Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Cirt

Alleged cavassing

I do not consider this to be canvassing, and in any case, it's had no immediate effect, as I responded to put off the work. Bearian (talk) 17:29, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Re: Outside view by Gamaliel

I agree that it looks like some of the charges are just throwing everything at him to see if something sticks. But there are also some legitimate charges in there as well. This RFC seems to be treating Cirt like OJ Simpson--like the police then, we're trying to frame someone who's guilty anyway. It's bad for the police to use bogus evidence, but ultimately, OJ did do the deed he was accused of. Ken Arromdee (talk) 19:36, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Gamaliel's comment seems to ridicule Jayen's evidence without any substantive analysis (which is rather ironic). I'd also like to add that Prioryman's claim about wikihounding is an exaggeration. I commented at the linked to discussion and Jayen was not "heavily criticized." Indeed the thread went nowhere and people suggested RFC/U as the appropriate courses of action if either editor had complaints about the other. On that point, the arbs also suggested RFC/U when they declined the RFAr that Coren started about Cirt and the Santorum issue. I don't see how posting notice to each arbitrator about the RFC/U individually (as opposed to on a much more public noticeboard) amounts to "canvassing." People should look at all the evidence and decide for themselves what may or may not have merit. Many will undoubtedly find, as Ken has, that even if some of it seems overly ambitious there are very clearly troubling bits in there as well. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 20:09, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

If there's a legitimate charge in there I'd like to know what it is. It would save us all so much time. Wnt (talk) 20:38, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

For example, (1) biasing Wikimedia pre-election content relating to two US elections in favour of the candidates preferred by Anonymous, involving both the Wikipedia and Wikiquote main pages. (2) Multiple violations of WP:BLPSPS. --JN466 21:19, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Because you're planning to take my word for it? Cirt's involvement with political articles during elections is very troubling. I think his other promotional writing, like the Daryl Wine Bar article is also troubling, but less so because BLP issues are invovled with the political stuff not to mention gaming the encyclopedia to advance real life political interests. Those who have commented that Cirt has puffed up articles for both Democrats and Republicans fail to acknowledge that his interests in these matters clearly don't fall in line with party politics. The pattern her is clear by the way. Cirt has not only puffed these articles up when it mattered (ongoing elections or recent announcements of running for office), but he's worked as hard as he could to get maximum exposure through things like DYK. When someone engages in this kind of puffery they edit against WP:NPOV and WP:WEIGHT. One of the additional aspects of all this that Jayen has not even mentioned is that Cirt's puffery has caused a serious amount of disruption in multiple venues related to the good faith efforts of others to curtail his politicking. It took 2 AfDs to delete both the Dickson and Daryl Wine Bar articles (articles that very clearly never belonged in the encyclopedia). During the process Cirt dragged editors to AN/I and otherwise contributed to a very unproductive atmosphere in order to defend his work. That was what bothered me most. That people who are just trying to do their job and keep the encyclopedia filled with good quality encyclopedic content all of a sudden had to suffer harassment at AN/I and all kinds of accusations of incivility, hounding, etc. because they didn't have the social capital he had. Yet they were right all along. That's not something we need around here. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 21:33, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, if that is your view, why don't you draw up an Outside view? I'll sign up to that. :) The RfC/U is already a lot to read; there are lots of other issues in a similar vein that could have been added. Some of the ones you mention are touched upon in the AN/I threads linked towards the bottom, in the Canvassing section, i.e.

• Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive644#Philip_Baird_Shearer_-_block_review
• Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive649#Behaviour_of_admin_Cirt_in_content_disputes
• Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive656#Potential_WP:CANVASSING_by_User:Cirt--JN466 21:46, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

While I personally have the opinion that OJ did it, if I were on that jury I could not have convicted him... because the police were so busy trying to frame him, badly, that they introduced far too much reasonable doubt. It's deeply troubling to hear someone say "we're trying to frame someone who's guilty anyway". Look closely at that statement: It admits that one is providing false evidence or false testimony in order to falsely prove someone guilty of a crime, but justifies it by assuming the role of judge and jury, declaring guilt without evidence or due process. The statement is, in short, vigilantism, and I don't see how such is compatible with Wikipedia's Pillars. It sure isn't WP:PROVEIT. Besides, comparing Cirt's editing with the brutal stabbing death of two people...? // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 22:14, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not trying to justify framing anyone, I'm saying that yes, I agree with Gamaliel that many of the charges against Cirt are absurd and are an attempt to get him in any way we can--the one about the two recipes probably being the worst--but there do seem to be some genuinely bad things in there as well. We *are* trying to frame a guilty person, and it's *not* good that we're doing that. Bring up things that he has actually done and stop making things up. Ken Arromdee (talk) 15:47, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like we're in agreement there, then! My personal preference would be for this RfC/U to be closed out, and a new one opened by someone who does not have a long and antagonistic history with Cirt, addressing the specific behaviors that are troublesome, rather than trying to pillory him. It seems to me like we need more "stern intervention meeting" and less hatchet job. It'd be more productive. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 16:36, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I am sorry, but I disagree. Several people at FAC commented that they felt they were being "sold" the book. The FAC failed; if it hadn't, the article on the bacon book would one day have turned up on our main page. The article's lead says, " "The book received positive reviews, and its recipes were selected for inclusion in The Best American Recipes 2003–2004." That is making a lot of the fact that two recipes were thus included. Why not just say, "two of its recipes were included"? Yes, seen in isolation, it's trivial. If you see it a dozen times, you go Ahem. If you see it a hundred times, you get pissed off. The difference between you and me is simply that you've not seen it as often. Partridge, at santorum, was another wonderful example of twisting a source in such a way that, although what was said was strictly speaking "verifiable", it completely misrepresented that source to the reader, to support a POV in favour of that term. This from an editor who is a master at quoting out of context (Cirt: "[Gloria] Gaynor worked her way through Scientology"; source: "Gaynor worked her way though Scientology, transcendental meditation, and Buddhism [on her search for a spiritual home]" and fights tooth and nail against having that put right. But I can understand that to someone who comes to this with fresh eyes, it is not compelling. So I'm all in favour of concentrating on the more material points. Cheers, --JN466 17:04, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I am completely unconvinced. Am I supposed to believe that in that text Cirt was trying to convince readers that the whole book was selected for inclusion in Best American Recipes? These seem like incredibly picayune things to pull up - especially by comparison to deletionists, for whom it's always their way or the highway, who make up a dozen bogus reasons to exclude something because they don't like it. Deletionists are all about the raw exercise of power, but for inclusionists, knowledge is the more important, and I cannot support a plan to punish an inclusionist for a few dubiously rough edges in a vast body of work. Wnt (talk) 23:09, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Timing of santorum edits

