Arthur Rubin, an admin, has accused me of "lying" (and/or "misstatements" etc) on half a dozen or more occasions, along with stating that I'm incapable of understanding basic English a couple of times. This relates to the curious case of the legitimacy of the official Wikipedia guideline status of WP:RY. [1] [2], [3], [4], [5]. He has then accused me of redacting the claim I made which he found so outrageous. In all cases, I have asked at least eleven times for diffs of the "lies" and the subsequent "redaction". [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] Rubin has stated that he will only present diffs in a formal setting, so this is it, simply a request for him to provide the diff(s) of my "outright lies" and the diff(s) of my "redaction" of said outright lies. I had hoped it wouldn't need a trip to the drama board to sort this out but apparently not. Other editors appear to have made direct and overt statements calling the status of this guideline into question, yet they have not been subject to similar accusations from Rubin. Now I know this is going to spiral out of all control, because this is Wikipedia, this is ANI and I'm TRM, but I'd like, just for once, to focus on the matter at hand please. Other corollary issues which I'm sure will be brought up to divert from this should be placed in their own section. This thread needs to focus on whether this is appropriate behaviour from an admin since such unfounded accusations easily constitute personal attacks and since so many unresolved requests for evidence easily constitute a failure of WP:ADMINACCT. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:35, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• As a reminder for anyone who wants to look into this. WP:NPA is policy and defines as personal attacks (amongst other things) "Accusations about personal behavior that lack evidence. Serious accusations require serious evidence. Evidence often takes the form of diffs and links presented on wiki." Only in death does duty end (talk) 10:02, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  Indeed. I'd like to see this complaint addressed on its merits alone, without the usual "spiral[ling] out of all control" - if at all possible. -- Begoon 12:12, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  Going even further, I'd suggest that other commenters hold back until Arthur Rubin has had a chance to present his response. Black Kite (talk) 14:21, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

::::: Too many edit conflicts. I'll reply when I have some time at home, in about 21 hours. Diffs will also show that I told him I could only generate the diff links when I'm on my desktop, that I considered his talk page and ANI the only appropriate place to put them, and that I offered to give him the diffs on his talk page, but he had previously "banned" me from his tall page, and refused to "allow" me to post the list on his talk page. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:07, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I will also provide diffs which show that he considers any editor who disagrees with him WP:BULLYing, and that his demand for my not using his talk page was caused by my giving him credit for pointing out problems, and posting requests to fix them in the proper venues. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:11, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I had a longer reply, but I had edit conflicts, and I cannot easily recover it on my desktop. I also attempted to redact TRM's identity from the complaint, but I further alleged that the misstatements require an admin close for an RfC in Talk:2017; further redaction would make my request for an admin close meaningless. I shouldn't have named TRM as the liar in that venue, but having done so, further redaction is absurd. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:17, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't matter, the point is that you refused to supply links for the past week or two yet continued to promote this "outright lying" campaign at most venues you could. You didn't need a "formal location" for such diffs, any location you chose to repeat the personal attacks would have been fine. You have certainly been able to respond quicker, and per ADMINACCT, you have failed in that duty. Per NPA, you have also repeatedly attacked me at various venues across Wikipedia with your accusations of (a) me "lying" and (b) me "redacting the lie" while (c) allowing a number of other editors to apparently say the things you accused me of without any recourse. How odd. And yes, as I noted, you'll be attempting to divert scrutiny over your failure of admin duties by providing other spin, do that in another thread because this is simply about your refusal to supply evidence to support the many personal attacks you have made despite multiple requests, per NPA and ADMINACCT. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:19, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. You have had weeks to get this information together, yet you abjectly refuse. That's not good enough. With your selected attacks on me across multiple venues without evidence, you should resign your mop immediately. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:23, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

More nonsense. Your personal attacks against me are quite relevant as to why I didn't redact complaints about your editing, which I posted in the wrong venue. I am willing to apologize for posting them to the wrong venue; however, absurd statements being made about the content and status of WP:RY at Talk:2017 require an admin close of the RfC. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:31, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Who said anything about personal attacks on you? The only issue being dealt with here is your refusal to supply diffs for weeks and weeks despite you using every venue across Wikpiedia to personally attack me. I'm not interested in your "redactions", I'm interested in your evidence that I "lied" and your evidence that "I redacted that lie" and your reasoning for not supplying this evidence for at least two weeks and your abuse of your position. Now then, I don't care about RY, I don't care about "venues", I care about NPA and ADMINACCT. Address those issues please, and stop trying to obfuscate the issue. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:34, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, a couple of things about the ability (or lack of) to post "diffs". Firstly, I tried it tonight, while walking, with a three-year-old iPhone, and copied a diff to my sandbox in around thirty seconds. Secondly, I recommended to you that you seek technical help with accumulating and posting diffs, from someone with the capability to do it in a timely fashion. Thirdly, it would have been so simple to just say "your lie is found at page X with date/timestamp Y". Yet, despite your position as an admin, your requirements per ADMINACCT, your obligation per NPA, you refused to do any of these for more than two weeks, so here we are, wondering why you should be an admin. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:33, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• OK, it's time to stop this thread, before it does indeed "spiral out of control". I strongly suggest that comments stop until Arthur Rubin posts his response, as he has above said he will do sometime tomorrow. At that point, either his response will show that he has or has not any evidence for his comments about TRM. At that point, we can continue forwards. Thank you, Black Kite (talk) 20:38, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

  Sure, so Rubin has had two weeks to post a response and refused to do so. I just wanted others to know that I had given him many, many options on how to proceed before we ended up at the drama boards. Yet again, it needs to be assessed in the context of his position as an admin. And now we wait while he gets to pick when and how he wants to continue. Bravo. 20:41, 25 July 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by The Rambling Man (talk • contribs)

• That's fine - if he doesn't post a response tomorrow, then the situation can also continue forwards. But there is nothing to be gained from a continual back-and-forth between the two of you with no useful outcome, frustrating as it might be for you. Black Kite (talk) 21:23, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• I think the point has been missed. It's clear from Rubin's edit history that he has been online here every single day since my first request to provide evidence to substantiate his personal attack. He didn't, he hasn't, he's repeated the same attacks across Wikpiedia. It's now actually too late to apologise, redact etc, what we're examining here is his abuse of position, NPA violations and ADMINACCT fail. That needs nothing more from him. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:28, 25 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Since this incident involves an admin refusing to even acknowledge their behaviour - there's a clear case to be made for removal of the admin tools. Possibly via arbcom if need be, but nobody here wants that. As such, I would like to make the following proposal... Twitbookspacetube 04:41, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Never mind, then! I'll start putting together a case - I'll wait 48 hours before filing to allow for response - They've already had weeks so I feel that I'm being generous here... Twitbookspacetube 04:54, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Just to comment on my close, Twitbookspacetube, I strongly believe community-based desysopping should exist in order to ensure adminship isn't such a big deal. It's been repeatedly proposed and shot down, though, so meh. As it stands, a discussion on desysopping wouldn't be actioned by the beauracrats or stewards, so it's not possible. (This is not a comment on the specifics of this case; I haven't read anything about them.) ~ Rob₁₃^Talk 05:23, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Also by way of observation -- if you do put together a case to bring to ArbCom, they're very unlikely to take it up unless you show a history of misconduct or abuse of the admin tools. I think that a single instance would have to be particularly egregious before it qualifies as the basis for a desysopping case. (In fact, I'm not sure if I've ever seen them take a case brought to them based on a single instance -- as opposed to when they themselves react to a instance of misbehavior, and desysop on their own initiative.) Beyond My Ken (talk) 11:17, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

30+ hours since this was filed and no sign of any appropriate response from Arthur Rubin. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 13:51, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

To be fair, he said he will respond in about 21 hours, 25 hours ago. I've been also waiting for the input though. Alex Shih^Talk 19:50, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I've been waiting three weeks for the input. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:55, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

But Alex why did it require multiple requests by TRM and an ANI report to compel Arthur Rubin to provide diffs? He is not a few hours tardy; he's missed the mark for two or three weeks now. As a person who edits almost exclusively on a mobile device, I find his smartphone excuse unconvincing.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 20:01, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I seem to be running a fever. My next edits anywhere on Wikipedia under any of my accounts will be a personal status update or the diffs. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 20:52, 26 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

(As of 21:59, 30 July 2017 (UTC), Arthur Rubin has held true to this) pbp 21:59, 30 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Nobody has said anything different. Thanks for the note. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:10, 30 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Nudging this thread to prevent premature archiving. Of course, the discussion over why it would take three weeks for an admin to provide evidence to substantiate the various personal attacks can continue regardless, the diffs themselves are, by now, almost irrelevant. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:43, 27 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Nudging again, to ensure thread stays on notice board. Once again, regardless of any diffs that Rubin might supply, the case of him not supplying them to support his various personal attacks despite nearly a dozen requests to do so can surely be discussed without his presence. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:44, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well sure, it can, and it should. Sadly, all you can really get here is "Arthur has done wrong, and is reminded not to do wrong again", and a record that you tried to resolve the dispute, so that arbitration requests don't get rejected as premature. That truly sucks, and I sympathise. For the record, though, I do think the failure to provide the requested diffs, after repeated requests, is a breach of WP:ADMINACCT. -- Begoon 11:22, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, the community's acknowledgement that the admin offered unfounded personal attacks over a span of weeks and yet refused to supply any evidence, contrary to ADMINACCT and NPA, can be established right away. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:11, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I also agree with this being regretful, and sets a dangerous precedent for ADMINACCT. Hopefully the case will have a proper closure soon. Alex Shih^Talk 18:22, 29 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Nudging the thread once again to ensure it is addressed properly. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:09, 30 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

TRM, I started to place a DNAU on this thread yesterday but found someone else already has. It will not be archived and no one should manually archive this either. You won't have to nudge it and we will expect the response from AR per WP:ADMINACCT.
 — Berean Hunter (talk) 20:30, 30 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Cool, thanks for the note about the archiving. However, what is important is to allow the community to decide as to whether this behaviour is commensurate with an admin, regardless of whether or not Arbcom wish to do anything (which, because it's about TRM, is highly doubtful). A resounding community endorsement of the infractions would go a long way to giving Arbcom the wakeup call they need as they continue to defend and coddle admins who routinely abuse their position with impunity. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:36, 30 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed removal of admin tools from Arthur Rubin

ARBCOM case

As instructed above, I have waited 48 hours after my last comment here, then filed a case at arbcom which can be found here. Twitbookspacetube 05:13, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Same Admin has made many serious accusations against me and refused to provide any evidence. He even pulled a user right without evidence. Worst Admin here. Legacypac (talk) 17:51, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Not that you'd reflexively dive on a bandwagon, of course... -- Begoon 19:12, 28 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well Rubin did instigate an involved block a few weeks ago and accused a good faith editor of being a vandal, so it's pretty clear that my experience is not unique. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:38, 30 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, sorry, perhaps my comment was a bit harsh, but, without any additional diffs provided, the coveted award of Worst Admin here seemed pretty strong. -- Begoon 02:13, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, I guess Legacypac could offer some of those diffs here or at the Arbcom case to substantiate such a claim. Although Legacypac isn't an admin, we still expect to see diffs for such statements. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:22, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

See the next section (I moved to User:Legacypac/AR) TRM's treatment by AR sounds very familiar. Legacypac (talk) 07:54, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the quick response and provision of diffs Legacypac, perhaps you should consider RFA! The Rambling Man (talk) 07:58, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, thanks for the quick response, Legacypac, and my apologies, again, for my brusqueness. -- Begoon 10:44, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

AR has established by his behavior we can say anything nasty we like about him without any proof of misconduct. Heck we could even remove his bit without any evidence like he did to me. I operate on a different standard. Legacypac (talk) 10:49, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This topic cannot be handled at ANI and the whole section should be closed. Please keep evidence for the Arbcom case that will not proceed until the subject returns to editing. Johnuniq (talk) 08:04, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think this ANI thread should be closed yet. The Arbcom case may not be accepted. And in any case there would seem to be aspects of this situation—separate from any Arbcom case—which might be addressed here. And in particular, Arthur Rubin has promised to respond here to the request for diffs—as soon as he is able– and I for one would like to see his response (or lack thereof) before this section incident is closed. Paul August ☎ 11:39, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. It would seem a bit "Catch-22", when a requirement for an ARBCOM case is that all previous dispute resolution steps have been exhausted, to close this attempt now. I'd like to see Arthur's response too, and I hope he will soon recover and return, but, equally, I don't think we need to wait indefinitely for that before deciding if there was already an ADMINACCT issue here, prior to his illness. -- Begoon 12:09, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

As I said above However, what is important is to allow the community to decide as to whether this behaviour is commensurate with an admin, regardless of whether or not Arbcom wish to do anything (which, because it's about TRM, is highly doubtful). A resounding community endorsement of the infractions would go a long way to giving Arbcom the wakeup call they need as they continue to defend and coddle admins who routinely abuse their position with impunity. The Rambling Man (talk) 12:19, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Arbcom have now hatted the case because although Rubin is editing elsewhere online, he's too ill to edit Wikipedia. Coddling the protected admins, the admins who use personal attacks and fail to abide by ADMINACCT, day on, day out. Disgraceful. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:34, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Presumably the "hatting" will only be temporary. @The Rambling Man: How do you know Arthur Rubin is editing elsewhere online? Paul August ☎ 23:51, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Paul August: this question may be somewhat difficult for The Rambling Man (or any other editor) to respond to, because of the implications regarding WP:OUTING. —Sladen (talk) 01:04, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I guess I'm a little confused here. TRM's complaint seems to be that AR has made accusations against him and then failed to provide any evidence. If that is so, it strikes me as odd that TRM would choose to make an accusation against AR that he cannot substantiate without running afoul of the policies on outing. Lepricavark (talk) 03:45, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

No need to be confused. Like here, Rubin edits under his own name across the Internet, it's not hard to establish that he is only too ill to edit Wikipedia. The Rambling Man (talk) 05:58, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• I have no opinion on the users involved here, but am I correct in assuming that the only way an abusive administrator can be desysopped is through Arbcom action, which they they can defeat by taking a wikibreak? If so, that might explain why abusive admins say "go ahead, try to get me desysopped" as they know the process. Coretheapple (talk) 22:51, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• At the Arbcom case, I commented that the filing was premature but that was only because I had faith Arthur was telling the truth about his timely illness. However, if what TRM says is true and Arthur really is active on other websites, just not Wikipedia, then Arbcom should proceed. There simply is too many excuses by this admin that I can poke holes in and if this gets swept under the rug, I can not even begin to describe my level of disgust.TheGracefulSlick (talk) 23:37, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

After what the arbitration committee did to kww on your behalf, I think you're the last person who should be whining about them. That said, it is true that the ArbCom has in the past been too indulgent of people feigning illness to avoid an arbcom motion; remember A Nobody, anyone? Reyk _YO! 00:36, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm curious... are you saying that ArbCom is too lenient in recent years compared to the A Nobody request or that they were too lenient then? GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:40, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Too lenient back then. IIRC that editor feigned a very obviously fictional kidney complaint just as his arbcom case was starting, which did not prevent him socking here or editing heavily at Wikia including blocking people there who'd annoyed him here. And the arbitration committee rather meekly seemed to accept this "illness" and stick the case on the shelf. I was annoyed at the time that arbcom did not even attempt to question the extremely obvious deception. In the end A Nobody was permabanned at ANI, which got arbcom off the hook a bit. Now we see another case where someone may be dodging an arbcom motion allegedly on health grounds while still being heavily active elsewhere. Now, I haven't looked deeply into the Arthur Rubin situation so it might be unfair of me to compare him to A Nobody; in that situation I was being personally maligned so I took more notice of it. My only point is that arbcom has previously taken blatant malingering at face value and I'd like them not to do so again. Reyk _YO! 00:59, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This is the first I've heard of the A Nobody request, since I wasn't particularly active then and probably didn't even know what ArbCom was. It looks like ArbCom indef banned him until such point where he would agree to return and participate in a case... Is this what you find too lenient? Did I miss something? (Genuine question. ArbCom case requests that don't turn into cases are difficult to look through these days, and they weren't better seven years ago. Let me know if you want me to take this to your talk page, btw, I'm not sure it's particularly germane to this discussion.) GorillaWarfare (talk) 01:09, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for the delay in replying here, had to commute. We hatted the case until Arthur Rubin returns, as we've done in the past with other cases focused on a single party where that party is not editing Wikipedia. We'll unhat it when he returns. I have no idea where Arthur Rubin has been elsewhere online, though I don't think it's reasonable to assume that because he is not so ill he can't operate a computer, he is well enough to have the energy to come back to Wikipedia while he's the focus of an ArbCom case request.

