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A request for arbitration is the last step of dispute resolution on Wikipedia. The Arbitration Committee considers requests to open new cases and review previous decisions. The entire process is governed by the arbitration policy.

For information about requesting Arbitration, and how cases are accepted and dealt with, please see guide to arbitration.

Please make your request in the appropriate section: Request a new arbitration case Request clarification of an existing case Request an amendment to an existing case This includes requests to lift sanctions previously imposed Request enforcement of a remedy in an existing case Arbitrator motions Arbitrator-initiated motions, not specific to a case

Arbitration changes • purge • v • d • e  Requests for cases Name   Link Date     Target date Jehochman (link) 24 December 2009 — McCready edit warring topic ban (link) 7 December 2009 — Open cases Case   Pages Date Drafter Clerk Target date Evidence and Workshop Tothwolf (•/ t) (e/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t) 13 November 2009 SBa MB&DW 20 December 2009 Voting Motion to close or dismiss Recently closed (see all) Eastern European mailing list (•/ t) (e/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t) 22 December 2009 Co&NYB KL&MD Ottava Rima restrictions (•/ t) (e/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t) 20 December 2009 WZ Sed&AGK Asmahan (•/ t) (e/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t) 14 December 2009 WZ HW Clarification and amendment requests Case   Link Date       Requests for Clarification (Currently none.) Requests for Amendment Lapsed Pacifist 2 (link) 11 December 2009 The Troubles (link) 17 November 2009 Motions Name   Link Date     Target date Open Motions

Requests for arbitration

Use this section to present a request for a new arbitration case. Before requesting arbitration, you should read and familiarize yourself with the Arbitration guide, which covers when cases will be accepted, presenting a case, and what to expect. Then, read the following instructions: To make a request, please follow these steps: Edit the arbitration request section, copy-paste the following template: {{subst:arbreq}} below the first header and click save/submit. Edit the arbitration request section again to fill in the names of the involved parties, and provide links to any prior attempts to resolve the dispute (such as formal or informal mediation or talk page discussion). State your request in 500 words or fewer, citing supporting diffs where necessary. You are trying to show the Arbitrators that there is a dispute requiring their intervention; you are not trying to prove your case at this time. If your case is accepted for Arbitration, an evidence page will be created that you can use to provide more detail. You are required to place a notice on the user talk page of each person whom you identify as a party in the request. To do this, you can simply add the following template: {{subst:arbcom notice|section name}} to the respective talk pages, replacing "section name" with the title given to your Arbitration request. Once you have done this, post diffs of the notification to the Confirmation section of your request. This is not a page for discussion. Reply to another person's comment in your section. See the relevant section of the arbitration guide. It may be to your advantage to paste the template into your user space or use an off-line text editor to compose your request before posting it here. The main Requests for arbitration page is not the place to work on rough drafts. Arbitrators or Clerks may summarily remove or refactor discussion without comment. Please do not open cases yourself; only an Arbitrator or Clerk may do so. Requests from banned users should be made by e-mail directly to the Committee (details). Only Arbitrators and Clerks may remove requests from this page. Do not remove a request unless you are one. After a request is made, the active Arbitrators vote on whether to accept or decline the case; 0/0/0/0 corresponds to Arbitrators' votes to accept/reject/recuse/other.

Jehochman

Initiated by FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} at 00:46, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Involved parties

• FT2 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log), filing party
• Jehochman (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · moves · rights)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• [1]

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

A range of attempts have been tried including:

• Private mediation (with Hersfold and SirFozzie as facilitators)
• Arbcom election question
  • Question from FT2: FT2, Jehochman
  • Jehochman Q&A talk; a lot of comments were later revised and/or struck out (see history)
• User talk posts: FT2->Jehochman; Jehochman->FT2
• Uninvolved opinion sought (Alison) and second uninvolved opinion (Lar)
• Email discussion overseen by Lar, broken abruptly by Jehochman on the verge of conclusion (off-wiki)
• Arbitration Request filed by Jehochman, declined 28 November 2009 without prejudice against refile

RFC requires multiple users who tried to resolve the issue. The matters here were first admitted off-wiki and the on-wiki dialog lacked the key evidence, which was not accessible to onlookers, so almost no users were ever in a position to become informed and try to resolve them. It is therefore very unlikely that a valid RFC co-certifier will exist.

