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WP:AE

Requests for enforcement

Click here to add a new enforcement request
For appeals: create a new section and use the template {{Arbitration enforcement appeal}}
See also: Logged AE sanctions

Important information

Shortcuts

Please use this page only to:

request administrative action against editors violating a remedy (not merely a principle) or an injunction in an Arbitration Committee decision, or a contentious topic restriction imposed by an administrator,
request contentious topic restrictions against previously alerted editors who engage in misconduct in a topic area designated as a contentious topic,
request page restrictions (e.g. revert restrictions) on pages that are being disrupted in topic areas designated as contentious topics, or
appeal arbitration enforcement actions (including contentious topic restrictions) to uninvolved administrators.

For all other problems, including content disagreements or the enforcement of community-imposed sanctions, please use the other fora described in the dispute resolution process. To appeal Arbitration Committee decisions, please use the clarification and amendment noticeboard.

Only autoconfirmed users may file enforcement requests here; requests filed by IPs or accounts less than four days old or with less than 10 edits will be removed. All users are welcome to comment on requests except where doing so would violate an active restriction (such as an extended-confirmed restriction). If you make an enforcement request or comment on a request, your own conduct may be examined as well, and you may be sanctioned for it. Enforcement requests and statements in response to them may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. (Word Count Tool) Statements must be made in separate sections. Non-compliant contributions may be removed or shortened by administrators. Disruptive contributions such as personal attacks, or groundless or vexatious complaints, may result in blocks or other sanctions.

To make an enforcement request, click on the link above this box and supply all required information. Incomplete requests may be ignored. Requests reporting diffs older than one week may be declined as stale. To appeal a contentious topic restriction or other enforcement decision, please create a new section and use the template {{Arbitration enforcement appeal}}.

Appeals and administrator modifications of contentious topics restrictions

The Arbitration Committee procedures relating to modifications of contentious topic restrictions state the following:

All contentious topic restrictions (and logged warnings) may be appealed. Only the restricted editor may appeal an editor restriction. Any editor may appeal a page restriction.

The appeal process has three possible stages. An editor appealing a restriction may:

ask the administrator who first made the contentious topic restrictions (the "enforcing administrator") to reconsider their original decision;
request review at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") or at the administrators' noticeboard ("AN"); and
submit a request for amendment ("ARCA"). If the editor is blocked, the appeal may be made by email.

Appeals submitted at AE or AN must be submitted using the applicable template.

A rough consensus of administrators at AE or editors at AN may specify a period of up to one year during which no appeals (other than an appeal to ARCA) may be submitted.

Changing or revoking a contentious topic restriction

An administrator may only modify or revoke a contentious topic restriction if a formal appeal is successful or if one of the following exceptions applies:

The administrator who originally imposed the contentious topic restriction (the "enforcing administrator") affirmatively consents to the change,^[a] or is no longer an administrator;^[b] or
The contentious topic restriction was imposed (or last renewed) more than a year ago and:
- the restriction was imposed by a single administrator, or
- the restriction was an indefinite block.

A formal appeal is successful only if one of the following agrees with revoking or changing the contentious topic restriction:

a clear consensus of uninvolved administrators at AE,
a clear consensus of uninvolved editors at AN,
a majority of the Arbitration Committee, acting through a motion at ARCA.

Any administrator who revokes or changes a contentious topic restriction out of process (i.e. without the above conditions being met) may, at the discretion of the Arbitration Committee, be desysopped.

Standard of review
On community review

Uninvolved administrators at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") and uninvolved editors at the administrators' noticeboard ("AN") should revoke or modify a contentious topic restriction on appeal if:

the action was inconsistent with the contentious topics procedure or applicable policy (i.e. the action was out of process),
the action was not reasonably necessary to prevent damage or disruption when first imposed, or
the action is no longer reasonably necessary to prevent damage or disruption.

On Arbitration Committee review

Arbitrators hearing an appeal at a request for amendment ("ARCA") will generally overturn a contentious topic restriction only if:

the action was inconsistent with the contentious topics procedure or applicable policy (i.e. the action was out of process),
the action represents an unreasonable exercise of administrative enforcement discretion, or
compelling circumstances warrant the full Committee's action.

^ The administrator may indicate consent at any time before, during, or after imposition of the restriction.
^ This criterion does not apply if the original action was imposed as a result of rough consensus at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard, as there would be no single enforcing administrator.

Appeals and administrator modifications of non-contentious topics sanctions

The Arbitration Committee procedures relating to modifications and appeals state:

Appeals by sanctioned editors

Appeals may be made only by the editor under sanction and only for a currently active sanction. Requests for modification of page restrictions may be made by any editor. The process has three possible stages (see "Important notes" below). The editor may:

ask the enforcing administrator to reconsider their original decision;
request review at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") or at the administrators’ noticeboard ("AN"); and
submit a request for amendment at the amendment requests page ("ARCA"). If the editor is blocked, the appeal may be made by email through Special:EmailUser/Arbitration Committee (or, if email access is revoked, to arbcom-enwikimedia.org).

Modifications by administrators

No administrator may modify or remove a sanction placed by another administrator without:

the explicit prior affirmative consent of the enforcing administrator; or
prior affirmative agreement for the modification at (a) AE or (b) AN or (c) ARCA (see "Important notes" below).

Administrators modifying sanctions out of process may at the discretion of the committee be desysopped.

Nothing in this section prevents an administrator from replacing an existing sanction issued by another administrator with a new sanction if fresh misconduct has taken place after the existing sanction was applied.

Administrators are free to modify sanctions placed by former administrators – that is, editors who do not have the administrator permission enabled (due to a temporary or permanent relinquishment or desysop) – without regard to the requirements of this section. If an administrator modifies a sanction placed by a former administrator, the administrator who made the modification becomes the "enforcing administrator". If a former administrator regains the tools, the provisions of this section again apply to their unmodified enforcement actions.

Important notes:

For a request to succeed, either

(i) the clear and substantial consensus of (a) uninvolved administrators at AE or (b) uninvolved editors at AN or

(ii) a passing motion of arbitrators at ARCA

is required. If consensus at AE or AN is unclear, the status quo prevails.

While asking the enforcing administrator and seeking reviews at AN or AE are not mandatory prior to seeking a decision from the committee, once the committee has reviewed a request, further substantive review at any forum is barred. The sole exception is editors under an active sanction who may still request an easing or removal of the sanction on the grounds that said sanction is no longer needed, but such requests may only be made once every six months, or whatever longer period the committee may specify.
These provisions apply only to contentious topic restrictions placed by administrators and to blocks placed by administrators to enforce arbitration case decisions. They do not apply to sanctions directly authorized by the committee, and enacted either by arbitrators or by arbitration clerks, or to special functionary blocks of whatever nature.
All actions designated as arbitration enforcement actions, including those alleged to be out of process or against existing policy, must first be appealed following arbitration enforcement procedures to establish if such enforcement is inappropriate before the action may be reversed or formally discussed at another venue.

Information for administrators processing requests

Thank you for participating in this area. AE works best if there are a variety of admins bringing their expertise to each case. There is no expectation to comment on every case, and the Arbitration Committee (ArbCom) thanks all admins for whatever time they can give.

A couple of reminders:

Before commenting, please familiarise yourself with the referenced ArbCom case. Please also read all the evidence (including diffs) presented in the AE request.
When a request widens to include editors beyond the initial request, these editors must be notified and the notifications recorded in the same way as for the initial editor against whom sanctions were requested. Where some part of the outcome is clear, a partial close may be implemented and noted as "Result concerning X".
Enforcement measures in arbitration cases should be construed liberally to protect Wikipedia and keep it running efficiently. Some of the behaviour described in an enforcement request might not be restricted by ArbCom. However, it may violate other Wikipedia policies and guidelines; you may use administrative discretion to resolve it.
More than one side in a dispute may have ArbCom conduct rulings applicable to them. Please ensure these are investigated.

Closing a thread:

Once an issue is resolved, enclose it between {{hat}} and {{hab}} tags. A bot should archive it in 7 days.
Please consider referring the case to ARCA if the outcome is a recommendation to do so or the issue regards administrator conduct.
You can use the templates {{uw-aeblock}} (for blocks) or {{AE sanction}} (for other contentious topic restrictions) to give notice of sanctions on user talk pages.
Please log sanctions in the Arbitration enforcement log.

Thanks again for helping. If you have any questions, please post on the talk page.

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Gazifikator

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Request concerning Gazifikator

User requesting enforcement:
Grandmaster 12:56, 9 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested:
Gazifikator (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated:
Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan_2#Amended_Remedies_and_Enforcement

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it:

[1] First rv
[2] Second rv

Diffs of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required by the remedy):

[3] Gazifikator was placed on editing restriction by Nishkid64 (talk · contribs)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction):
block, and topic ban on Moses of Chorene

Additional comments by Grandmaster:
Gazifikator (talk · contribs) has been placed on editing restriction, which limited him to 1 rv per week. [4] However today Gazifikator made 2 rvs on the article about Moses of Chorene, removing the quotes from professor Robert W. Thomson, a notable expert on the subject. This is a clear and deliberate violation of the remedy. In addition, this user has been engaged in disruptive activity on the article in question for quite some time, reverting any attempts by other editors to include the opinion of the western scholarship on the subject of the article. Therefore, in my opinion, a topic ban on editing the articles related to Moses of Chorene should also be considered. Grandmaster 12:56, 9 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested:
[5]

Discussion concerning Gazifikator

Statement by Gazifikator

User:Grandmaster previously iniciated 3 editwarrings ([6][7][8] etc) with different users at Moses of Chorene article, and despite last time the article was unprotected by the same Nishkid who noted that he will "reprotect if edit warring flares up" [9], Grandmaster continues POV-pushing. At the same unprotection day a 'new user' comes who reverted to Grandmaster's old version again [10]. And as this 'idea' was also unsuccessful, Grandmaster started another unconsensused editwarring. He adds a detailed minority view, which goes against WP:WEIGHT and is a direct continuation of his previous editwarrings. I explained it many times at the talk, as well as provided more reliable sources criticizing Prof. Thomson's view, who was just a translator of Khorenatsi. But Grandmaster continues his POV-pushing to the article, and he is the only user who's topic ban is really justified. Gazifikator (talk) 13:24, 9 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other editors

Please see my comments here: [11]. Given the context, it seems odd that Grandmaster would intentionally ignore the discussion that he participated in and go ahead with those changes. Strikes me like baiting. Sanctions need to be applied evenhandedly.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 14:36, 9 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Gazifikator

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Gazifikator is in violation of his restriction. His statement above does not address this issue. I have blocked him for 72 hours in enforcement of the restriction. Subsequent violations will result in more severe sanctions.