• On May 9, Cirt made five edits to Santorum (neologism), primarily adding a response by Santorum that in my view substantially improved the article's NPOV. [1] Prior to this, he had not been a substantial contributor to the page for at least a year. [2]
• On May 9, at 11 p.m. EDT, Jon Stewart suggested that users search Google for the term "santorum", leading the term to become one of Google's top hits. [3][4]
• On the afternoon of May 10, Cirt began seriously editing the article. In the course of 14 hours, he made the majority of 100 edits by six users. [5] This all occurred after the term became newly newsworthy and notable thanks to Jon Stewart.

So, based on the timeline, there is a perfectly credible alternative to the "pure political motivation" theory for Cirt's edits. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 20:55, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Page view stats bear out the link to Jon Stewart's show. On 10 May, the day after it was broadcast, views of the article went up from 1,900 on 9 May to over 149,000 on 10 May. [6] Note that Santorum didn't announce his campaign formally until 6 June. [7] Stewart's show is the only conceivable factor that could have produced that usage spike. Prioryman (talk) 21:03, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Yeah, I'm having real trouble understanding the complaint... if something happens to make a topic suddenly far richer in reliable sources overnight, apparently what you should not do is make use of them and go digging for others that might have been missed? I guess I've been doing this Wikipedia editing thing all wrong... // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 21:14, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of the Jon Stewart show. The article Macwhiz posted, published on the day after the show, described Santorum as a "presidential hopeful". Apparently, "On Monday night's Daily Show, Stewart ran down the list of lesser-known presidential [hopefuls] and encouraged viewers to Google them." --JN466 21:11, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

It's surprising that you weren't aware of it, considering that information about it was added (not by Cirt) to the article only a few hours after it was broadcast. [8] It's still there now in an amended form under "Reception and political impact", which says: "[Stewart's] reference to it in May 2011 caused the word to be one of the most queried search terms on Google the following day". Surely you must have read the article you've been campaigning against? Prioryman (talk) 21:16, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Jayen, I think that's where a lot of the consternation from "the other side" at santorum came from: that Daily Show clip generated tons of press in RSes, and fed interest in the term... leading to the reinforcement of the PageRank for Savage's page (and likely ours). If Cirt hadn't done it, someone else would have: bet you'd find a history of page expansions following notable usages on Stewart or Colbert's shows. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 21:17, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, the timing is certainly close. Cirt started editing the article on 9 May, 22:21 UTC. That's 17:21 Eastern time, and probably a few hours before Stewart's late-night show. But I agree Stewart's show covering the presidential hopefuls, and subsequent press coverage, cast a spotlight on the issue. --JN466 21:39, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

This is neither horseshoes nor hand grenades, though. As for the five edits Cirt made on the 9th, adding Santorum's POV to the article, I note that one of them was an article published on April 28—just 11 days earlier. This implies to me that Cirt was not exactly tending the article at the time. It is, however, consistent with an editor finding a recent source that has not yet been assimilated, and then finding other material in the process of balancing out the article. That's normal editing. Frankly, unless someone wants to present unequivocal evidence that Cirt was somehow collaborating with Dan Savage and Jon Stewart to hype the article before it made the news thanks to Stewart—which would be an absurd allegation—I think this has to be chalked up to coincidence. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 22:04, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. That whole complaint stinks of a witch hunt. That the complainants completely ignore the very obvious explanation for why the article ballooned in size and visibility and instead, along with SlimVirgin accuse Cirt of being in cahoots with Savage is deplorable. Even assuming that they legitimately did not know about Stewart's piece at the time that they compiled their complaints, it seriously suggests they were looking for things to complain about, rather than addressing real issues. The point about YouTube videos is just as patently ridiculous. The complainants may have some legitimate points in regards to problem behaviour by Cirt, but they've poisoned their case by including such suspiciously weak claims, and I can't see this rfcu going forward as a result. Just a lesson for next time: quality over quantity. Don't throw 20 complaints into the wild and see what sticks; research each one well and only include ones that can stand up to scrutiny. Throwaway85 (talk) 04:13, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Throwaway there is no "case" here to be poisoned. An RFC is not an all or nothing proposition. The initiator has made several claims about Cirt. If there are legitimate points in there then those should be noted and dealt with. If others bring up legitimate points same goes for that. To disregard "legitimate points" because you think others are not as legitimate does a disservice to the community and to the RFC process more specifically. Please remember also that the RFC does not result in sanctions. Its very purpose is to air these kinds of claims so that others in the community can evaluate them and determine which ones might require further action if any.Griswaldo (talk) 12:58, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