@Coretheapple: No. If an abusive administrator were the subject of an ArbCom case and took a temporary wikibreak, we'd just resume it when they returned. We had a case a while ago (Toddst1, I think), where an admin stopped editing. The case was never resumed because Toddst1 didn't return until after he was desysoped for inactivity. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:29, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@GorillaWarfare: Is that same courtesy extended to ordinary users who are hauled before arbcom? Coretheapple (talk) 00:42, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. At least, I can't recall any cases we've held against someone who was completely absent – I hope I'm not wrong. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:53, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Coretheapple - Speaking as a disinterested party with zero ties to Arbcom: it is indeed a common practice to recess from activity when a participant, regular user or administrator, is unable to effectively participate in an Arbcom process. This reality has been gamed from time to time, I strongly suspect, but it remains a fact. Carrite (talk) 02:48, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And personally, I think that's the way it has to stay. WP:NOTMANDATORY is just too important a principle for a volunteer community to not be weakened, even if the rare problem editor takes shelter under it. Life happens and I don't think it's reasonable or smart to give an incentive to editors in disputes to go digging into evidence of what is going on in eachother's lives. None of that should matter. Whatever the nature and authenticity of Arthur's illness (or anyone stated need for needing to disengage with Wikipedia) it shouldn't be a topic of discussion here. The AE report isn't going anywhere and Arthur either has to stay away or face the music once he comes back. No harm results to the person alleging misconduct directed against them in either of those scenario's and we keep this community out of a sticky area it wisely chose to avoid early on and consistently ever since. Snow ^{let's rap} 23:08, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Request for clarification

Without implying anything either way on the particular users and behavior being discussed here (I have not examined the evidence myself and thus have no opinion on that) is it actually true that, if Arbcom declines to accept a request for desysopping, that ANI can do nothing, no matter how good or bad the evidence is? Surely that was not the intent of the policy. If the admin's behavior is bad enough (again, I have no opinion as to whether this is true in this case) ANI could decide on a community block or a community recommendation for desysoping, right?

Now in this case, Arbcom (Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Arthur Rubin and WP:ADMINACCT) has put the case on hold for reasons (hasn't edited for five days) which would customarily not be accepted as a reason to put an ANI case on hold. Should we put this on hold as well, close it with a request to refile if Arbcom doesn't act in X days, or continue on with it?

BTW, this may be an example of the Super Mario Effect.

Background: In Mario Brothers, When Small Mario takes a hit, he dies. When Super Mario takes the same hit he turns into Small Mario. The obvious analogy would be a case where when a regular user misbehaves badly enough he is site banned, but when an administrator misbehaves in the exact same way he is desysopped and becomes a regular user.

There is also an even larger and far rarer Giant Mario, who can walk over and destroy everything in his path, including the largest and most powerful enemies. Eventually Giant Mario reverts to being Super Mario. The analogy here is left as an exercise for the reader. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:18, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In addition to your very apt analog: given that the entire process is dominated by administrators, it strikes me as a case of regulatory capture in an almost comically exaggerated sense. Coretheapple (talk) 23:29, 31 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

the community can't take away admin rights but the community can block or ban. Sir Joseph ^(talk) 00:06, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sir Joseph is right. The community can't desysop, but they could impose sanctions or block/ban the administrator. GorillaWarfare (talk) 00:31, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If I am not mistaken, The community can recommend desysopping, and if there is a strong consensus behind the recommendation (again, not established in this particular case) it is likely that an followup request to Arbcom will result in them doing the desysopping. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:18, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

One would hope that would be the case, but, in reality, ARBCOM will do whatever its members decide. Policy says the community may not desysop, and ARBCOM, theoretically, will not "make" policy. So an ARBCOM discussion can easily override, or just plain ignore, your "strong consensus". As I said above, that sucks, and we should seek to change it. -- Begoon 14:02, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly, and when the wronged party is considered persona non grata by Arbcom then it's even more likely that it would be ignored. However, that's precisely why I want this discussion to continue, we don't need permission from anyone to discuss this behaviour, we don't need Rubin to be present to discuss his behaviour, and a consensus is growing that he has not only made multiple, unfounded personal attacks, but that he has summarily failed in his duty as an admin to respond to the dozen or so requests. Where we go when this discussion is done is another matter. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:38, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

WP:ADMINACCT says in part "Administrators are expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their Wikipedia-related conduct and administrator actions and to justify them when needed. Administrators who seriously, or repeatedly, act in a problematic manner or have lost the trust or confidence of the community may be sanctioned or have their administrator rights removed. In the past, this has happened or been suggested for: ...

• Bad faith" adminship...
• Breach of basic policies (attacks, biting/civility...)
• Conduct elsewhere incompatible with adminship (not applicable)

• Failure to communicate– this can be either to users (e.g., lack of suitable warnings or explanations of actions), or to concerns of the community (especially when explanations or other serious comments are sought). (For weeks, then this thread and ArbComm)
• Repeated or consistent poor judgment

AR recent conduct meets 4 out of 5 past reasons for sanctioning or stripping Admin powers. He is unquestionably continuing to breach point 4 right now. Legacypac (talk) 19:11, 1 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed block

[Consensus to enact, as amended] Proposed editing restriction

Almost moot

Infringement of editing restrictions

Rubin has made this edit in direct infringement of his restrictions. Even at a good faith stretch, this edit doesn't comply with what Rubin is currently allowed to do. Please, someone action this. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:08, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'd say "meh" unless he keeps it up—I imagine he's assumed that my I wouldn't have any issue were he to want to talk to an individual about the case on their own talkpage comment above forms an implicit part of his community ban, and this edit does fall within that—any edits connected with the current request for arbitration and any case that develops out of it, broadly construed is in the wording of the ban. (His claim is nonsense unless he's using some truly weird phone or a pre-2009 iPhone that hasn't had its software updated since—any iOS device running iOS3.0 or later and any Android device will let you do a point-a-to-point-b text selection, as I'm sure he knows perfectly well.) Unless he either goes back to editing material unrelated to the case, or carries on throwing unsubstantiated allegations around, I wouldn't want to block for that. ‑ Iridescent 19:15, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Fucking marvellous. This really is "protect an admin" day. Please note, Rubin's edit relates to the ANI thread, which is not included in the legitimate areas of discussion Rubin can participate. Either this CBAN exists or it doesn't. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:34, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

TRM, unless I am misunderstanding you, the ban specifically allows the editing of ANI. And admins do get blocked for high jerkiness often enough. L3X1 (distænt write) )evidence( 20:29, 4 August 2017 (UTC) [reply]

He didn't edit ANI, he asked someone else to do it for him, even though he is fully capable of doing so himself. This is way beyond stupid. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:50, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Since ANI is included in the list of pages he can edit, if he's merely asking someone else to copy something across to here, I don't think it's a problem (though as Iridescent says, why on earth he can't do it himself I have no idea, and why he wants to do it at all is a mystery, since we're pretty much done here). If he starts editing completely outside his restriction, it will be a different matter. Black Kite (talk) 19:50, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

ARGH, that's the whole point. He's editing a talk page of another user, not any of the pages he's entitled to edit. The CBAN wording should therefore be updated to included "Any user talk page Rubin chooses to edit to make requests to copy and paste details to ANI or the Arbcom case, despite the fact he can simply type that information in at those permitted locations himself." What a joke. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:02, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

He's avoiding scrutiny at every single cost - He's an admin for fucksake so why can't he just copy it himself" - Needless to say he was temporarily restricted from editing any page on this entire website except Arbcom and so therefore this should be enforced .... Not be a case of "Oh it's a talkpage nevermind" - We should enforce this regardless of what page he edits period. –Davey2010^Talk 20:16, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I give up. This is now becoming de facto standard, the admin has it their way, the rest of us just get blocked without discussion. Bravo. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:22, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm about to leave him a note making it really obvious what the restriction means. If he edits in any way outside it again, I'll block him myself, regardless of whether I've commented at the ArbCom case. Black Kite (talk) 20:26, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't matter any more. This is just how it is. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:28, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

He's not allowed to edit articles right now. Indefinitely. And the admin who imposed that sanction, contrary to the proposal that attained consensus, imposed it such that even the closure of the Arb case won't remove the ban. He has effectively been indeffed and he has several editors graciously watching his every move, ready to pounce on anything that appears amiss in the hope that he will land in even more trouble. If he wasn't an admin, he probably would have been blocked by now. In fact, the block might have already expired. Instead, because he's an admin, he's indefinitely prohibited from contributing to the encyclopedia and he's been subjected to a large-scale public humiliation. Under his real name, no less. I'm not asking or expecting you to have any sympathy for AR, but I do implore to consider that he simply is not getting off easy. Lepricavark (talk) 23:12, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

He subjected himself to public humiliation. Legacypac (talk) 05:53, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

And you've generously given of your time and energy to make that humiliation as painful as you can. I believe we might consider that being "part of the problem". Lepricavark (talk) 11:44, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

To be technical he made 3 edits outside his restriction [20] ignoring the earler ones he made to the RY pages where this whole thing started and other pages while the community had already BANNED him but no admin had closed and enacted the ban. The decision was also to BLOCK him but that was not implemented (I can respect the close there), but given there was a storng possibility of a block too, his editing of various pages is pretty gutsy. Legacypac (talk) 20:49, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That's one way of putting it. He's just laughing at all of us. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:50, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Legacypac: The CBAN did not come into force until AR had been notified that it had been agreed upon. Therefore any editing before notification was not in breach of the ban.

Re his editing on a mobile phone, it may be the case that he finds it difficult/impossible to cut and paste part of a page. I've got a smartphone, but there's no way I could edit Wikipedia on it, although it has the capability. I can just about manage simple editing on a Kindle Fire, but need a "proper" computer for serious editing. Mjroots (talk) 07:04, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Certain phones have a stupendously annoying tendency to make the keyboard so big you can't actually see the edit window. My previous phone, when I tried to edit a new line, would jump the view up to somewhere else in the edit window while I was typing. Quite frankly, mobile editing of WP is fraught with problems. However, counter to what AR says, it is possible to copy paste provided you tap and hold where you want to start your copy, then drag the markers to highlight the text you want to copy. It's clunky and horrible, but it is doable. Blackmane (talk) 02:55, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I do agree that for a lot of people and a lot of devices, editing with a mobile devices is quite a lot more difficult then with a desktop. I'm probably a millennial although only barely and I even used an iPad 2 a lot for quite a while although I never went beyond iOS 6. Nevertheless, I still find it quite clunky and difficult. (Actually I don't know if it's been fixed now, but one of the big bugbears with that that device was the tendency for me to go away to look for a link, come back and find everything I'd typed was gone.)

It probably doesn't help that all the phones I've ever owned have been fairly cheap ones. Well except for an S4 Mini but that was tiny. Definitely I find dealing with edit conflicts very annoying. Even worse if you use the mobile site. I've seen some people say how brilliant they or someone else is at using mobile devices so clearly AR was talking nonsense but this seems to be making assumptions that just because some people can do it well means everyone can. I can say there is no way in hell I'd ever want to present a significant case requiring lots of diffs if editing using a mobile device and I actually do provide a lot less of diffs and links and stuff when editing using a mobile device.

I do agree that the specific comment is confusing. AR is not wrong that it's not possible to shift click or select to cursor, at least with most Android devices and IIRC iOS 6. What you can do is drag and to select. But that does mean you can try and deal with edit conflicts. Although as I said, I still find them very annoying to deal with even more so if you keep hitting them.

More fundamentally, I don't understand why it was needed to make a big deal over this. Since it appears to be correct that AR was explicitly allowed to edit ANI, why is it such a big deal if they asked someone else to do it for them and it's the only thing they actually did? I don't see how it helps anyone to make a fuss over it, and I don't see why we should block someone, admin or not for this "technical" violation of their CB.

If they're allowed to edit ANI but they find it difficult and ask someone else to do it for them, provided the person they ask doesn't mind and that's all they do, what's the point in making a big deal over it? This seems to be real case of WP:BURO and rules for the sake of rules. Maybe AR is really doing this just to annoy people. Maybe not and they really do find it difficult in which case meh why not let them do it provided it's all they do and whoever is being asked to copy and paste the content is fine with. Was it ever going to be productive to open another subthread to discuss whether AR should be allowed to ask someone else to copy and paste their requests in the other person's talk page rather than their own?

So, since it's likely to be impossible to prove, provided they're effectively only editing ANI or Arbcom, it seems better to just assume the later and let it be since ultimately it's little different anyway from them editing their own talk page. To be clear, I'm not saying there was anything wrong with telling them that technically it's a violation so you should stick to your own talk page which is what would be happening if you were blocked anyway, even if it's fundamentally no different since people may go apeshit about it; instead simply that there was no reason to go apeshit about it.

Unless the fear was that they were trying to bring someone else's attention to the case. The only other relevant factor is that perhaps it makes it a little harder to monitor them for violations. But even that is only barely true since people would have still look at their edits to their own talk page. I think we can all agree that AR asking people to edit other pages for them, or make suggestions for other pages would be a violation, so ultimately someone was going to have to check out edits to their talk page if we really care that much and don't trust them. And there isn't that much of a difference between looking at a diff for AR's talk page, or someone else's talk page.

