Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Venezuelan politics/Workshop

Main case page (Talk) — Preliminary statements (Talk) — Evidence (Talk) — Workshop (Talk) — Proposed decision (Talk)

Target dates: Opened 6 April 2024 • Evidence closes 20 April 2024 • Workshop closes 27 April 2024 • Proposed decision to be posted by 4 May 2024

Scope: Conduct in the topic area of Venezuelan politics, with a specific focus on named parties.

Case clerks: ToBeFree (Talk) & Dreamy Jazz (Talk) Drafting arbitrators: Firefly (Talk) & Guerillero (Talk) & Sdrqaz (Talk)

Purpose of the workshop

Arbitration case pages exist to assist the Arbitration Committee in arriving at fair, well-informed decisions. The case Workshop exists so that parties to the case, other interested members of the community, and members of the Arbitration Committee can post possible components of the final decision for review and comment by others. Components proposed here may be general principles of site policy and procedure, findings of fact about the dispute, remedies to resolve the dispute, and arrangements for remedy enforcement. These are the four types of proposals that can be included in committee final decisions. There are also sections for analysis of /Evidence, and for general discussion of the case. Any user may edit this workshop page; please sign all posts and proposals. Arbitrators will place components they wish to propose be adopted into the final decision on the /Proposed decision page. Only Arbitrators and clerks may edit that page, for voting, clarification as well as implementation purposes.

Expected standards of behavior

• You are required to act with appropriate decorum during this case. While grievances must often be aired during a case, you are expected to air them without being incivil or engaging in personal attacks, and to respond calmly to allegations against you.
• Accusations of misbehaviour posted in this case must be proven with clear evidence (and otherwise not made at all).

Consequences of inappropriate behavior

• Editors who conduct themselves inappropriately during a case may be sanctioned by an arbitrator or clerk, without warning.
• Sanctions issued by arbitrators or clerks may include being banned from particular case pages or from further participation in the case.
• Editors who ignore sanctions issued by arbitrators or clerks may be blocked from editing.
• Behavior during a case may also be considered by the committee in arriving at a final decision.

Motions and requests by the parties

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Proposed temporary injunctions

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Questions to the parties

Arbitrators may ask questions of the parties in this section.

Proposed final decision

Proposals by S Marshall

Proposed principles

Citing sources

1a) Under Wikipedia's verifiability policy, editors are expected to add citations. The purpose of a citation is to help readers and other editors verify that the information in Wikipedia articles is based on reliable sources. A good citation is one that directs the reader to a specific place in a reliable source that fully supports the article text.

1b) A citation is poor if it doesn't direct the reader to a specific place, or if the source isn't reliable, or if the source doesn't fully support the article text.

1c) Good citations are important everywhere that appears on a rendered page in the mainspace, but particularly important in contentious topic areas.

1d) Poor citations make needless work for other editors. Frequently adding poor citations can amount to misconduct.

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I looked in Wikipedia:Arbitration/Index/Principles for a pre-existing principle that says this, but I didn't see one, so I wrote this from scratch.—S Marshall T/C 17:25, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

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Proposed findings of fact

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Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

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Proposed enforcement

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Proposals by User:Example 2

Proposed principles

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Proposed findings of fact

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Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

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Proposed enforcement

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Proposals by User:Example 3

Proposed principles

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Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

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Proposed enforcement

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Analysis of evidence

Place here items of evidence (with diffs) and detailed analysis

Analysis of WMrapids's evidence by Robert McClenon

It appears that User:WMrapids is "slightly opposing" the designation of Venezuelan politics as a contentious topic based on a reasonably mistaken understanding of what is an essential feature and what is an optional feature of the contentious topics procedures. WMRapids writes: CT would prevent involvement from our necessary, newly-interested users. They are probably thinking of the application of contentious topics to Palestine and Israel, which is even more difficult than other contentious topics. Palestine and Israel articles are subject to Extended-Confirmed protection, which excludes new users, in order to prevent brigading and sockpuppetry. The Extended-Confirmed protection is not a built-in or automatic feature of contentious topics, but an optional feature that is necessary for an area that is even more problematic than Venezuelan politics. What the contentious topics designation would do is to authorize disruptive editing to be dealt with by Arbitration Enforcement. New users should be able to participate, as long as they are here to improve the encyclopedia, and as long as they honor neutral point of view.

I recommend that ArbCom designate Venezuelan politics as a contentious topic, so as to enable Arbitration Enforcement, without imposing extended-confirmed protection. Robert McClenon (talk) 14:29, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

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Moved from the evidence page --Guerillero ^{Parlez Moi} 18:24, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

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Analysis by S Marshall

The view from 30,000 feet is this:

Although NoonIcarus is miscalled a "pro-opposition" editor in various places, in fact on Venezuela his position is actually anti-Maduro. WMrapids, or (now we know WMrapids is a sock) more accurately the person running the WMrapids account, is strongly pro-Maduro. Many other people editing Venezuelan articles are generally tolerant of Maduro, but usually less so than WMrapids. I think this underlies the annoyance at NoonIcarus.

Mainstream news sources in first world democracies converge on a position that's generally skeptical towards Maduro, although far less skeptical than NoonIcarus. Scholars and academics tend generally to be somewhat more pro-Maduro than the news sources.

The person running the WMrapids account is adept at civil POV-pushing and sealioning. They're able to advance their agenda within Wikipedia's behavioural constraints. NoonIcarus is less so, and NoonIcarus takes the bait, so some kind of editing restriction on him is definitely beneficial -- but we do benefit from skeptical eyes on our coverage of recent Venezuelan politics. It's definitely in the encyclopaedia's best interests to allow NoonIcarus to wave the red flag when there's bias.

Indications on my talk page suggest that the person running the WMrapids account is unlikely to go away just because that one account got CU-blocked.

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General discussion

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