Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Michael Hardy/Evidence

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Case clerk: TBD Drafting arbitrator: TBD

Any editor may add evidence to this page, irrespective of whether they are involved in the dispute. You must submit evidence in your own section. Editors who change other users' evidence may be sanctioned; if you have a concern with or objection to another user's evidence, contact the committee by e-mail or on the talk page. The standard limits for all evidence submissions are: 1000 words and 100 diffs for users who are parties to this case; or about 500 words and 50 diffs for other users. Detailed but succinct submissions are more useful to the committee. This page is not designed for the submission of general reflections on the arbitration process, Wikipedia in general, or other irrelevant and broad issues; and if you submit such content to this page, please expect it to be ignored or removed. General discussion of the case may be opened on the talk page. You must focus on the issues that are important to the dispute and submit diffs which illustrate the nature of the dispute or will be useful to the committee in its deliberations.

You must use the prescribed format in your evidence. Evidence should include a link to the actual page diff in question, or to a short page section; links to the page itself are inadequate. Never link to a page history, an editor's contributions, or a log for all actions of an editor (as those change over time), although a link to a log for a specific article or a specific block log is acceptable. Please make sure any page section links are permanent, and read the simple diff and link guide if you are not sure how to create a page diff.

The Arbitration Committee expects you to make rebuttals of other evidence submissions in your own section, and for such rebuttals to explain how or why the evidence in question is incorrect; do not engage in tit-for-tat on this page. Arbitrators may analyze evidence and other assertions at /Workshop, which is open for comment by parties, Arbitrators, and others. After arriving at proposed principles, findings of fact, or remedies, Arbitrators vote at /Proposed decision. Only arbitrators and clerks may edit the proposed decision page.

Evidence presented by Boing! said Zebedee

Preliminary statement by Boing! said Zebedee

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

This all started as a dispute over the article Ancestral health created by User:Michael Hardy, in which User:MjolnirPants was, I think, a little snippy at worst - see User talk:MjolnirPants#Ancestral health. Michael Hardy then, in my view, went overboard in response. Rather than simply dealing with PROD or CSD nominations in the normal way, he posted a complaint about MjolnirPants at ANI (linked above), which was closed as inappropriate. He then posted a gem at User talk:MjolnirPants#I apologize for doubting your infallibility.

At User talk:Michael Hardy#August 2016, User:NeilN tried to calm things, only for Michael Hardy to make clearly false claims about what MjolnirPants had said, calling him "a hard-core bully". I blocked for 31 hours for the personal attacks, but unblocked with a suitable block log reason when a consensus was developing that a block was excessive.

You can see from the above links that Michael Hardy is not listening to the large number of people advising him to drop the stick, and yesterday he repeated his accusations of bullying here. He then went on to make another complaint about MjolnirPants at ANI here, which was quickly closed. NeilN has warned him that a block will come if he doesn't stop, at User talk:Michael Hardy#Please read.

User:M. A. Bruhn has uncovered a list of previous problems going back over the years, which apparently include wheel warring and outing (I'd forgotten, but I redacted the outing) - diff.

Michael is an old-school admin who was appointed after this RFA. He has not kept up with required standards of admin behaviour, as he admitted at User talk:Michael Hardy#Drop the stick - "However, I've never attempted to keep up with policies not related to my regular activities".

I don't know if ArbCom will consider a desysop of an admin without recent abuse of the tools, but I think the links above show a serious failure to follow WP:ADMINCOND and indicate someone who really should not be an admin. Over to you for your thoughts, and perhaps any other path of action that you might feel is appropriate.

