Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard

Motion: India-Pakistan

Original announcement

Can we handle harassment?

There is one thing out of this Fram-WMF shitstorm which might be worthwhile to discuss. There was a statement that T&S could not forward the case to ArbCom because ArbCom is not really equipped to handle with on-wiki harassment. Indeed, ArbCom requires multiple prior resolution attempts, which would be ANI. In my personal experience (I really tried and failed) proving harassment by an established user at ANI is close to impossible, since one needs to collect a large number of diffs (order of dozens), and it must be pretty obvious that harassment is taking place. Any complaint against an established user at ANI always causes a shitstorm, which actually adds to the feeling of being harassed. Before one goes to Arbcom, one needs to demonstrate several of these failed ANI threads, which makes the whole enterprise close to impossible. Is there anything on the Arbcom side we can do about it, such as closed proceedings similar to T&S? Let me make it clear that this topic is not about me - whereas I am seriously disappointed that the community did not help me when I needed help, I do not currently need help, and I am not going now to discuss issues I had in the past. This is a principal question. Feel free to move it to one of the noticeboards if you feel it does not belong here.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:59, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Ymblanter, Well, I'm certain the answer is it depends on the case, sometimes good at handling it, sometimes not (which actually is the very thing the WMF office policy suggests would happen (sometimes not good)), it's also bound to be the only possible truth - nothing and no-one is perfect all the time. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:03, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

The closed proceedings already exist: ArbCom requires multiple prior resolution attempts, which would be ANI isn't really true for harassment cases. It's true for the serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve part of WP:ARBPOL, but harassment would fall under matters unsuitable for public discussion for privacy, legal, or similar reasons and be heard in private, provided one could convince them that it was necessary. The issue is more a reluctance on the part of editors to take things to Arbcom, and a reluctance on the part of the committee to take on interpersonal disputes. ‑ Iridescent 18:06, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

We are specifically talking about on-wiki, not off-wiki harassment. I am sure an arb or a former arb today said ArbCom would not handle a closed case with exclusively on-wiki evidence (do not remember who that was).--Ymblanter (talk) 18:09, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

You may be thinking of BU Rob13's comments at Wikipedia:Community response to the Wikimedia Foundation's ban of Fram#Bishonen_unblocked_Fram_(+_reactions), which is very relevant here. Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:12, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Yes, this must be it, thanks.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:24, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Rob is probably right—we tend to handle on-wiki issues in on-wiki cases, even when there are (in my opinion) good reasons not to. We are also, in my opinion, not great at handling harassment cases and situations involving long-term disruption by established editors ("unblockables"). When we have in the past placed bans on established contributors based on private evidence, they've gone over pretty poorly: with similar "star chamber" accusations and claims that despite not having seen the evidence, the block can't possibly be warranted. I have to say I'm a little surprised at the number of people who have said that if it had been the ArbCom who had placed this block and not the WMF, all would've been fine and dandy—I suspect that is not how it would have shaken out at all. GorillaWarfare (talk) 18:22, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

The thing is though GW, ArbCom has more transparency in that at least we know who made the decision to sanction someone (and we know they are part of the community here, and are aware of community norms). With WMF, we have no idea - we have the names of WMF functionaries (most of whom don't contribute to enwiki and probably know little about it), but are clueless about who actually made these decisions, something that is of course made worse by the communications being sent to us by the equally faceless WMFOffice account. Black Kite (talk) 18:27, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

If what Rob said on his talk page is close to being accurate, which does line up with what's being said here and kind of lines up with personal experience with the Commitee, then Arbcom is not just "not great at handling harassment cases", they're set up to do everything wrong. The way I understand the process having been explained by Rob (and Drmies, tangentially), Arbcom currently requires the victim to self-identify, and to be exposed to further harassment from their attacker, and new harassment from the community. We need to have a mechanism for anonymizing complaints of harassment, while giving the accused an opportunity to respond. Rob had some good points on this. If we don't, then victims will be 100% justified in skipping local processes and complaining to the Foundation directly, and we've all seen by now how they handle these things. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:45, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I think it's probably something to put up for discussion. Currently, the general rule is that cases may not be handled privately unless they require the review of private, off-wiki evidence. Cases focusing entirely on on-wiki conduct are generally expected to be handled on-wiki. There might be other cases in which that should be different, but I don't want to go too far in the other direction either—the community has generally held that transparency in processes, especially disciplinary processes, is a desirable default, and that exceptions to that should happen rarely and only for good cause. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 18:57, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

The fact that a search for "star chamber" finds that a quarter (10/41) of the archive pages include accusations of ArbCom acting like a star chamber, certainly would seem to make GorillaWarfare's point for her.

I mean, I can already hear the cries of "ArbCom is suppressing criticism of themselves", "how dare they not reveal the evidence" etc had ArbCom sanctioned Fram. Many of the exact same accussation as that is being levied at the WMF office, would be levied towards ArbCom. It is not like ArbCom is super-duper popular - only in comparison to the foundation they can be said so. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:04, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Agreed, most issues involving only on-wiki conduct ought to be "tried" on-wiki. Legitimate claims of harassment need to be an exception to that. Otherwise, instead of reporting, people will just go away, and then "harassing opponents off Wikipedia" becomes a silently accepted practice for "winning" content disputes. That's already occurring, and it's unacceptable. Rob said that he had been working on an OTRS queue specifically for this (I don't have OTRS access and don't know how it works), that's a step in the right direction. Editors ought to feel comfortable reporting harassment knowing we'll keep their identity safe while we investigate. We (by "we" I mean whoever ends up charged with this) will get a lot of false positives but we can quickly discard them, just respond with something like "someone deleting your article is not harassment, here is where you should follow up" or "someone saying 'fuck' in an unrelated conversation is not harassing you personally, you can post at WP:ANI to review the situation". Just put it back to the community when it's not genuinely a harassment situation. And no, the community should not review legitimate harassment claims, we're not capable.

Also, to a point Rob tried to make many times right up to on his way out the door, we need to be better at enforcing the civility policy evenly at all levels. That's probably not entirely related to harassment but it should be said. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:20, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, Rob made a good point about the star chamber thing too, though he was obviously speaking from a position of (justifiable) frustration. Some things need to be handled privately, that's all there is to it. If Arbcom won't do it, then it gets punted to the WMF, and they're a faceless entity that does whatever they feel like and views the community as disposable free labour. Better Arbcom, who we elect to do this thing and can unelect if we're unhappy with them, and are a committee of community members with many voices working together which is actually accountable to community process and review, than an ambiguous group at the WMF who ignore our policies and have no accountability at all. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:29, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Was just going to link to Rob's very relevant comments at User_talk:BU_Rob13#Sorry_to_see_you_go. but EC'd. I certainly would prefere ArbCom over the WMF doing it, but perhaps precisely because ArbCom is elected by the community also means the the "loud rude group" can have an influence of decision making (though the fact that the elections are widely advertized does help a lot with that). Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:36, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

And vocal complaining from that group is going to influence ArbCom decisions because of its responsibility to listen to the "community" - meaning the people who comment on decisions, even if all their concerns are nonsense - even if ArbCom recognizes that, their going to be reluctant to make the next unpopular decision etc. Galobtter (pingó mió) 19:42, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

The only real defense I can propose for that is for more of us to be vocally supportive of the Committee doing the right thing in this area. Which prevents nobody from being constructively critical when they fail, keeping in mind the civility policy. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:52, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

+1 (ok more than one) to Ymblanter's question/observation. Worth noting that the Community Health strategy working group is probably asking similar broad question about how well harassment is handled across all different projects. The Land (talk) 18:13, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

And just to emphasize, these are the lines of defense against harassment, and as one can see they can fail or succeed all along the way: 1) the editor being harassed, having the wherewithal to defend themselves; 2) other Users (also known a bystanders); 3) Administrators 4) Arbcom; 5) WMF. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:15, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I think it is very clear to anyone who is not currently in Deep Anger mode that no, the community here - Arbcom or otherwise - cannot handle harassment in any reasonable way. The simple fact that folk jumped to immediately assuming bad faith on the part of the WMF - who must serve as the victim's proxy and advocate - is testament to that. Attacking Raystorm and her personal life (thus assuming bad faith about the board chair, which then assumes bad faith with trust and safety, and the executive director, and a large handful of employees) cements that position further. The "community" here nearly always blames the victim. Nearly always. --Jorm (talk) 18:20, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

On a related issue: it's come up in this committee before, and you see the argument sometimes elsewhere, 'Let WMF enforce the TOU (i'm/we're not going to)', and 'Let WMF handle it", whatever 'it' is. So, there you go. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:33, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

• I've made a few comments on FRAM about this already, but I think that ArbCom (and other community processes) do a poor job of dealing with harassment and user behaviour issues more broadly construed. The public, all-sides-should-be-scrutinized approach done by amateur self-appointed ANI/case participants does not work for addressing long-term problematic behaviour. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 19:54, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

True, but bad behaviour in general is something that the set-up of Arbcom is well equipped to handle, when it doesn't involve sensitive charges like harassment. "Issues that the community is unable to resolve" is a large part of their mandate, and every Committee since I've been around here has actually been reasonably effective at it. But the "airing all evidence in public" method does not work for harassment. It's insensitive and kind of awful. I think there are some members of the current Committee who get that, and some that don't. That's unfortunate, but speaks to Rob's points about electing better arbitrators. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 20:09, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Even when there are no sensitive elements, I've observed that it's difficult for the Committee to take action against long-term misbehaviour that doesn't reach a particular threshold. There's also the harassment / negative remarks that are inevitably directed at the filing party whenever an unblockable (or really anyone) is taken to ArbCom. I've never had reason to file a case myself, but if I were in that position I doubt I'd be comfortable with it given the likely reaction. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 20:37, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I think a major part of that is that, as a community, we don't really have a well-defined border of diligence and harassment, nor of civility and rudeness. We have bright-line "this is unambiguously harassment/rudeness" (WP:NPA, WP:OUTING, contacting an editor's employers) but outside of those "harassment" and "incivility" are virtually undefined. Ask 10 people, and nine of them will give you a unique answer (with the 10th being paranoid and cutting off all contact). —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^Bori! 20:45, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

That may be a reason why we are so bad at dealing with it, but it isn't a solution. If the community is unable to set a standard, maybe this is a place for ArbCom to step in. There doesn't need to be an official bright-line policy on this, there just needs to be enforcement. I maintain that if actions start being taken against some of the key actors, others will start to get the hint that their behaviour isn't acceptable. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 20:59, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom has attempted to take action on civility in multiple cases in the past. So far that hint you speak of hasn't been taken, and ensuing uproar about the ArbCom decision(s) has, in my opinion, only made things worse. GorillaWarfare (talk) 21:07, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

It occurs to me that the lack of a standard on civility may be in part a side effect of the "flat" nature of the wiki. People have pointed out that our standard of civility ("who among us hasn't told ArbCom to GFY?") is pretty appalling in comparison to a professional workplace, volunteer environment, etc. And indeed, few of us would stand up in a department meeting to declare that "The project is late because Tom here is a fucking meathead who can't follow directions." On the other hand, it's not hard to imagine Bob, Carol, and Janice, professionals, sitting down in their cubicle at work, discussing amongst themselves "how to keep that dickhead Tom from fucking up the reporting system more than he already has". Because en.wikipedia has generally encouraged editors to keep their communications on-wiki, we've compressed all of these social situations into a single open space, where the social standard is considerably lower than in a formal professional setting but perhaps somewhat higher than among a few editors bellyaching about a mutually-detested acquaintance. (The latter is hard to believe, but those who remember the ancient festival of "leaking of wikipedia-en-admins IRC logs" will do so, and appreciate why we've chosen this particular approach.) I hope there's room for improvement in the current system, but I'm doubtful that we can in fact get everyone to adopt "company manners" all the time without some sort of compensatory mechanism for people's need to vent among the like-minded. Choess (talk) 06:14, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

A place to start would be to make a distinction between userspace and article space, so that the former is more akin to the workmate cubicle where it's more acceptable to vent, and the latter is more akin to the department meeting where professional conduct is expected at all times. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 10:23, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@PaleCloudedWhite: - that's an interesting thought. The tough one would be Wikipedia space, where there both internal and external discussions, and is where harassment from long-term users is most likely to occur. One notable issue is that most professional environs don't have (so many) individuals who distinctly not there to contribute, so an analogous expected behaviour has issues. Nosebagbear (talk) 10:39, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

I would consider Wikipedia space to be more like article space, though that's my personal view. If people were interested in this as a practical concept, I don't see why more specific parameters couldn't be established through discussion and usage. PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 11:37, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

So when they say they don't think ArbCom can handle harassment, do they mean there's any technical defect or only that ArbCom somewhat listens to a community that doesn't want people to get long-term blocks over a few stray emotions? I mean, Fram's cited diff might have been a little vicious [and I doubt it got ArbCom's sympathy!] -- but it is not "harassment" in any sense of the term I know of. Wnt (talk) 10:33, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