If there is any misconduct by Grandmaster or others, this is not the place to evaluate it and it does not excuse Gazifikator violating his restriction. All editors may make separate enforcement requests against Grandmaster or others if they believe in good faith that the conduct of Grandmaster or others merits sanctions. Sandstein 15:19, 9 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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.

Parishan

Attention: This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.

Request concerning Parishan

User requesting enforcement:
Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 23:13, 24 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested:
Parishan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated:
Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan_2#Amended_Remedies_and_Enforcement

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it:
Severe edit warring in the past 3 weeks:

Gago Drago [12], [13] The name of the town was Verinshen in 1985, when he was born, Parishan replaces it with the current Azeri renamed name.

Ganja [14] Foreign names were first removed by Proger. Parishan reverted to that version. [15], [16], [17]

Julfa [18] Brandmeister removed the Armenian spelling (he called it tweaked). Parishan reverted to that version. [19], [20], [21]

Azerbaijani people [22] Parishan placed them as Hanafi, then reverted when that is replaced. [23], [24].

Kars [25], Atabek removed the Armenian term and replaced it with Georgian. Parishan reverts to that version. [26]

On Lingua Franca he launched a slow revert war that he resumed recently. It all started several months ago when VartanM removed Parishan's addition. [27]. From then on, Parishan engaged in a slow revert war. [28], [29]. Mackrakis modified it to comply with the sources Parishan used, it did not satisfy Parishan. [30], he continued to revert war. [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36], [37], [38]. He stopped for a while, but recently started again. [39], [40], [41].

Made drastic changes to the Armenian churches template. [42], followed by a partial revert. [43] then revert: [44]

Removed the link to Armenia from an Armenian monastery. [45], then reverted the compromise. [46]

Revert war with IPs here. [47], [48], [49], [50], [51], [52], [53]. Then continues against registered users. [54], [55]

I think this is sufficient to get the picture. If not, I will add more. Note that Parishan was almost placed under restrictions during AA1 already. See here: I will not hesitate to initiate a motion to modify this remedy after the case is closed if you involve yourself in edit wars or other disruptive types of editing.

Diffs of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required by the remedy):
See below, under 'Additional comments'.

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction):
High time for AA2 restrictions to apply to Parishan

Additional comments by Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!!:
Note that Parishan was informed officially (that is by uninvolved admins) twice of AA2 restrictions, here and here unlike most users. While the initial reverts were against AzeriTerroru (probable sock account), they are mostly reverts to recent controversial changes. Rest of the reverts were against other users.

In the recent past, various admin’s have confirmed that Parishan has a tendency to edit war but he's not under restrictions. See Deacon of Pndapetzim 's comment and the following report here.

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested:
[56]

Discussion concerning Parishan

Statement by Parishan

What we see here is a random collection of all article reverts (controversial, non-controversial, sockpuppet reverts, anonymous vandalism reverts, and even plain edits) that I happened to perform in the past three weeks presented here as a gigantic list of instances of 'edit warring.'

In addition to not being a revert, edit (1) is merely clarification of non-controversial information. It does not take a wiseman to figure out that being born in the given town physically cannot imply being born in the mentioned region. Mind you, it was never disputed further, so the term edit warring does not apply here.

Edits (2) through (12) are reverts of a sockpuppet who could not think of anything better to do than to stalk edit histories of Azerbaijan-related article contributors undoing all their recent edits. His/her reverts would have to be undone eventually.

Edits (12) through (15) do not qualify as 'edit warring.' The other party removed information without consulting the provided sources, but the issue was quickly resolved on the article's talkpage.

Edits (16) through (18) are definitely not edit warring. In fact, with those edits I expanded the template adding more links that pertained to the topic and are not disputed (they are still in the template), and left a comment on the talkpage. My single revert in edit (19) was triggered by the other party either not having noticed the proposed discussion on the talkpage or not willing to participate in it. With that, I did not engage in any more reverts.

I wish I could comment on edits (20) and (21) but I am clueless as to what User:Eupator meant by posting them here. Are they supposed to qualify as 'edit warning'? Please elaborate.

Edits (22) and (23) are one-time edits in different articles; calling them 'edit-warring' seems too harsh.

Edits (24) to (27) are reverts of an anonymous vandal who 'specialised' in removing references to Azeris and the Azeri language from as many Iran-related articles, as s/he stumbled upon, and specifically in the case with Farah Pahlavi in removing sourced information about the personality's ancestry. I have tried twice [57] [58] to get the page at least temporarily semi-protected in order to put an end to this IP-switching user's disruptive activity, but neither time the administration considered this case of vandalism severe enough. Parishan (talk) 05:57, 25 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other editors

Eupator, could you please improve the presentation of the evidence so that we can establish more easily whether this is indeed edit-warring? For instance, I am unable to easily determine whether edit #1 is even a revert of somebody. You could complement each entry in the list with the name of the article affected, a diff of the revision reverted to, and the name of the editor who is being warred with. Sandstein 05:36, 25 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In hindsight I see how spending a little more time to organize the diffs would have helped you guys to sort through them.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 20:55, 25 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Eupator, have you ever been involved with a content dispute with this editor? It seems likely because you were a named party in the first AA case. I feel we need to do a thorough review of their entire editing over the last few months (to avoid judging on cherry picked diffs), and we should also review your editing (to establish whether you come here with clean or unclean hands). We should not permit editors to use this board as a tactic to gain the upper hand in content disputes. Jehochman ^Talk 22:16, 25 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

AzeriTerroru (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) appears to be a single purpose, edit warring account, possibly a sock puppet. I think we need to determine who's running that account. It takes two (or more) to edit war. There is no sense in sanctioning only one side of an edit war. Jehochman ^Talk 22:18, 25 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Already blocked by Nishkid64, sock of Shahin Giray (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). Thatcher 00:37, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Eupator, what sanctions exactly do you request? The modified AA2 remedies are very broad and allow admins to do almost anything. Parishan has already been notified of the case and the remedies, the next step would be to apply some sort of specific measure. What do you request? Thatcher 00:50, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Merely the application of standard revert/civility parole (one revert per page per seven-day period with respect to any article that reasonably deals with AA issues) for the duration deemed necessary.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 01:37, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - Hi Thatcher, gotta say i'm impressed :) However I still believe that Parishan's reverts are part of a disturbing pattern though. One good example is with the article of Kars. On that article Parishan attempted to incorporate the modern Azeri term with a long history of revert warring. [59], [60], [61], [62], [63], [64]. Unsuccessful, the Armenian name was removed altogether just recently by Atabek, and when reverted Parishan reverted back. In my opinion Parishan very often uses his additional revert privileges against users under 1RR. On Lingua Franca, this report by Fedayee may be helpful: [65].-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 02:22, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. In a general, I have no problem with spelling for a particular town if there are verifiable NPOV references to do so. In this case, Kars has not much to do with Armenia, except for the fact that Kars province is located on the border of Armenia. Moreover, the origin of the name, as provided by NPOV reference is Georgian (kari - gate) not Armenian, the Armenian spelling cannot even provide the meaning in translation Armenian with a source. Anyways, since this is a topic-specific issue which needs to be resolved on talk page, not sure why this is a subject of discussion in WP:AE, except for lack of WP:AGF. Atabəy (talk) 15:55, 2 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Inappropriate comment, see the article. On top, it seems Atabəy is confusing "verifiable" and "verifiable by Atabəy". Sardur (talk) 00:24, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am aware that content dispute is not allowed here, but for clarity sake I have to note that 'Verinshen' was never the name of that town (this is regarding the edits in Gago Drago). See 28-76 on this Soviet-issued map. Parishan (talk) 08:14, 27 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thatcher, I do not see a need in banning from editing the page Lingua franca. Perhaps you did not notice that the discussion regarding Azeri involved two sections on the talkpage. In the first section, after the third party review of the issue, I discovered another source and restored the deleted information having provided this new reference (as opposed to "reverting Mackrakis' version", as Eupator is trying to present it here). User:VartanM reverted this edit but ignored my proposition to continue the discussion. I let the crippled version hang in there, even though it was no fault of mine that VartanM's disagreement stemmed merely from being uncomfortable with the word "Azeri" being used on Wikipedia (anyone who has read the talkpage can see that he had not cited a single academic source or provided any plausible scienfitic counter-argument in response to about six sources he was presented with). So this is not a case of me insisting on the importance of "Azeri"-ness; really this is a case of VartanM and Fedayee having a problem with the academic use of the word "Azeri" all throughout articles on Wikipedia despite its academic validity (in fact, VartanM has been reported precisely for deliberately stripping Wikipedia of mentionings of Azeris and Azerbaijan [66]). Since February I have discovered two or three more independent pieces of evidence to back up the information he kept removing. This time it did not cause any disagreement or controversy. So I really have no idea why I am being considered for punishment as a result of my activity in this article. I would say, I did my best as an editor having had the patience to spend four months on the talkpage over one sentence backed by six or seven sources (found and cited by myself) reacting on outrageously unacademic statements from someone who was clearly trying either to wear me out or to temporise. I am all for reaching compromise, but compromise is not possible when the other party has literally nothing on the table except speculations: no sources, no stable arguments, not even a clear idea of what they are trying to disprove. Also note that while this discussion is going on here, an anonymous account goes around all of the said articles deleting the information added by me, as if attempting to provoke me to edit warring. Parishan (talk) 03:35, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Note that Greiwood (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), who was involved in the edit war at Ganja, is blocked as a sockpuppet of a banned user. Thatcher 04:48, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- I'd like to hear what VartanM and Fedayee have to say about Lingua franca. Thatcher 04:53, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I will keep this short and concise. The problem is not that Parishan isn't using sources but that the sources he uses do not say what he claims they say. He assumes too much from them. Under those circumstances, I can just not pretend that Parishan ignores the sources he is using do not support his wording and that's why it's impossible to debate with him. See my reply on Lingua Franca here. He also added a new source, but the source is not clear. Note also Parishan's consideration of the other editors version: "...the page is being reverted back to its non-vandalised state." As for the claimed removal of Azeri, Parishan shows a claimed report (his edit) but fails to provide the actual initial reply by VartanM here, the problem was anachronism something which Parishan never addressed. Note that other users' skepticism in trusting that discussion will lead anywhere in Parishan's case is because time and time again he ignores what others say. See those long two replies by an editor here about Parishan's created article [67], [68]. Parishan does not even bother replying to anything, the only comment he leaves is this after he removes the tag, when most of the reasons given to have the tag have nothing to do with this. If a revert war starts, he has a revert advantage over other editors so no one bothers reverting. That's all I'm going to add for now. - Fedayee (talk) 17:52, 27 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