• Just a comment on User:Bbb23's suggestion that "I don't think is a case about an administrator, but rather a case about an editor who happens to be an administrator". I can appreciate that. But I'd also suggest that this kind of aggressive overreaction can be significantly more intimidating when it comes from someone who is seen to be an admin. Fortunately, MjolnirPants doesn't seem to be easily intimidated, but there are many who would be. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:28, 7 August 2016 (UTC)
• <Response removed - it was a bit long, and it's more evidence phase material anyway. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 06:59, 8 August 2016 (UTC)>
• @GoldenRing: What makes you think I'm bedridden after surgery? I can assure you I am in rude health. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:45, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
  • @GoldenRing: No problem. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:54, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
• @EEng: It's only an attack when there's no link provided to support it. So thanks for reminder - I've provided a source now ;-) Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 21:38, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
• I want to make one point, pinging @Michael Hardy: The key issue here is the repeated accusations made with no diffs to back them up despite being asked multiple times, and the multiple repetitions of those same unsupported accusations (including here on this page, before they were removed by a clerk). Even at this stage, if Michael will accept the Wikipedia requirement to provide evidence to back up accusations and to accept any resulting consensus, then I'd think we can still back away from this. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:48, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

Oh, and agree to stop imputing extreme emotions to other people, eg "immense anger". Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:52, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

• @Michael Hardy: There is nothing in that link that *forbids* anything. There are statements of the form "If you do A then I will do B", but that is not the equivalent of "I forbid you to do A". Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 09:57, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
  • @Michael Hardy: So, we have to go on your interpretation of what you think he meant rather than what he actually said, despite the fact the he has subsequently clearly said that he did not intend to *forbid* you from anything and despite a number of other people disputing your interpretation (and nobody as far as I can see so far agreeing with it)? Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 12:28, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Nothing more to add

I don't anticipate offering any further evidence, as it all seems to have been presented already. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:16, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Michael Hardy

Preliminary statement by Michael Hardy

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I have never before encountered any user ordering me not to express disagreement with something he said or to post reasons for that disagreement, nor ordering me not to ask him questions to clarify something he said. He had stated that some pages I linked to existed only for the purpose of selling something. I responded that I could find nothing on those pages that appeared to attempt to sell something. He said at length that it was abusive for me to dispute anything he said and he would absolutely not tolerate disagreement with him. He also said an article I created was a duplicate of another article, but made no attempt to say which other article. So I asked which one. He was immensely angered by that question and told me it was abusive for me to ask about that.

Ordering another user not to disagree with one's statement and also not to ask for a clarification should be considered inconsistent with the way Wikipedia should function. One seeks consensus by discussing things. Respectful disagreement (saying that the linked page shows no sign of trying to sell anything) and a respectful request for clarification (asking which page he thought was duplicated) are an essential part of the process of discussion whose goal is consensus.

Among comments on this episode I find at least two people suggested I resign as an administrator. The first notice I had of that was a question on my talk page: whether I would consider resigning as an administrator. I responded by asking what purpose this suggestion was to serve. That is a natural thing to wonder about that, and that user then expressed immense anger that I didn't answer his question. I'm really surprised at that behavior. I don't owe answers to such questions to every random stranger who comes along; the nature of the question itself suggests some justification should be offered; it was reasonable for me to request a complete statement of the proposal before deciding whether to answer the question or not.

