only in an inline note. I'm seeing a problem here, but not the one you want me to see. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 14:01, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

That's ok, it was not me who reported this editor, and I do not have any time now to build a full case - and if I had time, I would have gone straight to AE. I can survive if they continue editing for another few months.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:12, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

• Ymblanter, I had a better opinion of you, but nevermind, it's ok because my expectations doesn't worth anything. Besides, it's impolite to talk about a person in the third person in their presence, as you did. You can use my nickname or just "user" --Devlet Geray (talk) 15:07, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
• Ivanvector, thank you for you adequate position --Devlet Geray (talk) 15:07, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Ivanvector, Never mind, im fucking dumb. LakesideMiners^{Come Talk To Me!} 15:10, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

(ec) No, I do not think so. The page is about a Middle Age Crimean khan, and the user who is apparently of Crimean Tatar ancestry has just taken this user name. This is not more COI that User:George_Washington editing an article about George Washington. Though of course they feel strongly about some issues, and this is a considerable part of the problem.--Ymblanter (talk) 13:19, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, you write "They are already unlocked on their former home project, Russian Wikipedia." I was never blocked there, Devlet Geray was blocked indefinitely for numerous violations. But the point is not that, but that his behavior here is unethical. And it was he who began to haunt me after blocking in the ruviki. He canceled my edits in articles where he had never made edits before. Каракорум (talk) 13:28, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I mean Devlet Geray, not you. (They were blocked, not unlocked).--Ymblanter (talk) 13:32, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Ymblanter, never mind, im dumb LakesideMiners^{Come Talk To Me!} 15:10, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Do we have a policy on biographies of undead persons? ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 15:15, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Creffett, I believe it includes chainsaws. Guy (help!) 15:29, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Back to the original topic here; Devlet Geray, directing edit summaries like the one linked at the top of this discussion towards other editors is not OK. If you think someone is following you around, bring it to an administrator's attention. I seriously considered just blocking you anyway, but there seems to be enough objection that I'm content to give a strong warning. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 16:26, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

One note. Devlet very aggressively accuses me of persecution, but if we look at the history of edits, we will see that it was he who began to pursue me in articles Insurgency in the North Caucasus, and List of wars involving Russia. He’s just deleting my edits without comment, although he’s never visited these pages before. And this happened due to the fact that after a permanent lock in Ruwiki for war edits and Pov pushing, he tried to get round the blocking through ip, after which I wrote to the administrator of Ruwiki and he was completely blocked. As a result, he began to pursue my contribution in other language sections, in particular here. Каракорум (talk) 17:49, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I would like to note that Каракорум's behavior in this matter is quite inexcusable. He has been wiki-stalking Devlat Geray for a long time. On Russian Wikipedia, he nominated almost every single article created by him for deletion, and after not getting his way, re-nominated kept ones. He is an active editor on Russian Wikipedia articles about fringe topics, and maintains a heavy, obvious WP:BATTLEGROUND mentality. (when asked about the language of edit summaries he said quote "Of course you right. I used russian, because my opponent knows it".--PlanespotterA320 (talk) 14:21, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Devlet Giray himself began to pursue me in English Wiki, after his was blocked in ruwiki. I didn’t blocked him there, it was done by the administrators according to numerous facts of violations. And the participant PlanespotterA320 in the same way she is engaged in pushing into ruwiki as well as Devlet, for which she received a topic ban to some articles. Moreover, she wrote a comment on my discussion page, despite the fact that she was not pinged there, which indicates a persecution on her part. Do you have a complaint about my edits? Are they vandal? If not then don't chase me.Каракорум (talk) 14:28, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Like I told you before, your edits appeared on my watchlist. I am not chasing you. I merely saw that you had arrived in enwiki (engaging in unaccaptable edits) and decided to confront you on your talkpage, and I was horrified by what was already there. On English Wikipedia, there is no rule that people have to be pinged or "invited" to other users talkpages. Каракорум is a notorious Tatarophobe on Russian Wikipedia, who has written things on ruwiki that would result in a ban if they were done on enwiki. He literally went on a tirade nominating Crimean Tatar articles that clearly met notability requirements for deletion, and repeatedly re-submitted deletion nominations when unsatisfied by the 'keep' result. Such POV pusher/propagandist that behaves like a wrecking ball should not be tolerated on english wikipedia. At the very least, their complaints should be taken with a grain of salt.--PlanespotterA320 (talk) 14:37, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