The thing is, the readily-checked claims are either flimsy or trumped-up, so some of the other claims that depend on deep research into article histories get discounted: why go to the work of researching the minutae when everything else seems to be (how to be civil here?) lacking the full details to present a balanced view? It begs for TL;DR. There's also claims that depend not on objective evidence, but subjective evaluation of a vast editing history. I find it hard to invest the work in trying to find evidence of bad faith on Cirt's part when the evidence of good faith on the part of some of his accusers is so tenuous. I'm not saying that I couldn't be persuaded, nor that I think Cirt is perfect; I'm just saying that so far, this RfC/U isn't persuasive. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 16:43, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

That is why I said, at the top of the RfC/U, Users are advised that understanding the problem requires a close review of several lengthy articles. Please do not comment until you have reviewed the article versions indicated. Thank you., and repeated at three points in the RfC/U, Before reading on, please review this article version for neutrality. We cannot arrive at a serious work result when people are prepared to spend 2 hours on posting and reading drive-by comments, but are not prepared to invest two hours in going from an RfC/U from top to bottom, following the indicated links, and then writing a considered and informed opinion. You said, For example, it's implied that the Corbin Fisher article was a promotional piece. Having read the full contents of the leaked conversation between Cirt, SlimVirgin, and Shell Kinney, I did not get this impression. From reading the conversation between SlimVirgin and Cirt? SlimVirgin's stance in the leaked conversation between her and Cirt will not make sense to you unless you have read the article that the conversation was about. TL;DR is not the correct method to respond to an RfC/U. --JN466 18:58, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

And what we're (or at least I am) saying is that it's pretty unreasonable to expect people to go through all of the trouble of reading every edit to an article before arriving at a decision when you don't go through the trouble of realizing the very simple reason behind the Santorum article so quickly gaining in size and popularity (sure he DYK'd it, but it would have been grossly expanded anyway), or why he would include the "Message to Scientology" video, or any of the other things that showed a lack of understanding and research on your part. When I said you've poisoned your "case", I meant it. It's damned hard to convince a large group of people that there's a problem with Cirt's behaviour when so much of your evidence is so clearly flawed. It's not just bad, it's self-evidently bad to anyone with the most cursory understanding of surrounding events. It's for that reason that I, and others, have described this as having the appearances of a witch hunt. Rather than a considered critique of Cirt's behaviour, your evidence reads as a throw-the-spaghetti-against-the-wall attempt to list as many things as possible in the hopes the community is outraged at one of them, or sufficiently encumbered by the weight of the evidence to be unable to come to any sensible conclusion. The simple fact of the matter is that the vast majority of the evidence you've presented does very little to convince me that there's a problem with Cirt's editing, and that makes me think there are ulterior motives, here. That conclusion is only buoyed by the leaked emails between Cirt and SlimVirgin. It was obvious that both of them were playing political games and scheming and trying to lure the other into saying something that could be used against them, and I have neither the time nor desire to involve myself in that bullshit. That the complaints presented here in large part mirror SV's complaints suggest that this is an extension of her politicking, and the whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not going to defend Cirt, and I'm also not going to condemn him based on what is clearly an ongoing political struggle between rival groups on Wikipedia. Throwaway85 (talk) 19:20, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, what Throwaway said. You're asking me to devote hours to researching myriad issues as "background" before understanding your claims. In deciding whether I'd rather spend my time doing that or, say, productively editing the encyclopedia, I look first at the easier-to-verify claims. I don't think I'm alone in this. In this case, those claims came up short. I am not saying that none of your claims have any merit, or that I won't look into them; I'm saying that, because you chose to include some real reaches, a person could easily reach the conclusion "the easy-to-check claims have no merit, so it's unlikely that the others do" and not bother to look further. It would have been better to concentrate on one or two things and clearly lay out the timeline, with appropriate diffs. Instead, much of what the RfC/U links to is either picayune, or makes those opposing Cirt look at least as bad as what the RfC/U claims Cirt has done. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 00:03, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

FYI, here's an article about an earlier plug for the neologism on the Colbert Report from February 2011.[9] and here's one from a week earlier with a Google screen shot showing the Wikipedia article was already the #2 hit for "santorum".[10]   Will Beback  talk  23:28, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Quotation of Anonymous forum postings

The link given as evidence for the Anonymous forum: [11]

• The message Jayen selectively quoted as evidence is numbered #18.
• The message I quoted as saying Cirt is ethical is numbered #13.
• Cirt's name entered the thread in message #6, apparently from someone looking to see which editor performed a "cleanup" of David Miscavige. Interestingly, while the RfC/U seems to be trying to paint Cirt as a rabid anti-Scientologist, the folks on this anti-Scientology forum were concerned that he was making pro-Scientology edits—and perhaps even a Scientologist plant himself. The later comments #13 and #18 were by way of refuting those concerns.

