Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests

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Arbitration​Committee

A request for arbitration is the last step of dispute resolution for conduct disputes on Wikipedia. The Arbitration Committee considers requests to open new cases and review previous decisions. The entire process is governed by the arbitration policy. For information about requesting arbitration, and how cases are accepted and dealt with, please see guide to arbitration.

To request enforcement of previous Arbitration decisions or discretionary sanctions, please do not open a new Arbitration case. Instead, please submit your request to /Requests/Enforcement.

This page transcludes from /Case, /Clarification and Amendment, /Motions, and /Enforcement.

Please make your request in the appropriate section:

• Request a new arbitration case
• Request clarification or amendment of an existing case

  This includes requests to lift sanctions previously imposed

• Request enforcement of a remedy in an existing case
• Arbitrator motions

  Arbitrator-initiated motions, not specific to a current open request

Arbitration Committee proceedings

• recent changes
• purge this page
• view or discuss this template

Case requests

Request name	Motions	Initiated	Votes
Persistent WP:IDONTLIKEIT behavior in WP:NCROY discussions		10 May 2024	0/5/0

[edit]

Open cases

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

[edit]

Recently closed cases (Past cases)

Case name	Closed
Conflict of interest management	13 Apr 2024
Mzajac	7 May 2024

Clarification and Amendment requests

Request name	Motions	Case	Posted
Amendment request: Conduct in deletion-related editing	none	(orig. case)	30 April 2024
Clarification request: Palestine-Israel articles 4	none	(orig. case)	13 May 2024
Amendment request: Article titles and capitalisation	none	(orig. case)	13 May 2024

Arbitrator motions

No arbitrator motions are currently open.

Current requests

Aspartame_controversy

Initiated by Twoggle (talk) at 04:53, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Involved parties

• twoggle (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), filing party
• ScienceApologist (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request`

• Scienceapologist[1]

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• Formal Mediation Request (See Response to Case)
• Mediation Cabal (See Response to Case).
• Request to discuss at end of this section
• Numerous requests to discuss before deleting large sections of article -- See my revert comments
• Prior attempts with discussing massive removal/POVing of article without discussion with Editors who participated in previous consensus.
• Additional prior attempts with discussing massive removal/POVing of article without discussion with Editors who participated in previous consensus

Statement by Twoggle

On October 31, 2008, the existing consensus Aspartame_controversy article was largely replaced with a extremely POV version, without any discussion, in numerous edits by Scienceapologist[2]. [3][4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15].

I reverting a few of these edits with pleas to discuss to discuss prior to replacing a consensus article: [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] (see my comment in this section).

Requsts to discuss were met with Edit Warring rather than any attempt to discuss: [21] [22].

When attempts at discussion were ignored, I pursued mediation. Informal and Formal Mediation requests were met with both unwillingness to mediate and inappropriate editorializing on the Mediation page. Formal Mediation Request (See Response to Case) Mediation Cabal (See Response to Case).

Several pillars/rules of Wikipedia were ignored, including WP:Consensus, WP:NPOV, WP:Civility, :WP:Disruptive_editing, etc. Of particular concern is that some of the edits: [23] were made with a claim of WP:Fringe and WP:Undue while at the same time, there was an attemped take-over of the WP:Fringe guideline by Scienceapologist[24] and others in a way that the existing Aspartame_controversy WP:NPOV WP:Consensus could somehow be declared WP:Fringe. Please note the significant WP:Fringe rewrite without discussion attempts: [25] [26] [27] [28] and repeated Edit Warning reverts: [29] [30] [31] despite a large number of requests for discussion first. Also please note the significant removal of text related to WP:NPOV and that all significant viewpoints should be represented fairly and without bias.

Scienceapologist[32] finally got a 30-Day ban related to edit warring of the WP:Fringe page: [33].

Attempts were made to force the change and/or start with a version after the non-discussed changes: [34].

Followed by incivility: [35].

Removal of ban notice from Talk page: [36].

Once the single page ban came into effect, the page of the Admin who set the temporary ban came under attack: [37] (see large and major edits by Scienceapologist[38]) which could give the appearance of retribution.