• What I do as an administrator. In recent years the things I have done that I could not have done without being an administrator have included these:
  • Moving pages over redirects, both involving articles to which I was contributing and those to which others were contributing, in some cases restoring edit histories of the pages that had become redirects (restoring histories can be done only by administrators, if I'm not mistaken).
  • Looking at deleted pages in order to advise their authors about certain things. For example, one might discover by reading the page that it was original research and then notify the author that there is a policy against that. One might think that would become clear in the deletion process. But sometimes those are conducted in language of those fluent in Wikipedia's rules and customs and even quite intelligent newbies don't understand them. I don't remember details right now, but I've seen a number of variations on this.
  • More generally, looking at deleted pages in order to understand and occasionally participate in discussions of the merits of the articles and of their deletions.
  • I remember an occasion when an editor was going about indiscriminately deleting the word "conversely" wherever he found it. I blocked him for one hour, reverted a bunch of his edits, posted a notice on his talk page that that word has a precisely defined meaning in mathematical logic (his edits made clear that he didn't know that), and then unblocked him.
  • I think the one time I unblocked someone was when the administrator who had blocked him appeared to have done so out of anger and out of disagreement with the views expressed by the person blocked. That is quite improper.
  • There are some other things, and I haven't made the least attempt to keep track of them.
  • What I don't do as an administrator includes getting involved in disputes among users. And many other things, of course. Michael Hardy (talk) 00:29, 8 August 2016 (UTC)
• It appears that this section has been edited by someone other than me. Here again is the principal instance of MjolnirPants forbidding me to dispute his assertions or ask him questions. I posted this here before. Michael Hardy (talk) 02:34, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
• One instance of outright dishonesty on this page is the statement from both MjolnirPants and Tarage that I disputed Mjolnir Pants assertion about "selling" instead of working further on the page. I did so chronologically earlier than my further work on the page, not "instead of" working further on it. Michael Hardy (talk) 11:44, 11 August 2016 (UTC)
• @Boing! said Zebedee: says there is nothing in the link I provided that "forbids" anything. To that I can only say that it must be read within the context in which it was written. And what if I say this is a nice little shop you got here; it would be a shame if anything were to happen to it. There is nothing in that that _threatens_ anything, is there? Michael Hardy (talk) 11:52, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

There is no reason for all this.

There is no reason for de-sysop-ing since I have in no way abused administrative tools. The closest I've seen anyone come to a reason is that an administrator should know the various rules applicable to matters raised at ANI. That is an error: There are _other_ uses of administrative tools than those. I have no intention of participating in ANI-type things; I dislike acrimony and I have no stomach for that. (Is there really any administrator who is well versed in ALL things done with administrative tools?) In particular, one thing I have done with administrative tools is looking at deleted articles in order to participate in discussions with people who read them, including their authors (sometimes done via email), and forming an opinion on the merits of the deletion (which potentially could affect the fate of the article). Other things I have done include merging of edit histories and moving pages over redirects that were not always redirects (that requires deletion of the redirect, and sometimes I restore the edit history after that). I have also sometimes edited the main page. None of that involves abuse of administrative tools. The fact that I responded to bullying, gratuitous disrespect, and dishonesty by making accusations of bullying, accusations of gratuitous disrespect, and accusations of dishonesty does not constitute abuse of administrative tools. Michael Hardy (talk) 20:36, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Could someone clarify the rules and customs about this point?

If you go to the talk page an administrator you choose at random, to whom you are a stranger, and ask whether they would voluntarily accept having their status as an administrator revoked, WITHOUT informing them that such a thing has been contemplated and WITHOUT informing them of the reasons for such an action, then is it considered offensive for that administrator to ask you what reason there are for that rather than just answering the question?

Michael Hardy (talk) 02:34, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

24 hours

I now find it explicitly admitted that others have edited this section. I will supply diffs within 48 hours. I find it asserted here that I forbade someone to disagree with me, although I am the one who said that forbidding other Wikipedians to disagree is objectionable. Too much is demanded of me when it is demanded that I be the only person here to condemn dishonesty.

Evidence presented by MjolnirPants

Preliminary statement by MjolnirPants

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

For starters, I have posted my own summary of the dispute between me and Michael here. B!sZ, NeilN and Linguist have had their say, and I have little substantial to add to that, beyond conveying what my own experience has been.

After tagging the article for speedy and logging off for the night, I came to WP the next morning to look something up, only to find 14 notifications, including of an email Michael sent me. (The contents of that email are substantially the same as what he posted here). After wrapping my head around all of that, I wrote up my version of events. Initially I thought to post it at the AN/I thread, but since the thread had ceased to be about our disagreement and become about Michael's reaction, I elected to write it on my talk page and post a link to it, there. However, after it became clear that Michael was pushing forward with his accusations against me, I decided not to fan the flames, so to speak, and occupied my time on wiki elsewhere. Since then, I've received ten more notifications over this, the vast majority of which were Michael editing my user talk page.