Statement by FT2

Jehochman has a hidden history of improper actions (including deliberate abuse of process and gaming) that sharply contrast with the trust expected of an administrator. There is a parallel history of deliberately deceiving the community on numerous occasions about his actions and their true motives, and aggressive attacks: repeatedly misrepresenting/smearing via unbalanced/misrepresentative/(often) blatantly untrue claims, for personal agendas.

He abused RFC, recall, and RFAR by presenting them as good faith while in reality undertaking them for retaliation. He repeatedly engaged in systematic "deliberate community deception" including at trust-based processes, and gamed the norms of privacy (intended to prevent copyright breach) to ensure he could be untruthful to the community and his claims on-wiki could not be matched against his statements off-wiki or the deception uncovered. He used unfounded accusations/attacks/smears, often knowingly false or misleading, as "smoke".

Sample evidence:

Abuse of process / Community deception at ACE2008

1. Stated off-wiki that RFC, Recall, and RFAR were used by him as a "political game".
   Stated off-wiki the immediate motive was retaliation, also described as "temper", [uncontrollable] "anger", "pique" and "personal grievance". (Has never denied these in private.)
2. When asked at ACE2008 if he had engaged in "political games", especially in the context of Elonka[2], denied it and asserted bad faith: "Claims of me being political are rumors started by those who like to play politics."
3. Eventual part admission: "I confirm that my prior attempts in 2008 to use wikiprocess to get you desysopped were motivated by personal pique".

Community deception at ACE2009:

1. As a candidate was asked about past conduct[3]. Used attacks, gaming and deception to conceal. (some evidenced below).
2. Alison was scathing: - the evidence was "unequivocal"; it showed "deliberate community deception" and "lying on-wiki to smear FT2s name and to wiggle out of your own clear faux-pas".

Gaming the privacy system (Nov. 2009):

1. Alison's statement:"From reading your responses in the logs, it's clear here that FT2 has not misrepresented what you said, which is clear and unequivocal... you knew other, less clued-in folks would believe your on-wiki answer, even though you knew that it was untrue... Of course, you're counting on the fact that it's his word against yours. However, the complete logs clearly show the truth here... deliberate community deception".
2. Yet Jehochman continued barely 3 hours later:"The voters will have to decide if they believe you or me"

Accusing/misrepresenting/smearing others to cover himself (Nov. 2009):
(Note how often accusations are repeated despite rebuttal)

1. Alleged "misrepresentation": - "seriously misrepresented..."[4], "inaccurate representation"[5], "My final answer is that FT2 misrepresents what I said and did"[6].
   Disproven by Alison[7] and later conceded "FT2 may have accurately represented my words"
2. Alleged bad faith:[8][9][10](line 294)[11][12]. Some were knowingly deceptive not just bad faith.
3. Claimed (misleadingly) unreasonable to discuss or no issue existed:[13][14][15] (untruth: no other user was affected)
4. Deception/attack at RFAR related to informal mediation:[16][17][18]. In fact no mediation at all was breached. (There was an agreement but diametrically opposite, Oct 10: - "Caveat... I would reserve the right to correct a clear, blatant untruth or misrepresentation.").
5. "Apologies" to the community contained untruths:[19]. (Jehochman didn't speak with me at all (!) until I contacted him subsequently about deception.)
6. Spuriously accused Alison of improper conduct at RFAR:[20][21]. Alison responded[22][23][24]

Jehochman's own partial admissions:

1. (Elonka  FT2). Posted only after extensive counter-efforts on-wiki (deception, gaming, bad faith, and evasion) led to multiple functionaries reviewing the evidence, and followed by the same again.