Or to put it a different way, while I myself have surely blown things up out of proportion before, this sort of thing more than anything is what makes me think there's no hope for wikipedia. To be clear, I'm not saying the fundamental issue i.e. the issue of AR making accusations and not providing evidence and hose accusations themselves wasn't a big deal. I'm simply saying that parts of what has happened here, seem to be. Obviously I'm including the kerfuffle over AR using someone else's talk page and whether AR's problems with mobile editing are genuine. But I'd also add the concerns over whether their sickness was genuine. I mean sure it did seem suspicious. But well since it's likely to be impossible to prove, and if they really were sick it would be offensive, it was better to just let it be. (I'd also note AFAIK they only said they were sick once. I mean sure if something else came up they could have came back and said "I can't do it now because of X" but I think it's clear that wouldn't have helped in any way so if this really was the reason I can't fault them. And even if they had no reason meh who cared since they're clearly not going to be allowed back without dealing with it so why not just let it be until they come back, if they ever came back.)

And on that note I'd put the cban there too. If it had been intended that we felt there was already compelling evidence AR needed to be sanctioned and there was no evidence that AR could present to us which would change that, and we didn't need arbcom that would be one thing. But since it was revoked after AR came back and arbcom accepted the case, that doesn't seem to have been the intention. Yet it seemed clear to me early on that there was no way in hell AR would be allowed to restart editing elsewhere without dealing with the case here. And it seemed very likely they would understand that and in the unlikely event they didn't and tried to restart editing elsewhere without dealing with the case against them well then someone would notice doubly fast and a cban or probably even an instant block would be applied.

Otherwise if they came back and tried to deal with this case but we weren't satisfied then we could cban. (Similar if they came back and arbcom rejected any case, we could consider whether we felt as the community there was something we wanted to do.)

But what was the point of spending that time making a cban when it was so unlikely to be useful since all it seems to have been for was to force them to either deal with it here, or partake in arbcom if arbcom accepted the case once AR came back. I mean I don't see how it helps TRM or sends a message to AR, Since we haven't said AR's behaviour was atrocious and there's no justification for it, all we seem to have said is that you weren't allowed back until you dealt with the case which as I've said, was obviously long before the cban.

P.S. I'm sure some would say this message is a similar waste of time, and I did carefully consider whether to post it but meh this is the second? time this week I've been fundamentally disappointed at how bad things are at en.wikipedia sometimes so I can only hope someone takes some part on board and we have fewer of these messes which IMO fundamentally damage wikipedia.

Nil Einne (talk) 12:59, 10 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Remove CBAN

Request to allow Rubin to continue to contribute until Arbcom case is concluded

Since they began editing last year, Nurseline247 has made a habit of adding unencyclopedic, frivolous and out-of-scope content to character lists and after it's reverted, they put it back in with misleading edit summaries. I typically veer away from bringing verified users to the noticeboard, but this is not an isolated incident and Nurseline247 has not heeded advice whatsoever-- they have only removed the warnings from their talk page and continued onward.

There are a number of pages in which this has played out. For example...

1. Spider-Man in film: Nurseline247 has repeatedly added content about the animated films to a page strictly reserved for live action productions. They've re-added the content with misleading edit summaries... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 (I may have missed some).
2. Beauty and the Beast: On this page, they keep on re-adding the Direct-to-Video specials that Disney produced that the other editors have reached a consensus not to include, but Nurseline247 apparently doesn't realize that... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
3. Alien (franchise)/List of Alien characters: Before the release of Alien: Covenant, Nurseline247 began adding the advertisements for the film to the franchise page and referred to them as "short films", which was way out of scope. After a number of editors, including myself, removed the content from the page, Nurseline247 simply re-added it to the characters page list, which put it at risk of losing its Featured List status.
4. Frozen (franchise): They keep adding out-of-scope content about Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2, despite that not being a part of the franchise. 1, 2
5. List of fictional shared universes in film and television: Nurseline247 apparently disagrees with the parameters of what a shared universe is, with other editors arguing it needs to have inter-connected concepts and characters... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
6. Arrowverse: Other editors argue that only characters that cross over between the series should be included, but alas... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and there are more, but I believe everyone can get the idea by this point...

Those are a few of the examples just right off the top, from the last month. Over the last two weeks alone, they have been warned many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many times- with several of those being final warnings- but it appears as if that doesn't warrant adjustment on their behalf. DARTHBOTTO _talk•cont 01:23, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I was notified by the filer regarding the thread. I am dropping here my two cents since I am quite involved with the reported user. Nurseline247 has/had (I am unaware of their previous edits) of adding unsourced edits at Spider-Man: Homecoming. I got involved when I saw this edit summary on my watchlist. I have used Twinkle for three now and this statement was false right off the bat. I went out to correct the user per one of the diffs above. Going back, Nurseline247 made a bold edit but was reverted. They then readded the content, which was reverted by me. This was a slow mo edit war per this and this. The content isn't exactly the same with every edit, but it was similar regarding the timeline. My issue with their edits there was that timelines should be discussed at the talk page. It involves original research and it's unsourced. Plus, a user can easily make a mistake with the timeline. I warned them and told them to take it to the talk page. They didn't feel like it. And it appears they were involved in other disruptive editing on other articles. Callmemirela 🍁 ^talk 01:48, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There had been problems with the addition of the name of a minor-level crewmember for the film Alien: Covenant being inserted into the cast section of the Alien franchise page. The name had been previously removed, but the editor Nurseline247 made → this edit re-emplacing the name onto that page. I informed Nurseline247 that this was a crewmember's name which appears approximately three minutes and 40 seconds into the screencredits for that film, and how that position within Covenant's screencredit hierarchy did not warrant the position Nurseline247 was attempting to place onto it by including it in the list. I went on to state on Nurseline247's talk page in this edit herethat the person's role as movement artist in the production of Alien: Covenant was no more important than the hundreds of other artists, assistants, technicians, compositors, etc. found within the screencredits, and that including it in the article's cast list served only to inflate this person's contributions to the film. I ended by stating that it ought to be considered vandalism should that name reappear again on the list in the future. I never received a response on either Nurseline247's or my talk page. Recently, I noticed that what I had added to Nurseline247's talk page and several other editors had been removed (which is that user's right to do), although I placed the WP:OW template on Nurseline247's talk page to let future editors know that not only were my concerns and others deleted, but that they were left unaddressed by that editor. — Spintendo^Talk 15:00, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like since this was posted to the noticeboard, Nurseline247 has continued their behavior at the Aladdin (franchise) and Diary of a Wimpy Kid (film series) pages. The I.P. editor 86.46.205.88 added out-of-scope content, including short films, which was reverted at the Diary of a Wimpy Kid page. After Zucat reverted them, Nurseline247 incrementally added the content back. DARTHBOTTO _talk•cont 19:11, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

While I have had my issues with Nurseline247 (mostly concerning shared universes), I think they can learn if they receive some appropriate punishment like a longer block.★Trekker (talk) 19:54, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If the editor is not willing to communicate, I think a block would be the appropriate action to take. This just might be another simple case of WP:NOTHERE. — JudeccaXIII (talk) 20:16, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Jeez, how long has this been here? In my defense, my edits to Alien (franchise) restoring minor level crew member Badego was simply because the absence of a name meant the Character column did not line up with the Cast. (See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alien_(franchise)&oldid=785944130), an dbecause I believed that Badego did indeed play a neomorph in the film. Now, in regards to Spider-Man: Homecoming, my edits there simply stated what year the film was set in, something I saw as necessary to clarify due to various online disputes I read about the topic. As I said in those edits, the criminal record of character Aaron Davis shows the film takes place in 2017, at least at that point in time, which ret. I'm not sure what the Arrowverse problem is exactly; from the links I viewed, I never added a non-Recurring character to that list. Are you talking about Constantine? Or maybe Harrison Wells?

In regards to "Nurseline247 has repeatedly added content about the animated films to a page strictly reserved for live action productions", I'm afraid that I haven't the faintest clue what you're talking about. What animated films? Since when have there ever been animated Spider-Man films outside of the Miles Morales one that was added to the page by someone else? Were you referring to the "Sony's Marvel Universe" films? True, it has yet to be confirmed whether Spider-Man will be in Venom or Silver and Black, but to my knowledge, it has yet to be denied either, hence why I put TBA. If it has been denied since I edited that page, my bad! Sorry about that.

Back to Alien (franchise), I changed "Short films" to "Promotional Short films", because that IS, in fact, what they were. The Prologues to Alien: Covenant had beginnings, middles and ends; none of the footage in them was intended to be in the final film.

And I know exactly what makes a shared universe, The Earth Day Special and A Million Ways to Die in the West perfectly fit the definitions, as does Hercules and the Arabian Night. I'm sorry I don't atypically read my talk page by the way. But I did take note of what was written there before I cleared it up. Will clarify at Diary of a Wimpy Kid (film series) that Class Clown is a short film. Thank you very much for your feedback.Nurseline247 (talk) 15:57, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You've misremembered exactly what changes were made to that cast list. There has never been a dispute over the addition of Bolaji Badejo, rather, the revision that you made shown here is of a person whose name had been removed nine days prior to you adding it again. And while we have this rare opportunity to speak with you regarding your edits, could you possibly elaborate on your page moves shown here and here, one of which has already been reverted and the other which was done w/o consensus? I ask because the reasoning behind your various article redirects performed over the past year (close to 80 of them) are rarely — if ever — expounded upon elsewhere. I believe it's these explanatory moves by you (or a lack thereof) which is bothersome, and that increasing the level of dialogue from you with your fellow co-editors on the changes you make would benefit us all.Spintendo^Talk 17:47, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If you look at the poster for Sinister II, you will notice that it does NOT, say Sinister 2 but rather Sinister II. Back to the Future Part II isn't called Back to the Future Part 2 after all. I was just following what the poster said.

On Killer BOB, I wasn't aware of any consensus, it's just that any time I've seen BOB written in text on Twin Peaks, Fire Walk With Me or The Return, it's been in all caps rather than small. Even in that Diary of Laura Palmer book from a while back, BOB is never spelled with anything other than all caps. Are these explanations satisfactory?? Nurseline247 (talk) 18:43, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

While you're justifying yourself here, you manage to continue to edit war with Zucat at Diary of a Wimpy Kid (film series), doing the exact same thing that prompted scores of warnings. DARTHBOTTO _talk•cont 20:54, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• I can comment mainly on the recent edits by Nurseline at Spider-Man in film (and also Spider-Man: Homecoming). At DarthBotto listed and linked, many of the edits to that article added or changed more than they described in the edit summary. While I am not as concerned by this, I am with what these extra edits include. Much of the time it was very excessive and unnecessary table coding, as well as WP:OR material regarding actors and characters they are playing. Also, regarding behavior of material at Spider-Man: Homecoming (see this edit). Not only was this largely WP:OR, Nurseline attempted to source such claims with statements, not reliable sources. Nurseline was warned countless times regarding this behavior, and encourage to engage on talk pages (users or articles') but did not. These edits also alerted me to the user's behavior on other article that was very similar. I've sadly come to the conclusion that the edits by Nurseline are generally more disruptive than helpful and they ultimately may not be here. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 21:45, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It is my understanding that consistency sets the agenda with regards to a film's nomenclature. In the case of Back to the Future, the sequels have been consistently set in Roman numerals in everything from posters to DVD clamshell packaging. This has not been the case with Sinister 2, as seen in packaging used on Amazon or in their promotional materials in other languages. In the case of Killer Bob, it would appear that a consensus should have been sought for the change you made simply due to the longstanding nature of it being disputatious. That being said, when one looks at the pendulum of editor preference for either style over the last 12 years of the article's existence (as shown below) it could be argued that the time had come for the pendulum to swing to the other, all-capitalized style. — Spintendo^Talk 04:04, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

1. Killer BOB.....2005-2008
2. Killer Bob......2008-2012
3. Killer BOB.....2012-2016
4. Killer Bob......2016-2017
5. Killer BOB.....2017-????

Now you're back at re-implementing the contents you added to List of fictional shared universes in film and television that were previously deleted? Do you have no respect for what people have been advising you about for months? DARTHBOTTO _talk•cont 01:03, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Could @Nurseline247 please confirm whether or not they are editing under the username Impending IP? These two usernames share similar edits on similar subjects, even sharing the same idiosyncrasy of marking all edits as minor. Please clarify. — Spintendo^Talk 02:51, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The same goes for 86.46.205.88. DARTHBOTTO _talk•cont 03:05, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I don't mark ALL my edits as minor; at least I don't intend to. I have full respect for what people have been advising me about, thank you very much! I hadn't looked at the page List of fictional shared universes in film and television; and I saw what you were talking about in regards to certain things not being "shared universes". However, I noticed that several genuine shared universes were deleted from my initial edit, so I re-added them in a considerably neater way. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Now, A shared universe is created when two or more characters come together into one film.

• Casper does exactly this; not only does it feature Ray Stantz alongside the title character, it features Father Guido Sarducci!
• Universal Monsters was connected by more than just "Dracula, Frankenstein and The Wolf Man"; as I put, it also connected Abbott and Costello and both Invisible Men.
• Annabelle, as of 2017, appears in 3 of the four films within the The Conjuring Universe; Ed and Lorraine Warren appear in 2.
• Hercules and the Arabian Night connects Aladdin and Hercules in the same way that Freddy vs. Jason connects Friday the 13th & A Nightmare on Elm Street. It features the characters Aladdin and Hercules and their respective supporting characters.
• Alex Kurtzman (director of The Mummy) confirmed that The Mummy (2017) was set in the same continuity as Stephen Sommers' The Mummy trilogy and its spin-offs, stating the films to be “part of the canon; we're just taking it somewhere new”.^[1] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nurseline247 (talk • contribs) 03:29, August 9, 2017 (UTC)

Now, A shared sockpuppet is created when two or more usernames come together under one editor who makes edits in their names.

I'll take your sidestep of my question (WP:IDHT) as confirmation that you're using this second account. Of course, using multiple accounts is your own prerogative (WP:VALIDALT). The expectation is on you to clearly delineate in those account's talk-page spaces that the other ones exist, using the Alternative account template or other such notification, in order to ensure WP:SCRUTINY. Since you're experienced at page redirects, may I suggest that redirecting one of your account's talk pages to the other one would sufficiently act as notification to other editors.

However, I'm afraid that restrictions on crossover editing of articles and topics might prove too cumbersome for you — if not downright impossible — given this edit in particular. Now that you've been informed of the expectations, I would note for future reference that any innocuous intentions expressed by you regarding crossover editing won't suffice as an excuse, and without any kind of alternative account notifications would likely be viewed unfavorably. — Spintendo^Talk 21:14, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Supermann (talk · contribs) has been a productive editor, with good intentions on improving our coverage of films in China. Some of the recent discussions however may require intervention from this community.

There is an ongoing dispute here in Film censorship in China since June 2017 in intervals. To paraphrase from the original poster, the dispute is focused on whether or not runtime columns should be included in this article. The discussion was initially a content dispute, in which TenTonParasol and several other editors from WikiProject Film pointed out the problem with several films inserted in the article as being censored, without the support of secondary sources (see revision history). The consensus was that any claims of censorship has to be supported by a reliable source that documents what has been censored.