Clearly, something needs to be done. Throughout this affair (and, apparently in several prior instances) Michael has demonstrated what appears to be a near-complete lack of those social skills necessary to collaborate with others on a project like this, especially in the position of being an admin. I agree 100% that his status as an admin should be revoked at this point. While he has yet to do any damage with his admin tools, the longer this goes on, the more I'm convinced that will become a question of when, not if. MjolnirPants Tell me all about it. 15:43, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

• I just want to respond to one thing that Michael has been repeating over and over again, because it seems to strike at the heart of this issue. He claimed I "forbade" him from disagreeing with me. In fact, I explicitly told him I would be happy to continue arguing with him about the article even after I hatted it for speedy deletion. Just to be clear, I told him one thing, and he has been repeatedly claiming that I said the exact opposite, in the face of multiple people correcting him. MjolnirPants Tell me all about it. 22:38, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.

Evidence presented by NeilN

Preliminary statement by NeilN

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Please see this exchange. This whole matter has been blown way out of proportion by Michael Hardy. The first ANI thread shows he does not understand how deletion tagging works. Copying from my close, "Absolutely does not belong at ANI. Editors can tag articles at any time if they feel, using good faith, the article should be deleted. The reviewing admin will take into account objections on the article's talk page." An editor saying they will tag an article if improvements aren't made and then tagging the article when they feel the other editor wishes to argue/discuss rather than improve the article is a valid action. It may be hasty or based on an incorrect perception but it is not "ordering far more experienced users not to express disagreements with you." [1]

The opening of a second ANI thread, after discussion on multiple pages and a brief block, shows a clear lack of judgment, far below what is expected from an adminstrator. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 13:47, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

Regarding "MjolnirPants and at least one other user told me that I was forbidden to express disagreement with them", I tried to get a diff from Michael Hardy for that but failed (see first diff in my initial statement). --NeilN ^{talk to me} 23:06, 7 August 2016 (UTC)

@GoldenRing: "...admin action is concerned, that should have been that." That would have been that hadn't Hardy opened a second ANI thread, essentially duplicating the first, and continued his misrepresentations on a variety of pages, including even here. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 12:41, 8 August 2016 (UTC)

@Opabinia regalis: With regards to, "hasn't had the opportunity to step back" - I think you're wrong here. Michael Hardy has had plenty of opportunities to step back. Instead, he's charged forward. Witness his actions on the talk page of Guy Macon. Guy asks Michael to stop posting there. [2] Instead of stepping back, a couple days later we get the bizarre characterization of "Would you be willing to request a voluntary desysop?" as "a personal question on a stranger's talk page" accompanied by a mini-lecture. [3] --NeilN ^{talk to me} 09:33, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Michael Hardy falls below the standards outlined in WP:ADMINCOND

Beyond my statement above, please look at the following: [4] Now, arbs, who among you would respond this way? [5] The response indicates a blatant disingenuous or a lack of competence to parse a simple English sentence. Hardy follows up his attempt at deflection with this entirely wrong assertion. [6] Editors often use "we" as a matter of necessity. "We don't accept unsourced contentious statements in BLPs." "We decided to do x." (after an RFC is closed) Yes, this is a trivial bit of evidence. But add that to what Hardy has said above: "Out of the blue he asked whether I would want to be de-sysop-ed when I had no idea such a thing was being considered by anyone". [7] Guy's question [8] came hours after the block and these posts. [9] If Hardy truly thinks the question was "out of the blue" his judgment is once again seriously lacking. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 03:32, 13 August 2016 (UTC)

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.