• • • • I,m sorry but. First, which of my edits here are unacceptable? Specific examples? Secondly, I did not submit Devlet's article for repeated deletion; if they were left, this is a lie. What exactly are they blaming me for? This specifically refers to the unacceptable behavior of Devlet. Каракорум (talk) 14:47, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
• Do. Not. Import. Conflict. From. Another. Wiki. Or. You. Will. All. Be. Blocked. --Floquenbeam (talk) 14:39, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

  Floquenbeam, Promoting to policy with immediate effect. Guy (help!) 14:42, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

  +1. I'm also not pleased about the personal attack inherent in the title of this section, but have passed it off as a loss in translation. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 15:48, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

  Ivanvector What do you have in mind? It’s not a war of revisions, but an abusive comment on the revision. Каракорум (talk) 16:07, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

  We call that comment an "edit summary". WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:44, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Abuse by blocked users

Please redact Special:Diff/944968112 and all edits related to talk page violation by 93.137.0.201 (talk · contribs) in User talk:Thepenguin9 and my talk page. For Poskaer (talk · contribs) please give him a harsher ban (e-mail address, talk page block). Thanks. Flix11 (talk) 22:45, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Flix11, Poskaer hasn't edited their talkpage ever. I don't think revoking TPA would be appropriate here (tho I did momentarily do so when I misread the diff you linked. SQL^{Query me!} 22:52, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

SQL What I want primarily is the redaction, for the block the e-mail one might suitable. Flix11 (talk) 22:53, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Flix11, Have they been emailing you since the block? SQL^{Query me!} 22:55, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

SQL No. Oh I see. If there is not, then no email block? OK, I am fine just with the redaction. Regards, Flix11 (talk) 22:58, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

'201 (currently under a 3-day block) may as yet lack the objectivity for which we strive: edit summaries 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6. Narky Blert (talk) 23:18, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

The situation could have been more clear, and was initially declined at WP:AIV before I made the block (Special:PermanentLink/945106591; courtesy ping Maile66). The reporter is not without blame, now having been warned for personal attacks twice this month on their talk page. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 01:58, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't believe admins have the power to block anyone's email account/address. The individual editor can control whether or not they can be emailed, by changing their settings at: Preferences/User Profile. Un-click "Allow other users to email me" and Save. Both sides in this spat are culpable in personal attacks. — Maile (talk) 02:34, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

That is confusingly explained. Yes editors can choose to disable receiving all emails. However editors shouldn't need to use this to stop abuse except in exceptional circumstances. It indicates we've failed if editors need to do it. Very rarely it may come to that, because of the limitations in our sock hunting tools given privacy considerations etc, although personally I'd also like the WMF to at least try via legal or other means to stop it when it comes to that. There is also the option to disallow "emails from brand-new users". Again because of socking, this option may sometimes be needed to stop abuse, and in cases like these it's fairly limited what we can do.

But to be clear, such options should only be needed when socking is being used for abuse via multiple account. For I think about 2 years now, there has also the option to specify certain editors who aren't allowed to email you. While it's a useful tool, it also shouldn't really be needed. If an editor does not want to receive emails from another editor, they can simply tell the emailer, on wikipedia, to stop. Such a request needs to be observed, even more so than a request to stay off someone's talk page. Failure to observe it should be met with blocks. And yes, admins can disable email access with blocks. SUL complicates things as editors may have accounts in other projects which we on en cannot handle, so the tool may be useful for such cases.

What this means is that despite the tool, it's not acceptable for use to require someone to use it if they complain an editor keeps emailing them when they've asked the person to stop. We can perhaps suggest it as a quick and easy fix, but we should also simply block for WP:harassment especially when it's brought to ANI. However we do require some evidence of sufficient abuse via email before blocking it, and often this needs to happen privately. I believe most admins will disable email for socks if the master is known to abuse email even if there's no specific abuse from that sock.

Note that this only refers to emails sent via the Wikimedia email system. If an editor has replied to someone before, or otherwise their email is public, emails may be sent directly. In such cases, there's nothing we can do about the emails. Editors could use filters which most email services and clients provide to block emails. However again, most good providers have policies which would likely mean someone needs to stop emailing a person if they've been asked to, and so it's likely also an option to complain to the person's provider if they keep email from the same address. If they are going through the effort of making new email addresses, that's a difficult situation, and sort of getting very off-topic so I'll leave it. That said, as with other forms of off-wiki harassment related to actions here, I would support a block of the editor here if it's clear that they are the same person although this would likely need to go through arbcom.

