Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case

Requests for arbitration

Arbitration Committee proceedings

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Case requests

Request name	Motions	Initiated	Votes
Richard Arthur Norton (1958- )		1 February 2013	{{{votes}}}
Sexology		30 January 2013	{{{votes}}}

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Open cases

Case name	Links	Evidence due	Prop. Dec. due
Venezuelan politics	(t) (ev / t) (ws / t) (pd / t)	20 Apr 2024	04 May 2024
Mzajac	(t) (ev / t) (ws / t) (pd / t)	—	Case suspended

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Recently closed cases (Past cases)

Case name	Closed
Conflict of interest management	13 Apr 2024

Clarification and Amendment requests

Request name	Motions	Case	Posted
Amendment request: Conduct in deletion-related editing	none	(orig. case)	30 April 2024

Arbitrator motions

No arbitrator motions are currently open.

Richard Arthur Norton (1958- )

Initiated by Fram (talk) at 08:03, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Fram (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), filing party
• Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Carrite (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• [1]

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive33#Help needed with image uploads from one user (started 14 March 2006)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive100#Concerning Image:7674564574788.jpg (20 August 2007)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive615#Using an audit as retaliation and Nixon's enemy list (22 May 2010)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive617#Gross Harrassment of User:Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (1 June 2010)
• Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20100822 (22 August 2010)
• Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20111108 (8 November 2011)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive228#Richard Arthur Norton copyright violations (9 November 2011)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive229#Richard Arthur Norton: continued testing the boundaries of his topic ban (7 December 2011)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive759#User:Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) - violation of topic ban (13 July 2012)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive239#Removal of topic ban (12 August 2012)
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Richard Arthur Norton continuing violating topic bans despite previous blocks (29 January 2013)

Statement by Fram

This is a typical case about a long-lasting situation where the community has attempted different approaches to solve the problems, but where the community is actually in deadlock on how to proceed.

Richard Arthur Norton is a productive editor, very good at finding sources, which has earned him the respect and defense of a number of editors. On the other hand, he has a history of problematic edits with regard to copyright, which has lead to two CCI investigations and a topic ban, which then again lead to multiple blocks.

My main concern are the ongoing copyright problems, on two fronts: his file uploads, and his links to copyright violating off-wiki pages, created by himself. As can be seen from the "other steps" section, this has been going on for years (at least since 2006), and shows no signs of improvement. He uploads many files as PD, only to change them to FU when challenged. This includes recent examples like File:Freudenberg-Louis Kohlman-Ralph MatavanBeach 1915 circa.png, which he marked as PD (which it wasn't), and then changed to be FU for an article on the beach, which is hardly visible in the photograph; or File:Cristmas eve, Isle of Pines, 1910 copy.jpg, which changed from PD to FU despite being 3,246 × 2,111 pixels large. Images like File:Larger print of Aftermath from the Hurricane of 1917, Isle of Pines.jpg are still incorrectly tagged as public domain.

Worse are his many links to copyright violations he uploaded on other sites like Flickr and Familypedia. Recent examples include this edit to David Emanuel Wahlberg, linking to the picture of a Swedish article from 1949 (so presumably copyrighted); this edit to Eddie August Schneider, linking to more copyright violations[2]; or especially this edit to Paramus High School, linking to the familypedia page of Steven Howard Temares, which hosts nothing but a full copy of a Wall Street Journal article from 2012. This Familypedia page was created by Richard Arthur Norton. Using it as a reference is not only using a self-written wiki page as a reference, but a very clear breach of WP:ELNEVER and WP:COPYLINK.

Considering the long ongoing nature of these copyright violations, the fact that he has been made aware of these problems for years, and the sad fact that the community can't find a good solution, I would urge the Arbcom to take this case on. Fram (talk) 08:31, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

(Removed responses because of length considerations). Fram (talk) 08:49, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

RAN reinstated clear copyright violating Familypedia link today:[3]. Fram (talk) 09:10, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

2 February; fair use claim for a 1,848 × 2,142 file?[4] Fram (talk) 08:24, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Carrite (Tim Davenport)

This has NOT been exhausted by the community and should be declined. Fram, in his rush to wield the blazing sword of justice to venue shop for a result which he finds "satisfactory," has opened this case request before the AN/I discussion thread has even been closed. I have a specific proposal to make there which was undercut by this unilateral decision. This case should be rejected at least until that thread is closed by consensus. Carrite (talk) 17:51, 1 February 2013 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 19:07, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

@Fram. My apologies if you are offended. I believe the correct term for what you are doing is WP:Venue Shopping and will make that change. Carrite (talk) 19:07, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

@Arbcom. You are, of course, free to proceed with the case here if you feel that is necessary. I don't want to come off as Richard Nixon saying "re-elect me and I'll tell you my secret plan to end the war in Vietnam." I have in mind a very limited punitive block, very explicit directions involving linking to external sites, and a supervised easing of an article creation prohibition. I can make that argument here or there, at your pleasure. I definitely think it would be more conducive to make this very specific proposal there, however. Carrite (talk) 19:20, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

@Fram. I think that you may well have extreme views on this matter that are outside of a potential consensus at AN/I. I'd like to try to achieve that there, whether you decide to adhere to WP:Assume Good Faith about the other parties in this potential case or not. Carrite (talk) 20:21, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

@Beyond My Ken. There IS a consensus to be had at ANI, but somebody hatted things this morning because the process stopped there waiting to ArbCom to accept or defer taking this case at this time. It would be nice if someone would put another sort of hat on that that keeps the thread active without clogging up the works at ANI. This is potentially a huge, lengthy, nasty, stupid case here or a fairly quick and painless process there — probably with similar outcomes either venue. Carrite (talk) 18:01, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

@ArbCom. The speed of this decision is creating problems. Please turn this down rapidly without bias against future reopening so ANI can work. There is a potential consensus there. Carrite (talk) 18:01, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

@Beyond My Ken. The "problem" is that ArbCom taking multiple days to make a call on whether or not to take this case has undercut the process at AN/I. Carrite (talk) 23:20, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Carnildo

Community-based efforts to resolve this have been uniformly unsuccessful in getting RAN to care about copyright. I've only been involved with the image-upload side of things, and that mostly indirectly, through the efforts of my bots:

The first time one of my bots gave him a notice about an image copyright problem was March 9, 2006; the most recent was December 21, 2012. In between he has accumulated over a hundred bot warnings about image uploads, FairuseBot has given him ten warnings about fair-use policy compliance, and OrphanBot has given him a dozen notices about missing fair-use rationales (RAN's uploads were one of the reasons I added the since-discontinued rationale check). On March 14, 2006, I was asked to do a special run of OrphanBot to remove all of RAN's uploads from articles on the grounds that most of them were copyright violations; I'd estimate that over half of them were subsequently deleted.