For anyone willing to look through the discussion, I think it is enough to assess the quality of argumentation on each side to realise who was driven by a desire to contribute productively to Wikipedia and whose only goal was bad-faith POV-pushing. Parishan (talk) 19:57, 27 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest to that "anyone" to also have a look at the "sources". Sardur (talk) 23:34, 27 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Let them be my guests. Parishan (talk) 02:01, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If it wasn't for Moreschi's intervention here, where he pointed out the obviously more relevant title, you would have continued lumping all Turkic speakers as Azeris. The sources you provide fall vert short of supporting the sentences you put together. You even justified the following and never changed your behaviour since. Here's a simple example of how you cherry pick sources: [69]. You're providing a 1942 map in Russian knowing very well that after that map was produced most of those names were changed as seen here. Even cherry picking has its bounds. Thatcher, I invite you to mediate a discussion in lets say this article and see for yourself what the real problem with Parishan's articles is. Only on few occasions did Parishan correct articles in accordance with the sources, such as here (the source said Turkic). I think you get the picture.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 00:34, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Eupator, your desire to fantasise does not limit itself even here. This is an entry from the 1978 issue of the Great Soviet Encyclopædia regarding what you refer to as 'Verinshen.' None of the sources you provided say anything about any 'renaming.'

To administrators: above is exactly the type of behaviour that the users who are reporting me here frequently display during discussions. Speculations, original research and pushing false information despite having facts in front of their eyes in the form of sources, later collective reverting, initiating a chain of countless reverts and as a culmination, reporting the other party for 'POV-pushing' and 'edit warring.' Parishan (talk) 02:01, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Eupator and Parishan, please stop discussing your disagreements here and limit yourself to comments strictly relevant to the question whether or not Parishan's conduct is disruptive as claimed in the enforcement request. Sandstein 05:39, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I know I went off topic. My argument is that 1) Parishan regularly edit wars, 2) He is very often uncivil as seen above ("your desire to fantasise does not limit itself even here") 3) Sees Wiki as a battlefield. For a long while he used to refer to everyone he didn't agree with as an opponent in quite a condescending manner until he was warned not to:[70]. The rest is your run of the mill content dispute and only Thatcher and Moreschi seem to be willing to dig deep and research each matter closely. If Thatcher wants to place new types of restrictions it would be nice to see them enforced.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 15:11, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sandstein, I apologise, but I think this little debate says quite a lot about how my edits come to be considered 'disruptive' by Eupator and certain other uses who are heavily involved in the editing of Armenia-Azerbaijan-related articles. Whenever POV-pushing cannot do its trick, the other party's edits are seen as 'disruptive.' Parishan (talk) 03:56, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Eupator, I have been and still am referring to them as opponents. I have never been warned or been told about its 'condescending' connotation. OED defines an opponent as 'a person who disagrees with or resists a proposal', which is what happens during Wikipedia discussions. An example of it being used in a sentence: 'I should not be held responsible for my opponent's poor command of English.' Parishan (talk) 03:50, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

One interesting point that should not be lost is Sandstein (below) actually complaining about administrators needing to evaluate the content of a contested edit before taking sanctions. The implication in that comment is that Sandstein thinks it OK to shoot first and never even bother to ask questions later. This explains much about his scattergun approach to inflicting sanctions on editors. From several past examples I had assumed he was displaying a most blatant bias. Is it actually the case that he just doesn't give a damn? I would hope that evaluating the content of an edit before applying sanctions would be a basic requirement expected of all administrators. Meowy 18:39, 28 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I generally agree with Thatcher's take on the issue, but I think that in the article Lingua franca has been disrupted not by Parishan, but by his opponents, who keep reverting sourced info added by Parishan. Therefore I think that people removing sourced info must be placed on restriction. Otherwise, the problem with Azeri and Armenian names in the leads of articles about locations in Armenia and Azerbaijan is a long standing issue. I even initiated an RFC about that a couple of years ago. Generally, Armenian users insist on inclusion of Armenian names in the leads of articles about locations in Azerbaijan, but revert any attempts to include Azeri names for locations in Armenia. I can cite diffs, but at the moment I'm away on vacation and have a limited access to the Internet. I will pursue this issue when I'm back. But there's a problem of Armenian and Azeri names that should be adressed in general. I think something should be done to resolve this problem. Grandmaster 09:09, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The issue is not who's right or wrong on Lingua franca, but the behaviour of Parishan. Isn't it time to have this settled? Sardur (talk) 23:29, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Note to Thatcher: Grandmaster has also accused the 'opponents' of Atabek prior to Atabek's topic ban. See for yourself the way Parishan distorts the sources with one clear example. To support his position he quotes from Stephen Adolphe Wurm (see talkpage): The Turkic Azerbaijani language, in the southeastern part of the Caucasus area, has been a very important lingua franca used for inter-ethnic communication. But the actual phrase is this: The Turkic Azerbaijani language, in the southeastern part of the Caucasus area, has been a very important lingua franca used for inter-ethnic communication among speakers of most of the Lezgian languages of the Caucasian Daghestan Group, and also among speakers of some of the Avar languages. He added a period to cut the phrase with the result being to misinterpret the whole sentence. Again, the problem in Parishan's conduct is not that he does not provide the sources, but that he manipulates and misuses sources. Grandmaster's attempt to put on parity Armenian and Azerbaijani for historic places will make any person with the slightest knowledge of the history of the region laugh. This was explained several times, I will not bother bringing this here, more so when it's off-topic. But Thatcher might start here where Baku87 adds the modern Azeri term. Note that over 80% of anything coming from Caucasian Albania came to us from Armenian text, the rest in Persian, Arabic and Greek and that modern encyclopedias do include the Armenian term (see Iranica for example). You get the picture here of the POV pushing in an attempt to include Azeri in every articles where there is Armenian in the picture. - Fedayee (talk) 16:46, 6 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Parishan provided multiple reliable sources here: [71], which are all being reverted for no reason. Grandmaster 07:33, 8 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Fedayee just above proved that Parishan altered an original source to sustain his position. He provided several examples here.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 17:29, 8 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

One day for Gazifikator, and how much for Parishan? Sardur (talk) 00:03, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Parishan

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Analyzing the diffs. Thatcher 01:18, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Analysis

Gago Drago, Parishan inserts a new fact where article was previously stable, reverts once to keep it, no discussion on talk page
Ganja, reverts 3 times (twice against sockpuppet), no discussion
Julfa, 3 reverts (2 against sock), discussion but he does not participate
Azerbaijani people, content dispute, Parishan added what look to be reliable sources when questioned, no discussion on talk page
Kars, one revert against sock, no discussion
Lingua franca, slow revert war against VartanM and Fadayee, extensive discussion seems to be going nowhere, Parishan attempting to provide sources, others dispute his sources. Issue is whether Azeri was ever a regional lingua franca.
Template, 2 reversions (no banned users or socks), some discussion, reverting against Serouj
Gtichavank Monastery, reverting against Serouj, no discussion on talk page
Farah Pahlavi, edit war with Megastrike14 (who edits a lot while logged out), no discussion on talk page

Comments Lots of contentious editing about the importance of "Azeri-ness" in place names, etc. Many attempts to provide sources, or better sources. Discounting the sockpuppet who was stirring up trouble, most of the remaining reversions are not of major concern. However, use of article talk pages is rare.

Preliminary recommendations: I am contemplating the following,

Banning Parishan, VartanM and Fedayee from Lingua franca indefinitely. They can discuss there issue on the talk page, and when they have reached a stable compromise, the article ban will be rescinded.
Placing Megastrike14 and Serouj on formal notice about the case and possible remedies. Warning Megastrike about logged out edits.
Warning Parishan to use talk pages more often to negotiate disputed edits rather than reverting (and sometimes trying to explain edits in edit summaries).