Nil Einne (talk) 06:39, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I submit my conduct to the community for review, advice, and correction

Moved to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard § Spectrum NACs

 – –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 06:42, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Cross-article university vandalism

Heads up. I have noticed recent bogus claims that various universities are actually online universities, often through Zoom. IPs are all over the place, and the edits are sometimes self-reverted. See recent history of University of California, Los Angeles, University of California, Berkeley , Yale University and Pennsylvania State University for examples. Meters (talk) 21:31, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the alert. This is being done because the universities have told their students to go home and take their classes online. I've already encountered one such article and protected it; I'll take care of the ones you list. If you see others, you could add them here. -- MelanieN (talk) 21:36, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Will do. Thanks. Meters (talk) 21:39, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm giving them all two weeks semi. I protected UCLA and Penn. MrZ already took care of Cal. Yale hasn't gotten hit yet. Just a matter of time, I suspect, but I'll have to wait until protection is actually needed. -- MelanieN (talk) 21:42, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Yale was self-undoen. Stony Brook University just popped up [88] with a bit of blatant extra v on the side. Meters (talk) 22:14, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Stony Brook isn't there yet; it's only been vandalized once. This same vandalism is being done on dozens of pages (I have personally protected more than 20 in the last couple of hours, and I'm not the only one doing it). I am wondering if this identical edit by so many different people is being inspired by something said on social media somewhere? -- MelanieN (talk) 23:42, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

My apologies for not noticing the prior AN thread on this. Meters (talk) 23:51, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

WP:SPECULATION on my part is that universities that are providing online classes during this coronavirus situation are being labeled as online by these IPs. Of course, there will be more to it than this but I'm adding this as food for thought. MarnetteD|Talk 23:59, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

That still leaves the question of why anyone would even think of going to a university's Wikipedia article and re-labelling it an "online university" just because of this. – numbermaniac 07:59, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Because it's "funny" to label a normally in-person university as online-only, since online universities tend to have a worse reputation/be less prestigious than traditional universities. creffett (talk) 18:45, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Wow, I wonder if this is some kind of spam campaign involving Zoom. Sheesh. I wouldn't leave the articles protected unless the vandalism is quite persistent though. On the scale of such things it's pretty tame. It's like the old joke of referring to Leland Stanford Junior University as a "junior university" because it says so right in its name, heh heh. 2601:648:8202:96B0:54D9:2ABB:1EDB:CEE3 (talk) 00:20, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm still seeing it come up on more university pages. Can someone savvy make an edit filter? Natureium (talk) 00:25, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

You can request a filter at Wikipedia:Edit filter/Requested. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 05:08, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

It's just a meme, not a scam. Someone made the joke, it got popular, so folks thought it'd be "funny" to change the Wikipedia articles. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:02, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Exactly. It's from the colleges where the kids have been sent home and are taking their classes online. Somebody started it, somebody spread it, lots of people copycatted, and we are stuck mopping up after them. -- MelanieN (talk) 19:49, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

SKZ2020

• SKZ2020 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Affected page: Michael Spence (academic)

Violation: User blanked page contents. Journeyman editor Dark-World25 reverted change and left "only warning" for disruptive editing. SKZ2020 then undid this reversion.

• Relevant DIFFs:

Original page blanking: (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Michael_Spence_(academic)&diff=prev&oldid=945151968)

Warning: (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:SKZ2020&diff=prev&oldid=945163038)

"Undo" of Dark-World25's reversion: (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Michael_Spence_(academic)&diff=prev&oldid=945164938) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Utnapishti (talk • contribs) 04:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

• Sorry I don't have time to investigate but a quick look shows that the material removed by SKZ2020 is typical of what is seen at Wikipedia when people use an article to attack a living person. The issue should be raised at WP:BLPN where people might have an opinion on how many of the digs at the subject should be retained in the article. Johnuniq (talk) 09:26, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I've added a COI tag to the article. I've just chopped a lot of NPOV-violating promotional material from the article, and SKZ2020 repeatedly removes content critical of Spence without discussion, some (but by no means all) of which appears well referenced. Bondegezou (talk) 09:51, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

For example, this edit by SKZ2020 is just adding lots of puffery, based on primary sources or SYNTHy extrapolation. Bondegezou (talk) 09:54, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Akira CA / Ythlev (two sections merged)

A while ago there was an RfC on maps of China, which concluded that using maps that lump the PRC and Taiwan together violates NPOV. A few users apparently do not agree with the consensus and have been constantly finding ways to circumvent it.