The original poster however, argues that by documenting the difference between original runtime and the runtime in China, it serves as the direct evidence of censorship due to the political nature in China ([21] [22] [23]). This soon turned into battleground mentality ([24]). I was previously contacted, and decided to respond in the same thread ([25]).

In response to the inability to substantiate claims of censorship, Supermann frequently invokes "June 2017 notice from SAPPRFT" to support the idea that any runtime differential is the result of censorship. For those unfamiliar with the notice, here is the context. The Chinese government issued a public notice in June 2017, which basically reiterates "television, radio and Internet distributors are forbidden from broadcasting "uncut" programs that have not been first reviewed by authorities" (Source: [26]). The following are direct quotes from the original poster in various places where this discussion has been appealed.

• But movies that got minutes lopped off is a form of censorship that needs to be well documented. (from the request for mediation)
• This is not to mention Wikipedia itself has been and still is a censorship victim in China. I shouldn't even have to invoke the late Dr. Liu Xiaobo here to beg for the consideration that censorship should be properly documented. (from the request for dispute resolution)
• It's illegal now to watch any movie whose runtime is longer than the one approved by censor. Basically by supporting me, you support making this page the last sanctuary and historian of censored films. (from the request for comment)
• This is like attributable to a reliable, published source, even if not actually attributed. I can't explain it well. But I beg IAR to come in place. (from second request for mediation)

For those of you interested, I'd like to ask you to visit the current discussion: Talk:Film censorship in China#RfC about the runtime columns if you have time, as it is a fair representation of the conversation that has been going on repetitively for the past month and half. Regards, Alex Shih^Talk 03:40, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

My reading of the discussion can be boiled down a few things.

1. A blatant violation of the fundament of WP:POV. Supermann's main thrust is that the difference in run time is evidence of censorship and that it should be given a place in WP. This is politicisation of content.
2. In this diff, dating back to June, their very statement that he doesn't don't want to get into "Right Great Wrongs" is truly ironic since all his subsequent edits smacks of WP:RGW and WP:ADVOCACY.

It is obvious that Supermann has a passion for film and the freedom of film as an artform, but that very passion is blinding them to the fact that they are trying to use WP as a platform for those beliefs. Blackmane (talk) 04:25, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I believe that this behavior extends beyond the Film censorship in China article and has extended to individual film articles, notably those films he believes were subject to censorship like The Mummy (2017 film) (see Talk:The Mummy (2017 film)#Release), Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice (see: Talk:Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice#Plot Summary and BvS: Dawn of Justice at DRN), and a couple of film soundtrack articles (see: WP:FILM#Music not included on the soundtrack) Supermann's battleground mentality, unwillingness to accept secondary sourcing, tendency to engage in original research, politicization of editing (yes, also in the BvS and soundtracks disputes), and advocacy editing are apparent there as well. I also draw attention to his most initial comments at Template talk:Infobox film#Runtime, where the earliest indications of tendentious editing and warnings against it were made. It's probably worth noting that Supermann filed two DRNs in a single week and probably nearly took a third unique dispute there, which is indicative of his battleground mentality, difficulty accepting consensus, and rejection of core Wikipedia policies. Also very important to note is that Supermann believes that IAR is the highest tenet, above all other policies, and so IAR has been invoked repeatedly, inappropriately: [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] Mostly, as someone who has gone back and forth with Supermann near constantly over the past six weeks in two unique disputes (my userpage, WikiProject Film for soundtrack dispute, DRN for same soundtrack dispute, the entirety of the film censorship talk page, the film censorship DRN), in both of which Supermann displayed the same patterns of behavior, my concern is beyond the scope of the censorship article. It's something endemic to Supermann's entire approach with editing, even when the content has nothing to do with censorship. ~Cheers, TenTonParasol 11:52, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I believe TenTonParasol is not reflecting the best Wikipedia that has yet to offer to the underpresented Chinese readers.1 She is making it an authoritarian place that I don't think the founder Jimmy Wales would approve. Filing two DRNs in a single week only means I am willing to follow procedures and policies to compromise. Filing RFC is per moderator suggestion. Filing mediation is only after experienced editors don't represent chinese readership. The BvS content disputes in terms of the additional soundtrack and Arlington cited above have all come to great compromise after spirited discussions that TenTonParasol refused to acknowledge would improve Wikipedia. Same for The Mummy runtime of 107 vs 110 min. All are now thoroughly cited to great secondary sources. Even a discussion on whether we call Anthony Scaramucci a lawyer has come to a great finale last night.2 As for the accusation of soapboxing and advocacy, they are simply false and persecution, since I have never advocated overthrowing the communist party. If I could take US as an example, this means I got to respect the other half of the Chinese population who wants to see communists to stay in power. Therefore, all i have been asking is proper documentation of censorship which are fully backed up by facts and has been done throughout wikipedia for a variety of authoritarian countries.Supermann (talk) 15:47, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The BvS DRN ended up getting resolved in the way that the two other parties were suggesting in the first place. The small dispute at Scaramucci appears to me to be a small back and forth as you interpreted a primary source as "practices law" without support of a secondary source and insisted on it for a little, though, it is as you said, you compromised in the end. However, please note much of this ANI discussion focused on your tendency to prefer personal interpretation of primary sources over secondary sources, and that you don't seem to understand that personal interpretation of primary sources is never appropriate. I bring up The Mummy dispute, and the others, as an example of how you argue and defend your positions—because that's what's really up for discussion here. Your comments attempting to refute soapboxing and advocacy here just lead me to believe that you do not understand what either of those mean, despite multiple editors linking you to the policies on them multiple times. In general, I always find it interesting that I am not the only editor who has firmly disagreed with you and your editing practices at the censorship article, though I do admit that I'm among the most vocal and have been editing at the film censorship article since near its creation, but you constantly single me out as if I'm the only oppositional party. It just feels even more battleground to me, and it feels like it's you ignoring that you're editing against a larger consensus, not against me and my personal opinion. ~Cheers, TenTonParasol 16:16, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"You ever think about the fact that wikipedia built the modern library of alexandria using nothing but nerds' need to correct each other?"1 The BvS Arlington DRN dispute comes down to whether we should mention Arlington in the plot summary with presence of secondary sources substantiating. The editors involved are similar as you are in terms of not accepting IAR as an equal policy to override MOS to improve. Arlington has every right to be in the filming section regardless of their suggestions, once my labeled "battleground mentality" found the special effects company which confirmed it. In the face of mounting evidence from vfx company, the editors had no recourse other than compromise. It is a four way compromise, though it is still weird not to mention Arlington in the plot summary, leaving curious readers scratching their heads. As for Scaramucci as a lawyer, had i not insisted, it would not have been npov.2 Whether nys unified court system is a primary source, i leave it for further discussion. i don't think i interpreted it to the extent of inappropriateness as you had insinuated. The larger consensus you have found so far does not represent half of the 700mm chinese internet users that wikipedia has yet to penetrate. You wonder why i singled you out? I have to wonder why you had to pick on me when you said I don't really have the means, for lack of a better word, to research and add new content at this time (lots on my plate in that area) I am of course grateful for your copy-editing, but the censorship page needs a leader. Otherwise it would be dilapidated as i go back into fulltime gainful employment next week. If you are actually asking for a block, you should reveal it. Maybe it's best this way so that I could focus on real gainful employment. I will maintain the film censorship list privately and never share it with narrow-minded editors.Supermann (talk) 17:30, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Looking at Film censorship in China, the very first thing I saw in the history was Supermann citing Deviantart as a source. I'm not even going to look any further into this; Supermann, if you're not willing to abide by Wikipedia's rules on reliable sourcing, particularly on a politically sensitive topic, then Wikipedia is not the place for you. (You've been here eleven years; you don't get the benefit of the doubt we extend to good-faith newcomers who haven't yet had time to read the policies.) Regarding I will maintain the film censorship list privately and never share it with narrow-minded editors, you're spectacularly missing the point—if the list isn't sourced to reliable, independent, non-trivial, secondary sources we do not want it. ‑ Iridescent 17:47, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Iridescent: How did you jump to Deviantart so fast? Do we have a policy against it as a secondary source? I was citing a Texan book author who put his opinion there. Had I known he had put that down somewhere more reputable, I would have used it. I found out his identity here.1 Since he said he is a book author, which i verified, I felt comfortable of citing his insight. It is all for the contextualization that TenTonParasol demands from day 2. If Ben-Hur 1925 and 1959 had been banned, of course I wonder if 2016 is censored too, due to Christianity. Back to your question of being here for 11 years, i literally only got educated on all the other policies/guidelines/essays earlier this year when i started to contribute more. Imagine half of the 700mm Chinese internet users have yet to be here, editing. The contextualization on the list is sourced to great secondary sources to the best extent of my ability. Pls let me know which one you don't like and I could try to find an alternative. Again, i think the runtime columns, sourced to state censor approved figures, is the best quantitative tool to document censorship. Textual analysis from the secondary sources would have been more available, had journalists not have a tough economic environment.Supermann (talk) 19:11, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Through the cunning ploy of looking at the recent history of the article? If you really need to ask Do we have a policy against [DeviantArt] as a secondary source?, I've nothing further to say to you—per my comments above, from a good-faith newcomer I'd think they didn't understand the nature of Wikipedia but given that you've been active for over a decade we're squarely in WP:CIR territory if you think there are any circumstances in which DeviantArt could ever be considered a reliable source for anything. ‑ Iridescent 19:18, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Could I use Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources#Self-published_and_questionable_sources_as_sources_on_themselves as a one-time exception for the book author? He had published 23 books. But if you insist on removing Ben-Hur 2016 from the list, pls go ahead. The current list is not comprehensive to begin with, thanks to the absence of runtime columns which would have shown Ben-Hur 2016 is shortened by 10 minutes.1 I can't tell you why, because no English news media have written about it. And this is how it is lost in history permanently. Yes, I have been here more than 10 years. But pls take a look of the number of edits over the years:lackluster.2 I appreciate the patience people have extended to me.Supermann (talk) 19:56, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Or Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources#Exceptions for this Chinese column^[2] at the Christian Times1, which was, according to translation for your perusal, "founded in 2008 by Beijing Gospel Times Information Technology Co., Ltd., which is not affiliated with any church or church organization. It is a Christian comprehensive information website based on Chinese local church and Christian, cross-denomination. Since the founding of the present, the Christ Times attaches great importance to content construction, based on the truth of the Bible, uphold the principles of "taking the church and using it to the church", and publish daily Christianity and gospel, such as church, international, social, cultural, Sexual information, services, the majority of the needs of the audience. The Christian Times wants to be a platform for church and church, church and society, church and government, church and believers, believers and believers to understand each other." At the bottom of the columnist's article, there is a translated caveat "(This article is the exclusive manuscript of the Christ the Times, the text of the views of the speaker on behalf of the stand, the Christ Times remain neutral. Welcome to personal browsing reproduced, other public platform without authorization, not reproduced!)" Supermann (talk) 20:11, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment - I tried to mediate this dispute at the dispute resolution noticeboard. I had to caution User:Supermann about soapboxing about censorship of movies by the PRC. (The fact that the PRC censors movies is not in dispute, and is the whole subject of the article in question.) I thought that the dispute had been resolved with agreement that it wasn't necessary or appropriate to include runtime columns in the article, and I closed the DRN case as resolved. However, it wasn't resolved; Supermann just didn't reply in 48 hours. It really does appear that Supermann is forum shopping, with both an RFC that is going against, and a second RFM. I will ask Supermann to please re-read talk page guidelines against soapboxing and to re-read the guideline against forum shopping and to read the dead horse essay. Your horse won't carry your banner about Chinese movie censorship any further. Your horse needs burial. Stop bludgeoning the horse. Robert McClenon (talk) 03:35, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Robert McClenon: Before I impose a self-exile and swear not to touch the film censorship article in my lifetime, i want to reiterate what i had said on your talk page already:I monitored the DRN daily, but I wasn't pinged about another third stmt request from you. Therefore, I thought the opposition was still modifying her second statement, but I was already expecting a moderation result. Never mind. I have followed your suggestion to initiate RfC. I don't know what can of worms I am getting myself into though. The DRN is not resolved in my eyes. Still, I am grateful for your time. Others had said the same thing and we lost in technicality. Furthermore, I am not forum shopping. I only used RfM after stall on rfc. I simply wanted to see if someone could really live up to the fifth pillar: Wikipedia has no firm rules. Wikipedia has policies and guidelines, but they are not carved in stone; their content and interpretation can evolve over time. The principles and spirit matter more than literal wording, and sometimes improving Wikipedia requires making exceptions. and give me one specific example where IAR did work.Finally, i was simply not soapboxing. Just to give you an example. When you guys thought I was anti-Communist by bringing up Liu Xiaobo, you had no idea that i put in his comments which alienated half of China to achieve NPOV. These comments include his past saying Chinese are impotent and his support for Bush's iraq war. it's all in the page history. I wasn't lying. Since no one is willing to come forward against the current establishment, I'll shut up. Supermann (talk) 04:40, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal time?