We need to have a mechanism for anonymizing complaints of harassment, while giving the accused an opportunity to respond. I don't see how these two concepts can coexist in practice unless one is also prepared to do away with the notion that someone accused of a certain behavior is provided with the ability to face and challenge their accuser, which would (rightfully) be found repugnant by the community. An ugly truth of western society is that formally accusing someone involves risk (which is admittedly and recognizably why it is frightening and why many avoid it), and I find it inarguable that Wikipedia could do a monumentally better job of enforcing protections against reporters; it must be seen as a balance (whether one agrees with it or not) between fairness for the accuser and fairness for the accused. I think allowing for anonymous reporting, and expecting people accused of such behavior to be able to realistically defend themselves without knowing exactly what actions they must explain and/or justify, is inherently doomed to failure. Safeguards for those doing the reporting are needed, but complete anonymity tips the balance of fairness in, well, an unfair way. Grandpallama (talk) 10:53, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

It's not that much of a paradox, though, really, but maybe my comment that you quoted is a bit idealistic. In a court of law in the west, yes, it's common principle that the accused may face their accuser, no matter that it revictimizes them. It's an essential component of justice. Wikipedia is not a court of law, it's a website. The WMF doesn't owe anyone justice, they owe users compliance with the Terms of Use, and if someone violates the terms of use the WMF owes them the door. What we're going to have to do is follow the lead of huge web entities like Facebook and Twitter and Reddit, and numerous others, and develop an anonymous reporting mechanism, with a community entity (likely Arbcom) that can review evidence privately, make a determination privately if a user has violated our policies, and act if necessary, subject to normal community block and appeal processes. That's already better in terms of granting rights to the accused because we have appeal mechanisms. When Facebook bans someone, they aren't told which specific posts they made that led to the action, that would make the reporter a target and nobody would report. They're told "you posted something that violated our terms of use, and we've removed it." Or, "you have been doing things that violate our community standards, you are no longer permitted to use this website." And there's no appeal, the operators of the website just act, end of story. Yeah, it's not very transparent, but some things cannot be transparent, that's the reality in 2019. If we don't have that kind of mechanism, then people who are victims of harassment will just never come back, which means we keep the offenders around to drive even more people off. And, if we don't have that kind of mechanism, then Trust & Safety has stated they're going to do it for us, with even less transparency, and that's what (apparently) they've done here. And I say good on them for taking the initiative. We've had the WMF gently pushing us for several years to strengthen our civility and harassment policies, we've consistently resisted for no good reason, and now they're taking over because they think we're not capable. And frankly they're right. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:39, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector:You make good points, and I'm not arguing with you on substance so much as pointing out a serious problem in the tension between recognizing that people who are victims need to be protected, and that those who are accused need an opportunity to make an actual defense. We do have the TOS, but Facebook and Reddit (and other social media sites) are a poor analogy, because those sites don't serve a greater purpose as Wikipedia (supposedly) does. They also host content, but they aren't a community of content creators that (again, supposedly) enjoy self-governance. Editing on Wikipedia and being accused of inappropriate behavior isn't the same as a trial, and yet the notion that people should have at least the opportunity to refute specific claims is pretty deeply engrained in our (both WP and western overall) culture. The fact that we have dispute resolution at all sets us apart from those other internet locales, and while we don't necessarily need a literal chance to challenge an accuser, there needs to be an opportunity to challenge accusations (wherein the tension lies, since those will reveal the accuser). And the way we know this is because we do have those dispute resolution boards, where for every real problem of civility and/or harassment that has gone inadequately dealt with, there are also people who howl about mistreatment/harassment/incivility in ways that makes us collectively roll our eyes. I don't agree with all of the hyperbole at the other page, but I do think a point has been repeatedly made that if we abdicate this aspect of our self-governance, we will not only never reclaim it, but will see increased slips in self-governance. Maintaining a world in which accused users have an opportunity to refute accusations (and appeal decisions, for god's sake!) is in line with the ideals and foundation of community that are (final supposedly) the bedrock of how Wikipedia works. Grandpallama (talk) 18:24, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

So normally as a total newbie I wouldn't add anything to a discussion like this (to anyone suspicious of how I found this page in the first place, I've been trying to get the lay of the land, and I figure trawling noticeboards etc. is a good supplement to reading explicit policies/guidelines--also, this stuff isn't so hard to find as all that!), but since at least one of the effects people are worried about here is the loss of potential new editors, I thought maybe a newbie perspective could be helpful. The thing that's given me the most trepidation about getting too involved here isn't so much the threat of obvious harassment, but the kind of low-level assholishness/aggressiveness that seems to just be an accepted part of the culture. I recognize that some genuinely well-meaning people here see it as a necessary trade-off for freedom, and I think of myself as someone who's good about moving on without feeling the need to engage, but frankly it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I have not been around here long, but over the past few weeks I've gone through archives to get a feel for how the community handles things, and one pattern I've noticed is that obvious, really uncalled for, and extensive harassment is generally handled eventually, but that more sporadic, subjective rudeness isn't even seen as a potential problem by a lot of people. That disagreement is inherent to anything subjective, but as someone who's new here but has spent a lot of time on the internet for almost 20 years and is familiar with how things work on other big sites (and in the mind of most non-editing readers, Wikipedia is on par with Twitter, Facebook, Google) the fact that "how much does civility even matter" is still being discussed here to some extent is frankly jarring (it's not on this page, but I've seen it). I hope this isn't read as interloping, or me trying to make sweeping statements about a community I'm not really part of at this point, I just want to try and provide the perspective of someone who's just gotten here, since it's usually unavoidably hard to get that perspective in these conversations even though more-established people do seem to think it's relevant. Zojomars (talk) 11:12, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

You are not interloping. Thank you for your perspective. GorillaWarfare (talk) 16:22, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

An antipathy towards non-collaborative behaviour isn't limited to newcomers. I appreciate many will say I should have a higher level of tolerance, but in the end, life's too short for me to try to keep engaging with editors who denigrate me personally. If it's not a matter about which I feel strongly about expressing a view, I will avoid engagement with such editors. As I've written about before, Wikipedia's discussion environment selects for less collegial editors over more collegial ones. isaacl (talk) 18:50, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you GorillaWarfare :-) . I want to just add a link to this write-up I found a couple weeks back, which I think summarizes some of these issues pretty well (not perfectly, but reasonably): [1]. I remember two points in there standing out to me--the note about them using 'fucking idiot' as a search term for examples, and the additional note on the example of conduct issues not being reported that explained that the user was eventually indeffed 2 years later. I'm very interested in how useful/accurate others find it. zojomars (talk) 14:13, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

• And one of the outcomes of course could be that it is not possible to modify existing processes to handle on-line harassment efficiently. In which case we will have to agree that T&S must handle it.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:14, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

  Let me prevent this topic from archiving: If ArbCom is considering a motion for the current case which includes a recommendation to organize an RfC, it clearly has a lot of overlap with this topic, and I would better wait until the motion has been at least proposed before moving forward here (and I am on holiday anyway).--Ymblanter (talk) 12:57, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

A perspective on ArbCom's ability to handle sensitive matters discreetly

Moved from WP:FRAM § A perspective on ArbCom's ability to handle sensitive matters discreetly

I'm surprised to see BU Rob13 say that the current ArbCom can't handle sensitive issues of civility without exposing the victim: "In order to avail yourself of ArbCom as a remedy, you must first go to ANI and see no resolution. This means that victims must throw themselves into the lion's den of ANI", etc, etc.. That has not been my experience at all. Once, not that long ago, I asked for a ban of somebody I considered was harassing me under very sensitive circumstances, and did it by e-mail to the committee. They took it in confidence and dealt with it in confidence (of course inviting responses by e-mail from the person I was accusing). They can do that. The only problem is that when the committee sanctions someone without letting the community in on the reasons, as happened in that case, editors, both well-meaning and otherwise, will be outraged at the lack of transparency (sigh). But the committee stood firm, which I'm very grateful for. They took a lot of flak for me, for their principles, and for a third party, who would have been seriously exposed if discretion had failed. ArbCom apparently can't win in doing this; they'll come in for a lot of unfair attacks when they deal with privacy-sensitive matters discreetly; but, as I found, they can certainly do it, or they could then. Has that really changed, Rob? I'm being purposely vague about time and occasion here, as I don't want to point a finger to somebody who can't reply, and I ask people not to offer suggestions or guesses. But I can share the details by e-mail if you like, Rob. Bishonen | talk 19:35, 12 June 2019 (UTC).

I can't respond to that exact instance on-wiki due to confidentiality, Bishonen, but there were fundamentally private aspects to that issue. Ironically, ArbCom is more equipped to handle harassment with private information than without private information. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 19:39, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I am extremely familiar with the situation you're talking about, just to be clear. Again, having to be vague because of confidentiality. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 19:40, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

This critically important conversation is happening in many places. Besides here, the two that I know of are User talk:BU Rob13 and Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard, and besides what might be going on at WP:FRAMBAN. Can we centralize? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:42, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I opened the Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard one, which is considerably longer that this one at the moment. I suggest to move everything there.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:44, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) What about an RfC? Not a "support/oppose" ratification of anything in particular, but just a way to gauge sentiment on it and get some ideas. What direction we'd want to go as far as policy changes could come out of that. If something positive can come out of this mess, I'm all for it. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 19:46, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I'm not sure an RFC is the right way to go, at least not just yet. Everyone's angry and bad cases make bad policy. I would like to see Arbcom issue a statement, maybe addressing the current situation, but generally clarifying how they handle (or intend to handle from now on) private reports of harassment. And if that needs improvement, then we go from there. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 20:11, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Since my post has been moved to this page, I'll just endorse what GorillaWarfare says above: "I have to say I'm a little surprised at the number of people who have said that if it had been the ArbCom who had placed this block and not the WMF, all would've been fine and dandy—I suspect that is not how it would have shaken out at all."[2] Hell no, the experience I describe above has made me completely cynical about the likelihood of that. It was pretty shocking to see so many people, including some I had previously thought highly of, ready to jump on the bandwagon and insist ArbCom was a pack of wolves and a pit of snakes for not publicly revealing all the private circumstances. It's a problem, certainly. Bishonen | talk 20:32, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Nevertheless, an arbcom block would have had far less escalation. For instance, I don't think there would have been an attempt to ban the entire Arbitration Committee if it had blocked Fram. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 22:26, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

I wouldn't be so sure. My experience from my time on the Committee exactly matches Bishonen's and GorrilaWarfare's. I've been an admin for 14 years, in all that time I don't recall a single instance of the community responding to an unpopular decision taken based on private information in any way other than with assumptions it must be wrong and assumptions of bad faith of those involved in making it (whoever made it), and it seems to get worse on every occasion, with some users seemingly getting more and more emboldened by the lack of anybody doing anything to rein in the worst offenders. Thryduulf (talk) 22:54, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Fram is/was too loud and too anti-this ArbCom for such an action to have passed with general acceptance - though there would have been many who would have defended ArbCom. I wish I could link to a really good (now deleted) essay about how good faith stops applying to certain editors. The more power a group/editor has the less good faith is shown them. This is discredit to us as a community. Despite that I still suggest there is a difference in kind in the uproar that would have occurred in that alternate universe (which would have happened and would have been substantial) and this, where the number and volume of defenders is less. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 23:00, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Quite a lot of the community outrage is "the WMF should not have the power to impose local bans". On the contrary, everyone agrees that the Arbitration Comittee has and deserves the power to impose bans that are appealable only to it. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 23:48, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Indeed, the reason we have ArbCom is that you have to have someone to look at private issues. The wiki model is a model for radical transparency, and we have been successful in applying it almost everywhere across the site but there are times when another solution is needed. For example, it just wouldn't work if a country decided to go full democracy and vote on every single decision, including ones that require knowledge of its military secrets; instead we have a president and a legislature. The question of whether to elect judges or appoint them for life (i.e. the executive chooses and the legislature confirms, while the legislature can impeach and remove judges as well) in real-life politics is an interesting one, but seeing as the executive and legislative functions on Wikipedia are completely decentralized there are no accountable people capable of appointing judges, hence the only option is to elect them if there is to be any sense of accountability. Much better than being a vassal state of some foreign country rich in resources to be exploited.