Not sure that further is required at this time. Thatcher 01:56, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have a further suggestion. I am not sure that 1RR is warranted at this time. Eupator's evidence shows a pattern of Parishan adding Azeri spellings, place name variants, and evidence that people or things were Azeri, but also removing Armenian spellings, place name variants, and links to things or people being Armenian. I'm considering an editing restriction on Parishan, that he may add Azeri spelling and name variants to articles where he believe it appropriate, and where he has reliable sources, but he may not remove Armenian place names, links, and spelling variants from any article. He may suggest such on the talk pages. If there is consensus to remove Armenian names, links and spellings, then someone else may do it. If there is no consensus among the usual editors, Parishan is advised to seek outside advice by RFC or third opinion, or to seek compromise. I'd like to know what other admins think about this; if it seems that it might work, there are several other editors this restriction could be applied to.
I think that a frequent problem with these articles, which I just realized, is that the inclusion of a linguistic or cultural variant place name or spelling in the lead of an article is used as a way of marking the territory, to say, "See, there is an Azeri name for this place, that proves that it used to be Azeri even though its current status is in dispute." Or, "The Armenians never lived here before the current geopolitical dispute so giving this place an Armenian name is wrong." (Substitute any other ethnic, cultural or political group of your choice.) The use of the lead in this way, to gain traction in a geopolitical dispute, is wrong. In some cases articles contain a discussion of the subject's disputed status, where variant names can go. ("Smith 1998 says the Azeri name for the region was XXX, but Jones 2001 says the Azeris were never a significant presence in the region.") I think there are a lot of editors who are dicking around with adding and removing linguistic variants to the leads of articles, for geopolitical reasons, maybe we can stop this. Presumably, an editor with an affinity for group A will be able to find references to support his argument, if so he should be allowed to add it. But he can not directly remove group B, only propose it on the talk page. We could limit it to the lead and to categories, since that is where most of the trouble is, or make it global. Think it will work in general? Thatcher 05:11, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the extensive analysis, which I believe is quite correct, especially with regard to the general problem of addition and removal of place names etc. on account of presumed geopolitical bias. Your preliminary recommendations are uncontroversial, I think, and I find your proposed sanction with respect to territorial behavior interesting. I'm not sure, though, whether it is easily enforceable, because administrators would need to evaluate the content of each contested edit individually. Also, editors behaving in this way can be assumed to edit non-neutrally in other respects with regard to their favored group, as well. Might it be easier to just issue brief topic bans to editors that exhibit territorial behavior (i.e., consistently adding/removing contested names, spelling variants, categories etc)? In this case, we may also need to outline the general concept in some guideline related to WP:NPOV. Sandstein 05:33, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

With respect to admins evaluating content, that already happens, for example, an article about a pop singer would not normally fall under this case, but would if the editors were fighting about his or her nationality. We already know that editors in this area edit non-neutrally with respect to ethnic and cultural divisions. We don't normally sanction people for having an ethno-cultural POV, but for bad editing behavior in connection with that POV (edit warring, ignoring consensus, dismissing otherwise acceptable sources, personal attacks, etc.) I'm struck by the seemingly large number of disputes that involve article leads and categories. The question for me is whether this would avoid some disputes or merely shift their location to the body of the article. I think it's worth a time-limited test. Insterested in further admin input. Thatcher 11:01, 26 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think the territorial behaviour sanction is too easily gamed. The others seem fine. Stifle (talk) 11:53, 30 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

With a heartfelt apology for the delay, I will not be following up on this. I agree that a narrow sanction applying to ledes and categories is easily gamed, and will only divert the problem to elsewhere in the article. I recommend cautions and warnings all around, making sure all the required paperwork is completed in the event that additional sanctions are required in the future. Thatcher 14:18, 7 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Greg L

This issue arose at the village pump (see thread) and I'm bringing this here now before somebody else does, mostly because (while the lameness factor is mystifying) I think I see an easy way out of this dispute:

Per Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Date delinking#Greg L restricted:

15) Greg L (…) is subject to an editing restriction for 12 months. Greg L is prohibited from reversion of changes which are principally stylistic, except where all style elements are prescribed in the applicable style guideline.

Passed 12 to 0 (with 1 abstention) at 18:56, 14 June 2009 (UTC).

I believe this revert is principally stylistic, and not prescribed by any entity other than himself (see Talk:Kilogram: "It makes the articles look better and any editor worth his salt can easily comprehend why they are there").

While I'm sure no true Scotsman would doubt him, Greg's version contains partially overlapping (i.e. improperly nested) element tags, whereas the most applicable style guideline I can find says that documents should be well formed.

The software (and html-tidy extension etc.) does clean up bad code like this, e.g.:

<b>whoever wrote <i>this</b> ought to be shot</i>

→

<b>whoever wrote <i>this</i></b><i> ought to be shot</i>

This ensures a properly parseable tree of elements, but one should avoid over-relying on post-save corrections as they tend to reinforce bad habits and leave mirror/fork projects complaining when database dumps contain articles and templates with mostly invalid html.

I'm sure exactly what Greg is even trying to do here anyway. The extra 0.1em of space is barely visible at normal font-sizes (and I could personally not care less provided they all look the same), but clearly the correct place for it would be in MediaWiki:Common.css:

sup.reference {
    font-weight: normal;
    font-style: normal;
+   margin-left:0.1em;
    }

I think that would make everyone happy here, but personally I'd suggest using the same margin on the right side too. — CharlotteWebb 12:20, 3 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

User blocked for 24 hour in enforcement of the arbitral editing restriction: no Wikipedia style guideline prescribes the use of "span" tags. The discussion on the merits about how to format such text should take place elsewhere. Sandstein 13:01, 3 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Ah, well… back to the drawing board. I was hoping that wouldn't be necessary. — CharlotteWebb 13:13, 3 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Aargh! It has been correctly pointed out to me on my talk page that the edit at issue was made prior to the arbitration sanction and cannot therefore be grounds for a block. I apologise to Greg L and have undone the block. I'll be more careful in the future, waiting for the user whose conduct is contested to comment prior to taking enforcement action. And Charlotte Webb, please be more careful also. Sandstein 13:26, 3 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Since being unblocked, Greg L has reverted a stylistic change to that same article, Kilogram. See [72][73] According to this he may be intending to appeal. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 21:36, 3 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That is regrettable. Unless somebody can show that this "font color" tag is somehow mandated by a style guideline, I guess we will have to re-block him now. Sandstein 23:04, 3 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I am an active editor on Fuzzball (string theory) and Kilogram. I am making edits all the time on those articles that involve font color, span gaps, typestyle, the linking and de-linking of words. What in the world does “…except where all style elements are prescribed in the applicable style guideline” mean? CharlotteWebb had to go back through thousands of edits to find an example of where I reverted someone well over a year ago because he/she doesn’t like to see CSS used in Wikipedia’s articles.
Does this mean that if I italicize some text to set it off for emphasis, that unless there is some style guide somewhere that says doing so is “prescribed”, then all editor have to do to jerk my chain is change what I’ve been writing and I can’t even oppose it? I might as well as walk away from Wikipedia; I author articles, I’m not a wikignome where I just make spelling corrections on text that is in roman-only font style. What if I link something? If someone goes in and links some totally trivial word in Fuzzball (string theory), such as “mist” in this sentence:
“Whereas the event horizon of a classic black hole is thought to be very well defined and distinct, Mathur and Lunin further calculated that the event horizon of a fuzzball should be very much like a mist: fuzzy, hence the name ‘fuzzball.’ ”
…I can’t change it back? That would be a style change, would it not? Is that the ball and chain on my leg? I can author these articles in which I am the major contributor but if anyone comes in and changes it, I can’t undo that change if it can be argued that was stylistic and isn’t “prescribed” (whatever the heck that means), like a 0.2 em gap to keep a refnote tag from colliding with adjacent italicized text? Just give me the word. For if I am so encumbered, I will not edit anymore on Wikipedia. Greg L (talk) 01:47, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
P.S. The “reverting” you mention that I did on Kilogram might well be some sort of trap someone set up for me. That editor didn’t change all the links that refer to the glossary; only four of them (that edit here) and left the vast majority (there are 24 in the article) in place. Go count them in the article and see for yourself. What a way to kludge up a nice article. So if someone goes in and does an incomplete change in an article like this, I can’t undo it; I just leave the article screwed up? Are you serious? This is the limitation on me; just stand back and watch editors muck things up with incomplete hacks? Greg L (talk) 02:01, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
P.P.S. I’ll be e-mailing an appeal in the next 24 hours formally asking for an adjustment to my restrictions. Please advise where I am supposed to send it. Greg L (talk) 02:40, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You can either post it on this page (see appeals section above), or if you prefer to e-mail it, send it to the ArbCom mailing list (if you send it to any arbitrator, such as me, he or she will forward to the rest of the list on request). Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:45, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Newyorkbrad. I will e-mail it to you or one of the others. Greg L (talk) 02:58, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I was hoping not to see arbitrary knee jerks like what was provoked by Charlotte's post here which does great damage to her honest intentions and her credibility as well as those of the admin who leapt up and blocked Greg. It appears to me that the edit concerned should not be considered a 'stylistic' edit. Closing the html tags is a technical matter. What is of greater concern is that it seems to have set Jayvdb off on a witch-hunt of Greg's actions, choosing an an incident which could be viewed as vandalism of article where Greg is the foremost contributor, whiffs of entrapment. I wonder if my defense of Greg here will set off accusation that I am in breach of participating in a discussion on stylistic matter? :-) Ohconfucius (talk) 03:10, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I looked at this article because Greg L emailed me and asked me to look at the CharlotteWebb initiated situation above. I looked at the edit history of the article while trying to understand the issue and how a 18 month old diff ended up being used for a block. While looking at the article history it is impossible to miss the fact that the most recent edit, after the block had expired, was by Greg L and appeared to fall within the remedy. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 00:36, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have to wonder about Charlotte’s move. She managed to induce Sanderstein to block, and he (tried to) undo the block after Ryan pointed out that I did that edit in March. Umm… not precisely; I did that edit in March 2008. Charlotte had to wade through some 600 edits to dredge up just the right edit (a reversion—not a simple addition that would be permissible—on a technique she disapproves of). And that technique(?): the use of Cascading Style Sheets, which is a character-spacing technique that the developers ensured is supported by Wikipedia’s server engine for a reason and is also used in templates such as the {{val}} template. I used it to move some crowded text, which can occur when footnote tags follow italicized text.
Then Jayvdb makes style-only changes to just 4 of 24 links that share a common property in the article, leaving me with awkward choice.
What Charlotte and Jayvdb did—whether by innocent mistake or cunning—amounts in the end to just so much wikidrama and wastes everyone’s time. I have a sprinkler system I’ve been installing and had been hoping to get outside today to work on it early when it was cool. Instead, I spent the whole morning responding to this sort of stuff. I find this whole day’s Wikipedia experience to be distasteful. I never pull childish stunts and always try to edit in good faith. I certainly don’t like being like an ape in a cage at the zoo for all the neighborhood kids to bang their sticks on the cage’s bars for their jollies. Greg L (talk) 05:51, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
"Then Jayvdb makes style-only changes to.." is wrong! I did not touch the article. You reverted another editor, not me. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 00:29, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Greg L, at the time you made this revert, you were the subject of a Committee decision reading: "Greg L is prohibited from reversion of changes which are principally stylistic, except where all style elements are prescribed in the applicable style guideline." In my determination, the revert at issue was principally stylistic, because all it did was to change the colour of some words. To my knowledge, no Wikipedia style knowledge prescribes the use of such colour. You have not, in your comments above, contested that the revert occurred while the restriction was in force, that the revert was stylistic in nature and that it was not prescribed in an applicable style guideline. Instead, you argue that the restriction is a bad idea. However, because Arbitration Committee decisions are binding, we cannot review this restriction here on its merits, but must enforce it. Accordingly, acting under Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Date delinking#Enforcement by block, you are blocked for 48 hours. I am choosing this block duration because my previous block of 24 hours (even if mistaken and soon undone) did not deter you from violating your editing restriction.