• Comment - I have no idea what User:Supermann is trying to say there. I know that they are passionate against Chinese movie censorship. I am not aware of any other editor who either is in favor of Chinese movie censorship or denies that there is Chinese movie censorship. They say that no one is willing to come forward against the current establishment, but I don't even know what establishment they are talking about. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:57, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Generally, in my understanding, Supermann believes that by keeping films that are ostensibly censored off the film censorship in China article, through the denial of the runtime columns, users are refusing to stand up to the communist Chinese government. There's several comments on the talk page there about it, though I'm mobile and cannot readily grab them all. But Supermann has made comments like that in the past: [33] [34] [35]. Seeing as Supermann has seemed to make good on his self-exile promise, what now? ~Cheers, TenTonParasol 03:16, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

•  Comment: I think a proposal of one year topic ban of Supermann on pages relating to film would be preventative of disruptive editing if the user was to return from his self-exile. Alex Shih^Talk 03:56, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Agree on the topic ban idea. They certainly like to WP:BLUDGEON their point, and from what I've seen doesn't listen. Lugnuts ^{Fire Walk with Me} 06:53, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I would support it. When Supermann asked me(? the community?) if a block was being requested, I thought to suggest a topic ban at the time. ~Cheers, TenTonParasol 15:39, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Grudgingly support. "Grudgingly" because given the attitude towards sourcing demonstrated above, this will just be transferring the problem to a different area, but I don't feel comfortable blocking/banning altogether so this seems the least worst option. (Incidentally, Supermann, unless there's a huge discrepancy in the runtime you can't consider it as evidence of censorship—movies regularly have different runtimes in different countries both because the credit reel is a different length depending on its language, because edits for different markets sometimes have expository lines (aka "idiot lectures") to explain things that are obvious to viewers in one country but won't necessarily be to people elsewhere, and above all because movies are often shown on film in their original market but in digital projection in translation (digital is easier to overdub) and Hollywood movies are traditionally shot at 24 frames per second but for historic reasons based on the evolution of videotape digital projection is often at 25 FPS which knocks 3–4% off the runtime right away.) ‑ Iridescent 16:55, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment – This is unfortunately a situation that I have seen many times before. An editor is somehow tendentious, and there is discussion here, and the editor then says that they will be taking a long wiki-break for some reason, either because no one is listening, or because they need to heal their wounds after the many personal attacks that never happened, or for whatever reason. Simply allowing the WP:ANI thread to be archived would be a mistake, because the issue will resume sometime when the editor returns, so the thread must be acted on. Unfortunately, I still don’t have a clue what User:Supermann is saying, but maybe User:TenTonParasol is right and a topic-ban is necessary. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:09, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Support a topic-ban from all topics related to film. (If they won’t clarify, we can’t narrow.) Robert McClenon (talk) 17:09, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Support. I have done what I could to explain why the runtimes cannot be used for the purposes of this article, but I was taken as somehow favoring censorship in China. None of my explanations had any effect. Meanwhile the article on the censorship in China has evolved and shows now a lot more important information on the topic that wasn't there before, but this doesn't seem to be of any value to the editor unless the runtime is included. I do not think User:Supermann is inclined to understand the five pillars and the other policies and guidelines of Wikipedia and to work accordingly. Instead this editor seems to keep campaining for an ideal, even in ways that go contrary to the rules. I don't think that a topic ban will change this, but at least it will let other editors free from having to respond to endless and irrelevant arguments. I am against blocking Supermann from Wikipedia, unless this editor continues such behavior in other areas as well. Hoverfish Talk 22:46, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Support This editor has taken to WP:FORUMSHOPping WP:WIKILAWYERing and treats discussions like a WP:BATTLEGROUND. This is but one example of their commenting on the contributor rather than content. This needs to stop. Again and again other editors have tried to explain the policies and guidelines that we all try to abide by and their response is WP:IAR. MarnetteD|Talk 01:45, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Support, though I fear that the battleground/bludgeoning behaviour will be carried over to other areas (which, to some extent it has done, for instance at Talk:Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia). One thing that would help might be if Supermann could be less focused on WP:IAR, and less inclined to treat it as a rule that should ideally trump all policies and guidelines, like here and here, not to mention here (including the edit summary). If the topic ban is enacted, that also affects Supermann's existing topic ban on articles related to a specific movie production company - that ban is indefinite but can be appealed in December [36], but that will obviously not be the case with this topic ban on top. --bonadea contributions talk 09:31, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Support a topic ban from all articles related to Chinese media. --Jojhnjoy (talk) 14:51, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
• Support per Robert McClenon Blackmane (talk) 02:48, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Closure needed

There seems to be a consensus for a topic-ban. Can an administrator please close? Robert McClenon (talk) 16:52, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Could a grown up look at the talk page of Talk:Requiem (Duruflé), and at the edit summaries surrounding the edit warring over the inclusion of an infobox. I will admit my actions have not been great, but when faced with lies, bullying, baiting and name-calling by a pack of registered editors, it would take the patience of a saint not to bite back. 213.205.198.246 (talk) 21:07, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

An editor posted a question about my involvement on the talk page, then removed it as I had editing as part of a range. He removed his own post, but I thought I would let my explanation below stand in case others also have the same query. 213.205.198.246 (talk) 22:37, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I am the only IP editor on that page over the last few days. For some reason my phone providers have been using dynamic IP addresses which has switched me around (to the confusion of a couple of people who think I have been responsible for long-term vandalism. I have not, but that's a problem with dynamic IPs. It's been an excuse for various people to accuse me of vandalism, cowardice and several other spiteful names. I always thought wikipedia had a civility policy that stopped such direct abuse. Is that still in place or has the encyclopedia become a nursery?) 213.205.198.246 (talk) 21:29, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

As the other half of that argument, I suppose I ought to register my distaste for this IP-hopping anon who clearly is a registered editor avoiding scrutiny. This is the same IP who has made the same reversion four times at Requiem (Duruflé) against three different editors other than me, then has the nerve to call my sole edit to the article "edit-warring". Unlike the other contributors, he has failed to make a single constructive edit to the article talk page, and now complains here that his trolling on that page has attracted a kick-back. --RexxS (talk) 21:41, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I have already stated do not have an account. I have edited on and off for a while with small edits as an IP. I am sorry you think it a crime to be an IP editor, but as you have had this explained to you several times, I do not know why you repeat the lie that I have an account. As to others being constructive on the talk page, you have to look carefully to find anyone being "constructive" there (perhaps only two people,can't claim that). Too many lies and too many insults have come from the keyboards of you and your cronies, all of whom have miraculously "appeared" there where there has been so little activity for so long. 213.205.198.246 (talk) 21:55, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If that "miracously appeared" is supposed to mean anything, it shouldn't. I have seen plenty of page lie dormant and then a glut of editors show up at a time. Also, some of the edit summaries would attract attention from any recent change patroller. L3X1 (distænt write) )evidence( 22:13, 2 August 2017 (UTC) [reply]

It isn't miraculous at all. The IP is opposing an infobox on this article, you could not find a more contentious issue to jump into on this whole site. Certainly there are at least two editors opposing the IP there who I see on every discussion about infoboxes on classical music but never edit classical music articles otherwise, they appear to care nothing about classical music,they just try to force those boxes into every article. Unquestionably they follow each other around whenever (which is almost always) there is an infobox issue.Smeat75 (talk) 12:24, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Plus, this page was recently mentioned on User:Cullen328's talk page—as someone who just passed RFA this week, he'll be having a lot more visitors to his talk page than usual, and at least some of them will have taken a look to see what the fuss is about. ‑ Iridescent 22:24, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In answer to your edit summary, no, I make no accusations of socking on the page, just that one of the editors has been going round several talk pages posting a link to the thread. 213.205.198.246 (talk) 22:29, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You do know that on a wiki, claims like that are checkable? That thread has been linked on a grand total of four talk pages; one of those was by you, and of the other three one was to Ceoil who is agreeing with you and one was to Martinevans123 who's not once commented in the thread? ‑ Iridescent 22:36, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I should have made it clearer: the thread or the article. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Opabinia_regalis/Archive_15#Forget_cat, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Peer_review/Claudio_Monteverdi/archive1#Comments_from_Gerda. And that is not taking into account the email system (it seems odd that the Montana chap had been absent for a couple of days, but their very first action was to revert me on an article they had never visited before. The additional lies in his edit summary are also disgraceful) 213.205.198.246 (talk) 22:50, 2 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You know there's nothing "miraculous" about how editors find pages. If you had the courage to log in with your registered account, you could enable navigation popups and see – as I did on a hover over his name – that Ceoil has just passed 100,000 edits. We've had our arguments in the past, but I have a lot of respect and affection for him, so I went to his talk page to leave him User talk:Ceoil #Céad míle some congratulations. Follow the link and look for yourself: the thread immediately above it refers to Gerda having issues with an IP. So I watch-listed the article and saw your disgusting behaviour there. It should not be surprising then that I eventually decided to revert your fourth revert, and to take you to task for your unconstructive and offensive attitude on the talk page. If you had a stable user talk page available, I would have posted there, but you choose not to reveal your logged-in account name, so I could not. The only thing that's surprising about this whole incident is that you're still allowed to edit Wikipedia after your blatant edit-warring on the article and trolling on the talk page. --RexxS (talk) 12:05, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, everyone could just have stayed out of it and let Gerda deal with it constructively, instead of jumping and escalating the situation. She did make the change to the stable article, and she's a big girl and could have made her case for the change. I just don't get the mentally of wiki-heros that swoop into conflicts like Underdog (TV series) and start reverting away. If you want to help, mediate, don't escalate. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 12:26, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

So, just let me get this right. After bringing a "complaint" against an editor which was summarily dismissed and is still on this page, the bogus basis of which "complaint" was that said editor got involved in "unrelated" disputes and "escalated" them, you're coming to another dispute, where the guy you just accused is involved, and in which you were not involved, and "escalating" it? Or trying to make some sort of point? I'm lost. Begoon 15:17, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Ummm excuse me, but I believe ANI is a forum that people don't have to be involved to legitimately voice their thoughts on a matter, right? That's why you commented on the previous ANI, right? Lynn (SLW) (talk) 15:41, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You're excused. Sure, but people are also not stupid, and treating them as such is generally inadvisable. They will see your motives. -- Begoon 15:52, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If you're referring to your question, I didn't find it so much "stupid" as hostile. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 16:00, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I know. You should work on that tendency. It's doing you no good. -- Begoon 16:12, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'll bring up with my shrink at my next appt. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 16:23, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Do the accusations re: socking and the name calling-"troll", "disgusting", "coward" etc., ever stop or is this a continuation of the hatted segment of the article's talk page? Someone was upset about the IP editor using the term "nasty individual"-judging from what's on the talk page and here, small wonder it was said. We hope (talk) 12:43, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It sounds like you still don't understand how wikipedia works. Wikipedia is a collaborative work so more feedback from other editors is generally something to be welcomed, rather than something that's harmful. If someone notices a change they support, then they should be encouraged, not discouraged, from voicing support for the change. In fact, in some cases it may not even be necessary for the person who made the change to comment if it's already became clear there is WP:Consensus for it. It doesn't matter whether the person who initially made the change is a "big girl and could have made her case for the change". Big girls and boys can also rely on others to help them in a collaborative work, hopefully not because of personal feelings these other editors have to the big girl or boy, but because these other editors saw something they feel makes wikipedia better, and is here to make wikipedia better and feels willing to dedicate their time in this case to making wikipedia better. Of course care needs to be taken to avoid piling on to a discussion, but that's mostly a problem when it's editor behaviour that's being discussed. Editors need to remember that massive support for a change they oppose is not generally something that should be taken personally. Perhaps more importantly, piling on is only a concern when there is already a lot of support. If consensus is desired but remains unclear, then it's not piling on to offer feedback. In particular, it's not piling on to offer feedback when none has yet been left, in other words, repeating what I said earlier, there's zero reason to wait for the editor who made a change to express their view before you offer your own view. If you want to work at a project where only a person who makes a change gets to express a view on the change or gets to express the first view, you need to look for something else rather than trying to work on a collaborative project like wikipedia and then getting annoyed because other people are offering feedback on a change. And as I said below, if feel I've misinterpreted your comment, you're welcome to explain what you meant, but please note I'm only going by what you've said, not what anyone else has said. Nil Einne (talk) 07:31, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• It looks to me, from a perusal of Talk:Requiem_(Duruflé), as if this 213 IP (who I do not believe for a second does not already have an account) is in dire need of a WP:BOOMERANG block for rampant incivility, and Rexxs should try harder not to lose his cool in the face of such obviously deliberate provocation. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:34, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• I think it's possible that the 213 IP is the banned LTA editor User:HarveyCarter. Beyond My Ken (talk) 19:54, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It's also possible that it's President Trump, not wanting to reveal his identity. Whoever it is, making that accusation here should be cause for a block. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 00:30, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Fortunately, you really don't have a clue what you're talking about. I'll take this as yet another retaliatory comment from you (there's another one just up above) in return for my expressed opinion in the thread where you were roundly lambasted by numerous editors for adamantly refusing to drop the stick. I would suggest that you give up this particular tactic of yours while you're still (barely) ahead, as it won't stand you in good stead, and will eventually get you sanctioned. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:12, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Here's how you should take it. After being the victim of framing and gaslighting, I feel like I should speak up for other editors in the same situation. If I get blocked, so be it. I would rather be blocked for doing the right thing than to cower from the toxic atmosphere here. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 02:31, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your advice, but I wasn't asking (or concerned) about how I should take it: I knew what to think. Here's what you should consider: in your effort to "speak up for other editors", you are not helping to end the "toxic atmosphere" here, you are assisting in creating it. When you insert yourself into a situation you know nothing about, and "do the right thing" on behalf of an IP who is likely to be an LTA, a massive serial socker, and who is permanently banned from Wikipedia (but has no compunctions about coming back again and again to bother people and disrupt the project), you are not helping anything, just providing cover for a vandal. Please stop doing that, and take more care about who you support -- Wikipedia doesn't need a self-appointed gadfly and ombudsman who doesn't know what they're doing. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:21, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know why you keep bring up framing. AFAICT it was your own comments that you made in the thread that caused the reaction from the community in the thread. At least in my case, and I strongly suspect for many other commentators there, it had little to do with what others had said about you or the dispute. Unless you're saying you've been a victim of your own failure to frame you responses correctly. Nil Einne (talk) 07:26, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It seems clear from your comments here, and the little I looked at in the article talk page, including the fact that you involve yourself in such a high profile dispute with clear knowledge of the history, that you have extensive experience with wikipedia. So even if your statement that you've never had an account is true, you should know based on your experience that given all this, people are naturally going to be very suspicious when you show up in a dispute like that. You should also know that, for better or worse, even if there's no conclusive evidence that you have used an account or are otherwise WP:Socking no one is likely to be sanctioned for voicing suspicion that you have had one, even if it's repeated once you've denied it. As for the rest, well I see a lot of not ideal behaviour from both sides, as unfortunately is the norm with these heated infobox disputes. Since you provided no diffs other than the article talk page link and the links to the alleged canvassing, it's difficult to call this anything other than another messy infobox dispute which we can only hope does not boil over into another one where sanctions are called for. Nil Einne (talk) 07:43, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not going to try to address all the dis-jointed comments above. I am going to summarize my thoughts here, and call it good.

Jumping into content disputes by making your first edit to an article a reversion of an edit by someone who is in dispute with your friend, can do nothing but escalate the situation into a behavior issues (edit: particularly in an article that you've never edited before, on a subject matter in which you have expertise and have never showed any interest in editing before. That is what RexxS did in both circumstances). Even Gerda seemed to think the conflict was unnecessarily escalated. RexxS's comment "At the end of the day, one has to make a decision about where to draw the line in tolerating bad behaviour such as the IP demonstrates. I draw mine pretty close to zero-tolerance for the attacks he made on two of our most respected and well-intentioned women editors on that page." pretty much just sums it up that he was playing "wiki-hero", protecting the little wimm'n folk, rather than thoughtfully entering into a debate. He had done the same to me, then came to the ANI complaint framing me by leaving out most of the relevant information in the dispute, and implying that I had changed status quo verbiage without discussion. He had jumped in and just started to revert me, without knowing the background of the dispute, which is summarized here. Then, in his second go round for the same complaint about him by the IP, he came onto this thread, and double-downed with accusations and name-calling, as per the comment by We hope.

