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=== Statement by Drmies ===
=== Statement by Drmies ===
I managed to have completely missed the note on my talk page; my apologies.<p>I really don't have much to say. This is an attempt to get something undone by way of a technicality, that some procedure was not followed or was broken--it seems to me that there is already broad agreement that this simply doesn't apply. For starters, there's Sandstein's "This does not prevent you from taking action if, unlike me, you believe it is warranted." More importantly, in my opinion, is the suggestion that everything is covered, or should be covered, by procedure. BTW, I think the community should be pleased that admins are willing to disagree and to consider and reconsider matters, and that more admins are willing to step up to the plate: all of us are making a small number of admins, including Sandstein, pull all the weight at AE. [[User:Drmies|Drmies]] ([[User talk:Drmies|talk]]) 18:07, 24 November 2018 (UTC)


=== Statement by AGK ===
=== Statement by AGK ===

Revision as of 18:08, 24 November 2018

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Clarification request: Genetically modified organisms

Initiated by Petrarchan47 at 07:21, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Case or decision affected
Genetically modified organisms arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Statement by Petrarchan47

I am appealing this action by Drmies: ​[5]​

Background:

  • KingofAces43 opened an WP:AE​ case against me. ​[6]​
  • The majority of the community weighed in on my side​. [7]
  • KingofAces43 contacted two administrators about this case:
    • Seraphimblade ​[8]​
    • Drmies [9]​ who said, "Kingofaces, I am sure you want more, and I am sorry I have no more to offer at this time." ​[10]​
  • After ​Sandstein closed the case [11],
  • Drmies reopened it. [12]​

Drmies had no authority to reopen the case according to policy​. violating WP:ADMINACCT Dismissing an enforcement request​​

In this 2015 case the Committee unanimously agreed "once a request has been dismissed by an uninvolved administrator, it may not be reopened". Dismissing an enforcement request (alternate)​

Drmies was informed of the violation and said, "There is nothing wrong with reopening a thread; if one admin can close it, surely another can reopen it, especially if a third admin thinks there's something to the request". [13]

(The "third admin" was AGK who weighed in after the case was closed ​​​[14]​, and after Drmies reopened it, banned me indefinitely from all GMO-related pages. [15])

@Serial Number 54129: I have struck mention of WP:ADMINACCT as unnecessary. petrarchan47คุก 17:56, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Drmies

I managed to have completely missed the note on my talk page; my apologies.

I really don't have much to say. This is an attempt to get something undone by way of a technicality, that some procedure was not followed or was broken--it seems to me that there is already broad agreement that this simply doesn't apply. For starters, there's Sandstein's "This does not prevent you from taking action if, unlike me, you believe it is warranted." More importantly, in my opinion, is the suggestion that everything is covered, or should be covered, by procedure. BTW, I think the community should be pleased that admins are willing to disagree and to consider and reconsider matters, and that more admins are willing to step up to the plate: all of us are making a small number of admins, including Sandstein, pull all the weight at AE. Drmies (talk) 18:07, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by AGK

First, linking to instants in the discussion gives an incomplete picture. Here is the full enforcement thread.

Appellant argues that per this principle in a case decision, enforcement requests are carved in stone if an administrator {{hat}}s it. Such a rule would be finicky, even for Wikipedia arbitration. Mercifully, decision principles are not binding. The actual rule is that requests are dismissed with a consensus of uninvolved administrators.

When the request was first closed, 1 administrator supported acting and 1 did not. Consensus: absent. Once a consensus emerged, 2 administrators favoured action and 1 was ambivalent. Consensus: existed. I think what happened between times is irrelevant. AGK ■ 20:51, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Sandstein

I agree with Winged Blades of Godric below that the grounds given for this appeal are invalid. But I certainly don't join Winged Blades of Godric's personal attacks on the appellant, which, having been made in an arbitration forum, should result in appropriate action from arbitrators or clerks. Sandstein 12:24, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Kingofaces43

I'm not really sure what's intended here. Petrachan47 was topic-banned from GMOs by AGK through discretionary sanctions. How the AE ended up being closed doesn't affect that topic ban or any sort of appeal. Topic-banned editors cannot bring up the subject material, admin board discussions, etc. of their ban unless it's directly relevant to an appeal, so I'm not sure why Petrarchan is trying to bring this up as opposed to someone else who isn't topic-banned if this is meant as a more meta-AE clarification rather than their own ban. I don't see any mention of a topic-ban appeal, and even if there was, none of what's posted here so far would address anything relevant towards an appeal, such as addressing the long-term behavior issues they were banned for in the first place we'd expect of an actual appeal. Kingofaces43 (talk) 19:55, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by WBG

He had raised the same point at Sandstein's t/p, a month back, where Sandstein pointed him to the same and he replied No worries, thanks for responding.∯WBGconverse 08:29, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

There would be some minimal merit, if he had chosen this venue to criticize AGK's final decision and/or the quantum of the sanction but here we have something about Drmies' actions as perceived violations of ADMINACCT and previous ArbCom decisions.