The community can discuss this issue just fine, but resolving it is a different matter. --Carnildo (talk) 04:01, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by User:Richard Arthur Norton (1958- )

I apologize for making errors, and work to correct them as quickly as possible. Last year I was working on Wikipedia four hours a day and became one of the top 100 contributors, now I may contribute about 15 minutes a month. I would love it if every non-Wikipedia image online came with standard copyright notice built in. Copyrights are complex, if they were easy we would just have a script written to determine copyright status and what constitutes fair use and we could automatically import images, just like Google now does for their sidebar biographies. Google has been trying to settle the fair use vs copyright vs orphaned work for over 5 years with Google Books and still has not been able to find a universal agreement to the issue. People that should be experts on copyright make mistakes too: The New York Times still incorrectly puts a new copyright notice on all the PDF files of articles published before 1922 that are in the public domain. Other editors here at Wikipedia are not always correct when they delete something that I upload, after all we are not all-knowing, just people trying to create a good encyclopedia, and all doing the best we can. Here at Wikipedia:Possibly_unfree_files/2013_January_31 we have my upload deleted of Amy Sherwin. The public domain status was rejected, then the fair use rational was rejected because there are images of her already on Commons. What image is on Commons as public domain? This very image that was rejected as not being public domain. Should I have checked Commons first? Yes. Should the person who argued that it was not in the public domain have recognized that the same image was listed as public domain and already stored on Commons? Yes. Do we both have the same goal: to make a world-class encyclopedia, that will preserve information and allow obscure, but notable people to remembered by history? Can every editor come to the same conclusion that an image is allowed by fair-use vs in-the-public-domain vs under-copyright? No, just look at any page of the daily list of images up for deletion. If it were easy, 100% of editors would agree, 100% of the time. At one point in Wikipedia we deleted every fair use image of a living person. At another point we decided that every fair use image from a new agency was not allowed. One day it was fair use, the next day it wasn't.

Statement by Beyond My Ken

Just in case the committee was not aware: The current AN/I discussion reached an impasse and has been hatted on the basis of the matter having been brought here. The prevailing community sentiment had been a topic ban for RAN, but it appears that that editor is incapable of editing within the ban, and, perhaps, does not understand the limits of the ban, or disagrees with it to the extent that he will continue to test its boundaries. Because he is otherwise a valued content contributor, the community appears to be split between those who wish the topic ban to be enforced, and those willing to allow RAN such a degree of freedom that the topic ban becomes, in effect, unenforceable and moot. In such a situation, it requires a "court of last resort" to examine the situation and either re-affirm the community's decision, or alter or remove it. It is not beneficial to the community to have a community sanction which admins are unwilling to enforce, which is much less likely to be that case with an ArbCom-based decision. For these reasons, primarily because the admin corps appears to be unwilling to enforce the community's decision, I believe that the committee should take this case. Beyond My Ken (talk) 15:27, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

@Hobit: Indeed, there were editors in the AN/I discussion that were opposed to a block on the basis that the situation was stale, but others - I'm thinking of Carrite, for instance - appeared to be opposed to the topic ban as it stands, and numerous other editors wished to expand it in one way or another. That fracturing was one of the factors that prevented any decision from being reached - that is to say, no admin was willing to take action based on that discussion, and it seems likely that such a division would be the outcome again if another discussion were held today. Considering that the community did agree at one point on a topic ban, the current state of affairs seems untenable, which requires ArbCom to step in, at least in my opinion. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:08, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

@Carrite: I do not share your confidence that there is a consensus waiting to happen at AN/I. I also do not understand what "problems" the committee's deliberative speed could be causing. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:05, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

@Carrite: I see no reason that a community discussion can't be started up again if the Committee doesn't take the case, so there's no particular reason for them to rush. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:23, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Hobit

A few quick points:

• I do think we may be stuck here. RAN had a lot of problems in the past and has occasionally (over a more than one year period) violated his topic ban. Some would prefer to be done with him, others would like to move forward with some type of oversight from a reasonable and uninvolved admin (I've suggested BOZ who is at least willing to consider it). If Arbcom doesn't get involved, it is likely we'll just have this topic ban (which effectively keep RAN away from doing anything he's interested in at Wikipedia) continue indefinitely.
• Beyond My Ken, I think, misses the issue with the block discussion at ANI. The only real argument for not blocking RAN is was that the violation of the topic ban was weeks ago and so the block at this point would be hard to justify (some made good arguments each way on that, including me). I've very little doubt that if RAN were to create another article in the next couple of months he'd be blocked in a heartbeat (as he should be). This isn't a problem with the admin corps being unwilling to enforce the community's ban, it's with the block being so cold that it is highly questionable at this point.

I fully understand everyone's frustration with RAN. But I think he's not done anything in the last year that would cause a ban/block or whatever for anyone not under sanctions. That's a fairly good record. Of course, he is under sanctions (and at least initially for good reasons). The community isn't going to be able to resolve this (unless RAN does something clearly ban-able) I don't think. It would be nice if the committee could provide a way forward (binding mentorship would be my choice)

I do worry that RAN will continue to do things that will get him blocked then banned. But I'd like him to get that chance. Hobit (talk) 20:40, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

@Beyond My Ken: I think you are a bit pessimistic. Looking at that discussion, I think 80% would agree to the block were it not cold--that would make it a pretty black-and-white thing. There has never been a problem with blocking RAN in the past. Hobit (talk) 02:06, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

• Roger Davies' vote takes the tally to a net four to accept, and starts the 24 hour minimum clock to opening a case. --Alexandr Dmitri (talk) 20:25, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ): Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter <5/0/0/4>

Vote key: (Accept/decline/recuse/other)

• Is there a reason why the community cannot discus this? I see the copyvios, and I see the history of problems with this user, but I don't see a recent discussion by the community which failed to reach a decision. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 15:53, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
• I'm leaning towards rejecting the appeal, on the basis that there still appear to be good-faith efforts as a community-based resolution on ANI and an arb case would be too hasty. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 18:40, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
• Awaiting stateement from Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ), but, like David above, not thinking this is ripe for arbitration at this moment. Courcelles 02:11, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

• Accept The long-term issues here mean that this is something the Committee should look into. Courcelles 19:37, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

• Also awaiting a statement from Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ), but I am aware that this has been a longterm, serial issue that the community has attempted to address in several ways. Its repeated recurrence is very concerning. Leaning toward acceptance. Risker (talk) 02:24, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
• I agree with Risker that the repeated return of that issue at various noticeboards is concerning; I am leaning towards acceptance as well, but would prefer to see a statement from RAN before I make my mind. — Coren ^(talk) 14:47, 3 February 2013 (UTC)
• Accept. This has certainly been a long-term problem, and one which the community has attempted to resolve through multiple discussions, CCI's, and a topic ban. Despite this, it appears as though concerns continue to surface. In reading RAN's statement, I cannot help but get the impression that he seriously misunderstands key parts of our copyright policies. What this case should determine is if that is in fact the case, and if so, if it's due to a genuine misunderstanding or some sort of willful refusal to understand, and how best to resolve the issue whatever the cause. This sort of deliberative investigation is something the community is largely unable to accomplish at high-speed venues such as ANI, and past attempts to do so at CCI have evidently proved to be ineffective since we're discussing this a few years later. Hopefully a case, while lengthly, will provide the full body of evidence necessary to put these concerns to rest for good. Hersfold non-admin^(t/a/c) 18:03, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
• Accept per Hersfold. Carcharoth (talk) 00:15, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
• Accept, also per Hersfold.  Roger Davies ^talk 19:31, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
• Accept. T. Canens (talk) 20:23, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Sexology