The difference between ArbCom and WMF is that we can throw out ArbCom members next election who are not doing their jobs taking into account the best interests of the community. This does of course make them think twice about making unpopular decisions, but keeping them on their toes about reelection is not necessarily a bad thing. Most of the community has proven themselves quite willing to listen when ArbCom is willing to engage, i.e. it's not about the decision but the process and attitude of the decision-makers. The kind of non-answer answers that WMFOffice gave is how you really piss people off. If you give a good summary of the basic facts of a case people will accept it. These Audit Subcommittee reports show that ArbCom is capable of disclosing potentially sensitive info in a responsible, concise, and informative manner. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 01:40, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Agree strongly with all of the above. If we expect WMF to butt out, at some point we will have to trust ArbCom to make hard choices, even when they can't give us all the evidence. If ArbCom has really failed in the eyes of the community, we need to invest in discussions about how to improve it. We also need to understand (collectively) that even if we don't love ArbCom, we may like the alternatives even less. —Rutebega (talk) 19:47, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

• I think BURob13 is misinterpreting his experience at arb com . As I saw it during my 4 years at arb com we have received confidential requests to take action. We've never asked them to goto ANI first. (though of course I do not know what may have happenned in the last 6 months after my term ended) The occasional privacy limitation on dealing with such requests is that there is sometimes no way of taking action without making obvious the identity of the person making the complaint. In such cases we've asked the person whether or not we should go ahead. DGG ( talk ) 01:10, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

DGG, I'm very happy to see DGG weighing in here. The post by BU Rob13 was a paradigm shift for me. As an active OTRS agent, I have fielded many complaints in which I have urged them to review and follow the dispute resolution guideline. Perhaps I'm reading it too casually, but my distinct impression has been that matters should not be turned into an Arbcom case, until other venues including ANI have been attempted. I am very sympathetic to the plight of a harassed editor who finds that offputting. I don't want to diminish Bishonen's experience, but Bishonen has a name recognition that means their experience may not be typical.

I do see that the dispute resolution policy has an explicit section about how to deal with sensitive issues. Perhaps it needs more emphasis because if you had said 10 minutes ago that one must attempt to discuss the issue with the other party, and go to ANI before going to ARBCOM I would've nodded in approval. I see that isn't the case, but it still seems plausible to me that a harassed party might not be fully aware of the opportunity to bring an issue to ARBCOM in private.S Philbrick(Talk) 01:44, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

• FWIW, I've emailed ArbCom on two occasions about "reputable Wikipedians" who have been shit-talking me off-site: on one occasion they replied and said they would do nothing because the shit-talking was relatively minor and possibly a "good-faith misremembering", and in the other I don't seem to recall ever getting a response. In the former case it wound up being moot because the editor in question was indeffed for on-wiki hounding of me about a month later, but in the latter the editor in question is still going around happily showing up when he sees me at ANI or wherever, and continuously undermining me. I wouldn't mind that they weren't willing to act on someone hounding me on- and off-wiki, except that when I asked them last November to publicly acknowledge that the reason the editor had been shit-talking me (the fact that at that time I was subject to two IBANs and had a third on the way) was completely invalid because I had requested those IBANs to protect me from one-way hounding, and/or to lift one of those IBANs that I had requested because it hadn't lived up to its intended purpose and was having the inverse effect of making me a target of harassment, the one Arbitrator who responded engaged in some pretty gross historical revisionism by saying "My predecessors IBANned you because your conflict was disruptive, not because of hounding"[3] and essentially said "You're not the target of harassment -- stop whining"[4]. I e-mailed that Arb and CCed the rest of the Committee explaining my situation (that every few months some editor starts harassing me about having an IBAN -- and it happened again a little under two weeks ago, while in January and February of this year I had a whole bunch of editors with grudges against me, who knew perfectly well that my IBANs had been requested by me to protect me from hounding and minimize drahma, openly talking about site-banning me because "How many IBANs are we gonna allow this guy to have before it's the last straw?"), and I never received a response. Frankly editing has not been anywhere near as enjoyable as once was since that experience, which was a big part in what was nearly a decision to leave the project entirely this January (which incident, coincidentally enough, Bish no doubt remembers) and the massive dropoff in my editing rate (particularly my article editing rate) since then. (BTW, I harbour no ill will to that particular Arb -- he did something very kind to me not long after, which I won't go into detail on -- but I think the institution of ArbCom, which seems perfectly happy to throw content creators to the lions at ANI rather than admit they or their predecessors screwed something up, needs to change.) Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:10, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

There was also another occasion, last year, ArbCom blocked an obvious sock IP for attempting to out me, but the editor's obvious main account (which only ever edited from 9:00 to 5:00, Monday to Friday, and so was clearly dodging CU by never logging in except on a specific work computer with a static) continued to edit freely for another for months before eventually retiring without ever facing sanctions (I guess the person changed work computers). I emailed ArbCom about it but never got a response, and a month later opened an SPI out of frustration, with the SPI being closed within three hours without comment (by a non-Arb -- I'm not implying that ArbCom was conspiring to protect my harasser, just that ArbCom didn't lift a finger to remove him from the site). Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:27, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

It would be absurd to say that arb com gets everything right. For everything that it does or does not do, some people always think it seriously in error--if it were otherwise, there would be no controversies to deal with. Some of the work is trivial and obvious, but much of it deals with interpretation, judgment, and nuance. It's necessary to guess what is probable, not come by some exact process of analysis to what is certain. It certainly surprised me, as it surprises every new member, how much nonpublic work there is--the visible part of ArbCom work is the smaller. Most matters--sometimes even quite small matters--are not unanimous--everyone on the committee sees things differently--sometimes very differently. There's a rule that we do not discuss how we voted in private, only give the decision (this is a rule which I have always opposed , since in the actual cases we vote openly), but I have nonetheless sometimes indicated where I at least did not agree with the majority, and I've previously said this was very frequent.

In general I agree with Hiraji (that's in general, not necessarily in the matters he mentions involving himself) that the committee have in my 4 years at least been very much too reluctant to consider problems, and have tried not exactly to do as little as possible, but to avoid doing anything that could possibly be done without us. This is no secret--it is only necessary to look at the discussions on whether to accept cases.

I do not know whether arb com was even told about this particular decision, but in my years individual people in T&S would sometimes give informal hints of what they were doing, and we were always extremely careful with what they told us. There are some matters they truly ought not trust us with--primarily legal matters and some particularly sensitive personal ones. But it is my opinion, and I know that of many others on the committee, that we were continually frustrated--and sometimes quite angry--at how little they told us: their bias was always to say as little as possible. And the inevitable reaction to this, is that, at least speaking for myself, I do not trust them.

There is a check on arb com--a considerable number of WPedians have been on the committee at one time or another--it's not that small a circle. In contrast, very few people have been on T&S, and most of them had no previous experience with WP. DGG ( talk ) 05:00, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the honest comment about T&S. Putting on a reductionist hat, a basic truth is that WMF employees are required to protect the interests of the WMF. This is not the same as protecting the interests or values of Wikipedia. The distinction is not a hypothetical one, as those of us that have been around long enough know cases where this difference has harmed both individuals and the project. --Fæ (talk) 10:24, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@DGG: there have been times when ARBCOM recorded publicly votes that were taken in private. That certainly happened at times when we were both on the committee. Doug Weller talk 11:31, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

DGG's take does not reflect my own thoughts. While I agree with his first two paragraphs, we diverge on the last two. I completely understand why T&S is tight-lipped about their ban investigations with the ArbCom and with the rest of the community. They are more open with the ArbCom than with the general public, as they understand that we are required to keep confidential what they share with us, but I think people need a little perspective: members of the ArbCom are volunteers who do not necessarily have much experience with community management, sensitive issues involving harassment, or anything with legal ramifications. Furthermore, the ArbCom lists have leaked in the past. The less they share with anyone, even people who've signed confidentiality agreements, the better they protect the people whose privacy they are trying to maintain. I obviously can't know what they don't share with us and so can't speak to whether I think that on balance they share enough, but my general impression is that they are quite adept at keeping us in the loop where we need to be, informing us of actions they will take (such as this one) as a courtesy, and keeping private other things that they handle that are not within ArbCom's purview (child protection being a good example). DGG is probably correct that their bias is to share as little as possible, which I respect. Personally, I do trust the Trust & Safety team. GorillaWarfare (talk) 16:35, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

@GorillaWarfare: - I'm not being humorous when I say that T&S does not show any sign of experience with community management. A bias towards sharing as little as possible is directly counter to any accused being able to defend themselves against specific charges. Nosebagbear (talk) 18:08, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

To be clear, I meant they bias towards sharing as little as possible with the ArbCom. I do not know how much they share with the people they ban. Sharing more details about office bans with the ArbCom would not be useful as far as the banned parties defending themselves, as office bans are not appealable to the ArbCom. GorillaWarfare (talk) 18:13, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

The last line of that is obviously true, but isn't really why people want sharing with ARBCOM. Preferably ArbCom could handle it, but if ArbCom had said "yes this was a reasonable decision by T&S, we can't say anything else", there'd have been some, but much less uproar. Going off Fram's statement, if the one edit cited was literally everything, that would be an absurd ban. Otherwise there would need to be additional concerns, which don't seem to have been indicated. While they've now written a much more civil and personable message, it didn't contain anything on how an effective defence was/could be made by Fram (or any other accused). Nosebagbear (talk) 21:33, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Ever since Office bans have existed, the WMF has chosen not to share detailed rationales for their bans with the Committee, and given the types of behaviors office bans historically tended to address, this is a very reasonable choice on their part. There are a lot of people making a lot of unequivocal statements about how the Office should or shouldn't have protected the information behind the ban, which is absurd to me given that no one making these statements knows what it is. At some point we have to accept that there are things the Wikimedia Foundation cannot and will not share with the community, including the ArbCom, and that the only people who are able to determine what can or should be shared with some or all of the community are those who have that information. GorillaWarfare (talk) 21:44, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Why be tight lipped or vague? Tort law. You just don't say things you absolutely do not have to say. Alanscottwalker (talk) 21:58, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

This necessitates an ability to know that the WMF will a) Be fair b) Enable an ability for a defence by the accused c) Always make good (not flawless, but good) decisions. The WMF's refusal to be transparent has hidden serious errors before, (knowledge engine, anyone?) and transparency aside, they make other mistakes too frequently for me to be willing to think that T&S is getting it so right that they don't need external oversight. Nosebagbear (talk)

In response to Alanscottwalker, while he's right on the reason why they act like this, surely the hypocrisy of the WMF to be suing the NSA over such issues while thinking that their own refusal to be open in order to protect others is justified is evident? Nosebagbear (talk) 22:27, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Not in the least, the communications you want from them are about identifiable living people, communications that would be used to identify and perhaps harm them, and communications which would be used explicitly and unequivocally to trash the reputations of people. Alanscottwalker (talk) 22:39, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

I don't want them - as the discussion above (which I fully accept I've been heavily involved in derailing, for which I apologise - it should really be held on WP:FRAM) was accepting, some degree of privacy is critical. There's a good post there recently, pointing out that T&S' awful communication has lead to a loss of trust. Without it, there's no default acceptance of the WMF as correct. That and my concern about any accused being able to make a complete defence are my primary concerns. The latter of which is on the list below. Nosebagbear (talk) 22:55, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

But you do want them, you want those communications to be made outside the WMF, but the WMF is the one with the tort liability. Perhaps worse, the people outside the WMF then become liable if they act on or pass along the communication. Alanscottwalker (talk) 06:29, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

As is obvious, GW and I have long had different perspectives on this, and each member of arb com has their own personal views also. This is a positive element of arb com: it assures that all aspects are considered. (Tho some arb coms have had a wider diversity of views than others). There are some matters that need to be handled with greater security and --hopefully--professionalism than arb com can provide. The WMF has long handled matters involving threats of violence, and after long struggle, 5 years ago they agreed to handle child protection. These are matters where great care is needed--there is almost always no good that can come from a public confrontation, the possible consequences are serious, and so are the consequences of an erroneous accusation--a factor which even by itself calls for non-public discussion. Some types of matters involving both on and off-wiki harassment might fall into this class also. But the ordinary on-wiki harassment usually does not. The security arb com offers is sufficient--there have been no significant breeches of this for many years. In 4 years with a variety of people, there has been only 1 instance of an arb who did not seem to take their responsibility seriously, and that individual was removed before any harm was done--the same problem could happen at the foundation--for all I know, it might have. There is no reason to think that professionalism of those with little familiarity with WP can do any better than the experience in arb com. There's no reason to think the decisions of a few people acting in a manner without direct personal responsibility are better than those of a wider group here whose opinions are public.

There is a serious limiting factor in dealing with harassment, in the real world, and on-wiki. Sometimes dealing with it properly will cause additional harm. Sometimes dealing in private can reduce this, but not always. At arb com, we alert people to this, and ask them to make an informed choice if they want to proceed. Sometimes they do not, and we respect that, even though it means that we can not do proper preventative justice to the offender. The present case is one where the postulated protection for the complainant's privacy by dealing in private was not successful--the attempt for greater privacy had the reverse effect entirely.

We may not be able do do justice, but we must avoid doing injustice. This is the basic principle of do no harm that underlies all of WP's dealings with living people and with our users. In this case, dealing with the matter in private did in fact do no harm to the accused, but that's because the problem was already quite open, and haas been so for many years, -- and, in point of fact, the penalty in my opinion not all that unreasonable. Just speaking for myself, it's what I would have voted for if it had come to the committee while I was on arb com. This will not be true always. The danger of using in camera procedures is their great capacity for doing injustice. We're not a legal system, and the adverse consequences are lower; but any system awarding penalties is a quasi-judicial system, and the rule against in-camera proceeding goes deeper than the Anglo-American legal system--it's a basic principle of fairness. To me, it's a basic principle of moral behavior that I would depart from only for compelling reasons of true personal or community safety, not the sort of garden variety harassment being discussed here. Others apparently think differently, but I would like to think they have not sufficiently considered the implications of proceeding in general in the manner that was done here.