Evidence presented by M. A. Bruhn

Preliminary statement by M. A. Bruhn

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I'd like to start off by saying that I originally had no intention of getting involved in the dispute in ANI as I felt that for the most part comments being added were just unnecessarily escalating a situation that should die down on its own. Looking through ANI logs though I saw unresolved discussions perennially brought up about removing the admin status of MH, commonly rehashing the same points presented here. With this in mind I felt it would be good to lay everything out and have a discussion about this in hopes to end this topic from being brought up again. With that said I'll go ahead and transcribe my summary from ANI below:

2005 - MH is rebuked for protecting page that they are engaged in an editing dispute over

2007 - MH starts an ANI discussion complaining of two admins who deleted an article whose AfD they closed (6 delete vs. 1 keep by MH) who he states "appear very very hostile to Wikipedia's conventional norms and procedures". MH is subsequently pointed out to have been wheelwarring against three other admins on this page's deletion. MH argues that the AfD was not an umambiguous vote for deletion since notices where not posted in places like the math wikiproject, and additionally states "Most people who spend all their time on AfD are bad people."

2008 - MH is subject of ANI discussion about stalking after leaving an unprompted antagonistic and demeaning essay on someone's talkpage regarding a dispute between them which occurred over two years prior. MH makes comments such as "I don't think that user should be forever excused from having to be reminded of that episode before that question is answered.", justifies his calling someone "mentally challenged" by saying "I was defending the victim against the bully when I wrote that second word, and I confidently stand by the word "liar"". Also "I was not insulting him; I was accusing him."

2009 - MH is subject of ANI topic for calling another users comments "bullshit" multiple times, and wheelwarring with two other admins even leaving an edit summary while reverting the first admin reading "his deletion looks like another attempt of speedy deleters to look as if they lack common sense."

2012 - MH has comment redacted (by none other than Boing! said Zebedee) for outing violation

• I'd like to echo some of the sentiments expressed below about digging through MH's edits looking for dirt. For this reason I almost posted a comment earlier requesting that other users consider not bringing forward additional evidence unless they feel it significantly changes the merits of accepting this case, but felt it inappropriate to make such a request for my not being a clerk or arbitrator. However, for what it's worth I'd like to go ahead and make that request anyways. M. A. Bruhn (talk) 19:43, 10 August 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support your assertion; for example, your first assertion might be "So-and-so engages in edit warring", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits to specific articles which show So-and-so engaging in edit warring.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.

Evidence presented by ThePlatypusofDoom

Michael Hardy has been Uncivil

Evidence of incivility by admin Michael Hardy: [10][11]. Also, when Guy Macon politely told him to not post on his talk page for any longer, he didn't honor that request, he just criticized him. More: failure to AGF, failure to drop the stick, [12], [13]. ThePlatypusofDoom (talk) 17:34, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.

Evidence presented by Kingsindian

Hardy did not abuse his tools

Self-evident, but apparently this needs to be said because everyone seems to have lost their mind. Please don't try to dig up dirt from 2012.

Nothing egregious happened

The "disruption" is a grand total of two ANI cases over two days, both dismissed very quickly. The second one probably never would have happened without the ill-considered block by Boing! said Zebedee, which they, to their credit, reversed quickly. All other drama is people poking Hardy (mostly on Hardy's talkpage) and Hardy replying to them, mostly but not always civilly. No less than 15(!) distinct people (many multiple times) posted on Hardy's talkpage, mostly unsolicited, about this matter. List of people: MjolnirPants, Dane2007, Cullen328, Tarage, NeilN, BSZ, SPhilbrick, Guy Macon, Orange Mike, Callmemirela, Omni Flames, Trovatore, Linguist111, Miniapolis, Opabinia Regalis. Many of them were well-intentioned, but many were aggressive, offering unsolicited opinions about how Hardy is not fit to be an admin any more. It's easy to fix this: stop posting on Hardy's talkpage (or anywhere else) about this matter.