Initiated by — Mark Arsten (talk) at 03:12, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Mark Arsten (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), filing party
• Jokestress (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• James Cantor (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Flyer22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• WLU (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Herostratus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• KimvdLinde (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Sceptre (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Legitimus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• Jokestress
• James Cantor
• WLU
• Flyer22
• Herostratus
• KimvdLinde
• Legitimus

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• Requests for arbitration: James Cantor at The Man Who Would Be Queen and related pages
• Talk:Hebephilia
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/HebephiliaIncident
  • Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-06-01 Lynn Conway (background information)

• Attempts to resolve issues including both Jokestress and Cantor

• ANI Please ban Jokestress from editing the article about Simon LeVay
• ANI COI edits by user:Jokestress putting WP at potential legal risk
• ANI BATTLEGROUND, WP:COI behavior
• NPOVN Users editing my biography during disputes

• Attempts to resolve issues with Jokestress (unrelated to Cantor)

• Requests for medication/Rejected/40#Homosexual transsexual
• Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-11-25
• ANI Jokestress re homosexual transsexual etc.
• ANI User:WhatamIdoing
• ANI Crusade
• ANI Andrea James
• COIN Jokestress
• COIN Homosexual transsexual
• RSN Guidance on pseudodymous authors
• ANI The faith and constructiveness of an editors edits in one subject are: Jokestress re homosexual transsexual etc.

Statement by Mark Arsten

This dispute largely revolves around our articles on paraphilias, particularly those that relate to transgenderism. James Cantor (talk · contribs) and Jokestress (talk · contribs) have been actively editing this area for some time, and they have often come into conflict with each other. Each has faced charges of POV pushing in our sexology articles. They each contend that the other is promoting biased information about scientists and unscientific information about sexology. They have been in conflict on many articles' talk pages and in Afds. Examples include here, here, here, and here. Both editors are open about their identities (James Cantor and Andrea James), and they have each been involved in high-profile off-wiki controversies in the field of sexology.

This case request was sparked by a dispute in our article on hebephilia. It led to an ANI thread, visible here. My involvement with this began when I closed an Afd in which they debated each other. I was concerned with the intensity of the interactions between them, and when I saw an ANI thread, I got involved and opined in favor of an interaction ban. During the course of the discussion, I became very concerned about Jokestress' use of Wikipedia to attack researchers she disagrees with. Recent examples are here and here. Several commentators who participated in the thread felt that Cantor was giving undue weight to his own work and the work of his colleges in several of our articles. He claims that this criticism is political in nature. While some felt that Jokestress was countering Cantor's bias, others saw her edits as POV pushing.

These claims are difficult to verify without understanding of an obscure subject area. There was fairly strong support at ANI for an interaction ban between Cantor and Jokestress, and most people who participated agreed that either James Cantor or Jokestress (or both) should be topic banned from paraphilias or sexology, but there was no consensus reached about the proposed bans. Subsequently, a number of the participants agreed that this could only be solved through arbitration--and I agree with them. At this point, I think it is safe to say that it is nearly impossible to improve articles on paraphilias due to the intensity of the dispute, so I ask the Arbitration committee to accept this request. I've included Flyer22, WLU, Herostratus, and KimvdLinde as parties because they were all involved in the dispute on the talk page of Hebephilia and in the ANI thread.

Edit: Added Legitimus (talk · contribs) per request on my talk page.

I admit I screwed up the name when I filed this. It does have a much broader scope than Hebephilia.

Statement by Sceptre

I'm adding myself as an involved party due to my involvement in the ANI thread, but I think this is the meaty case that ArbCom was designed for. As I've said on several times over the past week, there are many facets of this dispute, including questions about importing a (now-ten-year-long) dispute onto the encyclopedia, the promotion of fringe theories on-and-off-wiki, professional conduct on-and-off-wiki, when expert editing becomes COI-editing (and vice-versa, when outsider editing may compromise neutrality), and even encyclopedic treatment of a maligned minority, especially when said maligning comes from otherwise reliable sources. Of course, the committee's remit is limited, but I still think it's in everyone's interest for it to be taken up here rather than at AN/I where battle lines seem to be pre-drawn. Sceptre ^(talk) 03:23, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I echo Thryduulf to a point regarding naming, but I think "paraphilias" is a little too restricted to the dispute. There are issues with gender identity disorders (i.e. alternative taxonomy and typology of transgenderism) as well as sexual identity disorders (i.e. paraphilias) in the dispute. Sceptre ^(talk) 05:01, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Re: Hans Adler: I don't think it's wise or helpful to this dispute to obliquely compare the actions of Jokestress to the actions of pedophiles. The NYT article, and indeed the Dreger paper, only really tell Bailey's side of the story in the off-wiki dispute. While, were I in her place, I would not have taken some of the actions that she did, it is important to actually properly know the context of what she did before jumping to such a conclusion. Sceptre ^(talk) 14:54, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by KimvdLinde

Due to my work, I have easy access to many scientific articles, while my professional background provides me with an above average understanding of the literature and research methods. I am not sure when I came first in contact with James Cantor, but after the first encounter, I stated checking contributions of him to Wikipedia and quickly learned that it would be best if all of his edits would be checked by a competent expert in the field, because it became my impression that many of those edits are biased. Those edits are not in the category of obviously wrong, but in a more general category of the form of clever wording that will pass by the average reader and thus the average Wikipedia editor for that matter. I will provide one example here. Penile plethysmograph is a tool used to determine what stimuli arouses people, and is used as a measure that is independent of self-reports. The key in this kind of studies is effects that can be observed at the individual level versus effects that can be observed at the group level. In May 2008, James Cantor, editing as Marion The Librarian, inserted this claim: It has been shown to distinguish pedophilic men from nonpedophilic men. To a lay person, this reads as that you can take an individual, measure his response to pedophilic porno, and with certainty determine whether this person is a pedophile or not. This is not consistent with the results presented in the sources, which shows that you can assign a majority can be assigned to the proper category. This is a statement about a group, but also implies that not all of the individuals could be assigned to the proper group. In fact, the sensitivity to distinguish between pedophiles and non-pedophiles was between 29% and 62% depending on the specific subgroup. So, in September 2010, about 2.5 years after the misrepresentation was inserted, I changed the wording to reflect that [5]. A scholar like James knows this difference. The fact that he added it as if it was a guaranteed distinction, instead of a 'they observed a measurable difference between groups', is an obvious indication of biased editing. I assume it does not come as a surprise that two of the three articles that were cited to support the misrepresented claim came from his own institute.