FWIW, I pretty much concur with Tryptofish's comemnts at the original ARE-thread and think that the awarded sanction easily passes the rational basis review.∯WBGconverse 09:04, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by SN54129

  • I'd disagree with User:Sandstein's analysis that fucking incompetent rises to the level of a personal attack; it merely recasts WP:CIR slightly more robustly (possibly, on refelection, slightly overly robustly, as although the question of competence is fundamental, it can also be an extremely sensitive one).
  • @Petrarchan47: Wot's ADMINACCT got to do with it? ——SerialNumber54129 13:26, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Tryptofish

I've been mentioned, and I've been involved in this since the original case, so I will briefly say that there are insufficient grounds for any action here. The claim that the majority of the community were on her side is a stretch, and the rest sounds to me like wikilawyering about how an AE thread was closed. The bottom line is that the enactment of AE sanctions was in conformance with policy. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:37, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.

Genetically modified organisms: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).
  • I've removed some statements made by WBG at the direction of a member of the arbitration committee. --Cameron11598 (Talk) 18:45, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Genetically modified organisms: Arbitrator views and discussion

  • Recuse. Opabinia regalis (talk) 19:29, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sandstein's comment closing the thread stated that another administrator could take action if he or she thought it was warranted. Given that statement, the usual rule against reopening a closed AE request would not apply in this instance. If Petrarchan wishes to appeal from his topic-ban or seek to end it, he should focus on the substantive reasons the topic-ban was imposed rather than procedural issues. @Winged Blades of Godric: It is a bit contradictory to accuse an editor of trolling and of incompetence for the same post, since they imply very different mind-sets. On the other hand, it is quite acceptable to respond to the post without alleging either of these things. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:20, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • There are several named parties to this ARCA that have yet to provide statement. I would like to hear from some of them before making a decision. Mkdw talk 17:14, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've read this a few times now, and Petrarchan47, am I to understand that you're not appealing the GMO topic ban per se, but in fact appealing the "re-opening" of the thread? I assume, with the hope that if we confirm the thread should not have been re-opened, then the ban wouldn't have happened, and therefore can be dismissed. Well, no - I have no issue with the thread being re-opened, there had been little discussion and Sandstein closed as such, explicitly allowing for Drmies (or any other admin) to take action. If he'd closed as "clearly no violation", that might be different. WormTT(talk) 17:32, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree with my colleagues, Sandstein closed the thread specifically allowing other admins to modify the outcome at their discretion. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 00:14, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • As do I. I don't see grounds for granting the appeal. Doug Weller talk 17:30, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Same; Sandstein explicitly closed the thread to allow for later modification, so it's not invalid. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 17:38, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Clarification request: Magioladitis

Initiated by Magioladitis at 23:58, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Case or decision affected
Magioladitis arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)
Magioladitis 2 arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:


Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

Statement by Magioladitis

  1. Am I allowed to comment on Wikipedia_talk:Bot_policy#Should_BAG_members_have_an_activity_requirement??
  2. Am I allowed to do this task Wikipedia:Village_pump_(miscellaneous)#Change_coming_to_how_certain_templates_will_appear_on_the_mobile_web?

The first one is in the talk page of the bot policy.

The second one is a case of a series of edits that affect or may affect the visual output in the future and in some cases only in specific devices e.g. mobile phones.

-- Magioladitis (talk) 23:58, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In the second one, we have the following: Is there really a discussion that community should consider of whether to make these changes or not? Is the discussion of whether we should be making edits in advance to avoid breaking things in the future? If there is no subject of discussion on whether we should make these changes, then is there a consensus to make these edits? If yes, I am allowed to make these edits manually? -- Magioladitis (talk) 01:04, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

So, in the first one, I can participate in discussions about Bot policy as long at I do not mention COSMETICBOT or as long as noone in the discussion mentions it? -- Magioladitis (talk) 01:05, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I am asking the following: Do you think that these annouchments have automatically a consensus of implementation or not? If not I would like to participate in the discussion. If yes I would like to start editing right away. -- Magioladitis (talk) 16:52, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

PMC check my last comment above. It's not clear to me if these requests my WMF have consensus in the community. -- Magioladitis (talk) 18:04, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Doug Weller ask permission to edit template namespace. The request in Village Pump says "We ask for your help in updating any templates that don't look correct." -- Magioladitis (talk) 20:07, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

RickinBaltimore i.e. I can comment in the bot policy page when it comes to other matters. Thanks, Magioladitis (talk) 20:11, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

RickinBaltimore Bots? I am not allowed to say that we need a bot to fix those? How I am supposed to file a bot request then? I am allowed to apply for BRFA's as far as I undertsand. Or not? -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:10, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Beyond My Ken

Unless I've missed something, neither requested action seems to be forbidden by either the Magioladitis or Magioladitis2 cases. Beyond My Ken (talk) 10:23, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Username

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.