The first is by CaradhrasAiguo, who tried to hide the RfC and make it harder to reference it in the future. The user repeatedly removed the reference from the relevant MOS even though it is fully within scope and most users agreed to add it.

The second is by PE fans, who tried to overrule the consensus. The user asked on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/China and Chinese-related articles how Taiwan should be coloured on maps of China. A small number of users expressed Taiwan should be coloured as a lighter shade. The user then concludes that maps of China should include Taiwan and tried to force it into the MOS, in direct contradiction with consensus.

The third is by Akira CA and others, who disregard the consensus by finding excuses on why the RfC results do not apply elsewhere. They've tried to make a distinction between world maps and maps specifically about China. They've argued how such separating Taiwan only makes sense for that map because of the difference in severity. They disregard the core of the issue that including Taiwan on maps of China violates NPOV.

Finally, after an agreement that maps can include Taiwan if a distinction from the mainland is made, Akira CA attempted to circumvent the NPOV policy altogether. Many maps on the site have Taiwan lumped with China without distinction. I have removed Taiwan from such maps accordingly, but Akira CA reverted my edits on the grounds that Commons files do not need to be neutral. With no clear reason, the user wanted me to upload separate versions instead of replacing the existing maps. However the user then replaced the existing maps themselves with a version they agree with. The user also obstructed the removal of non-neutral maps as the MOS describes (Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/China and Chinese-related articles#Violation). Clearly the lack of NPOV requirement on Commons is this user's way of pushing their POV on Wikipedia. They selectively reverted a version they do not agree with.

The core issue is these users do not agree with consensus. If they wish to challenge the consensus, they should start new discussions, do close reviews, if all else fails take it to arbitration. They should not disrupt Wikipedia like this. Ythlev (talk) 12:11, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm Akira CA, the above user utilized canvassing and cherry-picked other user's comments to promote his preferred MoS version over others and the consensus. In the original RfC, the consensus was to replace the Greater China map wtih a mainland China and that a map that lumps the People's Republic of China and Taiwan together violates NPOV. However the user misinterpreted the consensus and claimed that "All content, including every lists, maps, and tables, related to China should not include Taiwan" despite that Taiwan's official name is the Republic of China, with the Constitution of the Republic of China and Kuomingtang claiming the political entity to be the only representative of China. There are also policies on Chinese Wikipedia to ban both "juxtapositioning Taiwan and China" and "including Taiwan as a part of China", because either way violates NPOV and "Wikipedia should keep silence on this matter".

Ythlev then started mass purging maps all over the Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons, including those shades Taiwan with a different colour and clearly labelled the island as "claimed but not controlled by China", a long-established convention on WikiProject Maps. The user changed and reverted this, this, this, this, this, this, and this 25 times in total to lobby his prefered version despite being reverted by four different editors. PE fans soon noticed his destruction and rose a discussion against his conduct. Many users supported the "controlled/claimed not controlled/grey" colour scheme (with the reason that they remain unresolved for either side, and the map should reflect this for the sake of neutrality, as with other maps on Wikipedia) for geopolitical disputed territories and voiced their concerns against Ythlev's removal of "claimed not controlled" territories. Even Ythlev himself admit that "Taiwan can be included with distinction" is as far as the consensus go.

However, I later found out Ythlev is still mass purging maps, so I posted a concern on his Commons user page to inform his violations of Commons:Overwriting existing files, which states that

Controversial or contested changes

Changes to a file that are likely to be contested should be uploaded to a separate filename. Upload wars (a form of edit war in which contributors repeatedly upload different versions of a file in an effort to have their version be the visible one) are always undesirable. As with other forms of edit warring, users who engage in upload wars may be blocked from editing.

If another editor thinks that a change is not an improvement (even if the editor making the change thinks it minor), the change can be reverted. Once a change has been reverted, the new image should be uploaded under a new filename (unless the reverting editor explicitly or implicitly agrees to the contested change). This is true even if the change is necessary, in one editor's view, to avoid a copyright infringement: in this case, if agreement cannot be reached through discussion, the old file should be nominated for deletion.