Since that first discovery, I have kind of kept a eye on his editing, because I think in due time, it will be a hell of a story to tell about how a single editor could slip in so many edits that are massaging the truth. It becomes even more interesting to see how too many editors will accept too easy what he writes as true, and even help consolidating it. Depending on the outcome, this ArbCom case could easily be the next chapter in that saga, because dispute resolution at Wikipedia is unfortunately limited to behavioral issues, and the ArbCom unfortunately at times has to leave the content issues in place or becasue of its narrow scope even will allow those to continue to be added. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 04:18, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf (re sexology)

I've become involved with this only since it hit AN/I. After reading the initial evidence there and in linked discussions my view was that this wasn't ripe for Arbcom (yet) and that we (the community) should at least try to solve it first. I proposed a topic ban for Jokestress and mutual interaction bans between her and James Cantor [6]. This proposal gained widespread but not consensus support. I didn't and still don't think this would be a final solution, merely removing the most disruptive elements so that the finer problems could be dealt with.

By yesterday evening my view had evolved somewhat, and I posted my dinosaur and dogs analogy, [7]. Mark Asten is following the implicit recommendation of the most recent commenters in choosing the latter option I gave there.

I think the community could solve this still but it would be a long, multi-stage process of progressively sorting out each layer before moving on to the next. The feeling I've been increasingly getting from AN/I is that the community doesn't have the patience to do this, nor faith in it's ability to see it through without needing arbcom down the line, so I would recommend accepting the case.

I see four strands that need looking at:

• COI issues regarding several editors, most notably Jokestress and James Cantor.
• Behaviour around the content dispute - arbcom needs to examine what barriers are preventing the community solving it.
• Interaction between editors, including Jokestress-James Cantor
• Allegations made at AN/I regarding Jokestress' chilling effects on other editors' willingness to participate (WP:OUTING). Thryduulf (talk) 04:34, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

re SilkTork: If you just issue motions like the remedies proposed at AN/I then the actual problem probably won't get solved. My intention in proposing them was not to just to create breathing room to identify the deeper problems and remedies - anticipating that might require arbcom. Given we're here now I don't see benefit in the two stage process and another formal request later.

I see interaction between Jokestress and James Cantor, and Jokestress' contributions and behaviour to the topic area aa a net negative. Questions that need answering are:

• Is James Cantor editing according to the COI guidelines?
• Is his interaction with others problematic?
• Does Jokestress' behaviour warrant a ban (permanent or temporary)? If not permanently banned, what restrictions should apply?
• Are there other problematic users? There's more than just two people involved here.

The topic and interaction bans would work better as temporary injunctions. Thryduulf (talk) 18:45, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

re Kim: You may have a point re James Cantor (although I'm not sure he's quite as bad as you paint him), but I can't Jokestress as anything other than a problem. Thryduulf (talk) 16:57, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Skinwalker

This is an extension of a dispute that has been festering in the "real world" for many years. This dispute has at times included serious allegations of harassment by aggrieved parties. This article gives some background. Skinwalker (talk) 10:50, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by MrADHD

I have only had very recent exposure to this dispute and these individuals. I read in late December 2012 an article on Psychology Today site about the proposed novel diagnosis of hebephilia being rejected by the American Psychiatric Association - a group of psychologists, James Cantor I believe included were among those involved in trying to get it added to the DSM-5 diagnostic codes. Our hebephilia article did not have any mention of hebephilia failing to gain a foothold in the DSM-V so I added some content which James Cantor quickly removed.[8] Whether his revert was justified is debatable but I was struck by how he claimed BLP issues when there were none seemingly to get around COI editing restrictions. I tried to resolve the issue on the talk page with James Cantor with limited success.[9] James Cantor then edited in descriptive terms on his professional opponents which reduced the credibility of their views such as labeling them in article text as 'kink advocate' and 'defense psychologist'.[10] I then became aware of hostile interactions from user Jokestress, primarily focused on James Cantor - I learnt later that there has been a long running dispute where a colleague of James Cantor apparently used pictures of trans-sexual children as objects of sexual ridicule during a controversial sexology conference - Jokestress then took from a website pictures of the researcher's children in retaliation and put terrible sexual comments about them 'to prove a point'. Of course this is totally unacceptable off-wiki conduct and two severe wrongs don't make a right. From this drama it appears User:James Cantor created a deception account called User:MarionTheLibrarian where he would edit articles relating to Jokestress (real name Andrea James) as well as other COI topics. At some point Jokestress realised that MarionTheLibrarian was in fact James Cantor (a well known sexologist) 'undercover' and then from what I can tell a full scale conflict broke out here on wikipedia (a conflict that had been raging off-wiki for some time). James Cantor tends to conduct this dispute using stealth civil battle tactics whereas Jokestress tends to use overt battle tactics - attacking everyone who is perceived to be allied to James Cantor. James Cantor seems to civily use half-truths in his battle with Jokestress - for example correctly pointing out the wholy unacceptable misuse of pictures of his colleague's children by Jokestress,[11] but then failing to say to wikipedia editors that his colleague started this by initially misusing pictures of children as objects of sexual ridicule.[12] Due to lashing out at numerous people (e.g. the respected NPOV editor WLU), Jokestress seems to be causing the most problems at this moment in time but given the complex lengthy background I don't think it is possible for the community to resolve. Really the conduct of both of these people is shocking; also these two individuals are also high profile people, each having their own wikipedia pages which makes this all the more stunning.--MrADHD | T@1k? 12:05, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

• NOTE: Arbitrators may want to note that apparently Jokestress will not be available until the 5th of February to add her thoughts.--MrADHD | T@1k? 12:32, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
• Shortened my statement as requested.--MrADHD | T@1k? 23:22, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Legitimus

I would say all of these other users summed it up nicely and between all of them you probably get the picture. As for my take on things, I admit I do tend to side with James Cantor most of the time. I have no off-wiki association with him or any of his colleagues, nor do I necessarily agree with all his group's published works. But when the chips are down, he is both a qualified professional and one of very few scientists involved in this dispute to have done actual primary research. A great deal of the professional works being stacked against his group's work are little more than editorializing. Some of these individuals, such as Franklin, appear to have personal stakes in discrediting this research, given her history of defending criminals for money. As for me, I don't care one way or the other if hebephilia is a mental disorder, so long as it's acknowledged that there are people out there who specifically target this population for victimization.