As for the possibility that the IP is a sock, it is gaslighting to make that accusation in this context. The IP came to this forum with a legitimate complaint which should be evaluated on its own merit. If someone believes that he/she is a sock, the proper way to handle it is to file an SPI. To make that accusation while calling for a boomerang against the OP is so inflammatory and destructive that I think it is behavior that is cause for a block of the accuser. The fact that such behavior is tolerated here at this notice board is one of the many reasons I say it has a toxic atmosphere. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:47, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Why is it "gaslighting"? I googled that term and got "manipulate (someone) by psychological means into doubting their own sanity." Please explain that specific objection in terms of this discussion. Honestly, your tendency to make knee-jerk reactions here is becoming very tedious. -- Begoon 12:30, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Gaslighting, in a broader form, is to destabilize the truth. In this case, to divert from the ip's complaint by bringing up suspicions that they are a sock. (edit: Or, like what you are doing, accusing me of having knee-jerk reactions making it plain your question requesting clarification of a term is only a lead in to the destabilization of the discussion.) Lynn (SLW) (talk) 14:25, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Just as a note on semantics here (so we don't end up with a situation with two parties misreading eachother's attitudes), "gaslighting" has a very broad range of potential meanings, and is not necessarily as hyperbolic as it might seem to somebody reading the dictionary definition for the first time and then seeing Lynn use it as she has. Traditionally the term narrowly referred to serious and meticulous efforts to toy with the mental or emotional state of another person. In more contemporary usage, however, it has taken on a broader meaning, that has to be read from context; it is not infrequently used to refer to any circumstances in which someone is trying to obfuscate the truth, especially by obscuring the record on some matter, and thereby frustrate the other party. So, a type of trolling if you will (or even just an effort to cover ones tracks and make the other party look bad or incorrect)--not just grand schemes of psychological manipulation like the one from which the term derives. Snow ^{let's rap} 23:00, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I see. Not a particularly useful term then, with so many diverse meanings. No doubt "trendy" though, and "useful" for vague accusations. That probably explains its recent "popularity". Thanks. -- Begoon 23:53, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it's like any word that's been around long enough; its idiomatic uses eventually become broadened. I actually think it can be an effective and useful description, though I agree with you that it's not coincidence that it has grown into its newer meaning in the era of the internet (and particularly in the new era of people truly mastering misinformation on the medium). That said, I think people should be careful about using it until its contemporary meaning becomes a little more thoroughly dispersed in the contemporary linguistic zeitgeist. I very nearly used the term on the project myself a couple of months back when I responded to a community discussion where I found an editor pretty blatantly lying about the contents of sources. I decided not to use the term specifically because I was worried that someone might be familiar with only the older usage. And also because I decided that it was (as usual) better to avoid commenting on the possibly bad-faith behaviour, sinc ei could address the same matter through the content itself. Snow ^{let's rap} 00:47, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Except that it's completed expected the behaviour of all parties will be evaluated in any ANI discussion. This isn't just an ANI issue either. It's ridiculous to expect people to sanction one editor for poor behaviour but completely ignore the behaviour of another editor, such as the editor complaining. Especially since we do not WP:PUNISH editors.

SPI is normally the route to deal with socks so generally mention of socks should be limited at ANI, but in this particular case, it seems clear that realistically nothing is going to come from an SPI for the simple reason even if it is true, it's not clear who the IP editor is. Of course editors are sometimes blocked without it being precisely clear who they are although most commonly that doesn't happen at SPI but ANI or elsewhere anyway.

In any case, the socking issue was an aside, the block was called for incivility not socking. The socking accusation wasn't new, it was I think partly what brought the IP here. So realistically anyone actually looking into the dispute (i.e. anyone actually proposing sanction on some other editor) would already know of it. And I said, above for good reason even if there isn't sufficient evidence for block of the IP, no one is going to be sanctioned for suggesting socking was involved in a case like this.

You seem to be harping on about RexxS, but the IP was clearly complaining about multiple editors joining the discussion not just RexxS. As I said above, the input of multiple editors should generally be welcome not discouraged on a collaborative project like wikipedia edit: that operates by consensus. (As I noted, uninvolved is generally what we want. In fact not involved editors with hardened views points joining is one of the few cases when more editors can make things worse. Yet you seemed to be complaining about the former even though the later was what happened.)

Also I find it hard to believe RexxS did not have any experience in this area since it's basically an infobox dispute and RexxS has a userspace essay (or whatever you want to call it) which I found form the discussion you linked to, that's about 1 month shy of a year old now User:RexxS/Infobox factors. Personally, I'm with Snow and many others that I'd much rather those with entrenched positions in the infobox disputes (to be clear I have no idea whether this applies to Rexxs, maybe they're one of the outsiders who is trying to help sort out the mess) but that's not going to happen so meh.

In other words, your accusation that this was predominantly an attempt to play wikihero seems to be groundless, and frankly offensive. Your quoted comment does suggest they may have considered concerns that women editors were being targeted and responding to that to some extent but since there is strong evidence this has happened on wikipedia, and it happens elsewhere I'm not willing to criticise that. While true whiteknighting may be undesirable, editors, whatever their gender identity should stick up for other editors who are often unfairly targeted for whatever reason. I mean after all, is that what you claim to be doing here?

This does of course mean that sometimes and within reason, you stick up for an editor if you feel it is helpful, when you're not sure if they're being targeted in this particular instance, because you're aware given their frequency experience of being targeted it's likely to be hard on them. It's offensive to suggest that women should be expected to put up with being unfairly targeted for being women, because they are "big girls" or that other editors aren't allowed to respond when they are concerned about someone else's behaviour towards another editor. (Edit: Which is not to say other editors can't defend themselves by themselves. Of course they normally can and it any case it's regardless of their gender identity. The point is editors should feel welcome to defend other editors when it's called for not because the other poor editor can't defend themselves but because it's the right to do, especially on a collaborative project like wikipedia that operates by consensus. And even more so if the editor has to do a lot more defending on average for reasons that shouldn't affect them. It's possible to defend another editor without escalating a situation and just because some cases this doesn't happen doesn't mean editors shouldn't be encouraged to help out when it's called for.)

As a final comment, I would add that I'm sure I'm not the only one who I had no idea about the gender identity of anyone involved until your final comment above (I thought maybe big girl was just a general way of speaking). It's not something that generally concerns me and knowing it doesn't change how I feel about anything. While it's true you're not the first person to bring it up in this dispute in general, I don't see that harping on about it here is helping anything. As I said, even if it's true one editor did raise it, the IP editor was clearly complaining about multiple editors, and I'm assuming some of them identify as male, maybe some even something else. I've seen no evidence for even one, let alone multiple editors joined the discussion because of the gender identity of participants. As I said before your reply, and others have said, all evidence is that this is a typical infobox dispute issue. (Frankly in some ways it would be nice of everyone taking part was doing so because of the gender identity of some of the initial participants. At least it would be a change.)

Nil Einne (talk) 06:14, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

One final comment before I'm done with this. While editors need to familiarise themselves with the issues including reading other comments, and looking at sources, and sometimes doing their own research; previously uninvolved editor participating in disputes is a cornerstone of resolving disputes on wikipedia. While being subject matter experts can help, sometimes it can make it worse and often it's not really necessary when the problem is general disagreement rather than finding good sources etc.

The big problems tend to occur in walled garden type situations were only people with hardened views participate. As I've noted above and below, this is actually a key problem in the infobox area rather than the participation of uninvolved editors being a problem. (Yet ironically as I also noted, from what I can tell this doesn't even apply to the editors you are complaining about. They are regulars at infobox disputes.)

Joining a discussion to help your friend can be a problem, but this can be complicated. I sometimes find issues from visiting the talk pages etc of editors I know. Sometimes I may find I often clash with this editor, sometimes I may find I often agree with the editor. But the primary factor that makes me look into a dispute is interest in finding out what it's about.

I definitely do not go into disputes to try and help out friends. And as far as possible, when I look into a dispute, I to my best to avoid any personal feelings towards editors involved clouding my judgement. (And personally, since a lot of my experience with editors is from outside general editing, it's often just as much that I may agree with editor I clash with or disagree with an editor I normally agree with.)

The point is, ultimately it's simply not wise to say an editor shouldn't look into a dispute simply because they noticed it on a friend's page because uninvolved editor participation is what we want on a collaborative project like wikipedia edit: that operates by consensus, and is a key part of resolving disputes on wikipedia. Now if an editor has a history as demonstrated by diffs of joining disputes simply to help out a friend, without regards to the merit of the dispute, then this would be a problem, but this would need to be demonstrated over time rather than coming from one single issue. (Or two.)

Nil Einne (talk) 06:14, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Nil Einne for taking all the time you did to write all that. (edit: Since I don't have the time or the patience to try to pick out and quote the points that merit response, I'm afraid they will have to remain unrequited.) Lynn (SLW) (talk) 11:17, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

A more general observation about the longterm issues here

Putting aside for a moment the question of whether or not the IP is a sock of a registered user or not, I'd like to comment on why this whole affair feels like oh so much deja vu for (and a large number of other editors here, I suspect). Every so often, I get RfC'd to (ro stumble across a notice on a community forum to) a contentious debate on whether to include an infobox in some BLP or classical music-oriented article. I never have to guess which 6-10 names I will see there, already locked into WP:battleground ranks, before any single outside observer or respondent has had a chance to comment. Pretty much all of the parties in the current case are on that list (perhaps including the IP, but who knows). And unless I'm mistaken, most of you were a party to the original ArbCom case on this issue, correct? And some of you have been sanctioned multiple times in relation to discussions on infboboxes.

I will say this much for these two partisan groups of edit warriors (and I use that term to reflect your apparent attitudes, regardless of whether you any longer regularly break 3RR in pursuit of your goals): I think you've all found ways to ensure that you are not technically violating the letter of WP:CANVASSING or prohibitions on off-wiki collaboration. I think you all know exactly which forums to post notices in so that the others will see, or else scan eachother's contributions to keep abreast of any debates your allies or the "opposition" are engaged in. Then you all dutifully present yourself for discussions which (insofar as I have seen) are invariably long, vitriolic, characterized by a jarring lack of WP:AGF, and just generally disruptive to the larger community. It used to confuse me as to why you even bothered, knowing the other side was doing the same thing. Then I realized the obvious pattern; because each side knows that they are roughly evenly matched, they know that most of these discussions end up no consensus--in which case, whichever party acted first may get their desired outcome grandfathered in, provided they summon enough support to stonewall discussion from the other side. Which itself explains why most of these discussions now devolve into the question of who was WP:BOLD first. At the same time, I've noticed that the RfC requests have become less frequent, presumably because the involved editors have begun to realize how impatient other community members are with the entrenchment and tendentiousness they find when they respond to those requests.

As I said above, I don't think you all are technically violating WP:CANVAS, but you sure as hell seem to be oblivious as to why we have that policy in the first place. I have fairly well-defined opinions as to when an infobox is or isn't called for in an article, but I stopped answering the RfCs in this vein years ago, because I found the debate within them distasteful and caustic. Frankly, I'd be embarrassed to be any one of you and still be so militantly engaged in so many of these discussions over the years since the last ArbCom case, making an ever-bigger mountain out of one of Wikipedia's oldest molehills. And I say that despite knowing and liking some of you in broader terms. I'm sure all of you feel that you are operating in good faith and within community guidelines over an issue which you think is worthy of this degree of debate, and I'm sure that some of you are more courteous and measured than others in how you present your argument; some of the heat in those discussions is there simply because some of the involved parties just don't have a particularly civil debate style to begin with. But I've taken the time to write this long-winded observation to tell you that (mostly owing to the lack of civility inherent in your years' long battle of wills), none of you come off particularly well from your dedication to this issue. This has gone to ArbCom in the past, and it could again. Personally, amongst those names that I have seen at 10-20 or more infobox discussions, I'd be happy to see you all topic banned from ever editing on or discussing an infobox again. That could realistically happen if you all can't find a way to turn down the heat and compromise more often. Snow ^{let's rap} 00:28, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"Pretty much all of the parties in the current case are on that list" - I don't see that. I share some of your sentiments about infobox wars and their needless toxicity, though. -- Begoon 00:56, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I should clarify that some of the parties I am referring to are involved in this thread, while others have commented on the talk page and others have edited the article itself. But regardless of what angle their involvement is coming from, I see a half dozen familiar faces involved in the dispute that I expect to see at every contentious infobox discussion. Snow ^{let's rap} 01:32, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with you that the infobox disputes are a mess. It would be nice if all the regular participants with hardened views just stay away from them but I guess realistically that's not going to happen. I don't follow them enough to be able to identify regular participants but have seen enough of them to know they're one of the many areas I don't want to touch. Unfortunately that is a common problem with these hardened disputes. Less involved participants who don't care that much are even less likely to participate since they look at the dispute, probably say "fuck no" to themselves and never come back. Nil Einne (talk) 05:31, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yup, that about summarizes my thoughts; there's intermitent edit warring and other types of disruption regarding the content itself, but it's the way they talk to eachother that really leaves me aghast and which will probably take most of them back to ArbCom again eventually. It would be great, as you say, if the hardcore on both sides would just take a step back. Even if the anti-infobox group agreed not to remove any infoboxes for a year, nor remove content from an infobox and the pro-infobox camp agreed not to add infoboxes or content to an existing infobox, the aggregate effect on the project would come out to be about exactly the same (since they presently cancel eachother's efforts out, more or less), except that the time that would be freed up between them would be substantial massive (and the amount of community disruption far less). When you consider the knowledge base of some of the involved editors on musical matters alone, and then contemplate the amount of expert hours they then waste just to counter-act one another, it's both stunning and depressing. Snow ^{let's rap} 09:01, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If I thought both "sides" would agree to this, I'd suggest it in a heartbeat, but unfortunately I doubt it'd happen. I find myself agreeing completely with your first post also. Trying to mediate the dispute would be like entering a shark pit or maybe a shark pit with piranhas. I've never understood why so many people have chosen this particular hill to make a stand on... wouldn't it make more sense to make a stand of this magnitude about something vital like using reliable sources or similar? And this is one area where even I find myself wanting to slap people with civility blocks... I wish the editors who are so invested in the dispute would wake up and realize that they are alienating so many other editors with their behavior. (I almost typed "toxic behavior" and it's getting to that point, people. It is possible to be "right" and have people support you and still in the end decide that the whole area is something that doesn't need particular editor's input. Ealdgyth - Talk 12:04, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"wouldn't it make more sense to make a stand of this magnitude about something vital like using reliable sources or similar?" Well, not really - the requirement for reliable sources is obvious, and not really seriously disputed anywhere I've seen. Infoboxes are, on the other hand, a style choice and style choices have led to some of the silliest, most intractable arguefests here. See dates, or hyphens, or icons, or diacritics, or commas... Ultimately, it's not surprising, really, that the people writing this body of work have the most intractable arguments on what are, in the end, often just points of semantics or opinion. It kind of comes with the turf. +9000 to it being done with less toxicity, though. -- Begoon 13:00, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Trust me, as someone who does a lot of source reviews at FAC, "the requirement for reliable sources is obvious" is NOT obvious to large chunks of our editors. Not that FAC is that bad, but some of the sourcing for the "drive-by" nominations is enough to make an editor despair. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:12, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Fair point, but that's more about education, publicity and policy enforcement. "Taking a stand" on that side of things would be good. My point was that it's dissimilar to arguing about infoboxes, commas or hyphens in the sense that we already have a clear policy on RS, whereas infoboxes are a style argument. In the end, I probably agree, the time is badly spent when there are bigger issues. But folks will do what they feel is the best use of their time, rightly or wrongly in your, or my opinion. -- Begoon 13:26, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

One of the problems with this and other situations where ArbCom has been asked to weigh in on intractable debates (and I say this as one of the involved parties) is that they seek a "now you all just get along" or "everyone is equally at fault" solution where all that happens is that the battleground moves from a project's local consensus to an article-by-article battleground but nothing actually changes, not the key points of debate, not the nature of the comments, nothing. There is no progress toward consensus, no middle ground granted (I once suggested collapsable infoboxes as a compromise -- to the dismay of both sides), and hard feelings only get worse instead of better. I think the problem is that infoboxes are the symptom of a deeper underlying debate over how information is conveyed and at what level. Without a project-wide discussion of those deeper issues, the infobox wars will never end. I see these core issues at the heart of the problem:

1. The question of whether to offer simplified information at a glance at all and if so, in what format.

   What goes into an infobox is a content discussion independent of the infobox/no infobox debate.