As to whether the restriction makes sense or not, you will have to take that up with the Committee. If you allow me to provide some advice from my real-life experience with judicial authorities, it is much easier to convince such authorities to reconsider a decision if you have not previously violated it. Sandstein 06:11, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Are you sure you're not just sore that Charlotte made an ass of you, and that you're consequently taking it out on greg? Charlotte's accusation was contrived as it was, as Greg pointed out. I thought we were done with the Kafkaesque drama with User:Locke Cole being banned, but I see now that the fun and games have just started again. Could this be silly season again? Ohconfucius (talk) 09:14, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Silly me - it's 3 days until the next full moon. No wonder! Ohconfucius (talk) 09:23, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

is a question from a puzzled onlooker okay? is GregL allowed to discuss style-related stuff on article talk pages, or is that also out of bounds for him, per ArbCom's "Greg L is topic banned indefinitely from style and editing guidelines, and any related discussions" (emphasis mine)? since there are a number of editors under similar resitrictions, it seems worth clarifying whether or not they're free to discuss dubious style-related edits instead of reverting them. Sssoul (talk) 09:48, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I suppose (and hope) that "related" means "related to style and editing guidelines", not "related to style and editing": the latter would be almost equivalent to a ban from all talk pages. --A. di M. (formerly Army1987) — Deeds, not words. 14:30, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- i suppose and hope the same thing, but while observing this ArbCom matter i've supposed and hoped a lot of things that turned out to be unfounded. which is why i hope someone from ArbCom will clarify this. thanks Sssoul (talk) 20:24, 4 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
My view is that these editors should be avoiding style discussions anywhere, especially if the discussion is a divisive style issue, or a "meta" discussion. However the remedy is intended to focus on the guidelines and discussions about the guidelines, which could occur anywhere. As a result, style/editing discussions about the specifics of a single article, on its talk page or between engaged editors, are not covered by this remedy.

Perhaps another wording would be "User x is restricted from participating in change to the guidelines, and from providing unsolicited commentary and interpretation of the guidelines, but is permitted to discuss the implementation of those guidelines to articles they are working on and with users they are working with."

Like most remedies, this one is clear for the great majority of possible incidents, but there are always scenarios where it is unclear whether a remedy is applicable. Edits to WP:MOSNUM/WT:MOSNUM would almost certainly result in heavy enforcement; however initiating a useful question at Help_talk:Columns wouldn't raise anybodies eyebrow unless the question was somehow laden with barbs.

Another example of a gray area would be if Greg L participated collegiately in a useful style discussion on Talk:Kilogram, and that discussion moved to a MOS talk page for additional advice, would Greg L be restricted from continuing to discuss the issue at Talk:Kilogram? If something like that happened, I would expect the MOS talk page to mention the ongoing discussion on the Kilogram talk page, and Greg L be permitted to continue with the discussion on the Kilogram talk page. However if Greg L started using the Kilogram talk page to respond to people's comments on the MOS talk page, that would probably result in a less liberal approach to how those gray areas are handled in future.

Admins are free to interpret the remedy differently. If you want a more binding clarification from the committee, please request it at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 00:21, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oh my. I saw some peripheral reference to the formatting of the kilogram article and went and looked. The massive use of embedded spans is poor form and not in any MOS I've ever seen here; ditto the font-elements. I did a bit of remedial work on the article — removed *all* the green, for example; also fixed heading levels and was about to sort out the spans. I'll wait as it looks like there's a lot to read in this thread. Embedding excessive markup is a bad thing; the whole idea of wiki-markup is that it's supposed to be reasonably 'clean' for unsophisticated editors ('un' in a technical sense). Any such new conventions need consensus first, and MediaWiki/CSS implementations second. Cheers, Jack Merridew 13:31, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

more

I see now that Greg is blocked over this and that John's involved here, there; and John is a mentor of mine (known to some, of course). I want to say, before anyone thinks to ask, that John in no way put me up to this. I tidy code as I see it. Cheers, Jack Merridew 13:45, 5 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Clarification

Someone just left a post on talk page wondering about a detail of receiving a Sewer Cover Barnstar. I responded to him. Then, I realized that this is discussing a humorous barstar, which relates to reading date articles, which is related to date linking. Was my response to a question posed on my own talk page a violation?
Note, that I’m generally keeping myself logged out so I can visit Wikipedia for information without nagging “you’ve got mail” banners across the top and because I am busy lately in real life. So if anyone has a pressing need for further information, you might e-mail me. Greg L (talk) 02:02, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Israel-Palestine reliable-source issue

We have a problem on Israel-Palestine articles with a small number of Israeli editors removing material sourced to historian Ilan Pappe, simply because he is the source. Pappe is also Israeli, formerly with Haifa University in Israel, now a full professor of history at the University of Exeter in England. His speciality is Palestine 1947-1948, and in particular why 700,000 Palestinian-Arabs left their homes when the state of Israel was created. He is disliked among certain political groups in Israel, namely those who are strongly pro-Zionist, because he argues that Israelis engaged in the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, and because he called for an academic boycott against Israel. He has had death threats, has been accused of creating bad history by other Israeli historians, and he had to emigrate from Israel to England because of it in 2008.

Outside Israel, his views are as accepted as those of any other historian, to the best of my knowledge. He is the author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (2006), The Modern Middle East (2005), A History of Modern Palestine: One Land, Two Peoples (2003), and Britain and the Arab-Israeli Conflict (1988). It's important for us to include his research if we want our articles to be NPOV.

My question is what can be done about Wikipedians systematically removing him, as well as engaging in BLP violations as they do it, posting insults and various allegations. I requested input on the reliable sources noticeboard in May, where it was agreed by uninvolved editors that Pappe counts as a reliable source, but the removal of his material continues.

Would administrators be willing to take action in future, under the existing Israel-Palestine restrictions, against editors who continue to do this? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 16:10, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other editors

While I don't know how the poster determines who is "uninvolved", by my estimation opinion was about equally divided in that noticeboard discussion, and I am one of those who consider Pappe's views to be notable and quotable but with qualifications, as he is a highly partisan and controversial figure not only in Israel. --Goodmorningworld (talk) 20:47, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

SlimVirgin, the remedy allows sanctions against those who "fail to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process." That means we can't sanction people on account of content disagreements (such as whether or not works by this professor should be removed because they are not a reliable source, a question about which I have no opinion and which should not be discussed here on the merits). But we can sanction people who conduct themselves badly in the course of such disagreements (e.g. edit warring or repeated BLP violations). I will entertain enforcement requests (see {{Arbitration enforcement request}}) in such cases. Prior to requesting sanctions, plase make sure that the following condition of the remedy is met: "Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question shall be given a warning with a link to this decision; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines." Sandstein 22:30, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. The thing is that, for the most part, it's all done quite politely, apart from the BLP violations against Pappe. Doesn't removing reliable sources for no reason fall under failing to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia — which is to present all majority and significant-minority POVs? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:57, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thekohser

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Request concerning Thekohser

User requesting enforcement:
«l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 17:52, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested:
Thekohser (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated:
Civility Restriction Purpose of ban suspension

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it:

[74] - Thekohser making a fake mentor request with a very sarcastic complement that was clearly a down outright insult considering I've been inactive.
[75] - Thekohser canvassing for a discussion on meta of which he and I were concerned, accusing me of being "disruptive"
[76] - Thekohser canvassing for a discussion on meta of which he and I were concerned, accusing me of being "on the warpath"
[77] - Thekohser trolling me about a page (which contained my views of Thekohser running for BoT) that was deleted on meta in an attempt to provoke a response
[78] - This thread indicates that once he had obtained my name he engaged in extended off-wiki reading seeking information that may further his feuding here.
[79] - Thekohser trolling me about my field of editing (WP namespace) and lack of article creations.
[80] - Thekohser accusing me of "attempts to goad me [him] into "failing" the terms of my unblock." and indicating that he will harass me off wiki
[81] - Thekohser indicating the above mentor request "was just an attempt to make a mockery of you being a mentor" after I did all the relevant pages.
[82] - I tell Thekohser about one of his socks that he "forgot" to list (which was a term of his parole also), after doing so he replied with a cheery comment that suggested he was proud of it, found it funny, is not remorseful for his past actions and has not matured since making the account. All of which is not in the spirit of his parole. I also think that considering the account concerned was an attack against Raul654, being proud of it is the same as another slap in the face for Raul654.

Diffs of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required by the remedy):
Not applicable

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction):
Block and / or reinstatement of Community Ban

Additional comments by «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk):
The background of this request is that I made a page with my views and justification before removing Thekohser's BoT candidacy leaving an edit summary inviting him to revert me if he still thought he was an applicable candidate given the damaging evidence that was compiled. Given that the BoT election is a private vote (which i was not aware of), said page was deleted and Thekohs restored his vote. All of the prior occured on meta. For some reason however Thekhos started trolling and harrasing me here after the incident was WP:STICK. Whilst he appears to make an apology for all the above, I feel that he did knowingly and intentionally break his civility restrictions in order to harass and toll me and that the apology (given his recent conduct) may be a ploy to avoid enforcement of his community ban. His excuse is that he "had forgotten the letter of the restrictions" because of the "new article creation, and article improvement efforts since being provisionally unblocked" [83] (which could be considered a sarcastic dig at my inactivity). Even IF he was negligent of his restrictions, it is no excuse for breaking them. It's worth noting that he alone initiated his uncivil conduct on this wiki and that he was in no way asked, encouraged or forced to move here by anyone, he chose to attempt to feud with me here.