As for Jokestress, yes she seems very bright and writes very nicely, but she is not a professional in any kind of mental health discipline and has far less defensible biases. We previously interacted on the pedophilia article, and her remarks in these sections [13] [14] [15] gave me a very uneasy feeling. Read them for yourself and make your own judgment; for what it's worth, I've heard most of them before. But sometimes it's not so much the biases as it's how she goes about expressing them. The shear ferocity and incivility I've witnessed makes me want to keep my interaction with her to a minimum, even if it means staying away from articles she set's her crosshairs on. During the discussion about hebephilia, she accused myself and others of hiding behind anonymous usernames and made several actions that appeared to be attempts to "out" us.

This included trying to send me e-mails, or at least claiming she did[16] which I don't doubt was some kind of ploy to bait me into replying, thus revealing my personal e-mail address to her. Her large volume of experience with wikipedia also means she knows how to use the system to her advantage, like any skilled lawyer knows how to use the courts. That kind of behavior right there freaks me out, and makes me not want to ever post anywhere she's part of the thread. I can confidently say Cantor has never insulted me nor has ever made me fearful that he would take action against me if I disagreed with him.Legitimus (talk) 20:59, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by James Cantor

I very much endorse Mark Arsten’s summary.

In 2003, Andrea James began a campaign of harassment against J. Michael Bailey, anyone she thought associated with him, and anyone who ever spoke positively about him, including multiple other activists and figures in the trans community.[17] Her off-wiki attacks became so notable as to be reported by the NYTimes [18]. Since 2003, she has created off-wiki attack sites against them,[19] joined WP, and although a widely productive editor in general, began manipulating sexology pages to reflect her POV. (Indeed, the NYTimes mentions the WP conflict, already that notable, a year before I ever made any WP edit). Although I had the greatest access to RSs by which to reveal the POV pushing, Jokestress' bullying of any editor not agreeing with her particular brand of politics has made it impossible for anyone (even other openly trans wikipedians who do not share Jokestress' view) to edit Sexology pages, including pages I have never edited at all.

Following extended conversation at AN/I, interested and uninvolved editors recommended (in addition to an interaction ban) a topic ban for Jokestress (16), Cantor (2), or both (2).[20] (I appreciate discussion is not voting, but at least one other editor found this list a helpful guideline.) As discussion continued, however, some felt that no meaningful ruling could be made/enforced by a single admin, and the present request was filed by one of the uninvolved editors.

PLEASE NOTE: I expect to be away Feb 21-Mar 3, as well as scattered periods in March/April. I am happy to list them, if appropriate.

— James Cantor (talk) 16:06, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I appreciate that this is not the time/place to contest claims made by other parties, but MrADHD's accusation is incorrect, as fact-checking shows: I started on WP in May 2008, using a regular (anonymous) account for two months[21], then began editing under my own name in July 2008[22], immediately linked the accounts[23]), and never made any "stealth" edit in the >4 years since.[24][25] As I say, this is not the time/place for such a discussion, and I am happy to revert this if appropriate, but I did not think the reversal of the timeline should be left untagged either.

— James Cantor (talk) 18:52, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Re Hans Adler's observation: Both the NYTimes article author and the peer reviewed article author asked for interviews, and both were turned down. The author of the peer reviewed article is explicit about this in her article, and the subject of the NYTimes article explicitly discusses turning down the reporter here. — James Cantor (talk) 15:38, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by WLU

I think that both James Cantor and Jokestress are problematic on sex and gender-related pages. However, James Cantor is a recognized expert who has acknowledged his COI regarding sources and agreed not to edit (I have acted as an intermediary on some articles, reviewing sources and incorporating as appropriate, turning down when not). Jokestress is an experienced editor who also has a COI (being a male-to-female transsexual and having a history of activism that is both aggressive and unpalatable; Skinwalker linked a NYT article above, I would urge the arbitrators to read this far more detailed and lengthy article). However, she edits and tags articles quite freely with no apparent appreciation for how her POV and dislike of CAMH staff may bias her contributions. In addition, some of her actions on-wiki such as this one and this one show a troubling concern with real-life identities - troubling because of her real-life activism and the effects it had on J. Michael Bailey. Anyone aware of that history may find such efforts to determine, or allude to real-life identifies having a chilling effect - a concern I and Herostratus agree on. Jokestress also seems to not assume good faith of other editors, or at least not me; note the discussion here where an inarguably minor edit pointing to an inarguably reliable source resulted in a lengthy BLPN and accusations I made these minor and unproblematic changes out of spite. But perhaps I'm tilting at windmills.

An interaction ban and a modified topic ban would seem to address this (Jokestress being restricted from editing sex and gender articles, James Cantor restricted to editing only talk pages of the same articles) but that's a decision for the arbitrators. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 23:45, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

In response to Jokestress' statements (in green):

• My editing on sexology, taken as a whole, has significantly improved our coverage.

This is unproblematic only if Jokestress' own contributions are neutral, there is the possibility that her editing has introduced a systemic bias that needs to be corrected. The idea that one's own contributions are unproblematic is a common one amongst those with a strong POV.

• With few exceptions, every edit by User:James Cantor aka User:MarionTheLibrarian aka User:WriteMakesRight promotes himself and his friends or denigrates their critics. He’s a single-purpose account and activist minority in his field abusing “expert retention” for self-promotion, the worst I’ve seen in my nearly nine years and 49,000+ edits.

James Cantor has voluntarily limited his contributions on numerous pages to talk page discussions or vandalism reverts. A topic ban/talk page restriction would ensure this continues. SPA are only problematic if they consistently push a single POV without evidence of learning or responding to criticism. Whether he is a POV-pusher or someone correcting a systematic bias depends strongly on his ability to verify text with reliable sources; if he can consistently provide recent, reliable, secondary sources to support his POV, that certainly suggests his POV has definite value. An assertion by any editor is far less valuable than a source.

• James Cantor’s alliance of sympathetic proxies effectively owns articles in Sexology. They manufacture “consensus” that misrepresents or suppresses much reliable and verifiable published work. It’s like chess: James Cantor is a powerful Queen with a number of Rooks, Knights, Bishops, and Pawns in play (several lost to blocks, bans, and attrition). On Wikipedia, systemic bias renders me a less-powerful Bishop, and I’ve not prevailed in most content disputes. If they get me topic-banned, they win, so they continue seeking first-move advantages.

This is among the more problematic statements made. The implication is that these "sympathetic proxies" are too biased to edit neutrally while relying on reliable sources. The example that started all this, hebephilia, is very far from a pro-CAMH/James Cantor sympathy piece, it contains considerable, possibly excessive criticism. I am not James Cantor's pawn and I resent the bad faith implication that I will do whatever he tells me.

• I endure sustained personal attacks by editors with strong emotional responses to Sexology, particularly the volatile intersection of human sexuality and legal consent such as paraphilias. As a prominent trans woman, I expect attacks on me and my work off-wiki. I should not have to endure them here.