2. The value of wikidata and if infoboxes are the most useful way by which it can be applied
3. The question of whether infoboxes are too complicated in syntax for the average user to use and if that is the "real" reason some people don't like them

   (creating an infobox wizard the way we have wikilove and warning quick editing tools wouldn't be the worst idea in the world...)

4. The question of whether the lead and an infobox are purely duplicative or if they serve different purposes, and what they are
5. The overall consistency of style and layout of wikipedia articles in general versus that for specific subjects (this being an issue raised with the stats that well over 50% of all WP articles above stub level do have infoboxes)

   The infobox wars had the unfortunate result of completely destroying the sometimes-legitimate ability of wikprojects to set any kind of guidelines to reflect WP:LOCALCONSENSUS, even when doing so might actually be logical. In other areas (I'm thinking of some the capitalization battles as an example), the results have been an absurd "house style" for WP that doesn't help its image of being an amateur's playpen.

6. What to do when there are sincerely good people on all sides of an issue.

   and what to do when frustration levels breach WP:CIVIL on the part of talented editors who simply reach the end of their rope.

In short, the infobox wars aren't actually about infoboxes. But the problem is that the underlying issues have been pushed to the side. Montanabw^(talk) 20:06, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, your edit warring and false accusations of vandalism here and here, along with misrepresenting your edits under the guise of BURDEN and status quo ante, (one did not apply and the other meant no infobox until a discussion), means you are probably the worst culprit here, summoned by email to back up your little friends. You are right about frustration: false accusations and lies are about as uncivil as you can get. 213.205.194.67 (talk) 11:42, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Another prime example of knee-jerk defense of one's "friend" without taking time to assess the facts. Of course, they can be counted on to do the same for you. Lynn (SLW) (talk) 01:51, 10 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I agree with Andy's hatting of the conversation so far, as it has indeed gone off the rails, but I've proposed something below the hatting. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:04, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Reboot

I visit WP in 10 minute chunks these days. I can't read thru this mess. In 5 minutes of review I definitely see unacceptable behavior from Trekphiler, I see borderline unacceptable behavior from Andy (there might be worse that I haven't seen), and I just removed an unacceptable comment by Llammakey. Possibly if I spent hours looking into it I'd find more, by these three and other people. But it doesn't matter, because I simply can't spend the time, and I doubt other admins can (or want to).

My 5 minute solution would be an interaction ban between User:Trekphiler and User:Andy Dingley, or at least a ban from reverting each other. But without further research I can't tell if that's reasonable or not.

The real problem is, ANI is not set up well to handle disputes. Particularly those that have been festering for, apparently, years. We don't actually have anything that is set up well to do this. So I have a sneaking suspicion that at this point, an interaction ban is the best that can be hoped for, even if both think it unfair, and even if it actually is unfair to one or the other. I wonder if both of you would consider agreeing to a ban from reverting each other to see if that solves the issue?

Note that only scrupulously polite responses will be accepted. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:04, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Oppose This is what Trekphiler wants: to exclude me from "his" articles. To be free to insert his stupid changes (his term) and be free of review from (at least one) other editor.

Seemingly, even in your 10 minute constrained time, I only deserve half that. If you haven't even read this "mess", why are you putting forward sanctions? Andy Dingley (talk) 17:10, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I explained why. There is no reason for me to continue here if you're going to snark at me too; I don't get paid to take it. Good luck with the status quo. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:14, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In have not been a party to this, but was watching another thread. The above suggestions does not (in effect) ban you form "his pages" what it doers is ban you form altering his edits (and him from altering yours). There is nothing to stop you editing materiel he did not add (or adding new material).Slatersteven (talk) 17:17, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Endorse - This is more or less what I asked Andy to do in the first place - solve these issues without the undo button as a first resort - but since both of them seem to be incapable of doing that, I asked Andy to disengage, presuming him to be the one more in control of his emotions of the two (and the one who was actually discussing the issue with me at the time). Since he seems unwilling to do that, a formal IBAN might be the best way forward. I'd also suggest it be made clear to Trek that he's on very thin ice (if a block is not also handed out). Parsecboy (talk) 18:28, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

What is needed here is for Trekphiler to follow WP:BRD, rather than revert-abuse-canvass, as he's been doing previously. No more than anyone else is held to.

I am unwilling to let all of Trekphiler's edits go unchallenged, because no other editor gets a free pass like that, so why should he? Andy Dingley (talk) 18:41, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It's you who has to improve their adherence to BRD - you have complained about Trek's reverts - that's the "R" in BRD. The burden is on the person adding the material to justify it (the "D" part - whether its you or someone else). Funnily enough, I recall lecturing you about this in the past. You were rather impolite.

I've told you this time and time again, Andy, but you haven't seemed to figure it out. Trek is not your responsibility. Take the world off your shoulders, man. Parsecboy (talk) 19:00, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've avoided mentioning this all this time (AGF despite your clear biases in the section above), but if you're going to bring it up, then here we go. Your beef with me, all along, has not been about Trekphiler, it's about me opposing your GA on HMS Thunderer - see Talk:HMS Thunderer (1872). Your GAs are not up to standard, they're done by tag teaming between a small clique. I've not looked at others in bulk, but Thunderer fails significantly (major aspects of the article are simply inaccurate, unsourced or contradictory). When this was raised, and the article expanded, you simply started bulk reverts.

Anyone interested in the backstory here: take a look at the Thunderer history and see if this is an "uninvolved" admin or not. Andy Dingley (talk) 19:14, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The heck are you talking about? I didn't write the article, or review it for GA - all I did was tell you to stop edit-warring. You seem to have me mistaken for User:Sturmvogel 66 - would you care to clarify this latest nonsensical allegation? Parsecboy (talk) 19:40, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Parsecboy is right, he only has one edit to HMS Thunderer (1872). Jauerback^dude?/_dude. 19:51, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose - firstly that was not a personal attack, that was genuine, genuine concern. As for an apology, I will not apologize for concern for the welfare of children. Nice try trying to force me out of the conversation though Floquenbeam. Reiterate Indefinate ban for Trekphiler as four times at the minimum is enough. Llammakey (talk) 22:25, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Llamma, tread carefully. That's all the more I'll say to you at this point. Parsecboy (talk) 22:48, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Llammakey: I'm struggling to find words to express what I'm feeling right now. You're absolutely incredibly lucky to have not been blocked for that comment, which ought to be revdeleted. You've just gone after an editor's family because you're in an online dispute. Think about that for a second. Then do yourself a favor and back away from the keyboard for a bit. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 23:12, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Uninvolved admin needed! In what alternate Wiki-universe is this in any way acceptable? Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:34, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Blocked for 24 hours. I have explained at their talk page why they only got a very short 24 hour block and not a much longer or indefinite one for this totally unacceptable remark. Fram (talk) 07:27, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Endorse interaction ban, with a reminder to Trek that he needs to dial it back starting now. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 23:14, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Support indefinte block for Trekphiler since his unacceptable edit behaviour is not limited to Andy Dingley. An interaction ban with Andy Dingley would not stop him from insulting others. Furthermore, Trekphiler demonstrated problematic edits, for instance by forcefully trying to erase the alleged "dysphemism" Nazi Germany from articles with edit warring. --Jojhnjoy (talk) 07:56, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I have a question pertaining to User:Chickymomo28: apart from a bit of early vandalism and a few isolated minor (and not always valid) copy edits to a random selection of topics, the substantive bulk of their edit history has otherwise entirely involved persistent attempts to recreate the same poorly sourced article about Canadian comedy musician Joe Bird. If it gets redirected they'll just revert it; if the redirect gets salted so that they can't do that anymore, they try again at some alternate title (e.g. a different disambiguator or a non-standard alternate capitalization of the title) to evade the page protection.

Prior discussion at Talk:Joe Bird (singer) has identified that their rationale for why the article should be allowed boils down to "he exists and I worked hard on it", but they seem unwilling to listen to any feedback about it — each new reiteration of the article is always a straight cut and paste of their sandbox page at User:Chickymomo28/sandbox, with no new edits to actually address what they've been told about needing to base it on reliable source coverage rather than YouTube videos and primary sources and circular references to other Wikipedia articles. And their other pattern is to simply try to erase anybody else's comments from talk pages, sometimes with an edit summary that consists of insults against the commenter. I don't know if this is a direct conflict of interest (i.e. the editor is Joe Bird) or just obsessive stanning, but they seem profoundly uninterested in actually collaborating in a constructive or productive manner or listening to anything short of "you can do whatever the hell you want". Bearcat (talk) 22:03, 3 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Stanning? L3X1 (distænt write) )evidence( 01:54, 4 August 2017 (UTC) [reply]

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Stanning — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 02:54, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It's a term for a fan whose behaviour is so obsessive that it verges on stalking: stalker + fan. Bearcat (talk) 15:15, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I've gone ahead and slapped an A7 on the sandbox. Twitbookspacetube 03:06, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Unlikely to be Joe Bird considering the article states that he died in 2009. Maybe an edit filter to stop this sort of disruption. Blackmane (talk) 03:17, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I didn't notice that. But they could conceivably still be someone who had a direct personal relationship with him, such as a son, daughter, brother, sister, friend or colleague. Bearcat (talk) 15:13, 4 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal: Topic ban from Joe Bird-related articles. --Jojhnjoy (talk) 22:17, 5 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• A topic ban for a user who has only had 3 edits in 4 months - 2 of which are in their own talk space - does seem kind of overkill - particularly when there's no signs of any warnings on their talk page. How about a boomerang for User:Bearcat who is well aware of the mandatory requirement of notifying the user on their talk page? No new edits? Doesn't look like it from the sizes of the various versions. I'm not sure why this is being dealt with in this manner, than simply going to AFD - which doesn't appear to have ever happened. There's no question that Bird is notable - the only question really is he notable other than as part of the Trolls. This looks more like an administrator misusing the tools in an edit war against a user in the administrator's field of editing. Nfitz (talk) 07:48, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly, AFD is not required to weigh in before an article is allowed to be redirected to a related topic. Nobody has at any point even suggested that the articles should be deleted outright, merely redirected to Three Dead Trolls. Secondly, notability on Wikipedia is a factor of the degree to which the person can or cannot be shown as the subject of reliable sourcing, but the editor has never made any attempt to show any at all — their attempts have been based entirely on YouTube videos and primary sources and circular sourcing to other Wikipedia articles and entertainment listings in a local WordPress blog, and not one of their attempts at recreating the article has ever contained even one reliable or GNG-assisting source at all. Thirdly, all I did here was raise a question for other fellow admins to look at and weigh in on; I did not presuppose that any particular remedy was required beyond the attention of other administrators, and the long-term consequence was proposed by somebody else other than me. And fourthly, the matter has been discussed directly with the editor in question, it just happened on the talk page of one of the article creation attempts (which I did provide a link to above) — so to suggest that they were unaware of why there's a problem here at all is not accurate: they were made aware of why there's a problem, and just chose to ignore it. Bearcat (talk) 14:38, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There's no question there is an issue with this editor, but with the current main-space edit rate of about 4 a year, I don't think any sanctions are necessary, as they pose no danger to the topic. Nothing wrong with a re-direct. But if the re-direct is challenged, take it to AFD - don't lock the redirect so only admins can edit. That's desysop territory as far as I'm concerned, and a far bigger issue than anything this occasional user has ever done. This is nothing more than a content dispute, and using your tools to win the argument, rather than going through an AFD process (that I suspect you'd win), is utterly disgraceful. No, their sources aren't great, but it's pretty easy to find mainstream media to support much of the content - but as you point out, really it probably just supports the TDT article, and not the standalone article; though a merge is not unreasonable. Nfitz (talk) 19:36, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There were sufficient warnings, they decided to delete all of them by blanking the talk page. Since they ignore warnings and really stick to this "Joe Bird", banning them from "Joe Bird" related articles is a good option. This is only one person, not an entire topic field. This user can show that they are capable of contributing since there are so many other things to work on here, even other musicans. This account appears like a single purpose account to me. If they continue working on "Joe Bird" with other accounts, an administrator should protect the article instead. --Jojhnjoy (talk) 14:49, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Looks more like a user, who have written a perfectly reasonable article, has red-taped to death, is losing interest, and is now up against an abusive administrator who should be desysopped. Nfitz (talk) 19:36, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well, that escalated quickly. Pray tell, how did this admin abuse their tools? Blackmane (talk) 02:38, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

By protecting the redirects Joe Bird (singer) and Joe Bird (musician) for admin edits only. See logs here and here. And then they come right here to ANI, after only 1 mainspace edit in 4 months, with no attempt to communicate with them on their talk page? And even after being notified 2 days ago, has yet to even notify the user of this ANI discussion in direct violation of the requirements? It's horrific administration. Should have simply taken the page to AFD. Nfitz (talk) 04:44, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly, redirects are allowed to be salted if they're repeatedly subject to attempts to convert them into a standalone article which is not showing or properly sourcing any evidence of sufficient notability to qualify for a standalone article, no differently than if the article were being repeatedly recreated from a redlink. Secondly, I have attempted to communicate with the user in question, and I showed the evidence of that already — as has been noted, they routinely either ignore or attempt to simply blank any discussion that anybody undertakes with them about it. And thirdly, sure, I'd have taken the article to AFD if I had wanted the title to be deleted — but there is no requirement for AFD to weigh in before it can even be redirected to a related topic. This is not "horrific" administration — I've done nothing improper whatsoever. Bearcat (talk) 15:59, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

[55]

Softlavender (talk · contribs) seems to think that posting a notice to WP:FTN about a deletion discussion is "non-neutral canvassing". This same accusation was made previously in a successful attempt to derail the last discussion Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gary Renard (3rd nomination). I ask that an administrator evaluate whether this accusation is warranted or whether this claim can be removed from the page. Thanks.

jps (talk) 11:33, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This is neutral canvassing: [56]. This is non-neutral canvassing: [57]. You've done the latter regarding the same article three four times now. -- Softlavender (talk) 11:45, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This ANI thread was non-neutrally canvassed by the OP in the same thread: [58]. [59]. -- Softlavender (talk) 11:53, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hard to see how this is canvasing, beyond the idea that asking people to have a look at any given forum means you are canvasing that forum (an implication the forum is biased it would seem to me).Slatersteven (talk) 11:59, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The basic idea is that a neutral notification means saying "Here's a discussion you might be interested in" (or words to that effect), while non-neutral notification lays out your position in the discussion, so that it might attract editors who agree with you, or biases the editors who go there by having seen your side before they even arrive. JPS has been here long enough that he should know that. WP:Canvassing#Appropriate notification and WP:Canvassing#Inappropriate notification are very clear on the subject. Beyond My Ken (talk) 12:12, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I am not seeing him laying out any position in his latest notification.Slatersteven (talk) 12:15, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

So, you think that this is neutral?