His actions also are against the very nature of why he is has been given another chance (that being "is to help build an encyclopedia and therefore the focus of your editing is to work directly on improving Wikipedia articles."). Not only has he been editing articles in his return, but he has also been Investigating me off-wiki, Inquiring about my name, threatening to feud with me off wiki, feuding with me here, canvassing for a meta issue. One of his 2 reasons for returning was for a "degree of restoration of the earlier good reputation of my original account and my real name" [84]. He was granted this privilege based on that he accepted (and followed) the terms (that are perfectly reasonable) and it would seem he has failed to follow the two most important ones given his actions above.

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested:
The requesting user is asked to notify the user against whom this request is directed of it, and then to replace this text with a diff of that notification. The request will normally not be processed otherwise.

Discussion concerning Thekohser

Statement by Thekohser

This all began on Meta when, within a span of a few minutes, Promethean (with whom I had never engaged before) called me a "rat mole", said I was "unhealthy", and then blanked my candidacy statement for the WMF Board of Trustees. One of my best defenses is to simply let Promethean speak for himself on this page, alongside his past record of disruption. I am going to let the following links also speak in my defense:

I am here to build an encyclopedia, and maybe enjoy a few good-natured chuckles along the way. If folks would just let me be, I will get back to that. -- Thekohser 02:28, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other editors

Good Lord. Promethean disrupted the WMF election process and engaged in vicious and often baseless attacks against Thekohser on Meta. Thekohser, as is his wont, responded by lowering himself some distance—though certainly not all the way—towards his assailant. Thekohser ranks at best second on the list of editors meriting sanctions here. Steve Smith (talk) (formerly Sarcasticidealist) 18:17, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This isn't ANI, and the only one under AE restrictions here is Thekohser. Regardless of what one thinks of Promethean's actions on Meta, the only thing that is at issue here is Thekohser on enwiki. -->David Shankbone 18:23, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Oh, agreed that Prom can't be sanctioned here on the basis of an Arb Comm ruling. I just thought that i. some context on thekohser's actions (which I don't really think constitute actionable invility even absent context) would be helpful, and ii. any uninvolved admin reading this might like to examine the possibility of sanctioning Prom on a basis other than an Arb Comm ruling. Steve Smith (talk) (formerly Sarcasticidealist) 18:27, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - Editors can be, and are occasionally, sanctioned for disrupting this board with a frivolous or bad faith requests. Jehochman ^Talk 02:41, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

With all due respect Steve, I have done nothing wrong here. My actions on meta, as bold as they were, were reverted shortly after and there was no issue. I admit I was ill informed, I thought the BoT election was one where you could provide justification for your vote, hence why I took some time to prepare my justification for my pending oppose on Thekohser. However the issue at hand is that Thekohser knowingly engaged in trolling and feuding with me here after the incident. And these "vicious and often baseless" (but not always) attacks you speak of, can you provide diffs? If not I wish to request that you strike that remark as it may be considered provocative without basis. Secondly The page on meta that you may be referring to, which contained the facts and diffs I had accumulated about Thekohser's conduct towards the WMF over recent years could not have been as vicious and baseless as you make out, otherwise A steward would not have so gladly given me a copy would they? Also, any administrator my examine my conduct here all they wish, I have nothing to hide «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 18:36, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Can I provide diffs of your attacks? No, because, as you just said, your attack page was deleted. And even if you thought that you were able to provide justifications for your votes (which you can, actually, as lots of editors have done in userspace subpages *without* resorting to baseless attacks), in what world do you live that you think you can unilaterally remove candidates who you don't find credible? Though I am struggling to, I can't find much explanation for your actions that doesn't involve some combination of the following: i. you don't like Thekohser, ii. you know that Thekohser often responds to immaturity in kind, iii. you knew that Thekohser was on a civility parole, iv. you hypothesized that if you behaved immaturely towards Thekohser it would result in him breaking his civility parole and being banned. Steve Smith (talk) (formerly Sarcasticidealist) 18:41, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

So the only "attack" you accuse me of is making a page that contained reasons not to vote the thekohster and my personal opinions drawn from the facts gathered, (which was deleted as out of project scope) that was later provided to me by a steward? I'm sorry but I'm finding your understanding of the situation mis-informed. I can also provide quotes from stewards where they say questions are allowed but pages that attempt to influence people to vote either way are not, so your view is contradictory to meta admins/stewards (if you want them feel free to ask.). Until today I had never even heard of Thekohser, know who he is, know what he is like nor know he was on civility parole, nor did I hypothesize anything as for it was he who came to the English Wikipedia to peruse initiate in an attempt to troll and feud. I think you need to consider WP:AGF again, mentioning the policy is no excuse for not following it. Also as innocently misinformed as I think you are, I don't think you rank first for sanctions ;-) _{(in response to "Thekohser ranks at best second on the list of editors meriting sanctions here")} «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 19:12, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Editors with civility restrictions placed upon them should not have those restrictions enforced if they are baited. Wasn't there a recent ruling, or perhaps it was only a proposal, stating that if an editor baits another who is under restrictions, whatever enforcements would normally be made against the restricted are made against the one baiting? لenna vecia 18:46, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I find it amusing that there was an assumption that he was "baited" by me which has yet to be established. What can be said for sure is that I made a page with the facts i had obtained which would have effectively shot down Thekohser's likelihood of being elected and I made a very bold move in removing his nomination asking him to restore it if he still thought that he was a suitable candidate. Said action I now see was a violation of his moral rights and I do apologize for that. However the problem is that Thekohser came to the English Wikipedia and started trolling me on my talk page after making a thread on the meta's admin board which saw said page deleted as being out of project scope and the issue resolved. I was more than accomodating for Thekohser's trolling at first, assuming good faith on numerous occasions. But the fact of the whole thing is that his terms of parole cover both initializing and retaliatory feuding, the first is the one of which I claim he engaged in. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 19:04, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Whatever rulings have been passed are beside-the-point when a restriction for coming back was agreed upon that "You may not engage – in either an initiatory or retaliatory capacity – in any form of feuding, quarreling or personal attack." Thekohser already admitted he violated this, and when he did so, he continued the feud ("make a mockery of you being a mentor"). Really, it's the arbitration ruling that is being made a mockery of here. -->David Shankbone 19:28, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Who's trolling who here?

16:22, 9 July 2009: Promethean "assume[s] that Thekohser just withdrew" from board elections.

16:32, 9 July 2009: Promethean's page of criticisms of Thekohser is deleted; obviously it was created some time before then.

20:45, 9 July 2009: Earliest time of "Diffs of edits" of Thekohser's behavior provided by Promethean above.

207.34.229.126 (talk) 19:32, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Everything you have posted is already known. But your layout does show that my vote justification page and bold action occurred on meta, was reverted and the page removed as out of project scope because they don't allow vote justification pages for BoT elections like they do on steward elections (can provide a quote if you want it). Then over 4 hours later Thekohser comes on to EN Wikipedia, after everything was resolved on meta and chose to start trolling me continuously. I'll read term 3 again "Civility restriction: You may not engage – in either an initiatory or retaliatory capacity – in any form of feuding, quarreling or personal attack." «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:01, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have the full picture, but I know everything could not have been resolved on meta by 16:32, 9 July 2009. See my second link which also shows that your "vote justification" page was deleted a 2nd time at 06:18, 10 July 2009. 207.34.229.126 (talk) 20:11, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The first time it was deleted was by my explicit request. The second time it was deleted was because Spacebirdy felt that the page was out of project scope as such pages are not allowed for the BoT election (I thought they were because they normally are in the Steward election). Whilst thekohser may have initated trolling here by then (I haven't checked times), I can be sure that he continued to troll after the issue was resolved. Its worth looking at the key factors, those being are that even If I was wrong with my action on meta, two wrongs don't make a right. He chose to come on the english wikipedia and explicitly started attempts to feud with me and lastly the terms specify that he is not allowed to engage in feuding of any kind wether initaltory or retalitory. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:26, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This request by Promethean for sanctions was made after and in response to an apology by Thekohser as can be seen by the dates.

I apologize for the spiteful comment above. I think it would be best if I politely withdraw my request for mentorship, since that was just an attempt to make a mockery of you being a mentor. Apologies for that, too. -- Thekohser 17:06, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I half expected this, I was willing to assume good faith however you yourself have admitted to what constitutes feuding, apologies or not. I'm afraid that in the interest of Wikipedia this will likely be referred to the Arbitration Committee for enforcement of the terms of your parole. I wish it didn't come to this but I'm afraid that it is unreasonable for me to bend over backwards for someone who isn't willing to change their conduct. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 17:19, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

144.189.100.25 (talk) 19:58, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Then there has been an apology, yes? Anything since then? Post dif. KillerChihuahua^?!?Advice 20:31, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes there has been an apology that was without doubt prompted by another user informing him that he was walking a fine line. However I feel the apology was 100% planned to avoid AE, Seeing as he has taken advantage of my GF on multiple occasions. I also note that an apology is not the designated editing restriction for breaking the terms of his parole «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:44, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This request was impending at the time of the quote above. It however provided me with the proof that he knowingly was feuding with me. Thekohsers apology (imo) bundled with the admitting of the attempted mockery (which was insulting in itself) was an attempt to avoid foreseeable arbitration enforcement and was not meaningful. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:15, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

25 minutes before the apology, you had this to say [[85]]: "The incident mentioned that occurred on meta has been laid to rest at last so that is no further need for discussion on that forum. I don't feel that Gregory has made any attempt to be uncivil to me" and now you claim that in fact you had an arbitration enforcement request impending (if impending can be used as a verb)? 144.189.100.25 (talk) 20:30, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