The more known uses of a file there are (through transclusions on Wikimedia projects), the more cautious contributors should be in deciding whether a change qualifies as "minor". Widespread usage of a file makes it more likely that even small changes will be controversial. If in doubt, uploading as a separate file avoids potential surprises for reusers. In some cases, prior discussion with previous uploader(s) or in locations where the file is in use may help decide whether a planned change can be considered "minor".

and Commons:Disputed territories, which states that

1. Both versions of any map can be uploaded as separate files, clearly labelled with their POV, and linking one another as Other Versions. Whichever map was first at a certain filename gets to stay there. The Wikipedias can decide which version is appropriate to use in which educational context. Legitimate improvements that are independent of POV can be made with complete consensus, but if anyone objects, they should be reverted and sent to a new filename.

over his 25 reverts.

Nevertheless, Ythlev ignored all these Commons Policies and regarded my messages as a circumvention to Wikipedia Policy through Commons Policy. He then threatened me on his Commons talk page and reverted every compromises he did before. Regarding to his conduct and multiple violations of policies across Wikimedia sites — including the 3RR rules — I posted a notice at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring. -- Akira😼CA 13:07, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I wish people would stop creating subsections for their comments here. Anyway, the MOS is under discretionary sanctions. If I find people are disrupting MOS pages, I'm going to become irritable and probably block them. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 13:42, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Actually, Ythlev, the only RfC-related notice I even blanked was your blatant canvassing (the ping notifications by that point were likely already sent to each of the targets anyway) which you attempted to deny. In addition to your own disruptive editing, which has appeared on this noticeboard not once, but twice, it is apparent that you are not above telling any lie. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 13:59, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

@Akira CA: "Taiwan can be included with distinction" is as far as the consensus go To be clear, that sentence means both a map without Taiwan and a map with Taiwan distinguished are acceptable. Yet your actions show you don't agree with the former as acceptable. You would rather have a map with undistinguished Taiwan than no map at all, as demonstrated by your reversions. In that case, the guideline is completely pointless. Ythlev (talk) 15:02, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

The above paragraph make zero sense as I have never add Taiwan to any maps that originally (before any of your edit) don't include the island. All I've been doing is stoping your disruptive editing with respect to the orginal uploaders and their versions. -- Akira😼CA 23:51, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Even PE fans wrote "However Taiwan should not be included if there is no distinction from the mainland". Ythlev (talk) 15:08, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

"using maps that lump the PRC and Taiwan together violates NPOV" I fully support this. In fact, my opinion is that if there is no distinction from the mainland, inclusion of Taiwan indicates the support of the POV that "Taiwan is part of China" and contradicts NPOV. However, the key point is that excluding Taiwan from China indicates the support of the POV that "Taiwan is not part of China", which also contradicts NPOV. The long time convention stated in WP:WikiProject_Maps/Conventions#Orthographic_maps is to mark disputed territories as disputed territories. I believe in that this long time convention fits best with NPOV principle. After a long discussion in the talk page involving many editors, the current version of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/China and Chinese-related articles indicates its support on WP:WikiProject_Maps/Conventions#Orthographic_maps. I hope that everyone can follow the current version.PE fans (talk) 23:15, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

• First, stop debating the dispute here. Second, I don't see why we're accusing a user of canvassing when they literally pinged their opponent in a dispute. Canvassing is selective notification that excludes potential opponents. It's not a credible accusation, so quit repeating it, that's a personal attack and WP:ASPERSION. Third, the community's consensus and the corresponding MOS guideline is fairly unambiguous: By default, Taiwan should not be included. Claiming that this is POV is irrelevant, when there is an NPOV dispute, the community can decide on what to do about it, and the community has done so in this case. There should be no attempts to override the MOS per a POV dispute that the community has already ruled on. Fourth, WP:WikiProject Maps/Conventions#Orthographic maps is irrelevant in a situation where it does not apply, per a community mandate. Fifth, we have no jurisdiction at Commons, but edit warring over Commons images that are hosted on Wikipedia with the intent of subverting Wikipedia consensuses, policies or guidelines is disruptive editing on Wikipedia. There is no "catch-22" that we will not block you because the disruption is technically taking place on Commons. And last, the reported users have been formally made aware of the relevant MOS DS, and I agree with NRP that we should issue blocks if disruption continues. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 03:16, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

  @Swarm: Where do we go from here? Since then, another user has edited according to consensus and could get reverted by the above users. How are you going to prevent these users from disrupting the site? Ythlev (talk) 05:24, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• Stop deceiving the administrators with all your positively loaded lies ignoring even the most basic facts. The "another user" misidentified the map by claiming it is POV on Arunachal Pradesh, however the map doesn't even include Arunachal Pradesh and shades it as Indian territory. The user is indeed damaging the Wikipedia by editing disruptively.