Personally, I think that it speaks well of Cirt's contributions to that area if both the pro- and anti- forces are concerned that he's pushing the other side's POV. If you're pissing off both sides, you must be doing something right. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 21:04, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

The David Miscavige edits discussed at that board, by the way, were in response to a BLPN thread: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard/Archive96#David_Miscavige. I don't think Cirt would deny that he has links with Anonymous. He has stated that he knows Xenubarb, and contacted her for assistance on the campaign articles. Gregg Housh follows Cirt on scribd (as do Jason Beghe, and Mike Godwin, for that matter :) ). Cirt has uploaded tons of Anonymous videos to Commons, and has freely admitted joining Wikinews originally with a focus of reporting on that one issue. [12] Project Chanology is his most-edited article in Wikipedia. That's all fine; but I don't think it should induce an admin to actually set out to bias Wikimedia content pre-election in such a pronounced manner, using two projects' main pages. It's not good for this project to be used as an electioneering aid. --JN466 21:30, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Please don't play "guilt by association". Knowing someone, even to the extent that you could ask their assistance in obtaining a copyright signoff from someone they know, isn't the same thing as being an associate of someone. I know someone who works on the crew of CSI, but that doesn't mean I'm associated with their chronic use of invalid IP addresses. We all know someone who has done something that other people don't like, without being in any way associated with their actions. (Or worse, not even knowing someone, but being observed by someone is not proof of taint!) Scientology is a hot topic on Wikipedia, and I fear that "He's (pro-|anti-)Scientology!" is the Wikipedia equivalent of "He supports terrorism!" at this point.

Reading the BLPN thread you linked and the associated talk-page discussion, I see what looks like WP:BRD, with Cirt making a number of deletions to make Jayen and Resident Anthropolgist happy. It looks like good collegial editing to me.

Per your link, I see Cirt saying "I know I focused on a particular topic when I started out here and was learning the ropes, but I have since attempted to diversify the type of articles I write, contributing to 10 articles on other unrelated topics." I don't think this is an uncommon thing. If I look at your edit history, Jayen, I see you concentrating on a small number of articles in a narrow range of topics in your early days, too—but I would not now try to paint you as unhealthily obsessed with cars and Indian mysticism.

I am still nowhere near convinced that you have made the case that Cirt is using Wikipedia as "an electioneering aid", and by the arguments in this RfC/U, I'm left to wonder if any editing of political articles would be acceptable during political silly season under this line of argument. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 22:33, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

"Promise made by Cirt to Lar, Scott MacDonald"

The RfC/U has a section, WP:Requests for comment/Cirt#Promise made by Cirt to Lar, Scott MacDonald, which claims "Cirt... does the opposite of what he said he would do", claiming Lar and Scott MacDonald felt Cirt had not kept his promise as a justification for the claim. I find this to be an incomplete version of events.

Reading the linked discussion [13], I see that Lar did raise concerns, but appeared to accept Cirt's clarification that he had reduced, rather than eliminated, edits on Scientology-related topics. His undertaking, quoted by Scott Mac, used the terms "shift my focus away from" and "avoid", which aren't absolutes. Lar and Sadads defended Cirt against Scott in the thread. It was pointed out that the articles in question were edited primarily due to Cirt's concentration on freedom of speech–related articles at the time, and were tangentially related to Scientology. Further, the whole incident was the result of a posting at Wikipedia Review, not on-wiki criticism. I don't see Cirt "doing the opposite of what he said he would do"; I see people not reading carefully and presuming that Cirt said something he did not.

What I found interesting was reading this after reading Scott Mac's position on Delicious carbuncle's first ARBSCI enforcement request against Cirt. Scott Mac wanted sanctions against Cirt, while other admins found Carbuncle's request faulty and not actionable. While both editors were warned, the sense I get of the comments is that several editors found Carbuncle "seem[ed] as if he instigated this conflict" and "clearly the dubious party here". (In fact, the comments were more pointed when Carbuncle filed a second request within an hour of the first request being closed.) See Future Perfect at Sunrise's comments here: [14] "Apparently, D.c. has been on a long campaign against Cirt, having posted about him extensively both on Wikipedia and on Wikipediareview for several months." In fact, digging further, I found that Cirt had previously sought, and obtained, an indefinite topic ban against Carbuncle from ARBSCI. [15] It worries me that there seems to be a certain list of names that keep appearing when criticism of Cirt is to be found, and that every time I look into the disputes, I seem to find Cirt acting with reason, consideration, good faith, and an intent to find a solution... and the disputants, not so much. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 03:26, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Lar and Sadads defended Cirt against Scott in the thread. Say what now? Sadads appears to defend Cirt every-time he involves himself with related discussions, which by the look of it is quite often, but how on earth do you get Lar "defend[ing] Cirt against Scott" in that thread? To Quote Lar: "Nevertheless, I think Scott asks legitimate questions about your area of focus. I think you should answer them rather than taking umbrage," and "I applaud your reduction. I just think you should go all the way." (emphasis added). Just because Lar is being very civil and extremely tactful doesn't mean he's defending Cirt. Also the admins disagreeing with Scott in the AE request are Jehochman and Doc James who both seem to have a history of supporting Cirt from what I can tell, and that was brought up in relation to the AE request. You say you are worried about the same names appearing in these discussions. 1) I hope you are also including the same names that appear to defend Cirt and to accuse those who call some of his edits into question of hounding and other disruptive behavior. 2) I think you ought to dig further to see if the "same names" that are critical of Cirt's editing now have always been of that mind or if specific events precipitated this, and if those events are related to the later moments of involvement. You should especially consider the idea that if a problem is repeating itself without solution editors who feel that they understand the problem will most likely continue to try to have it solved. Do these editors have anything to gain from criticizing Cirt? Are they POV opponents of his? What is their motive? If you would WP:AGF for just one second you might realize that just maybe some of these people are simply concerned about something they feel is harmful to Wikipedia, its community and/or its editing environment.Griswaldo (talk) 12:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I do not defend Cirt in everything, in fact I have expressed to him on multiple occassions that he should probably be redirecting his productivity on wiki to topic areas which have a little less controversy associated with them. However, I am just extremely alarmed at the aggressiveness of the rhetoric and persecution of him. The way in which various individuals have taken to trying to change Cirt's behaviour is extremely inappropriate and could have been handled with, for lack of a better way to describe the behaviour, more maturity. We are (or at least should be) a community built on principles of good faith, and I make it my business to defend individuals, who are likely humanly flawed, when they are persecuted aggressively without due cause, Sadads (talk) 01:13, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Troubled