Complete agreement with one caveat - pointing out that "being a transwoman may systematically bias your viewpoint" is not a personal attack and it is a point that should be recognized. It is a conflict of interest, and like all COIs it means contributions should be scrutinized, not discarded. This applies equally to James Cantor and Jokestress.

• Anonymous editing of Sexology topics leads to bad behavior and undisclosed conflicts of interest. One of my “crimes” was asking Legitimus to clarify his COI after he defamed Karen Franklin. She is among the majority of medical and legal experts opposed to the concept of “hebephilia” championed by James Cantor. Cantor and Legitimus have focused their attacks here on Franklin.

The anonymity of the contributor matters less than the quality of their sources and the fidelity with which they are summarized. As above, COI means scrutiny, not necessarily restriction. Given Andrea James/Jokestress' previous history of real-world activism to silence and chill academic debate, I think I am well-served by maintaining my anonymity. Jokestress' ongoing concerns over real-life identities concerns me and I would prefer it stop. Edits are problematic, people are not.

• Psychology and sexology are often misused as agents of social control. Wikipedia’s systemic bias overemphasizes medicalization and pathologization of human sexuality. Several fields of inquiry examine sexuality, including law, feminism, philosophy of science, etc. Work in these fields routinely gets downplayed or suppressed at Sexology topics in favor of anything that appears “scientific.”

Wikipedia is not a soapbox, a place for advocacy, or a place to right great wrongs. It is also not censored. In particular, it is not censored according to what Jokestress believes is an approprate way to describe transexual people. Wikipedia is based on the sum total and weight of reliable sources, and if those sources medicalize and pathologize transexualism then that is where we give due weight. But we also give due weight to minority opinions. It always, always, always comes back to what can be found in reliable sources - not editor opinion. James Cantor and the CAMH's views appear in peer-reviewed journals and books, highly reliable sources. Whether minority or majority, there is a place for these viewpoints, just as there is a place for criticisms of these viewpoints.

• I believe this case, if accepted, can provide guidance on:

1. Systemic bias within Sexology topics.
2. Expert retention vs. COI.
3. Reification of spurious or pseudoscientific concepts.
4. Creation of off-wiki content in order to include it here.

Point 1 requires sources to address under-represented viewpoints, not Jokestress approval. Regarding point 2, James Cantor is an expert as is evident from his many publications in scholarly journals, and he should be retained rather than driven off. Point 3 again requires reliable sources, not Jokestress' approval, and the CAMH/James Cantor's opinions do not fall into the category of pseudoscience per our guidelines on fringe theories. If a theory is pseudoscience, Jokestress' mere opinion is insufficient, she must supply sources to verify. Regarding point 4, Jokestress creating content off-wiki specifically for wikipedia would be an extremely troubling issue, particularly given that she is an advocate and activist, not an expert. Any such content, if used at all, would have to be attributed to "Andrea James, transwoman and activist", and there is a host of accompanying caveats that probably should be involved.

Most of Jokestress' points are troubling to me and seem to reveal part of the problem - Jokestress believes she has The Truth and should be permitted to determine content on the basis of that truth. I disagree. I believe that article content should be verified by what can be found in reliable sources in accordance with their prominence in the relevant expert community (as well as newspapers, grey literature and nonscholarly books when appropriate). Both Jokestress and James Cantor can point to reliable sources that can be reviewed for inclusion, but they can not and should not be the gatekeepers for what should be included. WLU (t) (c) Wikipedia's rules:^simple/_complex 20:35, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Hans Adler

Based on the New York Times article and the peer-reviewed paper on one of the involved editors, in connection with some of the diffs above, I think one aspect of this case is too big to be handled by Arbcom.

There exists an entire class of people, related to the topic of this case by mere accident, who are not allowed to edit due to the risks both to editors and to Wikipedia's reputation. This person should be treated similarly. By the operators of this site rather than a bunch of users who were elected by other users but can only relieve the Wikimedia Foundation of its legal duties up to a point. In this case, the right thing to do is to notify the Foundation in a way which they have to take seriously, and to make its legal department take responsibility. No volunteer should have to deal with such a person, and that includes the members of Arbcom. Hans Adler 12:54, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Re to Sceptre: P-s are the only precedent I know that the Wikimedia Foundation as site operators, as opposed to the community, has banned anyone. I am clarifying because an editor contacted me, apparently under the false impression that I am attacking AJ as a proxy for all transgender people. (You have chosen to say that word. I intentionally did not do that. Transgender people have it hard enough even without such associations.)

The New York Times and the peer-reviewed paper in a Springer journal got not statements from the other side but appear balanced anyway. This creates a very strong presumption that AJ's side knows that its position is not defensible. Also, I am assuming that any quality sources refuting the main accusation – targeting an opponent's children, a clear indicator of dangerous mental instability or serious criminal energy – would have been brought up by now.

You know as well as I do that the New York Times or a peer-reviewed paper would be more than sufficient for a BLP claim. Here we have both, and we are not even talking about article space. (Of course the biography already mentions the issue, with the restraint appropriate for the genre.) I merely proposed an office action to ban an individual who other editors have every reason to perceive as a serious threat to their and their family's personal safety. Hans Adler 15:12, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

Re to Beyond My Ken: The operators of this website have certain legal obligations which they can't just forward to volunteers. If someone gets hurt, the WMF will be in trouble. Hans Adler 17:38, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by little green rosetta

As an activist, it is no surprise that Jokestress/James is outspoken against her philosophical opponents off-wiki. It should also be no surprise that sometimes activists take aggressive action, as such as James has been alleged to have committed. Several editors have mentioned the NYT article in connection with James. To be fair, James feels this action is sauce for the goose. As I am uninvolved with this outside of ANI, I am unfamiliar with other off-site action by James, but I've been lead to believe they do exist. Several editors have also expressed concerns that Jokestress has attempted to ferret out their real life identities. The natural conclusion is that they are concerned about real-life repercussions because James has demonstrated that she is perfectly capable of taking action. This clearly contributes to a "chilling effect" as described by Thryduulf. The question for the community (and now Arbcom) is do those actions prejudice her from editing in this topic area because of this possible effect which is not conducive to a collegial atmosphere?

Cantor clearly has a COI, of which he has openly acknowledged. He has made what appears to be a good faith effort to be transparent, as demonstrated by the pledge on his user page, and his many reasonably sounding explanations. Some editors appear to question his sincerity insofar to accuse of him of being a civil POV pusher. I've not the experience to sift through the evidence to ascertain whether Cantor's behavior is problematic with respect to this COI/POV, but I hope Arbcom investigates this in able to make a determination because the community has clearly been unable too.