At the time I (thought) was his mentor, it would not have been fair for me to action an AE and not give him the opportunity to reprieve. However given that the hole thing was a time wasting ploy that took advantage of my GF I decided to take action accordingly. Its noteworthy that I did have some suspicion that he was taking me for a ride which is why I said an AE was impending, but at the time i was assuming good faith. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:42, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This looks a lot like standing around waiting for someone to fail and poking them with a stick just in case. Promethean ought to seriously consider refraining from any interaction with Thekohser . Shell ^babelfish 20:20, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. I'm not sure I agree with Jennavecia that baiting is a defense, but baiting is certainly wrong. KillerChihuahua^?!?Advice 20:31, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that baiting is wrong, however no one has established (or even accused me of) that I baited him into coming on to the English Wikipedia,to ask me to adopt him, declare that is was an attempt to mock me and then in the last act accuse me of scheming the whole thing up. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:42, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please don't pretend that your interactions with an editor on meta will somehow magically not affect your interactions with them on other wikis. Your actions on meta precipitated the response which has since been apologized for. Chalk it up to a lesson learned and seriously consider that your actions in regard to this editor may be a bit skewed. Shell ^babelfish 21:30, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, My interactions on meta with this particular user were a meta dispute subject to meta rules, whereas his actions here are an en wiki dispute subject to en wiki rules and restrictions thus I'm forced to action it here. Furthermore, my activities on Meta did not warrant the malicious cross-wiki trolling that soon followed. There is no chalk board here, what we do have is clear cut evidence that Thekohser behaved to an extent where intervention is required. He is currently subject to civility parole. His civility parole says that if he feuds (whether initiatory or retaliatory) than he is in contravention of his civility parole. If he is in contravention of his civility parole than the Ban should be reinstated. Please don't pretend just because 2 users have a scuffle on wiki that it completely justifies any over the top retaliation on another wiki, which is what your suggesting. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 21:51, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Its possible that I'm not coming across all that clearly, so I'll give it another stab. When I look at the interactions, I see an obvious bias by yourself when dealing with this other editor. I see some incidents on meta that I wouldn't be proud of and I see a predictable response. I see that the other editor has disengaged and even apologized while you seem to be winding yourself up more and feel the need to respond to every comment in this report.

This could all be one big misunderstanding where both sides didn't handle things well or given the other editor is just barely off a ban, this could be intended to bring that ban back by triggering poor responses. I'm trying to assume the first, but the wikilawyering ("but that was meta!") and disincination to understand your part in the conflict ("he's subject to parole, I'm not") is making it difficult. If you place your hand in a fire and then get angry with the fire when it hurts, others would be right to question your behavior. I am distinctly uncomfortable with the idea of engaging sanctions against someone who was provoked, especially a sanction requested after they managed to get a hold of themselves and drop the issue. Shell ^babelfish 22:12, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Given that he has threatened to take the feuding elsewhere (off en wiki) in one is his edits leading up to the apology, and he has not retracted this remark or provided any reassurance that he won't, I feel my pursuing this to the grave is but human nature. Perhaps if the fore mentioned situation changed I would consider letting "bygones be bygones" so to speak. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 22:35, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ok - makes sense, I certainly wouldn't want to see this dropped here just to get picked up somewhere else. Lets ask and make sure he meant he would drop this completely (including anything off wiki). Shell ^babelfish 22:59, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, Thekohser interacted with me here first in an attempt to feud and he has also revealed that he has plans to continue feuding with me else where to avoid sanctions. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:27, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

WTH is that, "he touched me first, mommy! smack him!"? Seriously. KillerChihuahua^?!?Advice 20:31, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No, Its a "this person went out of there way to break their restrictions and then threaten more feuding elsewhere even though I initiated no harm here" - I agree we should not associate except where necessary, but that doesn't excuse his conduct or assure me (or anyone else) he wont do it again here or elsewhere. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 20:42, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Procedural query: Promethean, the section you link to is not a sanction or remedy arising from an arbitration case. It also does not provide any authority for its enforcement, except that the ArbCom "may reinstate the community ban at any time". Could you please explain why you believe that administrators on this board (as opposed to the ArbCom) have any particular authority to take action in this case? Sandstein 22:34, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It would seem that you are correct, and that an "simple majority in a motion" by arbcom would be required to reinstate the ban. For the time being it would seem that the thread may as well stay here as it seems to be nearing a more desirable solution than that. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 22:41, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Promethean, you need to give the appearance of being a grown up. Your actions recently give a somewhat different appearance, at least to this observer. There really isn't much more to say here unless you keep pushing, in which case I think the sanctions that need applying are to you rather than to TheKohser. Baiting shouldn't be rewarded. ++Lar: t/c 23:15, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Lar, I can't comment on what happened at Meta b/c I didn't see that page, I think you are incorrect about the baiting part. The ArbCom decision foresaw "baiting" b/c quite a few people would prefer he not be here. That's why they wrote the civility provision specifying retaliation. Greg needs to always be the bigger man. Promethean isn't part of some legacy anti-MyWikiBiz feud - neither of them knew each other before yesterday. I think Promethean has taken this one incident too far, but on the other hand, Greg is a well-known limit-pusher and took it off Meta and over here. Greg was welcomed back to improve the encyclopedia. So early out of the gate and he's feuding with an 18-year-old editor and crowing about his socks that have long been a source of community distrust. I'd say Greg, when he invited the mentorship and started talking about the Meta feud, baited Promethean, who saw the opportunity to play it up because Greg is so easily goaded into this ridiculousness. So, no cause to reinstate the ban, but cause for someone from ArbCom to say this is fair warning there's no tolerance for it and please stop. -->David Shankbone 23:42, 10 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't looked into Promethean's allegations, but I can report simialr behavior. I participated in a discussion about content created by Thekohser during or prior to his ban (a thread started by an ArbCom member), and he was very adversarial. He demanded a list of articles that I had created, and then followed that list to tag one of the pages of which I was the sole contributor (a subpage which was mistakenly in mainspace)[86] and argued that I was guilty of plagiarism when I split another article.[87] He kept insisting that I act on some obscure issue from 18 months ago.[88] He was required by the ArbCom to list all of this socks accounts, and he omitted an IP that he'd used repeatedly to circumvent his ban. When I reminded him of it he left a bad faith comment.[89] In addition, he's made remarks that are borderline uncivil. He seems to be operating with a large chip on his shoulder. I don't think any enforcement is needed, but he should make sure he really wants to be here and is willing to behave in line with community norms and the ArbCom's conditions. 00:27, 11 July 2009 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Will Beback (talk • contribs) [reply]

Greg was given a fresh start. I don't think it is helpful to talk about old behavior. Can anybody provide a concise list of fresh diffs that violate the civility restriction? Jehochman ^Talk 02:41, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Jehochman, that comment makes no sense. Will's diffs are dated July 6, and this entire issue that Promethean heavily documented in diffs occurred today. Is your recommendation below informed if you are asking for "fresh diffs"? -->David Shankbone 03:01, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I stopped considering Will's comment when he started complaining about pre-ban behavior. As others have commented, there are diffs, but these don't show sanctionable incivility, and Sandstein is correct that the ArbCom did not provide us with an enforcement provision. What does stand out is Promethean's incivility and attempts to start battles. Jehochman ^Talk 10:53, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

J - what pre-ban behavior are you talking about? The matters I posted about have all been within the last week. Will Beback talk 11:02, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"there are diffs, but these don't show sanctionable incivility" - Its not incivility were looking at here Jehochman, what we are looking at however is that said user was feuding. As I have stated several times before, You don't need to be overly incivil to feud. Jehochman, please AGF also, I don't dream up ways to start battles as flippantly as you are suggesting and please show me a diff where I have been "incivil", Otherwise retract your value judgment that has no place on an AE thread about Thekohser (not me). «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 12:08, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why is it every time I see Jehochman, logic just flies out the window? Your clearly misinformed as well, He has not given a fresh start, rather his ban was suspended providing he follow terms that the quite blatantly breached as seen in The "fresh diffs" that are at the top of the page where they have always been. Any allegation of baiting is preposterous, unproven and is based completly on the fact that I made a page on meta that Thekohser didn't like because it shot down his election attempt, so he then comes on en wiki and trolls. The incidents at hand occurred on en wiki. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 03:19, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Promethean, when you say " Any allegation of baiting is preposterous, unproven and is based completly on the fact that I made a page on meta that Thekohser didn't like because it shot down his election attempt" you may have forgotten that your very first interaction with Greg was to remove his candidate entry from the [90] 2009 Wiki Board elections page with the comment: "I'm going to assume that Thekohser just withdrew per User:Promethean/ElectionVotes/Thekohser, Thekohser can of course revert if im wrong :-)" Am I mistaken? Uncle uncle uncle 04:47, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I made the page and did that bold edit yes, but to imply I did it in a bid to coax him onto en wiki to feud with me because I was in someway aware of his editing restrictions is preposterous and an assumption of BF. All the aforementioned Greg did on his own accord, knowingly and willfully breaking his editing restrictions. The "you poked me here so Im going to poke you there" excuse doesn't stick, as his editing restriction covers any retaliatory feuding as well. «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 08:32, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

@ Sandstien: You don't have to be uncivil to feud with someone, in this case his edits were both. What is well established is that Thekohser, for reasons most likely related to the meta incident, retaliated on en wiki (at his own choice) in a manner by wasting my time, attempting to make a mockery of me and last but not least engaged in extended reading about my off-wiki life. All of which shows he came here to feud, in direct contravention of term 3 of his parole which covers initiatory and retaliatory actions (effectively any type of feuding) «l| ?romethean ™|l» (talk) 08:40, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Thekohser

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

Are we enforcing behavioral issues (hypothetically speaking) that occur on Meta at EnWiki? Shouldn't behavior issues there be reported there, or am I wrong? Baiting an editor under civility restriction and then reporting them is manifest bad faith. I would be inclined to sanction such behavior as a simple administrative action (not arbitration enforcement). If Greg has been instructed by ArbCom not to take the bait, and he has, I think he should be reminded once, especially if his response was moderate. What say others? Jehochman ^Talk 02:35, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Whatever the merits of these edits by Thekohser (and most' don't strike me as especially uncivil), I believe this is not a matter for arbitration enforcement, as opined above. If necessary, the Arbitration Committee can be petitioned to reinstate the ban, but we here at AE can't. I intend to close this thread soon unless other admins disagree. Sandstein 07:13, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Promethean informed me about this case.[91] After analyzing the case for about 10 minutes, I've to agree with Sandstein. This isn't a matter of arbitration enforcement; this thread should be closed. AdjustShift (talk) 12:46, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Closed without action. Not a matter for arbitration enforcement. Please direct any concerns to the Arbitration Committee. Sandstein 18:15, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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.