The dispute had already cooled down by the time this ArbCom case was opened

The article at the center of the dispute is now at AfD where it is being handled appropriately. Since the 2nd ANI case was closed, there has been basically no drama whatsoever.

Also please see the timeline in my original statement and GoldenRing's timeline, which is more detailed but covers a smaller time period. Kingsindian ♝ ♚ 19:54, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Evidence presented by Guy Macon

Current word length: 468; diff count: 22.

As far as I can tell, nobody had ever asked Michael Hardy whether he actually wants to be a Wikipedia administrator before filing an arbcom case. So I asked.[14] I was very careful to not express any opinion about the underlying dispute.

Michael Hardy lacks the temperament required of a Wikipedia administrator

I have certain expectations when I ask a Wikipedia administrator a reasonable question. I pretty much always get a clear answer, or perhaps a followup question if my question was unclear. You don't realize how easy it is to collaborate with the average admin until you run into one who acts the way this one acts. Instead of simply answering my question, Michael Hardy assumed bad faith where there was none, refused to answer,[15] then tried to draw me into his fight with MjolnirPants.[16]

Michael Hardy has a battleground mentality

At this point I disengaged, stopped responding, and unwatched his talk page. That should have been the end of it.

Michael Hardy then tried to restart the fight on my talk page.[17] When I asked him to not post to my talk page,[18] he did it again.[19][20] This shows a battleground mentality and is, in my opinion, conduct unbecoming of an administrator. Accusing me of "posting a personal question on a stranger's talk page" was simply bizarre. Links:[21][22][23]

Michael Hardy makes dubious statements about misbehavior of other editors, refuses to provide diffs

Michael Hardy keeps posting descriptions of his interactions with other users with no diffs.[24][25][26][27] Multiple people have told him his description of events are not what happened[28] and have asked him to supply diffs,[29][30] but I have yet to see him do so. That's another normal behavior when conversing with admins; if you ask for a diff to a claim about what someone said, they simply provide the diff with no drama or accusations. You don't miss that kind of behavior until you run into an administrator who doesn't behave that way.

Michael Hardy excuses his behavior by referring to what other editors did.

Even after this case was filed and he should be on his best behavior, Michael Hardy has shown no understanding of why so many people are reacting in a negative way, and has doubled down with a series of WP:NOTTHEM arguments.[31][32][33] Two wrongs do not make a right.

Response to Michael Hardy

In a section titled "Guy Macon's assertion about me has no merit", Michael Hardy has once again described an interaction with another editor without providing any diffs. Here is a diff to the question I asked,[34] and here is a diff to his response.[35] Res ipsa loquitur. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:45, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Evidence presented by MRD2014

Incivility, refusing to drop the stick, but no abuse of tools

Michael Hardy has not been civil, like on Tarage's talk page saying he forbid Tarage to disagree with him, which he also did on ANI and gave the section the title of "I forbid anyone to disagree with me!!". He also would not drop the stick. M. A. Bruhn looked through the ANI archives and brought up these. Patient Zero was appalled that Michael Hardy is still an admin, and I agree. I also want to say that he has not abused the admin tools: only one protection (eleven years ago), deletions were mainly for pages blocking page moves, and the last block came six years ago. —MRD2014 T C 14:35, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Evidence presented by SB_Johnny

Nothing to see here as far as abuse of admin buttons is concerned

I hope the Committee will try to keep in mind that in the "old days" it really wasn't a big deal to give a person access to buttons as long as it was pretty obvious that the person in question wouldn't abuse them. 100,000 admins using the buttons once in a while would comport to the "old school wiki way" much more than 30 or 40 super-active admins doing all the work and getting upset at any all-caps ADMIN that dared to question them.

I'm not seeing any abuse of privileges here, but I'll happily list them if someone can bring them to my attention:

1. .
2. .
3. .
4. .
5. .

If someone brings abuse to my attention, I'll note them above. I can even add more slots if there are more than 5. If not, please consider the lack of evidence to be evidence, since as we all know it's very hard to prove a negative.