Magioladitis: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).
  • I've done some formatting fixes.‎ Cameron11598 18:47, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Magioladitis: Arbitrator views and discussion

  • As I understand it, Magioladitis, you would not be prohibited from participating in either discussion provided you do not discuss or participate in portions of the discussion that would violate your sanctions. For example in the BAG RFC, the principle discuss is clearly outside your sanctions, however, Headbomb has mentioned COSMETICBOT. You should not participate in that portion of the discussion. Mkdw talk 18:27, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The RFC will need to be formally closed. The request by the WMF for assistance appears to be effective now and it does not appear the community has raised any concerns or desire for a specific process. I would caution that if any changes are met with resistance, to stop and seek community consensus on the issue before proceeding any further. Mkdw talk 17:58, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Magioladitis: if the edits you want to make "only introduces a cosmetic change (that is, where there is no substantive change made in the same edit)", then you are prohibited from doing so. Neither of these discussions lift the sanction placed against you. I would err on the side of caution and consider edits like this one to be only a cosmetic change to how the maintenance notice displays. Mkdw talk 21:21, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agree with Mkdw - as long as the comments themselves aren't about COSMETICBOT, there's no reason you couldn't participate in those discussions. Opabinia regalis (talk) 19:29, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Recuse. ~ Rob13Talk 21:45, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree that you are not restricted from participating in the BAG discussion, as long as you avoid COSMETICBOT. As for the VP discussion, Magioladitis, are you asking if you can participate in the discussion, or actually make edits to make the visual changes when the discussion has finished? Everyone is responding to that one as though you are asking if you can participate in the discussion, but your actual wording is "Am I allowed to do this task". ♠PMC♠ (talk) 00:23, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Magioladitis, your response makes no sense. I need you to clarify: are you asking if you can participate in the discussion, or if you can make the edits when the time comes? ♠PMC♠ (talk) 01:10, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
For the second one, I would say you can discuss the situation, as long as you don't bring bots, AWB, or automated edits into it, which would (IMO) cross the line of your restrictions on COSMETICBOT discussions. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 01:16, 20 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree with Mkdw. You can't comment on COSMETICBOT but you can comment on other material. Like PMC I'm confused by some of your questions - some of which don't seem ones we can answer. Are you asking us for permission to edit and if so to edit what? Doug Weller talk 10:09, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Mkdw summed it up best I think. You cannot comment on COSMETICBOT and should stay far away from that discussion. RickinBaltimore (talk) 16:05, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
To add, I would say you can comment on the situation WITHOUT bringing up bots, or AWB ot any time of automated edit. Stay far away from those as you can. RickinBaltimore (talk) 22:06, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Amendment request: The Rambling Man

Initiated by Sandstein at 15:34, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Case or decision affected
The Rambling Man arbitration case (t) (ev / t) (w / t) (pd / t)
Clauses to which an amendment is requested
  1. The Rambling Man prohibited
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request
Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
Information about amendment request
  • Lift the restriction and replace it with another sanction if deemed necessary.

Statement by Sandstein

In October 2016, ArbCom determined, among other things, that The Rambling Man had been incivil and had resigned adminship after a desysopping motion had passed. ArbCom made The Rambling Man subject to a civility restriction, which was amended in September 2017.

This restriction has given rise to many WP:AE requests, including (I may have missed some):

  1. 14 December 2016: Warned by The Wordsmith
  2. 22 January 2017: No action as closed by me, Sandstein
  3. 5 March 2017: Blocked by me for a month; upheld on appeal with a reduced duration
  4. 10 April 2017: No action as closed by Harrias
  5. 8 July 2017: No action as closed by Dennis Brown
  6. 5 January 2018: No action as closed by Ritchie333
  7. 25 January 2018: No action as closed by GoldenRing
  8. 2 March 2018: No action as closed by GoldenRing
  9. 31 May 2018: No action as closed by NeilN
  10. 20 June 2018: No action as closed by Stephen
  11. 23 November 2018 (permalink): Referred to this forum by me with the agreement of other participating admins

In many but not all of these cases, I was of the view that an actionable violation of the restriction had occurred, but other admins disagreed. Regardless of which side one may agree with, it is clear that the restriction has failed to quell the conduct by The Rambling Man that others object to. It should therefore be lifted as ineffective.