I see that Cla68 (talk · contribs) has started a section which is entitled "Cirt's enablers", which I find troubling because it looks like the start of a type of "hit list". I'm not sure that this is constructive... although, I suppose that one faction enumerating those who they view to be the members of their opposition may be helpful, if there's really some confusion about that or something. I guess that I'm just wondering what the point of this is? Is the intent here to attack other editors because they are friendly towards Cirt?
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 04:04, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

This is indeed troubling, and looks like the out-of-process extension of the RfC/U to other disliked editors, who won't even have the basic protections of RfC/U prerequisites or the built-in space for a response. As it stands now, it serves to intimidate those editors who would offer a dissenting view to the certifiers of the RfC/U. When populated with names, it will only tar certain editors as "activists" and "bullies" by association. Insofar as this "hit list" makes no pretense towards dispute resolution or constructive dialogue, it offers a window into the motivations of the overall RfC/U on Cirt. Quigley (talk) 04:53, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the "enablers" section is unlikely to be helpful, and I would urge Cla68 to delete it. However, I would object to discrediting the RfC/U on this basis — preferring, instead, to WP:AGF and assume that Cla68 honestly believes that "These editors may be driven by a good faith respect for Cirt's editing ability and work". We should concentrate on Cirt's conduct and whether Cirt should modify his/her behaviour, and leave to another time (if ever) the question of whether or not other editors' actions may have contributed to the situation (if indeed there is a "situation" here). Richwales (talk · contribs) 05:27, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, it looks like he's refactored it into a statement in defense of DC and JN, which seems acceptable to me. Thanks for considering this criticism, Cla. :)
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 06:09, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Elections

Is anyone unclear about the election-related evidence? Hiram Monserrate and Jeff Stone were disliked by Anonymous [16][17]. As a result, their opponents Kenneth Dickson, Joel Anderson and Jose Peralta had political advertisements written for them, and featured on the Wikipedia (and Wikiquote) main page in the run-up to the elections. Are you all right with the ethics of this? Do you feel that being able to place such content on project main pages is a reasonable perk due to a prolific Wikimedia contributor? --JN466 12:52, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

• There is a related, standalone view: Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Cirt#Editing_around_16_March_2010_New_York_State_Senate_election.2C_and_June_8_2010_Republican_primary_for_the_California_State_Senate --JN466 14:06, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Predictions

1) People who supported the continued existence of the santorum article, friends of Cirt and various uninvolved parties will support Cirt.

2) People who opposed the santorum article, those who hold a grudge against Cirt and those who have prior disagreements with him will support JN466.

3) Cirt will get a kicking from JN466's supporters.

4) JN466 will get a kicking from Cirt's supporters.

5) There will be a lot of futile bickering.

6) Nothing productive will come of this RfC/U.

7) After this RfC/U has failed, JN466 will continue pursuing Cirt until the community finally gets fed up and imposes an interaction ban on both of them. Prioryman (talk) 19:14, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps Cirt should stop doing things that are worth pursuing? Tarc (talk) 19:56, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps he/she should also stop beating his husband or wife? Prioryman (talk) 20:13, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

But many of the things identified by critics of Cirt as "problems" are not seen as problems by many other editors: expanding the santorum article, writing articles on Dan Savage books, DYK submissions, etc. We can find a way to deal with whatever Cirt does that everyone sees as problematic (promotional tone, etc.), but I'm not sure how we bridge the gap with the larger issues when so many editors don't think they are issues at all. Gamaliel (talk) 20:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

They are not seen as problems by like-minded editors. Clique-editing is not a new Wikipedia phenomenon. Tarc (talk) 21:13, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

So everyone who disagrees with the RFC is in the wrong clique? Perhaps you should start another RFC on all of us. Gamaliel (talk) 21:37, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I removed a box to hide and archive this conversation, because in truth, it is illuminating. Anyone reading the RfC page should recognize that this is a political trial, in which we are debating over what should be allowed, not what Cirt did. The question we really need to ask is, is there a path to peace? It's one thing to have normal arguments over content - it's another thing to have two political parties arguing over every word as a tactic toward radically different visions of Wikipedia. Is there some way that we can avoid having constant battles over whether most of what is in an article should be taken out, whether articles should be deleted, whether editors should be punished for trying to make articles or otherwise take part in the normal process of promoting them? I mean, could we fork the project, let the deletionists compress the content into a Micropedia while the inclusionists could build up a Macropedia? Anything? Wnt (talk) 23:00, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

This debate doesn't have a thing to do with the deletionistism vs. inclusionism wiki-war. If you really think that this is what it is been about this whole time, well, naive is about the mildest thing I can say here. This is about Cirt deliberately violating WP:BLP policy by using the Wikipedia to propagate Dan Savage's anti-Santorum crusade. This is about Cirt elevating a concocted slur into a "neologism", using questionable sourcing to try to show the word being used in everyday English. This is about Cirt gaming DYK to increase the visibility of Dan Savage's books, thus elevating the visibility of the small-s "santorum" shtick...also accomplished by edit-warring the faux word into several sex-related templates while creating another entirely new one (now-deleted) to spotlight it. And you, Wnt, have been a part of this. A co-conspirator, accomplice, whatever colorful term we can find. You and many others, deliberately and royally fucking this place up by using it to further your personal ideological bent.