The power to proceed without openness and personal responsibility causes people to lose perspective. The necessary functions of dealining privately with exceptional matters led T&S to do so even when not necessary--and, judging from their statements, to intend to use this power more widely. It's always convenient to not have to explain oneself, and not have to deal with dissent. This convenience is what leads to systems entirely the opposite of what WP stands for. DGG ( talk ) 22:56, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Since I unblocked Fram, perhaps it's worth registering my agreement with GorillaWarfare in her comment above.[5] (Maybe not the last sentence.) I don't regret my unblock, but looking at the occasion I mentioned at the top of this thread,[6] where ArbCom was subject to a lot of ignorant speculation and sometimes frankly paranoid guesses and attacks, has focused for me some similarities with what people are now saying and assuming about WMF Office. These similarities make me uncomfortable. There are certainly wise comments at WP:FRAM — see for example Risker's post[7] — but there is also a good deal of assumption of bad faith/incompetence based on nothing better than ignorance. In my opinion. Bishonen | talk 11:20, 14 June 2019 (UTC).

Questions to be addressed

What I see from this so far extremely constructive discussion is

• ArbCom handles privacy issues, including off-wiki harassment, reasonably well.
• ArbCom does not handle on-wiki harassment well and is not actually designed to handle it properly:

  Different users have very different civility standards;

  Different users have different civility standards in various circumstances;

  We do not even have a working definition of harassment, and what actually is harassment is subject to wide interpretations;

  It is unclear how on-wiki harassment must be documented (very roughly, how many diffs are needed);

  There is no current practice to have closed hearing of cases solely based on open on-wiki evidence;

  There is no current specific practice to defend the harassed victim against further harassment during open on-wiki discussion (in whatever forum) of their case;

  During the hearing, the alleged harasser must have a right to defend themselves, and it is unclear how to keep the privacy during these communications.

• Is it reasonable to have a minimum civility standard ("bright line") and if yes, what would be its relation with the code of conduct currently being developed by the WMF?
• Are we happy with our policies, WP:CIVILITY and WP:HARASSMENT, or we want to amend/expand them?

Please feel free to add more issues or cross out those which are in fact non-issues. The next question will obviously be how we can address them, but first we need to agree on what we are addressing.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:23, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

There's also the related, further issue of the lack of anti-retaliation measures, and how existing policies (WP:OUTING comes to mind) make it a difficult matter. In particular when retaliation comes from non-parties acting in support of parties. The risk of third party pile-on, in particular off-wiki, isn't something ArbCom is equipped to manage adequately, and any adjustment towards changing that is also eminently subject to gaming. MLauba ^(Talk) 14:18, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for starting this discussion. Consensus on a definition of "harassment" is probably needed before we can find a way to stop it. That's difficult because "harassment" isn't really a specific action, it's the effect of action(s). If I told you to "go and harass that guy", it'd be up to you to figure out how, exactly. The same goes with the word "civility". I can say, "act civilly", but that's very non-specific, and it differs by culture and by person. Something that is civil in one culture (like sitting in a chair vs. on the floor, or making certain hand gestures, or spitting) can be considered very uncivil in another. It may be better to think in terms of specific actions as "do's" and "don'ts", because such actions can be reasonably interpreted as harassment or incivility. Examples of "such actions" may or may not include: threats of harm, un-evidenced accusations of misconduct (casting aspersions), profanity, outing/doxing, "following" editors to articles, making "too many" (however defined) negative commends about another editor or another editor's edits, ad hominem attacks, etc. There's no way to make a bright-line 3RR-type rule for civility (if you tell someone to "f off" three times in 24 hours, you get blocked), but the benefit of setting clearer expectations (do's and don'ts) is that everyone has the opportunity to adjust their conduct to avoid sanction. (And as a bonus we can demonstrate that our standards exceed the minimum standards of the TOU, and that our standards are enforced.) – Levivich 02:41, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

@Levivich: FWIW, something along the lines of if you tell someone to "f off" three times in 24 hours, you get blocked was actually proposed at WT:CIVIL and pretty roundly shot down, by everyone except those who were specifically on one side of the case that inspired the proposal, a little before you registered your account. Attempts to "clarify" in policy pages that "X is unacceptable" are almost always rejected because context matters, and such things are usually a judgement call. is, put simply, not how such a situation would work: tendentious editors would work hard to make sure whoever they are trolling violates that "bright line", and then would vehemently argue at ANI that since their victim violated that bright line they need to be blocked, and while the proper result of such a case should be either the apology and promise to change on the part of the tendentious editor in question or their indefinite block, attaining such a result would just be made more difficult than it already is if the excuse could be offered that "the policy is technically on their side". Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 04:47, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Exactly. This isn't a "bright line" scenario. Quite often, when I see someone claim "X is hounding me!", it turns out to be "I keep doing something I shouldn't be doing, and X makes sure I get caught!". "X keeps saying I haven't sufficiently sourced my articles!" "Well...you haven't, so X is right. Find sources before you start an article next time, like you should have been doing already, and the problem goes away." It's a very case by case thing, but most claims of "harassment" turn out to be bogus. (That does not in any way mean that when someone is genuinely being harassed, we should not act; not all claims are bogus.) Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 11:35, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

In terms of Wikipedia, civility (and harassment by extension) are not bright-line issues. It's more of a call-and-response kind of thing (that might not be the right term). When someone does something uncivil, we mostly rely on community response to have someone say, "Hey, @Jerry, that was not a very nice thing to say. Maybe tone it down?" And then we expect the editor to acknowledge the complaint (preferably) or we have ways to force them to comply (warnings, discussions, reviews, interaction bans, blocks, site bans, right up to global bans and reporting to external authorities for very serious cases). Using a specific example to illustrate the concept: when someone complains at ANI that someone told them to "fuck off", our response ought to be asking the offending user to behave, even if we regularly don't block people for that specific choice of word. We need to STOP telling the offended editor that THEY'RE wrong to be offended, because some arcane back-channel (to them) discussion decided long ago that saying "fuck" is okay. The point is not causing offense, not just not using specific words. Most editors don't complain, they just leave.

But then of course there's the "you really shouldn't have to be told this is wrong" kind of stuff, like (not an exhaustive list!) racial slurs, all-caps epithet-laden tirades, directed threats, doxxing, what we call hounding but is really obvious targeted harassment, and on and on and on, and it's happening all the time all over the project. To combat it we need admins to be less lenient in blocking when this kind of behaviour is identified and/or reported, but we don't have broad community buy-in that this is actually any kind of problem. There's a small but very vocal part of the community that insists this sort of behaviour is just par for the course on the internet, as though one must consent to harassment and violence by virtue of existing online, and they keep moving the goalposts of demanding a "fair trial for the accused". I know I have specifically declined to intervene in borderline harassment cases because of that vocal minority - I'm a volunteer, I don't need the bother of a weeks-long Arbcom trial because I blocked someone who mused about looking up a female editor's home address in a dispute but also they've created 10,000 articles, and people think content creation is more important than a safe editing environment. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:10, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

I think this last part of Ivanvector's writing is crucial. If we're going to say that context matters in civility, then we have to be willing to tolerate sysops using their discretion, both to act and not act. Context matters has sometimes seen to me to be a way to suggest we don't enforce civility at all. And while I agree with Ivan, there clearly isn't community consensus that we should be supportive of people who get (reasonably) offended by another editor - a real part of our community feels that if you can't deal with offense you shouldn't be an editor here. That has always felt to our discredit to me. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:42, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

This is all fine, and I enthusiastically agree, the problem is, this is a proposal of the kind "we need to do X more actively". X can be done more actively by two means: (i) changing policies (which could be Wikipedia policies, which are more difficult to change, or say ArbCom practices on which they decide themselves and thus which are much easier to change), and (ii) changing practices by personal examples. Whereas I personally could even prefer (ii), it has obvious disadvantages, and this is why all big communities such as countries only use (i). We are still not big enough for that, however, behavior paradigm shifts are really difficult and are not possible without a large agreement which so far I do not see. In practical terms, I once blocked a disruptive user with a large following base for disruptive behavior - the user was unblocked within minutes and continued the same behavior. I do not see how thic could be changed unless policies (incrementally) come first.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:59, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

What we ask admin to do vis-a-vis policing civility is akin to telling a police officer to go out here and stop crime, and when they ask "What counts as a crime? What are the laws here?", we say, "I don't know, whatever you think it is. We trust your judgment."

We have a WP:CSD that is fairly detailed in listing the specific circumstances under which a page should or should not be deleted by unilateral admin action; for everything else, we discuss and act by consensus. What if we had a "civility criteria for speedy block"? A list of circumstances, like CSD, when any admin can and should issue a block; for anything not on the list, send it to a noticeboard. – Levivich 22:25, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: We need to STOP telling the offended editor that THEY'RE wrong to be offended Umm... were you referring to the specific "fuck off" ANI discussion I mentioned immediately above? That ended (quite rightly!) with the NOTHERE editor pretending to be "offended" getting indeffed. Bad-faith trolling of editors so they say "fuck" seems to be a much more prevalent problem than foul-mouthed editors throwing F-bombs and causing good-faith boyscouts to be legitimately offended, so saying or implying that AGF applies more to editors who say they are offended by the phrase "fuck off" than to editors who say "fuck off" seems like a bad idea. (Also, given the venue, I should point out that ArbCom has a "civil POV pusher problem" that was recognized by most of the candidates I asked about the matter last year.)Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 13:29, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Seraphimblade, That's a nice summary of a challenging problem. I'm sympathetic to the idea that true cases of harassment ought to be handled discreetly and privately, but there are definitely situations where one person feels harassed, and a sober assessment is they are getting called out for bad edits. I'm not sure how to resolve this. S Philbrick(Talk) 17:57, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

@Sphilbrick: I'm not sure the situation you describe is all that difficult to figure out how to resolve, although I agree it's a very unfortunate problem whose quite simple solution might be difficult for anyone with a moral compass to execute without feeling guilty. If a sober assessment on the part of everyone else says the editor who feels harassed is getting called out for bad edits, then, regardless of their feelings, they have to stop making the bad edits in question. I've seen it happen a few times that the editors in question refuse to acknowledge that their edits are bad, and ultimately they either leave the project in frustration that their bad edits never get through, are subjected to a limited TBAN and consequently leave the project in frustration, or (rarely) push the issue so far that they are site-banned. There are a lot of people both on Wikipedia and in real life who simply can't admit to wrongdoing no matter how hard others try to convince them to, and those are the people most likely to feel "harassed" as a result of everyone telling them they are wrong, and, while it's sad to say as much, such people really can't contribute to Wikipedia in the long term. Ultimately we can't enforce a policy that forbids the action of defending the encyclopedia against people whose specific circumstances prevent them from admitting that their edits are bad and changing how they edit, and cause them to feel harassed by the said defense. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 04:45, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Hijiri88, I think we are largely on the same page but I still have some concerns. Under the current schema, editors with concerns about another editor can follow the dispute resolution process, which is well documented. If they feel personally harassed, there is another option, not quite as well documented, wherein they can submit private and confidential evidence to Arbcom. You and I are in complete agreement that if ArbCom assesses the evidence, and concludes that the complaining editor is unhappy because there bad edits are being challenged, then ArbCom "simply" has to craft a carefully worded response to that editor. However, suppose the conclusion is that there are problems serious enough to result in penalties, perhaps I bans, strong admonitions, and a short-term block rather than the global block the complaining editor might want. A strong admonition could be delivered in private but very awkward if you cannot explain what prompted it. Worse, imposing a short block and and IBAN without disclosing the confidential evidence is problematic. Maybe there's a way to navigate this but it seems quite challenging. S Philbrick(Talk) 13:00, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

On the "very different civility standards" point: The observation that civility is (to some degree) relative has generally been used to set standards for civility as low as possible (if no one could possibly think this is civil, then it is forbidden--and maybe not even then). There is no reason this has to be the case, though. Maybe if civility standards are relative, we should all be held to the highest possible standards. That's not what I'm advocating, but I think we need to throw out "civility is relative" as an excuse for the foul environment we have here. Calliopejen1 (talk) 16:43, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

On the question of private vs. public in arbitration: What about a private system for requesting arbitration and submitting evidence, but a public process for adjudicating the evidence? In many or most cases, there is no one "victim"--it's a pattern of bullying behavior across the encyclopedia. Now no one wants to come forward to confront the bully, because it opens them up to additional bullying not only by that person but by all of their friends. But suppose there were a mechanism to submit evidence privately, especially evidence not specific to one "victim", and then arbcom could publish this evidence, provide an opportunity for response, then evaluate and assess possible sanctions. Thoughts? Calliopejen1 (talk) 16:43, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom already accepts evidence by email for circumstances where privacy would be a concern. It'd just be a matter of expanding the requirements to include situations where the person submitting the evidence fears reprisal. And, of course, ArbCom should shield the submitter's identity in such cases. —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^Bori! 18:41, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