There is a small amount of crucial off-wiki evidence (provable privately or summarize publicly). The salient snippets ("particularly damning") have not once been claimed inaccurate in private.

Because of the scale of deliberate deception and abuse by an admin evidenced in this case (including gaming across two elections, two RFCs already and two RFARs), the Committee is asked to accept the case rather than refer it elsewhere.

Applicable norms: WP:ADMIN and RFARs (admin/editor conduct), WP:NPA ("accusations that lack evidence"), WP:GAME (gaming/abuse), and WP:NOT#BATTLEGROUND.   (AGF is not so relevant; this is deliberate deception/agenda not failure of faith.)

Alison's followup explanation.

FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 00:46, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@ John Vandenberg:

1. So far as the arbs expressed any clear view for before or after New Year, Carcharoth asked "Should this not have been brought to the community or ArbCom earlier" and CoolHandLuke indicated "3 weeks" [25][26].
2. The RFC was referenced by Jehochman, I could hazard a guess but he'll know which one he means. It's unlikely for a user to admit to abusing a process they never had involvement in.
3. WP:RFC/U requires "two users (who) tried and failed to resolve the same dispute". Hersfold and SirFozzie were joint mediators; they aren't users who "tried and failed" - they are just facilitators for the parties in trying; they wouldn't count. Alison only opined on evidence, and Lar was asked to opine and ended up listening and facilitating. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 03:01, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@ Durova: Cases near the end of the year often have the formal acceptance tally and/or the case opening kept open till January, for the Christmas season and to allow new arbs to vote and/or sit from the start if they wish (and I think also, departing arbs to be active if they wish as well). I wouldn't have a problem with doing so on this case. It's not in any rush. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 05:52, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@ Tznkai: The immediate on-wiki prompting incidents took place during the election itself, with subsequent directions being to suspend any genuine issue until the election was not an concern but (as best consensus was visible) not to delay them thereafter. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 07:33, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@ Roger: I'll be keeping all I can open and on-wiki. If for any reason I can't, I'll summarize/paraphrase/describe on-wiki and submit the original by email. I'll also apply commonsense, cc any off-wiki evidence to Jehochman, and (if needed) to Lar or Alison to ensure visible fair representation and accuracy. Sufficient :) ? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 19:58, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@ Newyorkbrad: The underlying issues are aggressive deception and gaming, and breach of trust as an admin... and that's an ongoing pattern that was visible 18 months ago but is also visible right up to current times. Some evidence does go a long way back. Some (omitted here for brevity) shows similar actions during the months before the election. Some is recent. That's how it goes when there's a long term pattern of bad faith adminship.

Of about 21 unique sample diffs showing the behaviors, all but about 4 show Jehochman heavily engaged in similar behaviors again (ie, attacks/unfounded accusations/gaming the system/deception) at ACE2009 or later. The latest diffs showing clear continuation and yet more deception are from just November 25 - 26, shortly before the direction to suspend any genuine issues. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 20:11, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@ Vassyana: Quick summary of off-wiki dialog:

1. Mediation: Initially I had serious concerns about Jehochman's conduct and fitness as an administrator. Jehochman asked to discuss them and suggested seeking mediators. Skipping the mediation content, my concerns were unchanged.
2. Dialog with Lar: The subsequent dialog with Lar took place after considerable ACE2009 deception and gaming of privacy. At this point mid-election the behavior was more serious, intense, and actively ongoing (public denial/deception/smearing). With three admins now knowing the evidence, Jehochman finally began to discuss productively. It was understood and agreed this would lead to a formal RFC (due to seriousness) in which Jehochman would have to "own his actions". Clearly this would be damning in places. RFAR was the other option.
3. Jehochman's statement (below) is untruthful and incomplete: Following Jehochman's partial admissions (01:17 UTC Nov 24 [27]) all that remained was to draft and post the agreed RFC. This is where Jehochman begins to diverge from honesty again ("... gloating... waited and waited... never replied properly... responses were extremely offensive... That's why negotiations broke down."). In fact, Jehochman got a proper reply, acknowledged it, there was collegial light hearted dialog, no hint at all of offense taken, and the breakdown was via his own abrupt actions in the middle of collegial dialog. All this is hard evidenced. This was what happened after the on-wiki posts Jehochman refers to:
   1. on-wiki, 1:41 UTC The post Jehochman refers to, which more correctly reads: "A quick note between coffees... we have had productive discussion. I'll say more in a bit, but for now the private dialog is still ongoing" [28]. Compare Jehochman's description of the post. This is where Jehochman's description breaks off, implying no proper followup.
   2. email, 01:56 UTC - Jehochman knew that the on-wiki response was a "holding note" - because I said so just 15 minutes later. I also stated the subsequent post would be "generous", would be posted "whenever's right", and "may well not be today". At that point I believed we were a handful of emails from the end.
   3. email, 02:11 UTC - I followed up with a good-faith removal edit "As a gesture of good faith..." [29].
   4. email, 02:35 UTC - Jehochman was not offended, in fact he was relaxed, and joking and laughing in email at the time, as here.
   5. email, 12:53 UTC - I post that I would draft the next agreed step, an RFC. Again working with Jehochman ("I'll post it here first, for review. I propose to ask all 4 of us who know about the case to endorse the final wording...")
   6. email, 14:39 UTC - Jehochman still fully engaged, discusses the RFC title in an amicable tone. This is already way past the posts whose non-followup (it's claimed) led to the breakdown.
   7. email, 15:51 UTC - I sent the draft RFC. Its tone and my own AGF may be judged by the header: "The community is asked to help conclude the case by reviewing these incidents (no longer in dispute), asking questions, and determining the final decision and conclusions that may be appropriate to put it to rest."
   8. multiple hostile emails starting 16:14 UTC - Jehochman's behavior abruptly and greatly darkened "out of nowhere". From joking and collegial he self-reversed, argued RFC was not needed or this was about others not him, and suddenly reverted to gaming, bad faith accusations, excuses, and conspiracy theories - for example that this was bad faith by Alison ("posted as a friend"), that it was a conspiracy with Elonka ("[I] know how she operates..."), that it's "some sort of game", that it would do no good, and a torrent of other "left field" matters and reposting of discredited matters long discarded. I tried AGFing (Lar can confirm) but it did no good. I kept away to allow time for calming, and for he and Lar to discuss, but the next day to Lar and my surprise Jehochman filed an RFAR "out of the blue" instead. There had been no prior discussion leading to this.
4. That was the breakdown. Lar saw it too.

@ Carcharoth (2): I do not understand your comment. A user abuses on-wiki, it's affirmed off-wiki, after considerable dialog the user then apologizes on-wiki for bad-faith adminship. Far from stopping, the user has never really ceased bad faith deception in multiple separate incidents on-wiki. The user has also engaged in serious deception at more than one RFC. The evidence (most of which is on-wiki) is independently verifiable. RFAR seems appropriate at this point.

@ Bainer: It's multiple on-wiki incidents of gaming and abuse, some extreme, in different disputes and processes. It continues to the present. Resolution has been attempted via multiple steps, all failed, listed above. The off-wiki dialog discussed on-wiki misconduct. As multiple RFCs have been gamed by Jehochman already and "deliberate deceptions" have not ceased, there's a concern about the scope for formal review in any venue where off-wiki evidence of bad faith adminship can be kept out.

@ Rlevse: Confirming the old issues are mainly background, and evidence of the long term pattern. The actual arbitrable issue is a pattern of deliberate deception of the community, smear attacks, and "gaming the system", for "bad faith" reasons and personal advantage, at multiple recent (2009) matters. I recognize my wording was not clear on this. I ask this is noted as clarification.