I think the above is what they proverbially call "throwing down the gauntlet", so, there you go. Tarc (talk) 23:56, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

So then this is an attempt to re-legislate the whole santorum saga?
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 00:25, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, of course it is. This is exactly the point I was trying to illustrate above. A few hours after it had been cited on Jon Stewart's show, producing a massive spike in usage and public interest, Cirt expanded an article; he added the term to a handful of templates in which it was only one of dozens of other linked articles; and he wrote several DYKs, none of which linked to or even mentioned the dispute article, as far as I saw. As many other editors have said, that is normal editing behaviour. When Sarah Palin made up some well-publicised nonsense about Paul Revere, it started a lot of editors working on that article. Same with the Japanese earthquake, the civil war in Libya and so on. Nothing that Cirt did appears to have affected the page ranking of Wikipedia's Santorum (neologism) article, nor could it have, as it was already at or almost at the top of search engine results months before he started editing it. I think that Tarc and others are seeing Cirt's edits through an ideological prism - Tarc's disapproval of the Santorum article is leading him to assign improper motives to Cirt's reasons for editing it. From what I've seen of this dispute, which first came to my notice at DYK, there is no reasonable evidence that Cirt was attempting to game search engine rankings for the article. Did people ever stop to think what the point of that would be when the article is already at the top of search engine results? Bottom line, this is a political dispute - all that this RfC/U is going to achieve is to give the Santorum partisans (on both sides) somewhere to vent. Prioryman (talk) 00:31, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't know that it's so much of an ideological issue (although that's certainly an aspect, since if they shared the ideology that they attribute to Cirt I doubt there would be complaints), but there's certainly an interpersonal issue here (personalities clashing, which I think that you're properly describing as a "political dispute"). I suspect that you're correct about "Tarc's disapproval of the Santorum article is leading him to assign improper motives to Cirt's reasons for editing it." for sure, but he's not the only one doing so. One thing though is that giving people a place to "vent" isn't a bad thing in my opinion, and it's certainly not pointless.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 01:05, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

The only path to peace I see, short of forking the project, is to allow people to build articles from reliably sourced material without accusing them of promoting the subject simply because they want to work on it; without accusing them of breaking BLP by covering people involved in controversies with other people; without selectively decrying the promotional effect of templates and DYKs only when they support a point of view you don't like. And that is accomplished by clarifying that policy indeed does not and shall not prohibit these things. In other words, for the inclusionists to win. ;)

While I understand it may be "naive" to characterize this as inclusionists versus deletionists rather than Anonymous versus Scientology or Democrats versus Republicans, there's a reason: because the latter debates are affected by the simple truth that one side has a lot of facts on its side. So the other has a lot of facts to hide. And so inclusionism becomes associated with one side of many different wiki debates - and always the right side, regardless of the issue. Wnt (talk) 02:23, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

<Turns to JN466 *kick*> OK, my part is done here. :)
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 23:09, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Ooooooooooooooooooouuuuuuch! --JN466 00:23, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

*grin*
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 00:26, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Regarding points 3 and 4: I'll kick 'em both! The way I see it, Cirt has a blind spot when it comes to being too positive, and Jayen has a blind spot when it comes to Cirt. Neither blind spot makes either editor a bad person, nor merits their removal from the project. I don't hate either of them, nor am I devoted to either of 'em. I'm here because I'm a pretty good writer and researcher, and I want part of my legacy to this planet to be a net increase in humanity's knowledge. Wikipedia's a good way to do that. Helping other editors past their blind spots works toward that goal. I don't think this RfC/U does that. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 01:21, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Wikihounders vs Whistleblowers

One of the accusations against Cirt in this RfC/U is that he did not come to an article "organically". While this is framed as an issue of "honesty" and "deceit" for Cirt, the same burden to come upon articles "organically" is not held to Cirt's accusers. The view by Pieter Kuiper is a prime example. He complains that he did one action, "fixed a deletion request on Commons of some of those anti-Scientology video files of his", which "got me on his/her list of ideological adversaries" and got him banned. However, the AE request he points to shows a more complex and common pattern of Cirt's enemies. Like Cla68, who was incited by Cirt's edits on "List of Scientologists", certain people cannot resist following the edit histories of those with whom they've had a minor dispute, and habitually reversing their actions the follower thinks is unjustified.

As evidenced by Cirt's AE thread, Pieter Kuiper did this by following Cirt out of commons into en.wiki, finding fault in Cirt's created article about Aaron Saxton, and then again in the "List of Scientologists" article, and then declining one of Cirt's DYKs with an unusually combative reason. It was Pieter Kuiper's edit-warring against Cirt to keep these changes in an area with active Arbcom remedies, among other things, that got him banned; not Wikilawyer magic. It is clear that Pieter Kuiper already decided himself an "ideological adversary" to Cirt before Cirt even filed the complaint.

But Jayen466 does not see it this way, endorsing Kuipel's summary with the lament that this AE action "never got overturned". It is fair to assume that Cla68 has a similarly sympathetic view, considering Cla68's section "whistleblower protection", formerly "Cirt's enablers", recasts those who point out behavior like Pieter Kuipel's as bullies or intimidators. However, it would go a long way towards resolving the dispute if the battleground mentality were dropped, and the Wikihounding policy reexamined. The connotations of "whistleblower" and "shooting the messenger", both used by opponents of Cirt in this conflict, suggest that Cirt is some pervasive juggernaut that must be stopped, and that following and disputing his every last edit to the death is justified, if not a duty for all good Wikipedians. However, if Cirt were to be treated as a fallable human being, who can feel annoyance and distress at the caravan of microscopic scrutiny surrounding him, encouraged by certain off-wiki sites; if his concessions in topic areas were to be taken as the basis of a solution instead of a signal to go for the kill, then a key component of what should be an acceptable solution to both parties will have appeared before our very eyes.