If I follow what you're thinking, Calliopejen1, I think it won't work. We really can't anonymize investigations on Wikipedia, or I can't see any reliable way that we could. "Public" in my mind suggests that diffs will be presented, and, well, there's an editor's name tied to every edit. Maybe editors' names are oversighted pending investigation, or we just republish anonymized highlights of an interaction? Someone's going to be able to figure out who said what without a whole lot of effort. This also risks victimizing those accused of harassment, which we also have to consider. I think this process really needs to start with anonymity for the reporters. How do you build in an ability for the accused to respond? Well, for serious cases, you don't. After the Committee (or a committee) evaluates the complaint, if the Committee agrees it's serious enough, they inform the user they violated our standards and that they're banned. People find that objectionable and rightly so to an extent, but for very obvious and serious cases we need to be willing to respect the arbitration process - we elect Arbcom, that's probably as close as we're going to get to transparency when private matters are involved. For less sensitive or serious cases, the Committee can advise the reporter that the complaint doesn't rise to our standards of misconduct, and that they can try the various dispute resolution methods to try to seek a resolution. If we don't do something like this as a community, with discussion and control over the process, then it seems the WMF has made clear to us that they're going to serve this function for us, their way, without our input and with no community control. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:40, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: - Your point about figuring it out is correct. However, I just view that lack of a defence as one-sided and too unfair for me to accept it (saying "well WMF will do it if we don't" may be true, but isn't sufficient to accept it). Two potential mitigations are 1) A couple of "Advocates" who will speak for the individual - the problem being that if the defence is on information not clear to ARBCOM, it can't be to the advocate. 2) Do let the defendent know of the specific evidence - off-wiki. Make it clear that any revealing of identity on or off-wiki will be met with a PERMABAAN. This obviously comes with the "well, if they end up Permabanned anyway, what do they have to lose?". However, I feel if we must accept our choice of poison, this middle-ground is better than other alternatives. Nosebagbear (talk) 19:51, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

If only Wikipedia were the whole Internet. If a person is accused of a crime and the person then harasses and threatens the accuser, they've dug a deeper hole for themselves (regardless of whether they are innocent or guilty of the first crime). Maybe bail gets revoked or they get charged with something new, but all this would be on top of whatever they were originally facing. If a person files a harassment allegation and the accuser learns the identity they can then harass the accuser in new and different off-Wiki ways even if we deal out the maximum wikipunishment. There are real risks for accusers in both meatspace and wikispace but inherently less protection online than off for non-anonymous accusers. That doesn't make charges against a person which they have no way of defending more tolerable.

Perhaps we can take lessons from terrorism cases where lawyers might have security clearances to see information and charges against their client that they can't share with that client as a model? Whether this happens through a Chinese wall at WMF with someone on T&S or through some sort of "public defender" functionary with ArbCom, I don't know but am throwing it out there for how to protect accusers and accused online. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:58, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: I'm envisioning this as functioning for on-wiki conduct only, and ideally where there are many victims. Let's say that User:Concernedobserver notices User:Serialoffender running around wreaking havoc across the project (but User:Concernedobserver may not have even interacted with User:Serialoffender). I'm thinking of a mechanism where User:Concernedobserver could report User:Serialoffender, without associating his/her name with the report. (Here, the conduct of User:Concernedobserver would not even be at issue.) Or perhaps User:Concernedobserver reports at one time, and User:Concernedobserver2 reports at another time, and the committee could have all of the relevant evidence before it. I'd like there to be a way for the committee to evaluate User:Serialoffender's conduct without having to involve the victims at all. User:Serialoffender would have a right to respond, and the community could see the relevant evidence, though. (There would be unredacted diffs, but no one would know if User:Victim or User:Concernedobserver did the reporting. Obviously, this would work better where there are multiple victims so the lynchmob doesn't retaliate against User:Victim by default. And of course User:Victim could report anonymously, and no one could conclusively determine whether the reporter was User:Victim or User:Concernedobserver.) Thoughts? Calliopejen1 (talk) 20:00, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

@Calliopejen1: - 3rd party accusations of high level harassment are relatively rare. It's also less critical on the retribution come-back as it's not an instance of "I'm stuck between complaining (with blowback) or continuing to be harassed". A bigger issue, is that in this identity-hidden case, the harasser might go "well, not knowing differently, I'll hold my most harassed victim responsible" - bringing someone into the frame against their will. Nosebagbear (talk) 20:18, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

One reason why they're rare is that a third party sticking their nose in will certainly be the next victim. I find much of the atmosphere toxic, but there is no way in hell that I would file a case against one of the WP:UNBLOCKABLEs. Third-party complaints might not be so rare if there were a different reporting system in place. Of course, I agree that victims could be brought in against their will. With Fram, that obviously happened with Laura Hale, even though no one knows conclusively who the reporter was. Calliopejen1 (talk) 20:25, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

• If one of the concerns is the 'star chamber' thing, you could still have private proceedings in specific situations. E.g. complaints go to T&S. If they are found to have some merit by T&S, T&S refers the case to ARBCOM, alongside the evidence, and both T&S and ARBCOM must agree that an action is warranted (after a coordinated investigation). Or something like that. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:51, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

The WMF Consultation on the Issue

The WMF appears to be having a consultation on a private reporting tool of harasssment - to be handled by the WMF. They are also planning on bringing in a universal code of conduct.

There's only 2 weeks left on the tool side of consulting - so please go add your thoughts.

The timing isn't iffy, but the lack of publicising is - the talk page got banners, why not this? In any case, please spread the word. Nosebagbear (talk) 16:53, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Over there at the consultation it looks to me as if the WMF is expanding its hegemony over the individual Wikipedias. Perhaps not consciously, but more likely because they feel they must due to their belief that the local Wikis are not sufficiently competent to address these issues themselves. IMO the WMF spokespersons, in the manner of skilled politicians, have carefully sidestepped some of the serious concerns voiced there by Risker ad MER-C. What the WMF always fails to understand is that among a large community such as that of en.Wiki for example, there is a far greater greater number of qualified and experienced sociologists than there are at Trust & Safety, and just because the volunteers are not salaried does not mean they are any less competent (though they may be less afraid of losing their unpaid job though if they screw up).

Where Wikipedia fails is that there is so little interest in becoming a member of Arbcom that the seats just have to filled from an ever decreasing list of candidates who happen to put themselves forward. Admittedly there are, or have been, some real gems among our arbitrators, but by and large it's not a group in whom the community nowadays seems to have much confidence. Most regular Wikipedia maintenace workers have some insight into what adminship entails, but no one know what he Committee does until they've been there.

Like adminship - which is is filled by users who come under a great deal more scrutiny, an open voting system, and a much higher bar - Arbcom needs to be made more attractive to potential candidates who genuinely possess the Wiki-knowledge and the required social skills, rather than perhaps just pursuing their own agendas or fulfilling their ultimate dream of having held yet another one of Wikipedia's most important positions. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:39, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

I've generally been satisfied with the past and present arbcom members despite inevitable stuff that I disagree with. Every election there have been some scary candidates but they rarely get elected. By comparison, bad admins are chosen all the time. I can't offhand think of anyone I want on arbcom who hasn't (past or present) already been on it. It's enough of a time sink that serving more than a term or two is beyond the call of duty. 67.164.113.165 (talk) 03:33, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

Nosebagbear, I left an update on the consultation page on Meta about the User reporting system. I apologize if my not updating the page left you concerned that the project was moving forward without having adequate feedback from English Wikipedia. As stated on Meta, the project is temporarily stalled for about a month now because of changes in personnel and project scope adjustments to sync it with the Foundations new Medium Term Plan. Boring reasons that I usually wouldn't mention on wiki. Normally, I start a project page on English Wikipedia. For this consultation, I haven't got to that stage yet. Do you think I should start one on ENWP or are folks happy to go to Meta?

I'm going to make substantive replies to other comments in other posts. SPoore (WMF), Strategist, Community health initiative (talk) 23:01, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

SPoore (WMF), I think you will hear from a wider segment of the English Wikipedia editor base of you create a page here as you'd originally thought. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 23:23, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

I think an ideal outcome would be first a en-wiki discussion on whether we need our own code of conduct, what would be its status, and what would be the relation with the WMF-developed code of conduct. WMF input would be very welcome to this discussion, but I think it should precede discussion of specific behaviours covered or not covered by this code. This probably needs to be an RfC, and if there are user interesting in (co-)organizing it I think we should just do it now, especially since we have a month Flo mentions here.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:34, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi Ymblanter, one point of clarification: the user reporting system and the universal code of conduct are two separate initiatives. The user reporting system is part tech and part social (workflows, access, training, policy, etc.) And the universal code of conduct is for the most part only policy. Both projects are complicated because they involve comprehensive consultations with many communities. These initiatives are not going to happen really fast so there is no rush. I'll share timelines and plans as soon as I know more. This is my long winded way of saying that you can expect consultations about the user reporting system and the ucoc to be separate. SPoore (WMF), Strategist, Community health initiative (talk) 13:29, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Encouraging collaborative behaviour

I believe we need to examine how the Wikipedia editing environment selects for uncollaborative behaviour. As I've written about before, consensus decision making favours those who are less accommodating over those who are more accommodating. Using consensus to make decisions only works when there is a strong alignment in goals and principles, but this is impossible to maintain as a group grows in size. (For example, some people may feel that English Wikipedia should be written at a fifth-grade reading level, to make it more accessible to a wider readership, while others may feel that it should be written at an eighth-grade reading level, to allow for greater concision when explaining complex topics. Both viewpoints are valid; they just are products of different underlying goals.) As a result, uncollaborative behaviour is one mechanism to essentially reduce the numbers of those holding discussions, excluding those who don't want to engage in protracted discussions with those behaving poorly, which will (as Risker said elsewhere in a slightly different context) "[burn up] social capital and sweat equity".

Although it would by no means be a panacea, I believe a key part of a solution to encourage collaborative behaviour is to introduce better content dispute-resolution mechanisms. For example, if there were a form of mandatory binding editorial review, disputes could be definitively settled, and disputants would gain much less benefit from being uncollaborative to each other. (Of course that is just a one-sentence concept and not a fully fledged idea.) Generally speaking, we need to foster an environment where there is no advantage to being unco-operative, and so the incentive for negative activity is diminished. isaacl (talk) 19:31, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

@Isaacl: - I've considered the merit (or lack therof) of binding editorial review "ARBCONTENT?". Various problems seem so likely to crop up. Firstly, "seek consensus" is a key part of the fourth pillar - which is already the one under issue. We've of course waived consensus before with ARBCOM. The problem is, we'd need quite a few editorial reviewers, even if used for the edge cases, - a dozen adjudicators wouldn't be enough. But there's no way the Community could be satisfied with single admins ruling on it. Beyond that, editors who rated their chances with it would lose much of the motivation to form consensus short of it (and many could play it well enough to hide that). Many feel that seeking consensus in editing, despite the inevitable imperfect consequences is Wikipedia. Nosebagbear (talk)

The idea of "not being co-operative handicaps you" - it's interesting, in that it feels a really good way to go. The problem is, I suspect this might cause more cases of trying to (politely) provoke the other party until breaking Civil (a definition of being un-cooperative), thus risking being counter-productive. It could of course also be productive. In some ways, this is what DS does. Violently. I think this could work well with pages with 10+ editors discussing the issue. If there's an editor on each side handicapping the "moderates" (those willing to talk), then remove them from discussion. But with those with 2/3/4 in, it could be counterproductive. I also despise DS, viewing it as a necessary evil at best. So I'd like judgement involved than that. Nosebagbear (talk) 20:44, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

So many discussions end in "no consensus" precisely because using consensus doesn't scale up. I know there are editors who consider this inertial effect to be a feature, but it's also frustrating that change can be readily stonewalled by less-accommodating editors, while the more-accommodating ones work at finding a true compromise. Having a mandatory, binding mediation mechanism, for example, can be reflective of general community views and I think could, under the right circumstances, be accepted.