Evidence presented by Callmemirela

Word count: 288 words. Diff count: 16

Lack of civility

Michael has been uncivil on occasions: [36], [37].

Disruptive/Battleground mentality

After Michael filed their initial ANI thread and it was closed [38], he opened another thread regarding the same topic [39]. No admin should act this way.

Michael goes by his rules. When Guy Macon asked him to not post on his talk page [40], he ignored the message and went on to post another message [41] [42].

Refusal to drop the stick

Michael is adamant that pursuing the issue at hand and the same argument is going to solve everything. He refused to drop the stick during this whole chaos. He was told by more than one editor and two admins that Mjoir (sp?) was not bullying or personally attacking Michael. He didn't listen. [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49].

I then posted on his talk page [50]. That didn't improve the situation. As per the section above (Disruptive/Battleground mentality), he opened another ANI thread copied from his reply to my message on his talk page [51].

Conclusion

All in all, Michael is unfit to be an admin. It's as if a teengager took over the keyboard and when things didn't go their way, hell breaks loose. He is not up-to-date with current policies and guidelines. He pursues the same argument and worsens the situation. You would not expect this from an admin; I certainly don't. I was appalled. An admin would look at the situation at hand, act civilly and try to fix the mess that was caused. No, Michael ran to ANI, claiming it's the other user's fault. And when NeilN close his thread, he got mad and opened another thread. He is in no position to be an admin based on his behavior lately. No admin should act this way. Plain and simple. Had he gone through the current RfA, he would not had made it.

Evidence presented by Tarage

Michael Hardy refuses to accept any error on his part

I don't really have a diff to present because you can see it from every statement he has made, including the ones here. Michael refuses to accept that he has erred at all. From the beginning, he has been running under the mistaken assumption that MjolnirPants was demanding that he not disagree with him. This was never the case, and multiple editors have tried and failed to explain this to him. The issue at hand is that instead of trying to work with MjolnirPants, he went on the attack, giving no indication that he had any desire to make improvements to his article or to work collaboratively. Far more disturbing though is that because he got such backlash from his outburst, he decided it was appropriate to plaster the same sort of "Listen to me or else" argument he thought MjolnirPants was presenting on other's talk pages, mine included. I honestly don't know if this was out of sarcasm or intended to be taken at face value, but either is behavior unbecoming of an administrator. It's petty, uncivil, and uncollaborative.

Michael Hardy has no desire to use his administrator tools to be an administrator

From his own talk page: "One thing I do moderately frequently that a non-administrator cannot do is moving pages over redirects, so your statement about 2012 is not correct. However, I've never attempted to keep up with policies not related to my regular activities." The only thing he uses his tools for is to move pages over redirects. He refuses to keep up to date with current policies, refuses to use his tools for the betterment of Wikipedia, and takes offense when asked if he would be willing to give them up. Michael is a valuable editor, and has contributed much to Wikipedia, but as an administrator he has contributed nothing. The fact remains that even if he never uses his tools, the fact that he has them, and because he does not keep up with policies could use them against said policies, creates a direct chilling effect on anyone who tries to work with him. If he does not use them, does not need them, and refuses to relinquish them, they should be removed from him. --Tarage (talk) 05:08, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Michael Hardy doesn't even understand what a clerk is/does

Again, I don't need to provide diffs because he's admitted this by claiming that "I now find it explicitly admitted that others have edited this section.", even though the clerk in question left a message on his talk page explicitly explaining why it was edited and even gave him 24 hours notice before doing so. This is an administrator on Wikipedia. This is the level of competence being displayed. --Tarage (talk) 09:03, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Evidence presented by {your user name}

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support your assertion; for example, your first assertion might be "So-and-so engages in edit warring", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits to specific articles which show So-and-so engaging in edit warring.

{Write your assertion here}

Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.