I recommend that ArbCom examine the conduct by The Rambling Man (and possibly others) at issue in the more recent AE requests, and determine whether any other sanctions less open to interpretation should be imposed.

Personally, I am appalled by many of the incivil statements by The Rambling Man cited in these AE requests, and believe that a suitably scoped topic or page ban might be an effective remedy (the disputes seem to center around issues related to WP:DYK). I acknowledge, however, that other admins and users see this quite differently, and believe that The Rambling Man is the one being harrassed here (which I have not examined in any detail). I suspect that this reflects, in part, the abiding disagreement among Wikipedians about whether and to which degree we should attempt to enforce standards of civility. Sandstein 15:34, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by The Rambling Man

Double jeopardy time by the looks of it. The list above is confirmation that there's a consensus that no infringement of the sanctions per their current wording has taken place since Sandstein blocked me (twice), the last time being something like 12 months ago (which he neglected to note). Since then a litany of "no action" cases. But now that's not enough, let's go back over all the previous cases and find a different angle so we can re-word the sanction so we can definitely block me, even retrospectively! Bravo. I think (in fact, I know) that the way in which this has been opened already attempts to strongly bias this hearing, and so there seems little purpose in me contributing to it further at this time. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:03, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Vanamonde's example is a perfect exemplar of the absurdity of the sanction. That I could make a completely generic statement about the state of generic individuals attempting to run for offices in a generic grouping of individuals working generically for a generic group of users sums up the futility of trying to discover gold examples of sanction infractions. It would be like sanctioning me for saying "I don't think Arbcom is working too well". The Rambling Man (talk) 00:13, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Oh and BU Rob13 makes a number of claims of communications from various "reluctant" admins, and a "groupies" list, this needs further investigation, with evidence presented here. As this list of "groupie" admins is fundamentally important to this case, we need to list them out and understand their involvement, as the Arb BU Rob13 has alluded. The Rambling Man (talk) 00:24, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Black Kite

I'll have more to say about this shortly (I'm away for a couple of days now), but I'd just like to point out that Sandstein has omitted that The Rambling Man was blocked for 2 weeks in November 2017 for a breach of this remedy [16]. I believe this was a unilateral act by the blocking admin, however, and did not make it to AE. Black Kite (talk) 16:12, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by OID

Unless ArbCom do something to restrict Sandsteins interactions with TRM in any admin capacity (the latest bullshit AE filing laying out the problems as a number of other admins pointed out) at the conclusion of this process I will be opening a community discussion at AN to have Sandstein banned from anything to do with TRM.

Really this is arbcoms own fault for placing badly formed restrictions that are a license for editors to use to harass someone who is actually attempting to fix problems that ArbCom is unwilling to do anythint about - chiefly the repeat offenders who keep putting error-ridden crap on the main page. Only in death does duty end (talk) 16:28, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Ritchie333

I think the creation of User:The Rambling Man/ERRORS (also known as WP:TRM or WP:ERRORS2) has helped defuse the dispute that has led to threads like this. TRM unquestionably does great work for the project, and in particular is one of our best featured list writers and reviewers. I do grimace occasionally at some of the comments he leaves at WT:DYK, and in particular I think he just needs to give Vanamonde93 a bit of a break, but by moving the complaints about the articles onto a dedicated page away from the general view, it means the issues get resolved without resorting to a huge post-mortem of who said what to whom and when. As I said on the other thread, if you gain TRM's respect and have a quiet off-wiki word, he is reasonable. If you charge in on horseback with Arbcom pro-forma templates, you'll get blown a raspberry.

To follow up on OID's point, there is precedent for sanctioning admins over-eager to block users without thinking of the full circumstances. AFAIK, Mike V is still community banned from taking any administrative action against TRM. [17] Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 16:30, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@BU Rob13: I closed the AE thread you started because it seemed that any administration action would cause more disruption that it solved (particularly as TRM had redacted the comment you were trying to sanction him for), and was specifically endorsing the emerging consensus of admins who had already expressed an opinion, particularly Vanamonde. Given the already publicised conflict between him and TRM, I take a "no action" request from him as more weight than from someone like me. When I spoke to you about it, I did mention that you had been accused of being a sockpuppet, though I also said I personally felt such claims were entirely without foundation and also said that you were helpful in other areas of the project. I was simply advising you on what a good course of action would be to sustain respect from the community and be able to do your job with the minimum of harassment. Given that it's fair comment to say that I haven't always seen eye-to-eye with NeilN on things, when I see he has also closed an AE report as "no action", it suggests a broad consensus across the administrative corps. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 19:17, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Pudeo

The wording of the amended prohibition is a failure. It's worth keeping in mind that the prohibition was a civility sanction, based on a finding on TRM being uncivil. It has also been noted that a lot of the incivility was about constantly being hostile and rude over a long period of time, but not going too much over the line with any individual comment (i.e. flying just under the radar). So obscuring the prohibition with the "speculation about the motivations of editors or reflections on their general competence" wording made it unenforceable.