The point I was making was not to remove unco-operative editors from discussions (though I'm not necessarily adverse to proposals along those lines), but that if there is no incentive to be unco-operative, the editing community won't evolve so there is an increasing percentage of unco-operative editors. If content disputes could be resolved more expeditiously, and with at least a temporary truce before being revisited, this would make it less likely that the only survivors in a dispute will be those who are less accommodating. isaacl (talk) 21:40, 17 June 2019 (UTC)

• You make some good points. In other threads, people often reference a lack of common standards of civility as a reason why enforcing civility on Wikipedia is so difficult. Maybe shifting that conversation towards positive expectations of effectively working in a collaborative environment would be a better approach. It's no secret that consensus processes are dominated by the loudest (and often the meanest) voices, and while there are no formal barriers to participation, editors who don't want to deal with people calling them and their ideas stupid are often tempted to find better things to do with their time. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 00:55, 18 June 2019 (UTC)
• Isaac has some great insights and great essays. One of the problems IMO is that Wikipedia does no real training of new editors. We never teach each other how to participate in discussions productively. I think it might benefit to have some how-to pages showing examples of constructive and nonconstrutive discussions, and outlining constructive and nonconstructive ways to turn disagreement into consensus. My concern about "arbcontent" is that you really need to either know the content, or learn the content, in order to adjudicate a content dispute. In some areas, WikiProjects might be able to provide a pool of knowledgable uninvolved editors, but I fear in a lot of areas, the two editors fighting about something will be the only two editors who know anything about that thing that they're fighting about. Hence, it may be more productive to teach everyone how to resolve disputes among themselves rather than creating a "content court" of any kind, which may never have enough judges in the right areas. – Levivich 02:45, 18 June 2019 (UTC)
  • Four years ago I floated the idea of a reference page for sample editor interactions, but it got a lukewarm reception, and so I didn't pursue it. There are already a lot of good essays on becoming a more effective editor, though: see the "Essays on building, editing, and deleting content" section of Template:Wikipedia essays. But realizing that you can benefit from reading and learning from, say, Wikipedia:Tendentious editing § How to pull back from the brink requires a degree of self-awareness and introspection that is unfortunately absent from many unco-operative editors. Additionally, there has to be a will to resolve a dispute fairly in order for someone to voluntarily take advice on how to do it.
  • There are certainly highly domain-specific topics in which some disputes would need a domain expert to resolve. (In the real world, as I understand it, mediators don't necessarily start out being familiar with the ins and outs of the problem domain, and may have to be educated by the involved parties.) But in many (most?) instances, what is needed is a weighing of the competing arguments in context of the applicable policies and procedures, plus an application of impartial editorial judgement. If we can start with addressing these cases, it'll be a useful step forward. isaacl (talk) 05:26, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

@Isaacl: I basically agree with that assessment, but I would add that in many (most?) instances, what is needed is a weighing of the competing arguments in context of the applicable policies and procedures, plus an application of impartial editorial judgement[, as opposed to] need[ing] a domain expert to resolve is a very idealistic way of looking at it. I had a dispute with another area on the topic of "Nichiren Buddhist-based new religious movements" some years back, and most of the sources were written in English for a predominantly lay audience: anyone could have clicked on the sources, which were also available for free, to see that there was no "difference of interpretation" but rather one editor matching what the sources said and another editor twisting them to fit what he wanted to say (quite blatantly, to the point where a cited source gave one year for an event occurring and that editor's version of an article would give a completely different year). The problem is that on certain parts of the encyclopedia (namely ANI) very few editors who aren't already "involved" will actually bother to click on diffs, read sources, etc., and will rather !vote based on which of the editors they "like" or "don't like". (The aforementioned Nichiren Buddhism dispute was open-and-shut, and I was genuinely shocked at how difficult it was to get anyone to actually look at it -- even ArbCom ultimately ignored it and decided to TBAN the both of us, with only one or two editors pointing out on this page at the time what a mess they had made of the case by not looking at the content to realize that one of us was completely right and the other completely wrong.) This means that ultimately, while we may not need mediators who are already knowledgeable of this or that topic, we definitely do need mediators who are interested enough to click around and verify (or falsify) what the various parties to the dispute are saying. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 05:39, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

(+1); essentially all sorts of open-shut content disputes turn into conduct disputes. ∯WBG^converse 06:34, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

This is a good point, and for me the big picture (not necessarily related to harassment) is that the bigger the set of individuums who are discussing a solution to a certain problem is, the more difficult is to find a consensus, and it is likely that the solution is not found. In the English Wikipedia, we have seen it many times. For example, we have a perennial problem of decreasing the number of active administrators, it has been universally accepted that this is because RfA is a broken process, or at least is perceived as a broken process, however, all attempts at the RFA reform end in no consensus. Presumable, the solution of the harassment problem, as far as it is shifted to the community, has good chances to end in no consensus. If a consensus decision can not be taken, an authority must step in and take a decision. We have pretty much one authority - ArbCom - which can take decisions which are related to user behavior but they are not authorized make policy decisions. Apparently, WMF decided they must take policy decisions in the areas which can be covered as ToU violations (and unfortunately in other areas as well, see for example the recent disaster with short descriptions). This is not good, since we must have policies which at the very least cover all possible situations of ToU violations, so that ArbCom must be able to deal with them, but this just does not happen. However, I do not know any solutions, since all the solutions must be approved by the community as policies and are likely to end up as no consensus instead.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:48, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

@Ymblanter:, while there is something to that, it has the following bits. The WMF can amend the ToU (and interpret it) as they wish, meaning they don't have any clear jurisdiction. While en-wiki has ended in NC on Civil issues before, they've also ended up with Firm "Oppose"s. So that's not a non-covered area, it's a deliberately exempted aspect that is being controlled by the WMF. The WMF can want an unacceptably high requirement, and saying we'd need policies to match that is neither viable nor moral. One truly monstrous thing done was that the WMF stated that en-wiki was proving repeatedly unable to control issues...without going and stating which issues, with examples, and what they'd classify as control. Nosebagbear (talk) 08:00, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

Whereas I agree with your assessment of the WMF activity, and whereas I was very clear during the incident what I think of Fram and how it should have been handled, I do think that, at the very least, certain aspects of Fram's activity on en.wiki in the past have been highly problematic, and if we had them clearly covered in the policies / had been able to implement these policies to correct these problematic aspects, there were probably no ToU violation case to talk about.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:46, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

True, but in two bright-line discussions on Civility I've participated in there were very clear-cut rejections. Editors are also against unclarified general rules - we have general (many would say vague) rules now, but it's much harder to trip over them. Do you have any thoughts short of a general solution that would raise the civility level requirements at least a bit "low-hanging fruit"? Nosebagbear (talk) 10:28, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

In this particular subsection, can we focus on how to foster a collaborative environment through positive incentives? There are lots of other sections where a discussion of civility levels can be held. isaacl (talk) 14:30, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

In the essay I linked to above on the issues with community consensus, I discussed the stalemate in trying to adopt new approaches by consensus, since consensus itself is broken in a large group. My previous thoughts are that it would take some kind of crisis which would motivate editors to essentially forego their veto on enacting change, motivate the WMF to enact broad change from above, or precipitate a large change in the editing population. Although the odds are against it, perhaps the current situation is that crisis. isaacl (talk) 14:28, 18 June 2019 (UTC)

@Isaacl: The problem is that "civility" is really very much in the eye of the beholder, at least when it comes to thinks that aren't also blatant personal attacks or harassment. Curly Turkey (talk · contribs) has a pretty foul mouth, and has come under attack for it from several users who don't like him for other reasons; he's turned his rhetoric on me from time to time (sometimes in jest, sometimes when I deserved it, and probably also sometimes when I didn't deserve it) but I've never thought to request sanctions for him for being "uncivil", since I know he's not doing it for the purpose of causing offense. AGF basically forbids editors who don't already know that CT (or others who similarly use colourful language) isn't a WP:DICK from assuming that causing offense is his intent, which makes sanctioning editors for solely "uncivil" purposes extremely problematic -- editors who claim to be offended by foul language are usually either (a) engaging in deliberate deception to game the system (and we don't cede ground to those editors -- never again) or (b) being too sensitive about such issues, either because they take things too literally (yeah, I know that "fuck" and "suck" are both originally sexual in nature, and that the way they are used has its origins not only in sexual contexts but in a sexist gynophobic and homophobic worldview[8]) or because they are kids (and in either case we can't modify editor behaviour or the Wikipedia "culture" just for them). Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:26, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

I've said nothing about civility in this section, nor made any suggestions that require distinguishing civil comments from others. As I mentioned above, can further discussion on determining civility be held in one of the many other sections that are already discussing this topic? isaacl (talk) 02:32, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I'm sorry, but you opened a subsection immediately below a discussion of civility, talking about encouraging collaborative behaviour and fostering a collaborative environment, and you also specifically mentioned community gridlock when it comes to "consensus", which is something that had been mentioned a bunch of times with regard to civility enforcement immediately above -- not only is it difficult not to read this as being about civility (and the enforcement thereof), but you certainly can't blame others for reading it in the most intuitive way. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:38, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

To clarify: I say "fuck" an awful lot, but I don't call people "fucking twats" or whatever, which is clearly a violation; most Wikipedians recognize the difference, but a vocal minority would sanction every "fuck" regardless of how it's employed, and ignore an awful lot of truly incivil language and behaviour because it lacks a "fuck". Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 03:25, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

@Curly Turkey: You're not seriously telling me you believe there is a "vocal minority" who sincerely support sanctions for "fuck" but not genuine incivility, are you? I will admit I forgot one category in my above comment: (c) editors who sincerely think that all cursing and swearing should be forbidden, and either don't know or don't care if/when they find themselves making common cause with disruptive POV-pushers; but that group generally place other words (the C-word, for example) in the same boat as "fuck" so they can't be who you're talking about. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 03:40, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

I meant "fuck" as a stand-in for the Seven dirty words—no, I don't believe they're singling out "fuck" but giving a pass to other such words. And, yes, there are editors who believe all cuss words should be sanctioned—some of them are sincere, and others are trying to game the system. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 03:48, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Interim Elections

Per the Arbitration Committee Policy, In exceptional circumstances, the Committee may call interim elections, in a format similar to that of the regular annual elections, if it determines that arbitrator resignations or inactivity have created an immediate need for additional arbitrators. Several arbs have now commented on how the inactivity of several members is affecting the ability to process the workload, and with 2 difficult cases open, a major request ongoing, and the whole WP:FRAM ordeal, would this be a circumstance the Committee would entertain for an interim election? Or do the current active Arbs feel they are capable to resolve the ongoing issues in a timely and satisfactory manner? Mr Ernie (talk) 13:38, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Some of the difficulty in this vein seems to be caused by Arbs taking on tasks and then becoming inactive - rather than just being inactive. i.e. it's tasks that were thought to be handled and not that's the real killer Nosebagbear (talk) 14:06, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Mr Ernie, I think the committee is managing, and will manage until the end of the year. At that point I would advocate increasing the size back to 15. Worm^TT(talk) 15:40, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Agreed with Worm here. There is also a fair amount of work that goes into onboarding new arbitrators, and I'd rather not add that to our workload unless we really must. At the moment we have only two arbitrators inactive, so things are a little more back to normal. GorillaWarfare (talk) 18:05, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Should the need arise, in these dreadfully troubled times, I am quite prepared to volunteer my humble self as as an Arbitrator. You are looking frightfully tired dear GW perhaps you need me to help you out? I remember the last war so very clearly when I drove an ambulance throughout the blitz and still trampled the enemy. I feel Wikipedia needs me now! The Lady Catherine de Burgh (talk) 18:23, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

I don't think that there is any chance that a user who has made only 3 edits since August 2018 will be elected an arbitrator. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 18:26, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Watch how you speak to a Lady Mr. Pery. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:31, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

She was probably in Bishzilla's pocket, which I think everyone would agree would be an acceptable reason for a future arbitrator not to edit. TonyBallioni (talk) 18:35, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

I would need to ascertain whether the Lady Catherine de Burgh voted for Brexit or not, because it's well known that the British aristocracy all voted "leave" so they could increase their investment portfolios and stop their properties being sold off and being opened to the general public leading to third-rate pictures of the old dining hall appearing all over Commons. Meanwhile, Pppery really should be aware of what some of the upper-class like John Hervey, 7th Marquess of Bristol got up to; he wouldn't think twice about planting his helicopter in your back garden to take a quick slash behind the shed. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 21:00, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

I think the irony is that we would need to ask T&S to set up SecurePoll. --Rschen7754 18:33, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Wow, that really is ironic! --Tryptofish (talk) 19:57, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

A little too ironic. --Floquenbeam (talk) 21:17, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

It's like ten thousand blocks when all you need is the WMF. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 21:25, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Who would've thought, it figures. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:28, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Open letter to the WMF Board