Statement by EdJohnston

I'm uninvolved in this dispute. This is a reply to SilkTork's idea that the case might be disposed of by motion. Since by now there is a huge documentary record, this might work. My suggestion is that the arbitrators could agree to focus on four previous discussions as evidence:

• Requests for arbitration:James Cantor at The Man Who Would Be Queen and related pages
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/HebephiliaIncident
• Talk:Hebephilia
• Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-06-01 Lynn Conway

Let's assume that the arbitrators could agree to such a limitation on evidence. Then in terms of remedies, they could see if it could be narrowed to four options:

1. No action
2. Sanction on Jokestress
3. Sanction on James Cantor
4. Both

If these options exhaust the realistic possibilities for near-term action, then the pain of a full case might be avoided. A motion might be considered instead. It is disappointing to have a long case which consumes a lot of resources and annoys most of the participants, but produces a result that could easily have been foreseen given what was known at the time of the original RFAR. EdJohnston (talk) 19:24, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Flyer22

Like others, I recognize the issues with James Cantor's editing. I also acknowledge that I am not the most neutral person to comment about Jokestress. The problems between the two of us, which also made her a problem for some others, started with the creation and deletion of the Adult sexual interest in children article. She wanted an article that covers all adult sexual interest in children, including non-pedophilic interest (such as child sexual abusers who are not pedophiles; yes, those exist, which the Pedophilia and Child sexual abuse articles already address); to this end, she also wanted the article to cover what she considers normal adult sexual interest in children (prepubescents and non-prepubescents). When she did not get her way with that article, she tried to turn the Pedophilia article into that article, disregarding WP:MEDRS, WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE. Refer to this discussion where we talk about it again. In that discussion, which she repeats her POV of "normal adult sexual interest in prepubescent children," I also mentioned how, when we get pro-pedophilia editors and/or editors who advocate adult-child sexual relationships (with prepubescent children or with any minor under the age of consent), she sometimes supports them, such as User:Cataconia, and that "[a]ll [she does] with regard to [that] article is stalk out its talk page and take the time to violate WP:TALK to complain about the editors [she] disagrees with, especially if [she sees] a chance to criticize James Cantor, any time [she sees] fit, all while trying to make [her] complaints relevant to whatever topic [she is] responding to." Here are diff-links showing that behavior, including support of Cataconia:[26][27][28]. I mentioned that she should have been banned from that talk page a long time ago or should have banned herself from it because her posts there are unproductive and continuously combative. I noted that Wikipedia is not a battleground and that her taunting, combative rants and/or spiels do not belong there. The kinds of views Jokestress accuses us of constantly shutting down at the Pedophilia article and related articles are expressed by the WP:CHILD PROTECT policy.

I and others stress that Jokestress has a clear non-medicalization POV, in which, for example, she treats all paraphilias as a normal variation of human sexuality. She has made plenty of comments about rejecting medicalization of sexuality, often times acting inappropriately toward James Cantor while she's at it; see, for example, her comments in this discussion (which has subsections) at the List of paraphilias article. This toxic environment that results when Jokestress interacts with Cantor and/or others she dislike/hates, such as me, needs to stop. Flyer22 (talk) 21:50, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Note: I significantly reduced the size of my above comment, per the 500-word limit (it's within limit, disregarding three of the diff-links and this note). Flyer22 (talk) 22:38, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by George William Herbert

This is a comment and not a statement per se.

I do not believe that this is beyond the realm of what the community could deal with, but aspects of it have been particularly difficult to actually do so. One, the participants have behaved disruptively enough over the totality of the long term view on-wiki to warrant some action, but sufficiently well that any individual incident generally did not rise to immediately actionable. Two, both are "experts" at some level (citeable; psychological professional and activist, respectively), and admins and editors tend to give legitimate experts some leeway. Three, some people are afraid of potential real-world consequences of intervention, though many admins are willing to act anyways. Four, the long term nature and subtle conflict make finding true neutral much harder, with long series of minor incidents muddying the waters for normal admins and noticeboards. Five, it's a particularly touchy area of sex study, which is already touchy on-wiki (and off).

I do not know if we actually need sanctions to come out of this, but we do need some fair determination of where neutral ground is and therefore where admins can safely stand, trying to enforce constructive peaceful interaction going forwards. A RFC could have potentially handled that, but an arbcom case is more likely to be able to frame it in an organized and neutral manner. I support Arbcom taking it up.

Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 23:59, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Herostratus

I think you should accept the case; if you do I'll make an argument for finding a way to encourage Jokestress (an extremely accomplished and valuable editor who has written or started hundreds of articles in many topic areas) to not edit in this one area which is so personally, professionally, and emotionally fraught for her.

Beyond that, I'd recommend that people pay special attention to whatever Legitimus has to say when considering these topics. He's learned, erudite, even-tempered, reasonably affable, and generally in the mainstream but also open-minded. He's a key asset here. Heed him. Herostratus (talk) 14:19, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Beyond My Ken

I write merely to reject the untenable suggestion that because ArbCom is composed of volunteer editors it cannot handle this case, or does not have the authority to do so. The case is essentially about the on-wiki behavior of two editors, which is well within the committee's remit, and there is no reason to think that it needs to be "kicked upstairs" to the Foundation to handle. I urge the committee to take this case. Beyond My Ken (talk) 15:48, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

• @Hans Adler: As far as I can understand, your concern is misplaced, but it's difficult to tell since you're not being specific. What, exactly, are you implying but not saying? What "class of people" do you mean, and what are the "certain legal obligations"? Why are you being mysterious about what you mean? Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:42, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
  • Hans Adler has posted a specific answer on my talk page.[29] My feeling is that it's not ArbCom's job to be concerned about the Foundation's legal liabilities, that's for the WMF legal department, and HA should be addressing his concerns there. If the Foundation wants to tak eover the case, they can say so and do it, but there's no reason for ArbCom not to take it on the basis HA lays out. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:44, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Jokestress

Flyer22’s edits attacking me were oversighted as actionable libel. Same with edits by Legitimus, Herostratus, and WLU. Their goal is obtaining sanctions against me, even a pyrrhic victory involving sanctions against them. For now, I’m ignoring all misstatements above and attempts to paint me as the main problem, a psychopathic criminal (!), etc.

I was first to request ArbCom, though I believe an interaction ban and agreement by all not to edit in Sexology article space should be tried first.

If this is to be our Ragnarök, let’s expand this case to include those who’ve escalated disagreements with me or James Cantor to noticeboards. Those named above are only part of the problem. Rather than collaborating, some editors run to noticeboards and rehash complaints about our off-wiki activity, often from over 10 years ago. Uninvolved editors react to that instead of the current dispute.