You can read all the recent DYK threads with such behauvior: 1, 2, 3 & 4 but I will also point out the exact diffs in the most recent AE thread.

  • I don't care what you think, your judgement is so flawed that I hope that I never see it exercised again [18]
  • No thanks, better things to do to check "work in progress Phase I", and I'd suggest you leave them well alone with your recent track record!! [19]
  • The problem with losing the prescription is that the level of competence of some reviewers is such that they will simply overlook fundamental issues. [20]

Yet many editors do not see these as being "reflections on general competence". What? Does he need to literally state "your general competence sucks" for the prohibition to kick in? Either improve it and start enforcing it or then just rid of it altogether. --Pudeo (talk) 17:34, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Spartaz

Unfortunately, we still haven't burned any witches. I hope that arbcom will remedy that. Spartaz Humbug! 18:44, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by BU Rob13

I urge the Committee to consider why AE routinely fails to enforce this remedy. I've repeatedly heard from administrators that they aren't willing to enforce this remedy, even in cases where the violation is fairly bright-line, because doing so immediately results in them being harassed by the "groupies" that show up to every single thread related to TRM. When I last tried to take a violation to AE, it was swiftly closed by an administrator who frequently works with TRM and defends him. I then received a rather threatening note on my talk page from that administrator that further attempts to have the remedy enforced would (somehow?) prove I'm some type of malicious sockmaster. The bite was quick, severe, and led to me recusing from further TRM matters.

Given the failure of AE in this circumstance, the Committee should at least consider making enforcement actions related to this remedy appealable only to the Arbitration Committee at ARCA. That would greatly reduce the influence of the involved editors that make enforcing this remedy difficult. ~ Rob13Talk 19:11, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by 331dot

I find it interesting that the fact the lack of enforcement of the remedy under discussion here is somehow seen as a problem and not as the simple fact that the line has not been crossed. There seems to now be a desire to craft some sort of restriction for TRM to break, or to make it harder to defend him, and thus block him every time someone hauls him into AE. The remedy should either be left alone or removed. 331dot (talk) 20:22, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by AGK

The arbitration procedures are already clear:

Administrators wishing to dismiss an enforcement request should act cautiously and be especially mindful that their actions do not give the impression that they are second-guessing the Arbitration Committee or obstructing the enforcement of their decisions.

— WP:AC/P § Dismissing an enforcement request

Eleven enforcement requests later, this decision either isn't working or isn't needed. Please provide for its enforcement or vacate it. AGK ■ 21:01, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Vanamonde93

If anyone actually reads through the AE discussions linked above, they will see that I have participated in a number of those discussions, and I have not yet advocated for a block against TRM. Despite stuff like this, I am not going to do so now. The ideal outcome here is for TRM to continue his content work without personalizing meta disputes the way he has been. As such that's what an ARBCOM restriction should achieve, by forbidding behavior that an individual editor is unwilling or unable to change of their own accord.

These AE discussions clearly include some filings that are frivolous, or include no clear violations (this, for instance). There are other discussions that clearly include violations of this editing restriction: this clearly speculates about the motivations of other editors; it was not sanctioned at least in part because TRM redacted the comment in question. That isn't a failure of the restriction; that's exactly what it's meant to achieve. Someone pointed out that TRM shouldn't have said what he said, and he retracted it.

Of late, though, we've had a somewhat different situation; the language TRM uses is again rather intemperate (links in the most recent AE filing). I am fine with people telling him to tone it down, instead of blocking him (indeed, that's likely to be more effective). Instead, most people in this discussion (with honorable exceptions) have refused to recognize that the comments like the following are indeed a problem:

"...anyone running this time would be doing it simply for hat collection purposes. But hey, let's see who "runs" (i.e. leaves it to the last minute to avoid scrutiny, then leap in with cabal backing!)." [21]

I would be hard put to come up with a clearer violation of this particular restriction; it's explicitly referring to the motivations of anyone who ran for ARBCOM this year. Yet we have multiple admins arguing there's no problem at all. Alex Shih I'm particularly bothered by your comment at AE, which came after the link I posted: and it bothers me because I know you to be an entirely reasonable person. Refusing to recognize these edits as violations of the restriction has the effect of undermining both AE as an institution and the expectation that experienced editors are expected to conduct themselves with some decorum. And that is a problem ARBCOM needs to fix.