Radeksz

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Request concerning Radeksz

User requesting enforcement:
Skäpperöd (talk) 12:59, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested:
Radeksz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated:
Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren#Discretionary sanctions

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it:

[92] Radeksz is accusing me of being "disruptive". I asked him to remove that [93] but he underlined that he meant it [94]
[95] Radeksz is accusing me of "forum shopping" and "inappropriate canvassing" and calls others to send me messages that I stop my alleged canvassing.

Diffs of prior warnings against the conduct objected to (if required by the remedy):

[96] Warning by Thatcher (talk · contribs)

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction):
that the accusations against me be removed/stricken from WP:RS/N and Talk:Kołobrzeg, that Radeksz stop ABF on my part, and if he cannot, that a mediator be appointed or Radeksz stay away from me.

Additional comments by Skäpperöd (talk):

Background: My trouble with Radeksz started after this case was closed and Radeksz started to show interest in articles I just edited. One of these articles was Kołobrzeg, the result is summed up here
"Disruption": I removed a paragraph that was sourced to a website contradicting the scholary sources in the article following an advise from the RSN and linked the respective thread in the edit summary [97]. Radeksz had followed that thread [98].
Background "forum shopping": It is true that there was a heated debate whether towns' websites are reliable sources at the RSN in early December 2008. This debate did, contrary to Radeksz' assumption, not have a clearcut outcome. The three diffs Radeksz provided in his "forum shopping" accusations are all from the same debate, though in different threads: [99] [100] [101] (all threads are from 6 December and are follow-ups: The first one was concerned with a specific issue, the second one if there is a general stance, and the third one if towns' websites should be allowed as a temporary solution). The RSN-thread where Radeksz accused me of forum shopping is concerned with getting an outside oppinion for the Kolobrzeg article and is of 8 July 2009 [102]. Though the December and July threads have related issues, there is no way to describe this as "forum shopping".

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested:
[103]

Discussion concerning Radeksz

Statement by Radeksz

Oh Wow. I am really speechless at the brazenness of this. I've never seen an AE report filed on such flimsiest of reasons, and I've seen some pretty darn flimsy ones.

Ok. I've had Kolobrzeg on my watchlist since time immemorial. Same for the other articles. In early June Skapperod launched a total rewrite of these articles without discussing anything on the talk page first. I can't read his mind so I don't know if it had anything to do with the Molobo case but I can see how he thought that once he got Molobo out of the way he should have a free hand in rewriting these articles to his liking. Not surprisingly many other editors objected which led to Skapperod violating 3RR on that article ([104], [105], [106], [107]. He also came close to violating 3RR on the previous day. All without discussion - though note there was discussion at other articles that roughly covered the same ground)

More recently (yesterday) Skapperod removed a whole paragraph from the article, again without any talk discussion. He claimed that the removal was supported by RSN. It isn't - just one example out of many is Blueboar tellking Skapperod that "Since town websites are published by the towns... they can be used in articles or sections about the town... so long as they meet the qualifying criteria" [108] (quick look at the links provided at Kolobrzeg's talk page reveals more of the same). Skapperod is clearly misrepresenting the discussion at RSN here. Just like in his "spawning" of other discussions he tried to misrepresent previous discussion and got called on it [109] (same diff, top of section).

In fact it is not true that "scholarly sources" contradict the town's website - there was a slight difference (probably due simply to someone's typo) which I fixed since. Using that as an excuse to get rid of a whole paragraph is ... well, disruptive.

As Skapperod himself admits, he had previously asked the same question on three different occasions at the RSN. Each time the discussion didn't quite go the way he wanted it and even outside, non involved editors disagreed with him. So here [110], he asked it yet again hoping to get the "right" answer. As far as I know this is the definition of forum shopping - asking the same question over and over again in hope of of getting the answer one wants. The fact that previously the 3 discussions were in 3 different threads shouldn't matter - it's still re-asking the question of other people with a view of getting a different answer. If I am wrong in my understanding of what forum shopping is then I'd be happy to listen to someone explain it to me. In fact Skapperod himself could have explained on the article's talk page why his action were not forum shopping rather than almost immediately filing this report.

Look at the timing here. Skapperod asks his question (for the 4th time) on RSN. Awhile later he receives one, somewhat supportive comment. Almost immediately (again), without waiting for further comments, he uses that one comment to delete stuff from the article. It basically looks like Skapperod KNEW that if the discussion was to develop, he'd be told the same thing as before so he chose to act on a single comment and claim "support" from RSN. Why not wait for others to comment? Why not, in fact, talk about it on the article's talk page? Why file a report so quickly rather than simply stating why he wasn't in fact forum shopping? This is basically equivalent (though on a smaller scale) to deleting an article at AfD after a single "Delete" vote, or moving an article at RfM after a single "Move" vote, or going through with changes after an RfC after a single supportive comment. That kind of manipulating of how things are done - and Wikipedia works through discussion and consensus, which is sorely lacking here - combined with removal of a whole referenced paragraph (again, w/o discussion), looks disruptive to me.

This is the basic "throw everything at them and hope something sticks" strategy which involves filing baseless and spurious reports here at AE to generate controversy and hope for a sympathetic, inexperienced admin to come around and rule in favor. Then months later, on yet another spurious report it can be claimed that the editor has been involved in "controversy".

I'm not sure what "staying away from Skapperod" would mean - we edit a LOT of the same articles and this appears to be an excuse to "clear away" another Polish editor that disagrees with him so he can proceed with his version of these articles. And on the weakest of pretext. Again, there's no reason here why Skapperod cannot, like every other editor is expected to on Wiki, explain himself on Kolobrzeg's talk page, discuss his edits, accept the consensus of editors on RSN and not repeat the same question many times - this is all part of the Wikipedia process. Why not "stay away from Radek"? Or is there some reasons why Skapperod has ownership of articles on Polish cities and towns?

Hasn't the AE had it's fill of questionable AE reports as of late? Shouldn't the admins here be given a bit of a rest?radek (talk) 16:04, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Response to Skapperod

"For me, being called a disruptive forum shopper is not much different to being called a little shit." - and for me having a spurious AE report filed on myself is not much different then you breaking into my house in the middle of the night and stealing my dog. Come on! We can make stuff up all day long and act mutually offended over every word. More completely tenuous connections, and unnecessary drama. Gimme back my dog!radek (talk) 11:42, 12 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by other editors

Skaperod's request should be dismissed, and he should be adviced to stop with these continuous silly complains against Polish editors. As for the Kołobrzeg article the biggest problem seems to be that Skapperod is trying to force a German POV on a Polish city: for example I went to count, out of the 37 References listed, 28 are German. When Radeksz wanted instert something from the Polish Webpage of the city Skaperod immediately started to make huge drama. It's ridiculous. Loosmark (talk) 13:31, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Radeksz by Skäpperöd

In addition to the "Addtional comments" in the request section:

The revision history of Kolobrzeg [111] shows: It's not like I had a conflict with Molobo there before, or that I started editing only when Molobo was blocked. It's not like Radeksz or anyone else who showed up on 6 June and thereafter had edited the article during the last years. Same for Police (town), Poland [112].
The RSN thread got one response the same day I filed it, and no further response until I removed the statement two days later - neither "immediately" nor out of evil motives.
The contradiction is not a "typo". If the website says the town dates back to the 5th and 6th centuries, and scholars - Polish and German - agree that the area wasn't even settled then and that the predecessor of the town was built only in the 9th century, and that the actual town in question was founded some kilometers away in the 13th century - that is pretty contradicting. Skäpperöd (talk) 19:01, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Response to Sandstein by Skäpperöd

Are you really saying that removing a statement two days after a positive reponse at RSN justifies to be called "disruptive" in mainspace, and that if a question at RS in part resembles a question that was asked 8 month before without a definite answer justifies to be called "forum shopping" and a call to send me messages to stop it? For me, being called a disruptive forum shopper is not much different to being called a little shit. This is not about a content dispute (Radeksz did not add any content to the article) or a nationality issue, and the amount of bad faith spread here indicates that something needs to change. I am not asking for an indef ban here, not even for a block. Skäpperöd (talk) 19:29, 11 July 2009 (UTC) On a second thought, you are probably right that this thread just furthers the mudslinging instead of preventing it. Skäpperöd (talk) 05:18, 12 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Reply to Skäpperöd

Radek said that removing text without discussing and with a lame excuse can be seen as disruptive. In no way can that be compared to calling somebody little shit which is a direct verbal abuse, so Skapperod please stop making drama, discuss the article on its talk page and work together with Radek on its improvement. Loosmark (talk) 21:58, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Radeksz

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

This looks like a misuse of WP:AE in order to win the upper hand in a content dispute. The edits cited in the request are not objectionable; rather, they reflect routine disagreements about content. In particular, it is not disruptive to state one's opinion that "Removing a large chunk of text without discussing it first is generally seen as "disruptive"". Unless other administrators disagree, I will close this thread with a warning to Skäpperöd that AE is not a substitute for, or part of, proper dispute resolution, and that he may face sanctions if he files more unfounded enforcement requests. Sandstein 18:23, 11 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am in complete agreement with your reading of the situation Sandstein. Shell ^babelfish 11:53, 12 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No action. Skäpperöd is warned not to file more unfounded requests. Sandstein 16:30, 12 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

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.

[1] The administrator may indicate consent at any time before, during, or after imposition of the restriction.

[2] This criterion does not apply if the original action was imposed as a result of rough consensus at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard, as there would be no single enforcing administrator.

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 :I am in complete agreement with your reading of the situation Sandstein. [[User:Shell_Kinney|Shell]]   <sup>[[User_talk:Shell_Kinney|babelfish]]</sup> 11:53, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
+*'''No action.''' Skäpperöd is warned not to file more unfounded requests. <small><span style="border:1px solid black;padding:1px;">[[User:Sandstein|<font style="color:white;background:blue;font-family:sans-serif;">'''&nbsp;Sandstein&nbsp;'''</font>]]</span></small> 16:30, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
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