Notable enough for a WP:FRINGEBLP? WP:AUTHOR? WP:GNG? Do we yet know who in the vast WP:Walled Garden of A Course in Miracles community is notable and who isn't? How do we decide? (At least Wayne Dyer did a huge number of PBS specials).

Beyond My Ken (talk) 12:19, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

When did he say that, as this was his notification of the latest AFD [[60]]. Do not get me wrong, I think the user is a problem (and have said so many times, and said it would get worse over time, including over the related issue of the last AFD close on this subject). But I also do not see this as being as bad (or even an infringement) of what he did on the third AFD, or here his complaint about the close of that AFD (such as not dropping the stick).Slatersteven (talk) 12:24, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That is the second link in Softlavender's comment above, after "This is non-neutral canvassing." Beyond My Ken (talk) 12:31, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The second links is to a thread that started before this latest AFD (the 29th of June, over a month ago). How is that canvasing in the latest AFD?Slatersteven (talk) 12:34, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The notice was IN SOLID CAPS AND BOLDFACE, in a thread which was nothing but non-neutral canvassing and personal attacks from the very beginning. Any notice on that thread already was and is by definition non-neutral canvassing (no matter how cleverly it was worded); the fact that it was IN SOLID CAPS AND BOLDFACE made it even moreso. Softlavender (talk) 13:07, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"I am not seeing him laying out any position in his latest notification." The "latest notification" was IN SOLID CAPS AND BOLDFACE, in a thread which was nothing but non-neutral canvassing and personal attacks from the very beginning. Any subsequent notice on that thread was and is by definition non-neutral canvassing. The well was already poisoned. If jps had stopped while he was ahead and accepted the "no-consensus" administrator's close of his AfD, instead of DRVing (and non-neutrally canvassing for that) and then non-neutrally canvassing for the new AfD started less than 10 hours after the DRV was closed as a near-unanimous endorse, and then non-neutrally canvassing yet again for this ANI, he wouldn't be in the position he is in now -- that is, open to being boomerang sanctioned for his egregiously and repeated non-neutral canvassing and failure to drop the stick. Softlavender (talk) 12:35, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Why then did it take you over a month to report it, and only after a new AFD? This smells of forum shopping and gaming the system. I agree (and said so) that he should have dropped the stick (and yes I am also going to say I think he forum shopped and has tried to game the system) but it does not alter the fact that his latest post was (as far as I can see) not canvasing (except to the degree I have said before about problems on the FTN).Slatersteven (talk) 12:39, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I did not open this ANI; please notice who did. I reported the first instance at the appropriate venue (jps's AfD) the day after it occurred, and I reported the subsequent occurrences the same way, as soon as they occurred. The "latest notification" was IN SOLID CAPS AND BOLDFACE, in a thread which was nothing but non-neutral canvassing and personal attacks from the very beginning. Any subsequent notice on that thread was and is by definition non-neutral canvassing. The well was already poisoned. Softlavender (talk) 12:41, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

My mistake, you did not even report it, just made a noise about it on the AFD page.Slatersteven (talk) 12:53, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I did not "make a noise about it". I posted a standard notice to the closing admin. Softlavender (talk) 13:02, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Slatersteven: As I already told you on the AfD (and now for some reason you are feigning ignorance even though you read and responded to my reply there): "It is clearly non-neutral canvassing. This is neutral canvassing: [61]. This is non-neutral canvassing: [62]. See WP:APPNOTE: Notifications must be polite, neutrally worded with a neutral title, clear in presentation, and brief." Also read the rest of WP:APPNOTE, including the chart. Also, you yourself came here to ANI from the non-neutral canvassing his fourth instance of it for the same article) of this ANI thread that jps made on the same FTN thread. Jps's FTN thread is classic non-neutral canvassing, mixed in with assorted absurd false accusations about me, poisoning the well, and so on. -- Softlavender (talk) 12:23, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

No I am not feigning ignorance of what you told me, I do not agree with your interpretation. Frankly (as I have also said before) you both have issues over this topic, and frankly I think the pair of you are gaming the system. Him by posting a notification that boarder on (but does not cross over into) canvasing and you by trying to provoke him into getting a procedural close on the latest AFD.Slatersteven (talk) 12:26, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I did not provoke anyone; I made a very standard notice to the closing admin. You responded to it and I answered you and you read and acknowledged and responded to my reply to you, but then came here posting as if you knew nothing about WP:APPNOTE. Softlavender (talk) 12:40, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• This appears to be a frivolous complaint. It was canvassing. Lepricavark (talk) 20:36, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, care to explain how the message was canvassing? jps (talk) 21:34, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You're earlier comments in the thread in question made it very clear what your desired outcome was and thus your purported neutral notification took on a perhaps unintended sarcastic tone. Regardless, this report is frivolous. Do you really think Softlavender has done anything actionable? Lepricavark (talk) 02:21, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to remove the comment as it is a lie and, WP:Pinnochio is a good standard. But having an admin do it is preferable to edit warring, isn't it? jps (talk) 03:29, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There is a difference between lying and having a difference of opinion. Lepricavark (talk) 01:39, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

No argument there. Should I include a note to that effect in the discussion, in your opinion? jps (talk) 05:18, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If you want to do so. I'm not sure if you mean this discussion or the AfD, but it's up to you either way. Lepricavark (talk) 11:16, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• There doesn't look to be any improper canvassing in this instance. At FTN, questions at play related to fringe topics are normal for introducing what's going relevant to the noticeboard, and those all look like pretty standard intro questions. Sometimes fringe topics are called walled gardens too. Of course FRINGEBLP, etc. are going to be relevant metrics for that noticeboard to weigh in on. Had there been argument for a particular viewpoint on any of those things, that notice wouldn't be neutral anymore. I don't see anything remotely indicating that happened though. Kingofaces43 (talk) 21:40, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

DOC NOTE Just so we're clear. The message that Softlavender is claiming is "canvassing is the following:

Followed by this notice which is also claimed to be "canvassing":

Are false accusations of OMFG CANVASSING!!!11!!111! the new WP:CRYBLP? jps (talk) 22:02, 6 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• RANT - I don't care whether he's notable or not. I do want all of these authors to refrain from discussing "non-neutral canvassing" on the AfD page, regardless of whether canvassing does or does not occur. Power~enwiki (talk) 06:37, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Frankly this whole thing bores me but I don't think we can ignore the fact that this neutral notice appeared in the same thread for the previous AFD where canvassing allegations were raised, frankly IMO justifiably.

The silly thing is I have no idea why we even need this mess. In reality although non neutral since it was the FTN it probably wouldn't have actually influenced the !vote much. So why on earth not just leave a neutral notice in the first place? Jps has been here long enough that they should know of the need to leave a neutral notice in the first place, and placing the notification at FTN was justifiable.

And why start a new AFD so soon after the previous AfD when I as I said in the AfD, the outcome was obvious. (Yes I know it wasn't Jps who did so.) Why not just wait at least 2 months so we have hope of having a different outcome and then posting a neutral message (e.g. the example cited above) rather than just wasting time both here and in the AfD? Yes I can understand why people concerned about FT may be concerned about an article on a possibly non notable on the person who promotes nonsense but there's surely a lot of other things relating to FT that could be done which would actually have a hope of achieving something.

Nil Einne (talk) 10:31, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Aww jeez, are we still banging on about this? Jps, everyone except you said I closed AfD #3 properly (or at least within the bounds of admin discretion for those who would have preferred a "delete" outcome), you were warned that going to AfD #4 immediately (I appreciate you didn't start the latest AfD, but I think you would have if nobody else had got there first) would result in a bunch of procedural keeps, and I predicted somebody would be telling you to drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass. I just didn't realise that last one would be me as well. Meanwhile, Softlavender, stop rising to the bait. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 12:49, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• It is ironic that I was chided for making things personal when you haven't the decency to assume good faith and instead speculate as to what I would or would not have done. jps (talk) 14:59, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well you certainly haven't walked away from the issue and done something else have you? If I was going to assume bad faith, I would have ignored your views completely and closed AfD #3 as "keep". Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:31, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• In about a year, both sides of this issue are going to end up being used as textbook examples of when to trout. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:38, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Drop the stick" typically means, "accept you're incorrect". I am not really willing to do that in this instance, though I'm happy to listen to arguments as to why anything that I've said is wrong. jps (talk) 16:18, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

What is so sad about this is that the WP:Walled Garden around A Course in Miracles is so very real, written from an "in-universe" pov, an almost impenetrable festering mass of crap that jps rightly brings to our attention. What a shame this thread is picking on jps, rather than having a damn good look at the issue. -Roxy the dog. bark 15:53, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I find that picking on me seems to be the thing that this place likes to do when a problem with actual content shows up. The content, it seems, is not as important as people who want to preserve some idol called "procedure". WTF is a "procedural keep" anyway? It's basically saying, "I think the party that is correct should go fuck themselves". And people wonder why I'm so cynical. Anyway, I do think it important that these issues be documented, for posterity, I guess. If anyone wants to go ahead and work on cleaning up the mess, be my guest. jps (talk) 16:18, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That's a flagrant misrepresentation, fabrication even, of what my !vote means. I guess you don't intend to hold yourself to WP:Pinocchio. Lepricavark (talk) 01:39, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm... Let me think about this. "Procedural keep" must mean that "according to procedure, we should keep". But why would you say that if it wasn't just a matter of wikilawyering point-scoring? Otherwise you'd just write, "keep" and leave it at that. If you don't believe me, do a search for when people have used the phrase. If you don't like the company you're keeping, don't keep it. jps (talk) 05:26, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently you didn't do enough thinking. Setting aside your false equivalence between supporting proper procedure and "wikilawyering point-scoring" (is this a contest or something), I'm objecting to your assumption that my !vote was meant to be disrespectful to "the party that is correct." Quite frankly, it is absurd of you to 1) assume that I think you're correct, which I don't; 2) twist my !vote into something insulting; 3) do both of those things at an ANI thread you initiated to accuse someone else of misrepresenting your motives; and 4) double down on your error when I call you on it. Lepricavark (talk) 11:16, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, Roxy the dog is spot on - if you'd spent more time arguing about the merits of the article and less time slagging off people who disagree with you, there probably would have been a consensus to delete at the previous AfD; I certainly didn't find anything myself that could have rescued the article, so had to rely on the arguments presented. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:23, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You had the power to close the discussion appropriately, but cravenly decided to refuse to do so. The presentations about content were made perfectly plainly and there is nothing more to add. I argued the merits of the article in spades as did others and the majority was in favor of deletion. Think about what is best for the encyclopedia instead of what you think the proper "procedure" should be. jps (talk) 16:33, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Cravenly? Come now. I think the AFD has enough eyes on it that this should be de-escalated rather than ramping up the rhetoric. Everyone back away from the keyboard and make a cup of tea. Only in death does duty end (talk) 16:47, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I have thought a lot about whether "cravenly" is the correct adverb. On careful consideration, I think it is. An admin who was brave enough to look at what was best for the encyclopedia wouldn't have made the threats and accusations lobbed above. In any case, I think having a cup of tea is a good idea. But I also think having a good WP:ENC is enjoyable. jps (talk) 05:10, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

But as I said above, if there really is a problem, why on earth can't we deal with it properly? Why do people have to behave so poorly by posting a clearly non neutral notificating, and nomming again after such a contentious AFD which went through deletion review, ensuring that rather than us actually dealing with the issues, we're wasting time dealing with this shit. Don't blame the other side, because it was entirely within the power of either side alone to prevent this, but both sides utterly failed to do so. Nil Einne (talk) 17:44, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. In case it's still unclear, if there really is a walled garden A Course in Miracles related articles, then this is something we really need to sort out. It's possible the contentious article is one of those that needs to be dealt with, perhaps by deletion but that's not going to happen now. I'm assuming there are more though. If people would start dealing with these, including AFDing them properly, we would actually be working on the problem. Frankly we probably wouldn't need to be here, if the first (third) AFD was handled properly, e.g. by only leaving a neutral notification on the FTN or after it happened, not letting the discussion over canvassing take over the AFD. Either way, we can either start fixing the problem, or waste more time on these pointless discussions. The annoying thing is I personally hate pseudoscience with a passion, so it really irks me that those who feel the same and want to help keep it out of wikipedia are making such a mess of things when there are simple and obvious things they could do which would completely avoid such a mess and it should also be obvious that what they're doing is in no way needed. Nil Einne (talk) 18:09, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I have been working on clearing out that mess. This is the inevitable part of such processes where the wall guardians complain about people trying to tear down the wall. We need to put to bed the ludicrous idea that it is not "neutral" to point out that this is a shitty, shitty article and the people who are arguing to keep it are doing so on the basis of some of the least reliable sources I've seen. If you want to nominate someone else to do this work to clean out problems, please go right ahead. But so far, I don't see many others helping. In some ways, I'm glad we're here because there does seem to be some more notice than the last time. [63]. jps (talk) 18:17, 7 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Why has this be done inn the way it has been...because people are allowed to do it.Slatersteven (talk) 08:56, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Holy fuck, is this thread still open?!?! Somebody close it, please??? Pretty please? ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 23:10, 8 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Part of my reason for starting this was to avoid the argument at the AfD. I suppose I could have tried the talk page, but I was hoping that maybe an admin might see fit to remove the offending phrase. On the other hand, I think this thread has allowed us to segregate some of the distracting sniping so that commentators can comment on content. If that's all I achieved by opening this, it was worth it. jps (talk) 15:24, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Granting the assumption that all of this drama would have spilled over into the AfD, I can fully sympathize. But still. I tend to look at drama the way Elmer Fudd looks at Buggs Bunny. I want to kill it, even if it sometimes puts on a dress and seduces me. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:29, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Well, as long as we allow anyone to contribute, the drama-culture will endure. I guess I see this thread as a good illustration to the reasons behind the existence of WP:CIR. God, we're on the fourth(!) AfD for a person whose main claim-to-fame is having written books about a book due to the fact that he believes he was visited by a couple of ascended masters. Oh, and not a person who isn't part of this groupthink that such channeling is plausible has bothered to write anything about him. I wish I could wave the WP:ENC flag, but it's hard to do that when you're surrounded by people who want to use channeled books as sources for articles. jps (talk) 16:35, 9 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• UPDATE: Ever since the fourth AfD was opened, jps has been edit-warring to gut the article: [64]. I think it's about time to suggest a boomerang in the form of a topic ban from Gary Renard, broadly construed, or a topic ban from A Course in Miracles, broadly construed. Softlavender (talk) 02:46, 10 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment: The OP has been blocked 25 times, including three indef blocks (and at least one of those indefs was for block evasion): [65]. At what point does a user become a net negative and receive a sanction that will prevent further disruption? Softlavender (talk) 04:50, 10 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]