Taking from DGG's proposed remedy, in any desired outcome, those who feel themselves Cirt's "ideological adversaries" should relieve themselves of Cirtwatch duty. Already, this RfC/U has attracted the attention of previously uninvolved members who would take up the mantle. This way, the perception among those sympathetic to Cirt that he is being "Wikihounded" will cease, and the perception among Cirt's accusers that they are the victims of "bullying" for these accusations will cease. It is natural for those accused of both Wikihounding and bullying to take an absolutist stance, and to argue that objectively, one of these exists, and the other is a fabrication. But perceptions are powerful, and regardless of the relative merits of each accusation, this proposed component of a solution will eradicate the potential for an explosion of bad feelings on both sides, wherever Cirt's editing is organically brought up. Thoughts? Quigley (talk) 19:47, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh my, "So what?" is unusuallly combative? For me, a yawn is the natural response to the question: "Did you know that Australian Senator Nick Xenophon quoted statements by former Scientology official Aaron Saxton during a speech in Parliament?" The only people utterly fascinated by this kind of thing are people obsessed with scientology. /Pieter Kuiper (talk) 20:46, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree. The extreme pro- and anti-cult editing are often hard to tell apart. Same tone, same obsessionality with trivia. SlimVirgin ^{TALK|CONTRIBS} 20:56, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Quigley, there is a lot of sense in what you are saying. On the other hand, it's not for nothing that Cirt has attracted attention on that website. His strong POV; his prolific contributions (who can keep up with someone who makes 4,000 edits a month?), his frequent contributions to "loaded" topics (like a critic's book, a lost lawsuit, etc.); his combativeness and knack to get opponents sanctioned—these are all factors that have contributed to that. Pieter, for example, did not "find fault" when he corrected Saxton's birthdate, he "found an error and corrected it". He was still templated. When Cirt created Werner Erhard vs. Columbia Broadcasting System, he prominently and at length discussed allegations of incest made against Erhard (a living person), but failed to mention that these allegations were later retracted. He mentioned tax issues, but didn't mention that it was the IRS who later on paid Erhard $200,000 in damages. I wish there were more editors who looked at these articles; as it was, Cirt gave those who did look at it to make it NPOV, after it came up at AfD, a very hard time [18]. Cirt took one of his disputants there, User:THF, to WP:COIN [19] and WP:ANI [20] on the same day (over THF's actions at a different article), all while his Erhard-related dispute with THF, which had started at the article's AFD the previous day, was ongoing. That's the sort of stuff that gets you noticed at WR, and legitimately so. --JN466 23:11, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't get it

I'm looking at the evidence presented here, and... I mean, I'm really trying hard to see and understand the criticism, but... I can see some minor issues, I guess, but from what I can see they're easily mitigated by the fact that, while it may not actually be "hounding", there's certainly a bit of a "battlefield mentality" that both factions have fostered. I don't consider myself part of the "clique" (which is what Tarc apparently sees), but if some of you want to include me in it just because I'm more on Cirt's 'side' here then on JN's then I'm fine with that. Y'all seem like fairly reasonable people (I've talked to JN466 on the VP about that essay, for example. He listened to what I had to say, which tells me that he's hardly unreasonable), and everyone involved here seem to be veterans. This seems like a series of content dispute skirmishes that have been steadily building up to something like this occurring.

I guess that I'm wondering... is this really about Cirt specifically, or is it a wider issue (I mean, Cirt is obviously at the center of this, but...)? Are there actually a couple of multi-party factions here? Maybe RFC/U, with it's inherent set of "rules" and standards, isn't the best venue for this?
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 23:22, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

multiply the minor issues by the over 2,000 edits per month rate. I edit kinda regularly and 200 is a lot in a month. each incident is not a big deal. the fact that there is one every month or multiple ones on the same month is the issue. The user's sheer volume and dedication to work on the project are what makes the bias, forum shopping, and requests to shoot the messenger about them such a problem. --Rocksanddirt (talk) 23:39, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Cirt's editing rate has dropped significantly since at least 14 June (weeks before this RfC/U), where he indicated that he was going to "reduce [his] activity level significantly" and "shift efforts in new areas of interest", which he has done, to U.S. Supreme Court cases. Quigley (talk) 23:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Yea, there's nothing quite like getting the fuck outta Dodge after you've just lit several fires, is there? Tarc (talk) 23:58, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

The certifiers' stated desired outcome is not to punish Cirt for alleged past wrongs, but to amend Cirt's future behavior. If this is an honest statement of intent, then they might have already succeeded. Quigley (talk) 00:06, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

So this is where I'm a bit confused. Cirt's editing rates seem to be the main issue, which really make me wonder about the motivation here. Is "contributing too often" really going to be something that we're going to turn into a problem? Don't you guys think that this will have wider implications then any effect on Cirt? ...This whole thing just gives me a creepy feeling. There appears to be a significant amount of anger and resentment on the part of the "anti-Cirt" crowd, just below the surface. If the problem is that our content seems to be slanted, then the solution to that seems obvious to me (and the solution shouldn't be to attempt to get rid of other content editors).
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 00:22, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