Statement by John Vandenberg

what.the.[beep]. Can't this wait until the new year? Is he abusing sysop tools now?

FT2 says a "Joint RFC [was] cut short", but I don't see an RFC at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Jehochman. Where is it? I'm guessing that he didnt mean "RFC".

He also says "Filing an RFC is not viable". I am not sure that is true, as there are a few other people who are involved in attempting to resolve this (Hersfold, SirFozzie; Alison, Lar?). Two of the potential certifiers are now waiting to take their seat on Arbcom; have they not seen the basis for this dispute? Why can't they certify it?

If it is purely a procedural issue, perhaps the committee members can recommend an RFC, as it did for Giano early in 2009. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 02:13, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

I have rewritten the "Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried" section so that it is neutral information. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 07:07, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by SirFozzie

Well, obviously, even if the results aren't ceremonially announced yet, I would need to recuse myself on this request. I worked with the parties during the initial stages, under the terms that what was said there would stay under mediatorial terms. I have my viewpoint of what happened to get us here, and I have my opinion of the situation. However, I must decline to speak further, as I did the last time this was before the committee. [30] I will again not comment further due to the promises I made to both parties and myself when I was asked to mediate, but hope that there is a way to resolve the situation. SirFozzie (talk) 02:32, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Durova

Good grief, could we please have a holiday without a Jehochman RFAR? If this were meritless I'd ignore it, but it looks like if it opens I'd have to present evidence. Does this absolutely have to come to a head on Christmas Eve? If this is accepted I will not present evidence before January. Durova³⁸⁶ 02:54, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Things are making a little more sense now. Last month Jehochman tried to initiate an RFAR about his dispute with FT2, which was "dismissed without prejudice to refile"[31] due to the upcoming election. Jehochman has posted in nowiki text that he will not be making a statement.[32] Bishonen has no kind words for FT2, which is not surprising because in January she was formally admonished[33] for attempting to block FT2 indefinitely while she was in a dispute with him.[34] Although I am a strong supporter of formal dispute resolution attempts, bypassing conduct RfC would be understandable in this instance for two reasons: the role of offsite correspondence would make it impossible for the community to weigh the matter, and Jehochman initially requested the arbitration himself. In light of Jehochman's refusal to present a statement the arbitrators could take FT2's assertions at face value, but in my opinion this is spectacularly bad timing because the incoming arbitrators would have a case foisted upon them without a voice in its acceptance. Respectfully requesting that FT2 withdraw this filing. I hope it's possible to work things out amicably, but if not it could be restarted in 2010. Durova³⁸⁶ 05:22, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Re: Bishonen, none of us are mind readers. Usually, though, the individual who abides by policy is the one who has the calmer head. There is only one administrator in site history who has attempted to summarily siteban a sitting arbitrator. It might be best if she stepped back and considered that her own interpretations are not the most reliable on this matter, and do not reflect well on her. Durova³⁸⁶ 16:04, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Also, nobody "has been bending my ear" on this matter. It comes as a complete and unwelcome surprise. I think for myself. Durova³⁸⁶ 16:06, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

• To Newyorkbrad: the usual way ArbCom evaluates old behavior is to weigh it only if it is part of an ongoing pattern that includes recent behavior. To raise two examples from a previous case I would have proposed a topic ban on Cirt if he had resumed edit warring, but he put that old problem behind him. Jossi continued his old habits of wikihounding and disrupting featured article candidates within his conflict of interest, so it was relevant to demonstrate that he had been doing those same things for years. Alison is a very trustworthy person and her comments point to a continuation of a troublesome pattern. Durova³⁸⁶ 03:37, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

To Carcharoth: tweak by Bishonen

Not "ready to be read"? Come on, you know about FT2's tweaking, don't you? A more constructive approach on your part would surely be to ask FT2, right now, to shorten his statement, which is roughly two times too long. Or, since he has responded to John Vandenberg's clerkish request for a shorter statement [35] by removing a mere three words, [36], the smart way to go might be to shorten it yourself, or ask a clerk to do so (and of course also to shorten any other overlong statements there might be). To keep this thing at least readable, you know? Without some such contrivance, I guarantee it won't be finished tomorrow. And I agree with Durova — except that I think it should come to a head and be rejected as promptly as possible, saving everybody's holidays. Bishonen | talk 03:21, 24 December 2009 (UTC).