My point is that the WP:NPOV and previous WP:Consensus of the Aspartame_controversy page has been gutted by repeated and eventually successful attempts at massive deletions of one side of the controversy. Attempts at discussion of individual issues and mediation were met with calls for my own banning! When a page about a controversy is taken over by a small group intent on not following Wikipedia WP:Consensus, WP:NPOV guidelines, it seems to lead to an extremely biased page and as is the case now numerous factual inaccuracies. In it's current form, after the gutting of much of scientific discussion and peer-reviewed references on one side of the issue, there are now appeals to personal websites and a made up, potentially libelous and unreferenced story about an alleged activist.

While the Arbitration Committee may not deal with specific article content, I think it is the lack of following Wikipedia Guidelines and respect for other Editors that leads to articles which can reflect very poorly upon Wikipedia as well as destroy the desire of knowledgable Editors to participate.

I have not quite lost hope for WP:NPOV and WP:Consensus on Wikipedia. Therefore, I am requesting that you consider one of the following solutions (but am open to others): 1) Start with the prior consensus (pre-October 26, 2008) and have formal mediation to discuss each concern/issue so that alternative text or references could be discussed to reach a consensus. 2) Split the Aspartame_controversy piece into two separate articles so that each side can be presently fairly. While I would have liked to edit both sides of the issue since I know all of the research and some of the scientists on both sides of the issue, I would avoid pro-aspartame edits if the they did the same to the anti-aspartame group. I do not prefer this idea, but whatever helps produce WP:NPOV results is better than nothing. 3) Freeze the pre-October 26, 2008 consensus article get back to the Arbitration Committee with results of Formal or Informal Mediation to see if further action needs to be taken.

Much more detail as well as defense of claims made against me for requesting mediation (e.g., [[Wikipedia:SPA], WP:OWN, etc.) will be provided on the Evidence page. Cordially, Twoggle (talk) 04:53, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

In response to the statement by ScienceApologist, the arbitration request is about WP:Consensus, WP:NPOV, WP:Civility, WP:Disruptive_editing, refusal to participate in discussion or meditation, etc. It is true that these actions led to an inappropriate change in content. I am requesting that we start from last consensus and move forward with discussion, mediation, etc. as mentioned above. Twoggle (talk) 07:16, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

In response to the statement by Jehochman, I requested discussion and then informal and formal mediation because I have never been shy about civil and reasonable discussions of the pages I have edited, including discussions of the scientific literature, scientific conferences, media articles, government hearings, etc. and how these things relate to WP:NPOV, WP:FRINGE, etc. A reading of the *whole* page after my edits on a page about controversy clearly show that I went the extra mile in giving equal weight and tried to present each side of the controversy with as much scientific accuracy as possible (as did many other Editors). The sample diffs simple show my reverts of large edits I at least partly disagreed with and a request to discuss. The first diff reverts the removal of a large section of text on one side of the issue backed up by two peer-reviewed papers and one potentially poor source which is why I urged discussion. The second diff was part of an attempt to discuss the previous consensus before numerous undiscussed massive edits. The third diff discussed on the talk page. I agreed with another editor about removing a link to a private page and I suggested it be replaced with a link to a published, peer-reviewed scientific review [39]. The discussion was on the Talk page for 13 days and no one objected before or after the edit was made. Twoggle (talk) 07:16, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

In response to the statement by Tom_harrison, it is true we had some disagreements over references and content in the last few weeks. I have consistently made futile attempts to discuss these issues on the Talk page. The one time Tom_harrison did discuss reliable source issue directly, we fairly easily came to a consensus and choose two new references. My main point of contention is that there were massive changes without attempts to discuss, my pleas to discuss were met with first no discussion and then edit wars, and then my attempts at mediation to somehow force a discussion of issues was rejected. The stated essence of Wikipedia is that it is supposed to be a collaborative effect [40]. If Editors refuse to collaborate and other rules are not followed, then other Wikipedia pages could easily become WP:NPOV, factually inaccurate (or worse, nonsensical). That's why I filed arbitration. Twoggle (talk) 22:20, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Statement by ScienceApologist

Content dispute at Aspartame controversy and therefore outside the purview of the arbitration committee. Consensus has gone against this particular user, who apparently thinks that because they think that aspartame is dangerous, Wikipedia should give equal weight to their opinion. The user outlines a number of conflicts totally unrelated to this issue, perhaps in the hope of getting their preferred content restored.