The principle of this restriction is a good one, because TRM has been unwilling to moderate his language of his own accord. If admins are unable or unwilling to enforce it (through blocks or conversation, it doesn't matter; the point is whether, when a violation occurs, admins take action to discourage further violations), then ARBCOM needs to revise it so it's enforceable, enforce it themselves, or to scrap it altogether and more or less make it official that once you've done enough content work, you can behave more or less the way you want. Vanamonde (talk) 22:45, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Alex Shih: Thanks for the clarification. Could you refresh my memory as to where that comment was? @Euryalus: I agree with Alex's reply to you below: I want to add that I'm puzzled by your suggestion that we reach consensus at AE. AE does not require consensus; a single admin could, while acting within policy, implement a sanction that others disagreed with, but such a sanction would probably end up at ARCA. We're trying to shorten that process here. Also, I've been fairly active at AE, and no restriction that I know of has engendered as much disagreement about its enforcement as this one, hence the request that the restriction be made easier to interpret. Vanamonde (talk) 15:54, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Thryduulf: That's not an accurate characterization of those discussions. First, Dweller is not "unambiguously unbiased", and has admitted as much himself. Second, several admins (including myself, before my involvement), have made it quite clear that the diffs brought to AE were not acceptable; sanctions were avoided in one case via a warning, in another case because TRM redacted his statement, and in a third by coming here; there was also one AE block and one block invoking this sanction that wasn't from AE. The reports have been from a number of users, too. So the notion that this is all Sandstein isn't going to fly; I have no issues with anyone examining his behavior, but there's more going on. Also, if you can look at the quote I posted above and say that that isn't speculating about others editors' motivations, that bothers me; is there anything TRM could do that you would consider a violation? Vanamonde (talk) 17:46, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Aside from which there's the fact that most of the threads linked above have had multiple admins saying TRM's behavior was sub-par, even disruptive, but despite that, there's little to no recognition that there's a behavioral issue here from a worryingly large number of people. Vanamonde (talk) 18:01, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Thryduulf: Yes, I misunderstood the first part of what you wrote. I still disagree with the second part: TRM's restriction has nothing to say about whether the editors are individual editors or a group; in this case, the group isn't even a non-specific one; it referred to anyone running for ARBCOM this year. Vanamonde (talk) 18:06, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Alex Shih

On mobile now so I'll have to substantiate with diffs later, but just wanted to quickly address Vanamonde93's ping: my comment at AE should not be read as an endorsement of "no violation"; my position is quite clear I believe in a previous long post I made about The Rambling Man and their civility at ERRORS. The purpose of my comment is to point out how the current wording of the restriction can be interpreted freely both ways, which is why we have found ourselves back at AE repeatedly without any results. The purpose of the remedy was certainly violated on more than one occasion, but the reality we have here is that the situation has been worked to a point that no administrator in their sane mind would enforce such remedy. In this situation, ArbCom needs to either take more responsibility or just declare the remedy as unenforceable. Alex Shih (talk) 23:54, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Euryalus: "the restriction is/was a mechanism to encourage The Rambling Man to be more civil in interaction with other editors" – Aren't ArbCom remedies meant to be binding, rather than serving the purpose of "to encourage" better editing behaviour? And this remedy is most certainly not about encouraging TRM to be more civil (because technically we should all be civil) when the wording is clearly written as "speculation about the motivations of editors". I also don't think it's true to say substantial portion of admins at AE "don't consider his comments over recent months to be uncivil"; there should be rough consensus that TRM has been uncivil in most of the instances, but no consensus on whether or not these incivility requires any action. And this no consensus mostly originates from the disagreement over the interpretation of the remedy as currently worded – what is the remedy trying to prevent? To ask AE to "get a consensus" over this basically proven unenforceable remedy is irresponsible on ArbCom's part. We can't get a consensus, and that's why we are here. If TRM can freely make insulting remarks, or make implications without making any direct reference, then this remedy is pointless and should be dropped so we don't find ourselves wasting time over this exercise in vain. Alex Shih (talk) 07:12, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Johnuniq

Escalating sanctions are good when dealing with, say, a copyright violator or vandal, but not in difficult cases such as this. The automaton response to TRM's poking is to double the length of the last block but that inflames the situation because disinterested onlookers can see that a month-long block of the person who does most to keep errors off the main page is ridiculous. If necessary (that's if) block TRM for 48 hours. Do that on every occasion. Problem solved. Johnuniq (talk) 00:31, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Thryduulf

I may have more to add later, but for now I think is best to copy over a couple of comments I made in the most recent AE request, the first related to TRM's behaviour:

"I see nothing actionable here. I see frustration, exasperation and annoyance, and undoubtedly born out of that I see comments that are less than ideally phrased, but none of it is passing comment on the general competence of editors. If you wish to see TRM using less emotional language then the best way forward is probably to sort the problem at its root - i.e. either fix errors in DYK queues, demonstrate that the matters TRM is highlighting are not errors, and/or get consensus that errors in DYKs appearing on the main page is not a problem (this last will require a wider consensus than just the editors regularly involved with the DYK project, probably an RFC). Thryduulf (talk) 10:47, 22 November 2018 (UTC)"[reply]

The second related to Sandstein's interaction with enforcement requests against TRM:

A (possibly partial) list and summary of previous occasions where Sandstein has commented on AE requests involving TRM
  • March 2017 Sandstein blocked TRM for 1 month 40 minutes after a report from a user with a known long history of antagonistic interaction with TRM. The only outside comment was "I think you can probably cut him [TRM] some slack for that [diff]."
  • March 2017 Appeal of previous block, length reduced to 1 week.
  • July 2017 Sandstein agrees with the unanimous consensus that the overly long request is not actionable]]
  • May 2018 Sandstein recommends a block of 1 month, six other admins and at least 12 other commenters said "not a violation", several also asking Sandstein to recuse.
  • June 2018 Sandstein recommends a block of 1 month. Six other admins (including me) and at least four others see no violation. 1 admin sees a posisble violation but no need for a sanction given the context. Myself and Dweller at least call for Sandstein to recuse. Thryduulf (talk) 16:01, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

(Initial list compiled by Thryduulf. Others may expand it, but let's not go back too far.)

I posted this in a collapsed section at AE as it wasn't directly related to the filing. I'm posting it uncollapsed here as it is directly relevant. This was compiled based only on the first 1 (or possibly 2) pages of results when searching the AE archives for "The Rambling Man". They may be others as the results I did get were presented in a random order. Thryduulf (talk) 02:38, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I also endorse OID's comments regarding Sandstein. Before an ARCA was mentioned I was considering starting an AN thread regarding the matter myself. It is a fundamental principle of adminship that you recuse when you are not able to act neutrally and objectively regarding a matter so that it is dealt with fairly. It is an equally fundamental principle that such matters must be seen to be handled neutrally, and if you are repeatedly told by many different people that you appear to be biased in a particular matter then you should recuse, whether you think you are biased or not.
Unfortunately my memory fails me regarding the name of the person concerned, but one (former, I think) arbitrator published a list of topics (and users?) in their userspace where they would always recuse. One of these was Armenia-Azerbaijan, where they perceived they had no bias but others perceived they did. This is a model Sandstein should look to emulate rather than doubling down when presented with repeated instances when they have been diametrically opposed to pretty much every other contributor to the discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 02:38, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

  • @Opabinia regalis: The issue with Sandstein is not how often he has commented on AE requests involving TRM (afaik nobody considers than a problem). The problem is how he comments: He presents himself as an unbiased administrator when literally dozens of other administrators in good standing tell him over and over again that this comments (including, but not exclusively, the calls to block TRM for a month when everyone else says there was no violation) demonstrate that he is really not. To me it has reached the stage of an admin competency issue: WP:ADMINACCT final bullet "Repeated or consistent poor judgment" and the general (but possibly unwritten) expectation that administrators will listen to an act on feedback given to them rather than doubling down. Thryduulf (talk) 12:22, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Vanamonde93: The disagreement is pretty simple to characterise in almost every report I've seen - with very few exceptions Sandstein and those who are unambiguously biased or involved regarding TRM see a violation, Dweller and those who are unambiguously unbiased and uninvolved see no violation. Sandstein sees every report as warranting a month long block, pretty much everyone else who sees a violation thinks that the appropriate response is a chastisement or short block. This is not evidence that TRM is not being blocked enough. Thryduulf (talk) 17:04, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Vanamonde93: You've misunderstood nearly everything I've written. I said "Dweller and those who are unambiguously unbiased" not that Dweller is one of those who are unambiguously unbiased. Likewise regarding Sandstein I'm not saying he is the only one who sees violations, simply that (a) he is the only one who is neither unambiguously involved nor unambiguously biased who sees them as such (you for example are very clearly involved) and (b) he is the only one of those who do see these as violations who thinks the most appropriate response is to block for a month. As for me, when I see TRM speculating about the general motivations of individual editors (rather than commenting about a non-specific group of editors in general or expressing exasperation about the actions (or lack of actions) of individual editors in a very specific context) then I will absolutely call him out on his breach of a topic ban. I will not vote to sanction him for things that do not violate his restrictions no matter how much people want them to be violations. As I said the best thing for everybody here to do is to actually fix the errors, that way there wont be anything for TRM to complain about. Thryduulf (talk) 17:55, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by power~enwiki

Reading Euryalus's decline suggests an alternate wording to me: The Rambling Man is strongly encouraged to maintain decorum in discussions with other editors. He may be sanctioned by a consensus of admins at WP:AE for excessively uncivil behavior. No specific rules about belittling editors or speculating about their motives (that are in practice impossible to adjudicate), no potential for unilateral action by admins who may be viewed as anti-TRM. power~enwiki (π, ν) 05:00, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by {other-editor}

Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.