Original announcement

• Might I be the first to doff my hat, and state my great respect for such an excellent (and open) action in support of the English Wikipedia Community, our self-governance, and our long-standing aims of openness and fairness. My sincere thanks to all of you. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:24, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• This is an excellent statement. The second para in particular raises some very serious issues around governance which need to be urgently responded to by the WMF given that they are at the centre of this matter. Nick-D (talk) 08:25, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• That is a very good note, on many levels. Well done. I also note Katherine Maher's helpful Friday night comments on her their talk page E.g. – "a role for ArbCom in the immediate case" and "consultation on how to build processes and tools". Feels like things are (finally) starting to move in the right direction; could be a productive week in store. Britishfinance (talk) 08:36, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you, this is very well worded, frank and to the point, without being aggressive or attempting to undermine the WMF authority. Let's hope they listen.  — Amakuru (talk) 08:39, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Kudos for drawing the line where it is due. --qedk (t 桜 c) 08:41, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Good job.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:42, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• I've been very critical of some of the actions of this iteration of the committee, but this is pretty much the textbook model of how such a thing should be done. Total credit both to whoever wrote it, and to all those who've put their names to it. ‑ Iridescent 08:43, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• A sensible and well written statement. Unlike most lashing out by this community so far. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:45, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you for that. It shows what true leadership looks like. Mr Ernie (talk) 08:46, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Wow - if only you wrote so clearly and concisely for cases ... sorry, I've been in sarcasm mode for a couple weeks now. Seriously very very well done folks. My compliments to the chef.
  • +1 Support — Ched :  ?  — 08:51, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• I also want to chime in with my support for this letter. As someone who's never been a big fan of Arbcom, I have to admit this was very well done. You have my sincere thanks. Sperril (talk) 08:58, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• With thanks to Joe Roe for pulling that together. SilkTork (talk) 09:03, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Perfect. Dignified, well-written, and just what needed to be said. Kafka Liz (talk) 09:04, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well done and thanks. PamD 09:08, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• A demand that the WMF leave action to community-developed processes should be preceded by developing processes that are well-equipped to handle harassment complaints. The upcoming Signpost article notes that Fram's actions and behavior were brought up to the Arbitration Committee by multiple editors without resolution. I, myself, brought up his behavior with no resolution. Where is the working community process that the WMF should refer harassment complaints to, in your opinion? From where I'm sitting, the current process seems to consist of receiving a harassment complaint and promptly binning it if handling it would be particularly difficult or controversial. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 09:15, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• But I think the note recognises that: We also acknowledge that ArbCom has struggled to handle civility and harassment complaints in a way that adequately balances privacy against transparency, and due process to the accused against victim protection. I think both ArbCom and Katherine Maher are moving to agreement that a much better process is needed on this area (I don't think anybody sensible has advocated during this whole affair that on-Wiki handling of these issues is working); but one that needs co-operation. Britishfinance (talk) 09:21, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• @Britishfinance: I appreciate their recognition of this, of course, but then they proceed to ignore it for the rest of the statement. "We recognize that our processes are wholly deficient. We demand that you refer others to those processes." It doesn't work like that. Fix the processes first, then the WMF won't step in. The WMF doesn't want to step in. They had to, in this case, because enwiki has allowed harassment to propagate unchecked. Even with the large number of resignations over this issue, I am willing to bet that the culture of abuse and harassment that permeates enwiki to its core has lost us far more contributions than the resignations. I doubt it's even particularly close. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 09:25, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• @BU Rob13: Honestly, I don't think ArbCom need to hammer this point; I think it is largely conceded by the community. I can't see the status quo regarding reporting of issues in this area continuing; the WMF, Katherine Maher, ArbCom, and the bulk of the wider community (there are loads of examples on WP:FRAM) want real change here. One thing is clear from this whole affair, is that there is no going back to the status quo. Britishfinance (talk) 09:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• And yet, the tragedy is that they can't make the last logical leap that the current situation was caused by the community. The WMF has been all but begging the community to deal with harassment for years, with community health initiatives, research, etc. The enwiki community collectively ignored them.

  Imagine things from their shoes. They can't get the community or ArbCom to act to prevent harassment, despite repeated attempts. The community repeatedly brushes off the issue, often responding to reports of harassment with further harassment. At that point, there was simply no viable "refer to the community" option available when they received a complaint. Their choices were essentially "Take action ourselves" or "Do nothing, and acknowledge we are allowing harassment to continue". There are no good choices there, but they clearly chose the less bad one.

  At the point of the action occurring, the community could have used it as a wake-up call and fixed the processes so no actions like this are ever needed again. Instead, they went on the traditional witch-hunt of victims, blamed the WMF, called for mass-firings, attacked employees, etc. I've seen admins I respected outright say there is no point enforcing our policies/guidelines on civility or harassment at this moment. If anything, the reaction of the community has greatly increased the likelihood of future office actions related to harassment. Hopefully, the community can reverse course and seriously reflect on how we got into this situation. I can't say I'm terribly optimistic, though. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 09:44, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Yes, British finance is spot on. It's taking a while for some at ANI to take this point on board, as people get let off the hook for obvious infringements, but there is going to be a new normal after the dust settles here. I just don't believe that it's the WMF who have either the local knowledge nor the time to police all that. They need to tell us what they expect, and we need to get on with it. Rob, you may think a high profile and unexpected ban of a senior admin was the way to do that, and you're entitled to your opinion, but whatever one may think of that it's indisputably backfired and damaged the project, at least short term. Utimately its going to take dialogue and collaboration to get to where we want to be.  — Amakuru (talk) 09:51, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• At least from the inside, I don't consider this ban unexpected. The Foundation discussed Fram with ArbCom multiple times over my term. ArbCom was aware of the conduct warnings and the general types of behavior that caused them, enough that I could spot that those behaviors were continuing on-wiki as I saw Fram pop up in various places. Knowing all of that, when Fram began following me around the project, taking shots at me, the Committee still did not act, instead allowing me to become so uncomfortable that I resigned. I am more than a little taken aback that the Committee then seemed surprised by the ban. They had every opportunity to try to handle the Fram issue themselves, in my opinion, even if they did not know the content of whatever reports T&S received. There was enough there to at least issue a very clear warning that further poor behavior would lead to sanctions, and honestly, that's probably all it would have taken to avoid action from the WMF. Some indication that the community was working toward handling the issue. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 10:08, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

(ec) It might be actually to become a good practice if ArbCon could forward to T&S the requests they can not handle. I hope this is already happening with the requests concerning the usual topics such as child protection, but it would have been a perfectly acceptable move, as fac as I am concerned, to forward there a behavior request they realistically can not handle. However, for me T&S starting handling behavioral requests on their own initiative without any community consultation is absolutely unacceptable.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:55, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Just as a point of information, we absolutely forward child protection and other "usual topics" to the WMF. We also have our monthly meetings in which we will sometimes update them on particularly difficult issues we're handling (even ones that are well within our own remit) but to my knowledge we've never asked T&S to take on something that was within our jurisdiction. Other arbs should of course feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. GorillaWarfare (talk) 16:28, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

The community needs concrete help from the WMF to improve those processes; it doesn't need them to step in and do it for us without being asked. – Joe (talk) 10:11, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

And until the enwiki community designs those processes and has the will to implement them, victims beware. ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 10:17, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Excellent statement. Thank you. Haukur (talk) 09:18, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellently crafted. Thank you. ∯WBG^converse 09:29, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• As you know, I'm a huge fan of Arbcom. But seriously, this is excellent work, well done to all concerned, it looks like the current members of the committee are genuinely committed to the mission and I applaud that. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:28, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well said. Let's hope they listen. -- Euryalus (talk) 09:32, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you. My enjoyment and interest in Wikipedia has decreased drastically over the past weeks but this gives me a bit of hope, as long as the WMF provides an adequate reply. --bonadea contributions talk 09:35, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

+1 to the statement - SchroCat (talk) 09:42, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Well written, thank you. Kante4 (talk) 09:45, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellent. Giano (talk) 09:50, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Yes - very thoughtful and helpful, well done Arbcom. The Land (talk) 09:57, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Hear hear. MER-C 09:59, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Terrific statement. Toa Nidhiki05 10:02, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• My principal objection to paid editing boils down to the question, "Why should I volunteer my time to improve an article that someone else is being paid to improve?" Why would I work to earn somebody else's paycheck?
  This whole scenario boils down to the same question, why would someone volunteer to serve on Arbcom and take all the grief which comes with it when T&S claim the turf and are being paid to do the same work? As the scope of T&S's self claimed remit expands (like an incontinent cat claiming territory) why would any of us volunteer do any of the housekeeping.
  I'm stumbling toward an uncomfortable, and unavoidable, question - am I a member of a volunteer community, or an unpaid employee of WMF?
  T&S need to get their tanks off the lawn and respect the distinction.
  But Arbcom have expressed all this a bit more eloquently. Well said. Cabayi (talk) 10:12, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Yeah, well-worded, puts the issue into clear perspective and points a path as to what to do next. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 10:13, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well said. Thank you. Struway2 (talk) 10:19, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Arbcom statement looks to me "sensible" until a "threat to leave" appears. There is no way to leave Wikipedia as there is no way to leave Earth (well, they threat to leave only Arbcom there). I think the solution is to consistently make users more WP:CIVIL in general. The source of the problem is the general tolerance of uncivil behaviour of experienced users. There should be more warnings and temporary blocks for such users so they don't go too far with it. --ssr (talk) 10:41, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  Define "civility". —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^Bori! 10:47, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  There is already a definition by the link to Wikipedia:Civility which is an established policy. --ssr (talk) 10:51, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  I asked you to define it, not rattle off what Wikipedia says it is. —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^Bori! 10:58, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  I was only referring to policy, not introducing my own definitions. --ssr (talk) 11:01, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Perfectly done, ArbCom Dax Bane 10:50, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• I fear I must concur that, per Rob: "We also acknowledge that ArbCom has struggled to handle civility and harassment complaints in a way that adequately balances privacy against transparency, and due process to the accused against victim protection" negates the entire rest of the letter's implied claim that Arbcom can handle it. This is them admitting they couldn't - David Gerard (talk) 10:55, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  Since ArbCom's composition changes with every election, a prior ArbCom's failure to act "correctly" does not logically mean that this ArbCom or any future ArbCom will act the same way. Furthermore, admitting failure to act in the past is usually regarded as the necessary first step to change one's behavior. I think this open letter is clear that the Committee is willing to address prior failures and defend the community's ability to self-police as much as possible. Regards SoWhy 11:03, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  I wrestled with this a bit myself. I feel like we're in a chicken an egg position: if the WMF has decided to take on enforcement of harassment issues, then there is no point in spending the immense amount of ArbCom's and the community's time required to have a thoughtful RfC about how to improve our process. But of course, without a better process, we will be no better at handling these difficult issues. I think one positive thing about this whole situation is that it has drawn attention to how nuanced these kinds of issues are—in the past, people have been extremely wary of ArbCom holding private proceedings, but it seems this situation has drawn attention to how important privacy protections are in harassment cases. I am hoping that we will come out of this with all parties (WMF, ArbCom, and the general community) better informed about all the issues there are to juggle in harassment cases, and a community more willing to allow the ArbCom to handle them privately when needed. GorillaWarfare (talk) 16:40, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Thank you for taking this stand. The persistent culture of WMF clumsily attempting to micromanage this project without consultation with its users is detrimental to its ultimate goal. Until WMF truly partners and dialogs with the Wikipedia community, these frictions will continue to drive highly productive editors away from the Wikimedia movement. Surely, that's not what anyone wants. - MrX 🖋 11:09, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Stronger than I expected. Glad it is.--Wehwalt (talk) 11:15, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Excellent, many thanks to the wiki.en ArbCom for bravely standing up for the values of the Wikimedia Movement against undue interference by third parts. Darwin ^Ahoy! 11:23, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• I feel so proud that the Arbitration Committee speaks up for my interests and advocates for the wellbeing of our shared Wikimedia Community values. This is the response that the Wikimedia Foundation reasonably should have expected when they took the extraordinarily unusual action that they did, then made the situation even weirder by both not explaining their action and having no particular response to this entirely predictable community response. This statement by ArbCom matches my view of the situation and communicates what I want. Blue Rasberry (talk) 11:37, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Very good letter, well done! Bishonen | talk 11:39, 30 June 2019 (UTC).
• Watching this incident caused me a lot of concern for a project whos mission I care deeply for-- in spite of my inactivity in recent years. The earlier comments by NewYorkBrad and especially this statement by the ArbCom brings me hope that there are plenty of thoughtful people with their hands on the rudder. The Wikipedia community is going to make things right (whatever right is), even if it isn't easy, and they'll do it togeather. I regret my limited role in the initial creation of office actions. While they were never the best tool, they were less of a compromise in a world where Wikimedia had a very different and much closer relationship with the rest of the community than the world we appear to live in today.--Gmaxwell (talk) 11:47, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellently worded, excellently crafted and dignified letter - I thank everyone at Arbcom for writing this, I really did lose all hope here but seeing this letter certainly gives me hope now. –Davey2010^Talk 11:54, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• The English Wikipedia community is indefensibly toxic according to the recent Buzzfeed report, if admission is the road to recovery then there we go. The letter in many ways is quite good, but 1) why did the Committee not acknowledge Arbcom was in private communication about Fram before the ban; and why did the Committee not acknowledge the policy change by the WMF was in fact publicly done on English Wikipedia by an English Wikipedia administrator? -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:08, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Comment. Where did the article state that the 'English Wikipedia community is indefensibly toxic'? Nishidani (talk) 12:17, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

@Alanscottwalker: Re. 1) – could you clarify what you mean by "in private communication"? Re. 2) – I wasn't aware of this, do you have a diff? – Joe (talk) 12:17, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

@Joe Roe: this is the diff--Ymblanter (talk) 12:23, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

That’s a WMF staff member acting in their capacity as a Foundation employee. One reason community members create such accounts when they join WMF as an employee is to be very clear about which hat is being worn when the edit is made and this was clearly not someone acting as a local administrator. –xeno^talk 12:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

We are not talking about hats. That staff member is well respected integral part of this community and that is what matters, when talking about community, and it was publicly done on English Wikipedia (ie. it was publicly done, in the community). -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:34, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Nishdini, that's how that article reads; Joe I will gather diffs, the prior communication before the ban has been mentioned on the ctte's noticebroad by iirc Opibiana and AGK; the policy change is in the page history of Office. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:22, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

No, that is how you read the article, despite it stating:

It finds itself in the painful position that the YouTubes and Twitters of the world have been unable to escape: in open conflict with some of its most devoted users, without whom its scale and success would be unimaginable, but whose sometimes toxic culture threatens its long-term health.