If this proceeds, I’ll make this case:

• My editing on sexology, taken as a whole, has significantly improved our coverage.
• With few exceptions, every edit by User:James Cantor aka User:MarionTheLibrarian aka User:WriteMakesRight promotes himself and his friends or denigrates their critics. He’s a single-purpose account and activist minority in his field abusing “expert retention” for self-promotion, the worst I’ve seen in my nearly nine years and 49,000+ edits.
• James Cantor’s alliance of sympathetic proxies effectively owns articles in Sexology. They manufacture “consensus” that misrepresents or suppresses much reliable and verifiable published work. It’s like chess: James Cantor is a powerful Queen with a number of Rooks, Knights, Bishops, and Pawns in play (several lost to blocks, bans, and attrition). On Wikipedia, systemic bias renders me a less-powerful Bishop, and I’ve not prevailed in most content disputes. If they get me topic-banned, they win, so they continue seeking first-move advantages.
• I endure sustained personal attacks by editors with strong emotional responses to Sexology, particularly the volatile intersection of human sexuality and legal consent such as paraphilias. As a prominent trans woman, I expect attacks on me and my work off-wiki. I should not have to endure them here.
• Anonymous editing of Sexology topics leads to bad behavior and undisclosed conflicts of interest. One of my “crimes” was asking Legitimus to clarify his COI after he defamed Karen Franklin. She is among the majority of medical and legal experts opposed to the concept of “hebephilia” championed by James Cantor. Cantor and Legitimus have focused their attacks here on Franklin.
• Psychology and sexology are often misused as agents of social control. Wikipedia’s systemic bias overemphasizes medicalization and pathologization of human sexuality. Several fields of inquiry examine sexuality, including law, feminism, philosophy of science, etc. Work in these fields routinely gets downplayed or suppressed at Sexology topics in favor of anything that appears “scientific.”
• I believe this case, if accepted, can provide guidance on:

• Systemic bias within Sexology topics.
• Expert retention vs. COI.
• Reification of spurious or pseudoscientific concepts.
• Creation of off-wiki content in order to include it here.

I propose holding the case pending consensus on including additional parties. Jokestress (talk) 18:39, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

• I note that this has been accepted by the Committee. Per this diff by Jokestress, the case will probably not open until February 5 at the earliest. - Penwhale | ^{dance in the air and follow his steps} 02:39, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

• @James Cantor: Of course. - Penwhale | ^{dance in the air and follow his steps} 10:04, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

Sexology: Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter <8/0/1/3>

Vote key: (Accept/decline/recuse/other)

• Awaiting more statements. Courcelles 07:09, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

• Accept Courcelles 07:08, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

• I don't think it's especially surprising that the community is having trouble solving the dispute on their own: having two parties in conflict come to Wikipedia to rehash a dispute over the substance behind articles connected to their conflict is something the project has very little defense against (I can remember a few other salient examples of an off-wiki dispute being replayed here that caused widespread disruption for years before they could be controlled).

  I'll wait until the two primary parties give their statement before voting on this case formally, but I'm probably going to accept this case now, before it degenerates into a wider melee. — Coren ^(talk) 13:17, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

  • Accept; it's clear by now that there should be a case to examine whether how the off-wiki dispute has impacted our editing process and what can be done to fix that, but it should obviously be held until Jokestress's return. — Coren ^(talk) 04:05, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
• Waiting for more statements, before making my decision, but, at first glance, there appear to be issues which ArbCom should examine and, for that reason, I am inclined to say we should accept the case. Also, if we end up accepting it, I believe it should be held in abeyance, to allow all parties to fully participate. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 13:35, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
• As above, waiting to hear more statements; and I'd like to look a bit more into what the community have done so far, and the difficulties the community have encountered in finding a solution. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 14:01, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm still thinking about this. People are indicating that interaction bans and topic bans appear to be the solution, but that the community feel that would be unenforceable without ArbCom. Is there enough evidence here for motions? If we can deal with this matter by motion, I would prefer that to a long drawn out case that ends up coming to the same conclusion, but in the meantime creates a lot of drama on and off-Wiki. The content side of matters we can't deal with, but the conduct we can. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 10:51, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Is this case to be about anything more than the conduct of James Cantor and Jokestress? We can't deal with the off-Wiki stuff that people link to, and we can't deal with the content. All we can look at is if the conduct of editors is disrupting the project. We can spend two months arguing over the finer details, and getting some unwanted press attention into the bargain, to end up with a decision to somehow stop the disruption. If we have evidence now that two users are disruptive when they encounter each other, and they are disruptive when editing articles on a certain topic, then we can find the same workable solution today as in a very weary and unpleasant two months time. Is the question here about if these two users are being disruptive, or is the question about how to deal with that disruption? If it is clear they are disruptive, and nobody disputes that, then we don't need a case, we can just go to motions to agree on a solution. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 17:13, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

I think it's worth including Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-06-01 Lynn Conway as background material. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 17:50, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

While it is flattering that people think the Committee can discover hidden truths, or that the members are smarter than the average bear, the reality is that we are just a bunch of fellow Wikipedia users who have been voted in from a very, very small selection of volunteers putting themselves forward. We have no special knowledge or skills above the average Wikipedian. All the Committee can do well is make binding decisions. Sometimes those decisions are good, sometimes they are bad, mostly they are just what could be agreed upon and looked OK at the time. I think it is clear that there is enough disruption occurring between James Cantor and Jokestress that an interaction ban is justified. The editing by both James Cantor and Jokestress of sexology articles draws attention and causes concern. James Cantor has offered for some time and continues to offer a mutual topic ban. This appears fairly straightforward: two users are being disruptive when editing certain articles and when dealing with each other. The community and even one of the two main parties feel that a mutual interaction and topic ban would be appropriate. We can decide that now by motion. So, we try an interaction and topic ban for both of them, apply discretionary sanctions to the topic area, and see if that reduces the disruption. If it doesn't then we can come back and look deeper at other solutions. If it does work, then we can look at appeals to lesson the sanctions, and see how that goes. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 22:19, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

• Accept - however hold opening the case until the return of Jokestress. Risker (talk) 15:03, 30 January 2013 (UTC) Recuse. Risker (talk) 03:14, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
• Accept and hold pending the return of all parties, if that's necessary. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 15:14, 30 January 2013 (UTC)
• Accept with same conditions. NW (Talk) 02:29, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

• @Jokestress: What additional parties do you think should be included? NW (Talk) 18:53, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

• Accept. T. Canens (talk) 03:03, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
  • I would not deal with this by motion. The complexity requires a full case. T. Canens (talk) 22:12, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
• Accept. The off-wiki dimension to this dispute makes me skeptical that this is the sort of thing we should remand to the community. AGK [•] 09:26, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
• Comment - leaning towards acceptance, but would like to hear a statement from Jokestress first. I don't think the situation is so urgent as to require acceptance before such a statement is provided. Certainly if a case is opened, a statement by Jokestress should go on the record along with those made above, and not placed out-of-context somewhere else. Once that happens, we will be in a position to decide how best to handle this. Carcharoth (talk) 01:31, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
  • Accept. Some small delay to consider obvious additions to the list of parties to this case may be needed, but in general the list of those who are parties to a case at the point of acceptance is not fixed or formal. Those who are not parties can still be discussed within a case as long as they are notified and that notification is formally noted within the case. Carcharoth (talk) 20:06, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
• Accept Worm^TT(talk) 11:19, 5 February 2013 (UTC)