The Rambling Man: Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

The Rambling Man: Arbitrator views and discussion

  • Civility is one of the most difficult points of Wikipedia, I don't think anyone disagrees that instances of incivility are easy to point out and while I haven't yet reviewed the AE requests (which I'll do over the next few days) I am unsurprised that a "civility restriction" hasn't worked. They historically been unenforceable as incivility is a reaction to other frustrating behaviours. I'm not saying it's the right reaction, but it's hard to sanction someone for being rude, when the reason they were rude is apparent and often worse than the rudeness. I'll await statements from those involved and the rest of the community and reply further after the weekend. WormTT(talk) 15:53, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Recuse. ~ Rob13Talk 19:03, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Recuse. Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:44, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'll echo what Worm said, and I'd be especially interested in statements which suggest alternative options (different wordings, enforcement methods or otherwise). Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 00:27, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Decline - the restriction is/was a mechanism to encourage The Rambling Man to be more civil in interaction with other editors. The history of its enforcement at AE indicates a substantial proportion of participating editors and admins don't consider his comments over recent months to be uncivil, at least not to the point of requiring any action. Playing around with the remedy wording isn't going to change that; and repealing the remedy simply pushes this conversation from AE back to Case Requests. The best course, if anyone feels The Rambling Man is uncivil in communicating with others, is to get a consensus for this point of view at AE and enforce the remedy already in place. -- Euryalus (talk) 04:51, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well, as I recall I'm the author of the current wording, so you can all aim your torches and pitchforks in my direction (orderly line, please). Thinking out loud for a bit:
    • The idea that everyone is too scared to enforce the restriction leads straight down the same path that led to the AE2 case, and we already know that goes nowhere good, so let's not do that. AE admins are sort of by definition not wimps.
    • 331dot has a good point that the underlying premise to a lot of these comments is that obviously TRM should have been blocked more, therefore his lack of blocks is evidence that the restriction is failing. Of course, an alternative explanation is that people didn't think he needed to be blocked. Still, there is clearly a problem somewhere - that's an awful lot of AE requests, and from enough different filers that it's hard to make a "they're all out to get me" case.
    • Sandstein comments on a lot of AE requests, so the fact that he appears in a lot of the TRM-related requests doesn't seem particularly significant.
    • "Arbcom is unwilling to do anything about errors on the main page" - arbcom is unable to do anything about errors on the main page. If there's a user-conduct issue related to main-page errors (or DYK, or whatever) and it goes beyond TRM, well, I hate to be all bureaucratic pettifogging but you're in the wrong place; down the hall, to the right, please file Form 2b sections 5-12 in triplicate here.
    • I've written a lot of tediously long posts about problems in how we define and manage "incivility", especially in the context of expressions of frustration by people working on content. Despite the bullet point above, it's pretty clear that a lot of this is coming from frustration over highly visible poor content. On the other hand, if I had to make a list of the most unpleasant behavior patterns on Wikipedia, this kind of self-righteous, me-against-the-world, everything-would-fall-apart-without-me, Defender of the Wiki business would be right up there. Last time around I called it "really goddamn annoying", and on review I think I understated the case. I think if WP:CIVIL had somewhere along the line been replaced with WP:HUMBLE, a lot of problematic social dynamics might have been mitigated. (Yes, I appreciate the irony of advocating for more humility while writing seven billion bytes of text about my obviously very important opinion ;)
    • Regardless of what else happens, I think Johnuniq's suggestion about non-"escalating" blocks has merit. I never liked that provision and actually thought it didn't apply in this case (but now that I look I was thinking of another case). I think it's a perverse incentive that prevents blocks from being used effectively, and I said the same about AE2, and probably AE1 before that, so it's hardly a TRM-specific view. I don't have a good feeling about power~enwiki's suggestion, because that turns the problem back into generic "incivility", and the whole point of the current wording (and indeed, the original wording from the case) was to be more specific about the nature of the problem. Any other ideas? Having been on the other side of this dynamic a few times, with people I enjoyed collaborating with, who were prickly on-wiki but reasonable in private, I would've thought I'd have a better idea of what to do about it, but it turns out that it's harder than it looks. "TRM is required to remove all adjectives and adverbs from his posts"? Opabinia regalis (talk) 11:03, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
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