“

@Horse Eye Jack: I don't see Arunachal Pradesh included under PRC / Tibet AR control on the current version from 06:28 UTC 13 Mar either. You wrote your comment at 16:30 UTC 13 Mar. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 05:39, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

”

-- Akira😼CA 07:04, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• Nothing at the text of WP:CANVASS mentions the requirement that all the users pinged are inclined to agree with the OP. Only one of the users Ythlev pinged opposes them; notice I participated at the outbreak article, am a frequent editor on East Asia matters (as opposed to some they pinged), and was not pinged. Ythlev is guilty as charged; no amount of apologism will alter that. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 03:37, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

• @Swarm: Also could you give me where the corresponding MOS guideline is fairly unambiguous: By default, Taiwan should not be included. this come from? The current MoS is edited by Ythlev himself one months ago, which he later admitted is a bold changes and doesn't reflect the consensus at the time. After he added his own word the MoS page has been edit warred numerous times, with not only myself but many other editors opposing his bold change to MoS without any discussion. There were no section about Taiwan's political status before his edit, and I didn't find your quote by seaching across the whole MoS space. -- Akira😼CA 05:48, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

According to WP:STABLE, by default, the long time version should be kept. On global maps such as File:World_marriage-equality_laws_(up_to_date).svg, the long time convention is to mark only areas controlled by each country. This has been re-confirmed in the discussion in the talk page of 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic and has been written in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style/China and Chinese-related articles. On country specific maps such like File:Europe-Ukraine_(orthographic_projection;_disputed_territory).svg or File:PRC_Population_Density.svg, the long time convention is to use a third color to indicate claimed uncontrolled territories. This has also been re-confirmed in the discussion in the talk page of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/China and Chinese-related articles and has been written in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style/China and Chinese-related articles. I don't see any reason to deviate from the long time convention. It does not respect the efforts of various editors such as the editors involved in File:PRC_Population_Density.svg between 2010 and 2013. PE fans (talk) 15:01, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Rangeblock request

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Hi. Please can someone help with a rangeblock? The two most recent IP addresses are:

• 39.57.233.73 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)
• 39.57.216.238 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

This is just the tip of the iceberg and has been going on for some time. The 39.57.2xxx seems the most common starting range. Hopefully there's no collateral damage and this can be done. Thanks. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 12:38, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Range blocked for a month. It looks like the IP range recently got off another month-long block, but I don't want to do crazy long blocks on such a wide IP range. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 13:35, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks NRP! Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 17:29, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

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User:Lepintin being disruptive with redirects

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Lepintin (talk · contribs) (a new account, but very likely not a new editor) is being disruptive with redirects. A lot of the changes Lepintin is making are not improvements and are to long-standing redirects, which have likely been subject to discussion and are where they are at via consensus. A few of Lepintin's changes might be improvements. After all, while reverting all of their changes, I reverted myself on this. But that doesn't outweigh the disruption. Clearly. I warned the editor, and the editor blanked their user talk page and continued on with their redirect editing. Someone came to my talk page to alert me to the fact that the editor is still being disruptive. Johnuniq warned the editor, and the editor blanked their user talk page.

Need some intervention here. Flyer22 Frozen (talk) 23:32, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

 Comment: - I have reverted all of the user's redirects. I checked the talk pages on each article and there was no mention of adding redirects. — Mr Xaero ^☎️ 23:40, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

This is Alarjar (talk · contribs). I already cautioned Alarjar earlier today. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 23:47, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

• Added a sockpuppet investigation for these two accounts, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Alarjar — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mr Xaero (talk • contribs) 23:56, 13 March 2020 (UTC)
  • @Mr Xaero: Don't edit my comments. Also, I've blocked both accounts as socks of Dinkton (talk · contribs). NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 00:02, 14 March 2020 (UTC)
    • @NinjaRobotPirate: I apologize. — Mr Xaero ^☎️ 01:32, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