It's becoming obvious, I think, that the aim is to get rid of Cirt or at the least to make it impossible for him to contribute without being hounded at every turn. I'm a newbie to this dispute (I only learned of it when it spilled onto DYK) but there seem to be two things going on here - a long-running dispute between JN466/Carbuncle and Cirt relating to Scientology (or cults in general?), and a newer dispute over the Santorum article. It seems to me that the long-running disputants have taken advantage of the most recent dispute to try to go after Cirt with this RfC/U. As an aside, I agree about getting a creepy feeling, not least because of comments like this: "I am intending to do a monthly thread here about Cirt's Scientology edits, because I would like to help them kick their nasty habit. Cirt, I don't say this in a mean way, but when you edit articles related to Scientology, it makes your fingers and breath smell like Scientology. And no one wants to kiss someone whose breath smells like Scientology." [21] I don't see how you can characterise such obvious harassment as "whistleblowing". Cirt isn't under any content restrictions as far as I know (surely they would have been mentioned by JN466) so this looks very much like an attempt to bully him into withdrawing from particular content areas or from Wikipedia as a whole. I can't support that. Prioryman (talk) 00:41, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

That's a pretty good description of my own observations (and conclusions).
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 01:08, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I definitely share V's feelings. Unless we want to limit Wikipedia to a certain class of high-functioning autistics, human nature says that virtually every editor is going to have personal biases. However, having thousands of active editors means that the biases average out. Someone makes an edit that seems biased? You edit their edit. If you disagree, you take it to talk and hash it out, maybe by getting a 3O or via an RFC. That's how the place is supposed to work! I haven't seen evidence that Cirt won't back down when confronted with reasonable evidence contrary to his position. (Why would you back down from someone who doesn't present reasonable evidence to the contrary?) In fact, it seems to me like Cirt's behavior is lapsing into learned helplessness at this point. This concerns me. I do not want to be the next person who is run out of town on a rail. This is personal for me, but not because I know Cirt (I don't) or because I'm part of some clique (I'm not) or for political reasons: It's personal for me because the contents of First they came... keeps running through my head. If there were a good case here, or if it were limited to just the editing behavior that is worrisome and actually discussed it instead of using it to vilify Cirt... if I didn't keep wondering if this is just groundwork to take Cirt back to ArbCom for formal ostracism... I wouldn't feel that way about this RfC/U. But... here we are. // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 01:15, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Exactly! That's where the "creepy feeling" is coming from, and First they came... keeps running through my head as well.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 01:19, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Quite right Macwhiz, this has become personal because the approach to the treatment of Cirt has been degrading to all those involved in ways that hurts the culture of the project, which we are very much part of, Sadads (talk) 01:29, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

This comment hits the mark. What distinguishes Arbcom cases from ordinary aggregated content disputes is the level of tendentiousness involved. Cirt has not displayed the level of aggressive persistence in his views that many of his past enemies, who have come out of the woodwork to condemn him here, have shown. At every level of this recent dispute, he has voluntarily withdrawn into smaller and smaller areas in which to edit. The only goal left for his detractors seems to be to have him stop editing completely. This is the real story of bullying here. Quigley (talk) 01:31, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh jeeze have we already come to Godwin's law? The Resident Anthropologist (talk)•(contribs) 01:45, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Godwin's law no longer applies, because unfortunately, Mike Godwin is no longer the legal counsel. :( Wnt (talk) 01:56, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

But did we mess up the Sircar/Case Corollary to Godwin's Law, as sanctioned by the man himself? [22] (Do we start counting from the debate on santorum or the start of the RfC/U?) // ⌘macwhiz (talk) 02:03, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

As someone who has used Wikipedia's dispute resolution system on several occasions, including a couple that progressed all the way to arbitration, I can attest that the process is not only time-consuming, but often involves having to endure some fairly harsh criticism from observers who don't approve and apparently feel that saying, "I don't agree with you" is an insufficient response. Emotions seem to run a little high, which I think might be helped if people remembered that this is just a website with most of its participants hiding behind anonymous accounts. Nevertheless, I guess being obliquely compared with the Nazis is par for the course. Cla68 (talk) 02:15, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Comment Huh? Do you all know how First they came… goes, and what that would translate to in the present situation? It would mean that when someone criticized Cirt's editing everyone would have just stood by while Cirt was crucified. That is exactly the opposite of what has been happening. When someone criticizes Cirt's edits it usually amounts to nothing as a best case scenario, and retaliation against the critic as a worst case scenario. Yet somehow you want people to believe that Cirt is a helpless victim here who is being bullied while the world stands by watching but refuses to help? A majority of people engaging this RFC have written and endorsed comments that state rather emphatically that Cirt's critics are full of shit, but somehow that means that Cirt is going to be railroaded? What planet do you live on? I'm sorry, but this is really starting to piss me off. Disagree with our comments all you want, but don't start playing the victim card in this way because it's totally offensive to every single person on this planet who actually has been a victim in their lives. Is your aim to increase the levels of drama and resentment against those who in good faith have come here to express their concerns? If you want to help us navigate this issue then point out the flaws in the arguments and endorse summaries that show how those critical of Cirt are wrong. And btw who wants Cirt gone? Who has proposed anything even remotely close to removing Cirt from the project? And who are Cirt's old "enemies"? The rhetoric being masticated and passed around above is completely counterproductive. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 02:24, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh and I didn't even want to touch the Nazi comparison, but clearly that's a rhetorical flourish that was not lost on me when I read this tripe. What is wrong with people?Griswaldo (talk) 02:24, 29 June 2011 (UTC)