ScienceApologist (talk) 05:09, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Jehochman

I had not noticed Twoggle (talk · contribs) before so I decided to look at their contributions. Since they created their account over three years ago, about 90% of their edits have been related to Aspartame. They also have a few contributions to Monosodium glutamate and Water fluoridation articles as well. The general nature of the edits seem to be pushing fringe views, violating neutral point of view, and generally failing verifiability. I am going to harvest diffs to post something to the user's talk page. There is a strong possibility that the editing pattern falls under our blocking policy's provision that accounts used primarily for disruptive editing may be blocked indefinitely. I will look into this further and await feedback before taking any action. Jehochman ^Talk 05:44, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

• Sample diffs: [41][42][43] Jehochman ^Talk 06:19, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Verbal

There is no need for arbitration here. The discussion on the article talk page is clearly against the changes that Twoggle wants to make, which fail our fringe, neutrality, verifiability and reliable sourcing criteria. This is a clear content dispute between Twoggle and the consensus at Aspartame related articles. I would support the action suggested above by by Jehochman. Verbal chat 07:13, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Tom Harrison

The disagreement involves reliable sourcing and due weight, and some soapboxing. Twoggle urges inclusion of unreliable sources supporting his view of aspartame, and has opposed using sources that contradict his view. In this case, giving equal weight gives undue weight to that view. Jehochman's approach above is appropriate. In any case, before considering arbitration there should be a request for comment. Tom Harrison ^Talk 12:38, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Scientizzle

We regulars are all aware of ScienceApologist's brusque history regarding WP:FRINGE-related articles, but this request is bordering on fatuous. I see nothing here requiring ArbCom's intervention and nothing between ScienceApologist and Twoggle that can't be resolved through the basic WP:BRD methods; it's a content dispute with an agenda-promoting single-purpose account. — Scientizzle 23:03, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by non-recused Clerks.

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/2/0/0)

• Reject. Since this is very largely a content issue, a mere week of prior attempts to resolve matters is not enough. And I will add that existing consensus always may be challenged: we need that much freedom to ensure the encyclopedia has forward momentum. I wouldn't always expect to see a fresh consensus restored in a couple of days. Charles Matthews (talk) 20:25, 7 November 2008 (UTC)
• I vote to decline the current request for arbitration substantially per Charles Matthews. However, I am troubled by the allegation that ScienceApologist began editing the mainspace article Elonka Dunin immediately after administrator Elonka, who is the same individual, imposed a controversial pageban on him. This practice presents the appearance of retaliation and should be avoided. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:12, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

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Clarifications and other requests

Place requests related to amendments of prior cases, appeals, and clarifications on this page. If the case is ongoing, please use the relevant talk page. Requests for enforcement of past cases should be made at Arbitration enforcement. Requests to clarify general Arbitration matters should be made on the Talk page. To create a new request for arbitration, please go to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration. Place new requests at the top. Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/How-to other requests

Arbitration Committee proceedings

• recent changes
• purge this page
• view or discuss this template

Case requests

Request name	Motions	Initiated	Votes
Persistent WP:IDONTLIKEIT behavior in WP:NCROY discussions		10 May 2024	0/5/0

[edit]

Open cases

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

[edit]

Recently closed cases (Past cases)

Case name	Closed
Conflict of interest management	13 Apr 2024
Mzajac	7 May 2024

Clarification and Amendment requests

Request name	Motions	Case	Posted
Amendment request: Conduct in deletion-related editing	none	(orig. case)	30 April 2024
Clarification request: Palestine-Israel articles 4	none	(orig. case)	13 May 2024
Amendment request: Article titles and capitalisation	none	(orig. case)	13 May 2024

Arbitrator motions

No arbitrator motions are currently open.

Current requests

Motion of clarification in the Tobias Conradi case

In that case, the ArbCom took the line that userspace is not to be used to keep "laundry lists of grudges". This was in a remedy, rather than explicitly given as a principle. The general question of what can and cannot be placed in userspace is addressed also by WP:NOT, and in the end comes down to whether given postings help the mission. Combining the explicit principles in that case, with the thought in the remedy, and policy, gives some relevant concepts on the acceptable use of userspace. The following represents our current interpretation.