Getting a handle on the size and severity of the toxicity problem in the Wikipedia community is difficult. The relatively small number of admins and active editors of Wikipedia compared to the number of active users on a major social network means 'the scale of harassment is necessarily smaller.Nishidani (talk) 12:46, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

I doubt people are under the impression that when I read, I am not reading for myself. And even in your quotes, you just showed the community is indefensibly toxic according to that article, there is no reason for an encyclopedia to be sometimes toxic in culture, and it has little to no defense (indefensible) - just because it's a smaller group is irrelevant to being toxic regardless, only to size. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:05, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, it's a shame more people didn't pick up on that at the time. Regarding prior communication about Fram, he has been a party to many arb cases over the years and more recently he's had disputes with several individual arbs and the committee as a whole. To my recollection, that has been the context in which Fram's name has come up on our mailing list during my term. Saying we were "in private communication" in the letter, which we tried to keep concise, could have implied that we were holding some sort of private case about him, or had received formal complaints, which is not the case. – Joe (talk) 12:32, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

No. I did not say just write "in private communication". My question was not about anything other than the private communications with the WMF before the ban, that have already been made public, and should have been acknowledged in the letter since the letter deals in communication. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:40, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

@Alanscottwalker: Oh I see (you did actually just write "in private communication" – that's why I asked for clarification :) ). In that case yes we'd known for some time that T&S were talking to him, and were told a few days before that they were considering a ban. Unfortunately that was on a poorly-attended call and I don't think many arbs picked up on it in the minutes (I was inactive at the time), which of course is not T&S' fault. I thought about putting that in the letter, but Jan has already apologised for not communicating it to us more clearly in advance, and I actually think T&S are generally good at keeping us (ArbCom) informed about what they're doing, so it didn't seem worth pursuing. The communication problems we refer to are largely in communication after the ban. – Joe (talk) 12:47, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

That is unfortunate, if you are not upfront about the communications before the ban, it is bound to mislead others into thinking there was no communication and put all blame on someone else, when communication is a two-way street. 'We are considering going to ban'; Possible ctte responses: 'how dare you'; 'oh, that makes sense given all our past discussions';'not worth discussing'; 'could care less', 'silence equals consent', etc. etc. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:59, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

And to tie it together, a similar thing arises in the other issue I questioned the committee about, by not noting the public on English Wiki change by a valued member of the enwikicommunity and WMF person, it likely misleads in a damaging way, likely causing 'othering'. Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:00, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Well written. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:10, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellent statement. I think it exactly expresses the issues. That said, Rob is right. Fram, and others, have had civility and harassment problems for years. If Rob is correct, and this has been brought to ArbCom in the past, yeah, I can see why WMF did this. It needed to be done. I'm still hugely opposed to WMF stepping in like this. We have a classic case that (mostly) only the "elites" contribute at ANI or even vote for ARBCOM. The vast majority don't have a say. And folks who have been here for a while have either adjusted to the civility problems or have pretty thick skin to begin with. Basically speaking, WMF could have done a much better job communicating with ArbCom before the ban-hammer got tossed about. But ArbCom, and the community-as-a-whole, should have done a better job actually recognizing civility problems and setting a higher bar for expected behavior. Hobit (talk) 12:13, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

"If Rob is correct, and this has been brought to ArbCom in the past, yeah, I can see why WMF did this." Help me follow your logic here. If the issue was a really toxic user that arbcom didn't handle which was concerning Wikimedia, why wouldn't the appropriate course of action for WMF staff to bring the issue to the arbcom and collaborate on a solution? Failing that, why wouldn't the the correct course of action be form WMF staff to act with transparency with (at least) the arbcom? Keeping arbcom (largely) in the dark and overriding the normal governance process doesn't foster a feeling of collaboration. To me it feels both disrespectful and suggests a fundamental misunderstanding of the purposes Wikimedia was created to serve.--Gmaxwell (talk) 12:37, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

To be clear, I think WMF did it wrong ("WMF could have done a much better job communicating with ArbCom before the ban-hammer got tossed about."), but yeah I wrote that poorly, so thanks for asking. To clarify: I understand why WMF felt they needed to act, I just think they should have taken other steps first. Clearer communication with ArbCom in an attempt to say "Folks, this is, in our opinion, harassment. If you can't take care of it, we are going to have to" would have been the right place to start IMO. So I understand why they felt the need to act (it was well overdue IMO), I just disagree with the exact actions taken. Warnings to ArbCom and the community as a whole were needed. This shouldn't be a closed-door process unless it has to be. Hobit (talk) 13:31, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Good effort but I'm not sure this is a good look: "We also acknowledge that ArbCom has struggled to handle civility and harassment complaints in a way that adequately balances privacy against transparency, and due process to the accused against victim protection...." followed in bold next section by "We ask that the WMF commits to leaving behavioural complaints pertaining solely to the English Wikipedia to established local processes." Local processes are not effective. Leaky caldron (talk) 12:34, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Comment.HobitCivility is as yet undefined. As to harassment, this takes numerous forms, such as persistent reverting at sight of an editor one dislikes, mostly with no policy-comprehensible edit summary, no matter how academically solid and on-topic the sources almost invariably are, and how lengthy the subsequent talk page explanation may be - something I have 13 years of experience of watching or 'suffering'. I don't report these things. Arbitration would invariably call such clashes 'content disputes' since it rarely invokes WP:IDIDNOTHEARTHAT as a problem of behavioural incivility worthy of sanction (I remember just one case from my area). Neither would the WMT T&S group do so. So their harassment policy is a restricted view of a wider exurban slum reality. Find another word, because this is just really about policing language, regardless of the obtusity, stone-walling, hounding etc that is a constant stick in the wheels of serious encyclopedic work.

Yes, the statement is close to impeccable within the terms of our remit and complaint.Nishidani (talk) 12:36, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• @Leaky caldron: the two passages you highlight don't have to be mutually exclusive. We can acknowledge that we need to improve, and invite help and guidance from the WMF in achieving that, without saying that we have to hand them all the keys to the kingdom and leave all civility / harassment blocks to them. Personally I believe the the T&S team has a lot of general and theoretical knowledge on this topic, which it could use to help ArbCom, but is ill equipped, both in size and local knowledge, to actually do the policing itself. Cheers  — Amakuru (talk) 14:03, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• I agree with Nishidani, though the quibbling grammarian in me is having a slight meltdown due to the placement of one comma. —Javert2113 (Siarad.|¤) 12:43, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Fantastic. – Teratix ₵ 12:45, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you. I guess this is the unpopular question, but what about the members who did not sign? Were they inactive or did they oppose it? (or is that something they would have to say for themselves?) --Rschen7754 12:53, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  @Rschen7754: - Check the thread on Joe's t/p. 2 are inactive and 1, umm.... ∯WBG^converse 13:00, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  Two are inactive and then there is this edit.--Gmaxwell (talk) 13:06, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• This is a good approach. Hopefully this can be used as a starting point to improving local procedures and working with T&S to restore accountability and community backing to this crucial area of user protection. -- Ajraddatz (talk) 12:58, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Brilliant statement. I know that at WP:FRAM some had low expectations of you, due to relative quiet. But we have a brilliant statement that was well worth the wait. ∰Bellezzasolo✡ Discuss 13:49, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you all who signed. DuncanHill (talk) 13:51, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well written, politely phrased and sets out where the fault lines legitimately lie. Nosebagbear (talk) 14:05, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• I've honestly never been prouder to be part of this community.--Mojo Hand (talk) 14:25, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you to the ArbCom members behind this. starship.paint (talk) 14:31, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• This is an excellent opportunity to define how the T&S team should work with the Wikimedia communities, and will hopefully develop a series of guidelines for their actions. We must not forget that this type of administrative sanction handed out by the WMF office could target any contributor in any language, not just English speaking contributors on en.wikipedia. I mostly contribute in French (I am bilingual), and I am following this incident with the greatest interest. I sincerely hope that a solution is found before we have more admins and other important volunteers resign. GastelEtzwane (talk) 14:39, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well done, and a model for how WMF staff should in turn communicate with the community in a professional and collaborative manner. Acroterion (talk) 14:43, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellent, thank you. —Kusma (t·c) 14:55, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• My thanks goes to the Committee for finally issuing a strong collective statement about this acute crisis — and specifically, the usurping of their authority by the Foundation. I've been calling for this all along. True, it took a while, but you know what they say... better late than never. El_C 14:57, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellent, well done all! Johnbod (talk) 15:04, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you for an excellent and thoughtful response. Once again, I hope the WMF is listening. Vanamonde (Talk) 15:10, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you. This is to note that everyone on the board has received this letter. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:15, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you to ArbCom for this; it is a well-written, concise, and extremely civil summary of the situation. However, given the way the WMF has been responding so far, I would also advise the Committee to be prepared to not get the sort of response you're hoping for to it, and be ready for the next steps to be taken, whatever they may be. rdfox 76 (talk) 15:24, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Everybody’s said everything that needs to be said, but yeah, this is great. —pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 15:28, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Hear hear (pile-on). – filelakeshoe (t / c) 🐱 15:31, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellent statement and guidance. I especially appreciate the comments from GastelEtzwane and GMaxwell. – SJ + 15:42, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well done. I'm really proud of what the committee has done here. Thank you. I hope it's given the consideration it deserves. 28bytes (talk) 16:19, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Excellent! If the response from the WMF is not satisfying enough, I, too, will let go of the mop. --Randykitty (talk) 16:21, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Great stuff. Thank you to all. - Sitush (talk) 16:23, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Great stuff indeed. Beautifully crafted and suitably measured in tone. Exactly the response required. May the reply be similarly thoughtful and constructive. KJP1 (talk) 16:33, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Yes, very well done indeed. Thank you for this. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 16:35, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Bene factum! -Ad Orientem (talk) 17:03, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you for this. Abequinn14 (talk) 17:04, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well done, thank you very much. SQL^{Query me!} 17:22, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• I've been looking for a bit of a beacon of light that there is a way forward in this bloody mess, while I've been wading through my inactivity. This is the first I've seen of it. This is a great response put forward by the Committee, and good job for not letting emotion bite into it. -- Amanda (aka DQ) 17:25, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• This is a very strong, substantive, and forward-looking letter. Now it is time for the Foundation to respond in kind. Neutrality^talk 17:27, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you for this step toward a solution whereby community-elected representatives develop processes for protecting the privacy of victims of harassment while also providing appropriate due process for the accused. 24.151.50.175 (talk) 17:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• A great letter, and a reason for optimism amid a very sad time on the project. I just hope that none of you really do end up resigning. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:49, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• As of 30 June, two bureaucrats, 18 administrators, an ArbCom clerk, and a number of other editors have resigned - Wow. I knew a couple of admins had resigned, but this is crazy. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 18:24, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  Tomorrow the Administrator Newsletter must be out, they include complete lists (note that there were desysoppings and unrelated resignations this month)--Ymblanter (talk) 18:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• I was asleep at the time that the letter was sent. I have now read it in full. It is an excellent letter. Thank you for your efforts. Mr rnddude (talk) 18:28, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Well said. Hut 8.5 18:42, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• This is a wonderful statement, and the absolute best you could've made. Thank you for this. Retroity (talk) 18:48, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• THe most impressive and probably the most important thing the Committee has ever done, or at least since I becaame a clerk in 2009. I know from my time on the Committee how difficult it must have been to get the wording right, and you can see from the comments above that most people think you did. Add me to the list of those who are proud of what you did and see it as the first ray of hope since this all started. Doug Weller talk 19:10, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• As an administrator and a ten year editor, I offer my full support of this letter from ArbCom to the WMF. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 19:12, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you arbs for this letter. I 100% agree with you --Guerillero | Parlez Moi 19:25, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you for this. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Very well done. Thank you. Kanguole 19:41, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Superb letter. Kudos to all who worked on this. – Ammarpad (talk) 19:51, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
• Thank you. Abecedare (talk) 19:52, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Acknowledging statement to Arbcom open letter

Dear, Arbitration Committee,

Thank you for sharing your thoughtful statement with the community and us. The Foundation will be working through the points you have raised and plans to provide a fuller response here in public tomorrow. Best regards, --Jan (WMF) (talk) 19:58, 30 June 2019 (UTC)