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Nselaa Ward

• AndreaPerry22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Could some uninvolved admin look at the most recent history of both Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nselaa Ward and Nselaa Ward? I'm sure that the perpetrator of the recent, problematic edit to the former and move of the latter was well intentioned: if it were me, I'd revert the page move and murmur some amiable suggestions. But I've already said my piece about the article in the AfD, so perhaps it shouldn't be me. -- Hoary (talk) 06:06, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

The creator of this highly promotional article dropped the whole BLP on their first edit a few weeks ago; may need to check whether there are UPE/COI/SPI issues here. Britishfinance (talk) 12:26, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Serial Number 54129 has kindly reversed the page move and warned the perp. Good. If you (or anyone) would like to comment on the merits (or not) of the article, then the AfD discussion is the place (though I'd suggest SNOW instead). -- Hoary (talk) 13:19, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Editor doesn't understand what Original Research and Synthesis are

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Long time contributor to Wikipedia Coldcreation doesn't understand these concepts as demonstrated on Art Deco page. When I removed obvious OR and SYNTH he reverted me saying 'Restoring sourced material. The claim of WP:NOR and WP:SYNTH is nonsense' [89]. I tried explaining it to him but he again reverted, this time adding source from quick key words search in google books which obviously didn't support text and context in the article. I raised issue at talk page, saying and giving examples of other sections also having the OR, he answered and completely missed the point. See [[90]]. Sauvahge (talk) 10:37, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

There is already, appropriately, a discussion underway at Talk:Art Deco. Coldcreation (talk) 11:09, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

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Possible sock-puppetry at the pages for Frank Oz and Ross Butler (actor)

There is a user (possibly multiple, but seems to be the same user using multiple IP addresses) who keeps adding ethnicity and/or previous nationalities into the leads of the pages of "Frank Oz" and "Ross Butler (actor)" against Wikipedia rules per WP:Ethnicity, but won't offer any explanations on his edits or post anything on the Talk pages of these individuals. Because the user is not logged in and uses multiple IP addresses, I have not posted on their Talk pages, as it would require me to post on numerous talk pages. Please take a look and tell me what I should do. I think it would be best if we could protect those pages, but I will follow the advice given. Apoorva Iyer (talk) 11:03, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you! Apoorva Iyer (talk) 12:09, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) They're not listening or engaging, so I've semiprotected both articles for a week. Thank you for reporting, Apoorva Iyer. Bishonen | tålk 12:10, 14 March 2020 (UTC).

POV-based removal of content

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Hi I'd be grateful for any help or second opinions as to why my recent edit on the page National_Rifle_Association is being removed. I did my best to be concise and maintain NPOV, but I suspect some POV or bias is behind removal of the content I am adding. Thanks. WinstonSmith01984 (talk) 15:18, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

@WinstonSmith01984: I'm not sure you want to do this. PackMecEng (talk) 15:21, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

@WinstonSmith01984: This may already be too late but I strongly suggest you stop edit warring to the extent of self reverting or you are going to be blocked. Then start using the talk page. To be clear, the only thing that requires administrative attention here is your edit warring. Everything else is a WP:Content dispute and you need to engage in dispute resolution just like everyone else. And that begins in the article talk page, and should never involve ANI. Nil Einne (talk) 15:31, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

The filer has made false accusation of vandalism, [[91]] has edit warred and refused to take advice from multiple uses (IDNHT). In fact I am getting a whiff of not here. and add to this accusations of POV pushing.Slatersteven (talk) 15:32, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

They have been partially blocked for a bit, so this can be closed now I think. Hopefully this will have an effect.Slatersteven (talk) 15:34, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Can this be re-opened? Regarding the edit war, I added a Talk section after seeing some users reverting my edit but providing no explanation. User Slatersteven who originally reverted, did not explain why he raised UNDUE as the reason for reverting my edit when asked. There's an un-addressed issue here and my suspicion of bias remains. I'd be grateful to just know what was actually wrong with my edit in the first place! WinstonSmith01984 (talk) 18:28, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

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Long term genre warring

Omair00 (talk · contribs · count)

User has been changing genres without consensus, with or without reliable sources and has not heeded multiple warnings stretching back years. Has a couple blocks, presumably for the same type of issues. Thank you, - FlightTime Phone (open channel) 16:18, 14 March 2020 (UTC)