Certain kinds of uses are impermissible. These include but are not limited to:

• Lists of grudges, problem users, diffs, just to make a point.
• In general, there should not be negative postings of the attention-seeking kind.
• Blogging: userspace is not for general commentary.
• Pre-emptive developments running ahead of community or ArbCom sanctions

Certain kinds of uses are permissible:

• Userspace may be used to warehouse diffs, but only when intended as part of drafting for active dispute resolution.
• Essays are obviously OK (use Category:Wikipedia essays, and {{essay}}, saying this is what they are). By their nature essays deal with “issues, not personalities”. If they ever cross that line, from the general issue to particular and personal allusions, they lose their privileged status.
• Drafts of political as well as policy pieces are OK, say ahead of elections. It is helpful if they are dated and headed to indicate this.
• Support for enforcement of existing sanctions, where there is a real and present need to share information.

Comment by Shoemaker's Holiday (talk)

Procedural objection: the case is over a year old, and AGK's proposal could be made policy through the normal procedure of simply editing WP:USER, the official content guideline for such things, or by discussing it on the talk page of same. There is no reason for the Arbcom to get involved, the connection to the case is at best highly tangental, and the Arbcom really shouldn't be in the habit of revisiting old cases simply to make a non-urgent policy rewrite.

Obviously, AGK's good faith is not in question - he was probably simply unaware of WP:USER. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 03:41, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

You are misunderstanding what is happening here. AGK reformatted the motion - the motion itself was offered by Charles Matthews. Avruch ^T 04:39, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, the formatting is unclear, however, this only makes arbcom's rejection in favour of Charles editing WP:USER more important: In the recent RFC on the arbcom, there was a a strong objection to what was seen as Arbcom writing policy. If arbcom decides to actually write policy by fiat, based on revisiting a year-old case, it would cause excessive controversy, all of which could be easily avoided if the Arbcom simply went to WP:USER as respected members of the community and declaring their support for Charles' change. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 09:29, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Considering that WP:USER already makes clear that content is only permitted with the consent of the community, this seems beside the point. Since the motion was drafted after I consulted on the ArbCom list, I'd be surprised if it didn't represent the "current interpretation", as it says. If I'm wrong about that, well, I'm wrong. It seems clearest to proceed in this way, clarifying first. Maybe there will be commentary that could be illuminating. (The clerk is just doing the clerk's job here, but the system has got Procrustean and templated.) Charles Matthews (talk) 12:01, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Erm, Shoemaker, I do know what WP:USER is. :)
Avruch has succinctly outlined precisely what I'm thinking here: I was clerking this thread, not making a motion. (Incidentally, only an Arbitrator may do that.)
AGK 12:13, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, sorry, the layout was really unclear as to who made the motion. Your signature was the only one near the motion.

On Charles Matthews' point - I'm really uncomfortable with the increase in arbcom power that this motion would represent - it effectively gives Arbcom the right to make policy simply by finding any past case to which the policy can be connected. Charles Matthews makes excellent suggestions for additions to WP:USER, and they could, in all likelihood, be added there uncontroversially by Charles as an editor. But an arbcom declaration in the same line puts any future decisions on the matter outside of the community's decision. It would mean that User page policy would, from then onwards, only be changeable by appeal to Arbcom.

The basic problem is that, as there is no evidence that the community is unable to handle user page policy, nor that community-based means for implementing this have even been tried, going for the "nuclear option" of Arbcom-declared policy as the first option seems, at the very least, to set a bad precedent; and, at the worst, could cause unnecessary controversy and drama. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 18:00, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

• Voting section below put into the usual format for these motions. AGK 21:26, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Motion

{Here should be placed the precise text of the motion—that is, what decision is to be passed, and what current case decision it should supersede. Or, alternatively, here should be placed the text of the "official statement" supporting the decision. Clerk assistance available upon a shout! AGK 21:26, 7 November 2008 (UTC)}

There are 10 active Arbitrators, so a majority is 6.

• Support.

1. Support Charles Matthews (talk) 19:49, 7 November 2008 (UTC) (proposing)

• Oppose.

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