• Comment to Durova. "Bishonen has no kind words for FT2, which is not surprising because in January she was formally admonished for attempting to block FT2 indefinitely while she was in a dispute with him." Oh, so that's why I have no kind words for FT2. I must be spectacularly touchy to those dumb "admonishments". Has somebody been bending your ear, Durova, or is that your own interpretation (including the supposed "dispute")? Could the incident you refer to have anything to do with why FT2 has so much resentment for me (and so much more interest in me than I have in him)? [37] [38] You may recollect that it had much more far-reaching consequences for him than for me ("admonished", bah). Bishonen | talk 12:38, 24 December 2009 (UTC).

Statement by Tznkai

I'm actually doing things that are not Wikipedia for the most part, but I do feel compelled to say at least this:

Baptizing the new committee by fire as soon as possible is a stupid idea, and stupid tradition.--Tznkai (talk) 06:43, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Wehwalt

I don't have much of an opinion about the merits, but I would say this: cases arise when they arise. If Arb intervention is needed, it is needed. The wheels of ArbCom grind slowly, so if there's a case here, get on with it. If there isn't, then there isn't one regardless of the timing. The calendar should not be a consideration here.--Wehwalt (talk) 15:27, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Cube lurker

One thing is clear, we have inappropriate behavior by someone. The $64,000 question is which one. Either Jehochman did what is described here, or FT2 has publicly slandered him more than once. Due to the nature of this situation Arbcom is the only apparatus that can deal with it, therefore Arbcom needs to handle this.--Cube lurker (talk) 17:12, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Non-statement by Jehochman

I will not participate in this theatre. If anybody has questions about my administrative actions, come to my talk page and ask me about them. Otherwise, there is nothing here but character aspersions and an apparent violation of WP:STICK. Insufficient benefits can be taken from investing your limited time in non-administrative matters that are 6 -24 months old, or recent questions and answers at the election which the electorate has already evaluated and voted upon. Please deal with something more pressing instead. Nothing changed since my request was filed and rejected, except that the campaign is over, so I am no longer concerned about the ongoing character aspersions. Feedback I have received from multiple parties during the election and recently is that I should ignore FT2 completely. So I am ignoring him. He can say whatever he pleases, and people can believe him or not. Thank you. Jehochman ^{Make my day} 16:32, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

@Vassyana: I issued statements to Elonka and FT2. Elonka's reply was derisive and contained false accusations. FT2's said he was going out to coffee, and to me read like he was gloating. I waited, and waited, but he never replied properly. To me, their responses were extremely offensive. That's why negotiations broke down. I regret entering into those lengthy discussions, because I feel that I was being played. The filing of this case on Christmas Eve, which has distracted me from family and enjoying the holiday, was needlessly inflammatory and offensive as well. The more that's said here, the more people will become angry with each other once again. Speedy rejection of this case would be best. I will have nothing further to do with FT2 or Elonka. That solves the problem as far as Wikipedia is concerned, because it takes at least two sides to have a fight, and I'm not participating. Jehochman ^{Ho ho ho!} 12:04, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by DuncanHill

The obscure references in the opening satement make it more clear than ever that the sooner we get rid of the ludicrous ban on quoting directly from emails the better. Better still, don't discuss Wikipedia matters off-wiki at all, little good and much harm usually comes of it. I have never had much faith in those who choose to take their problems off-wiki, and every case like this, which relies on evidence that cannot be presented to the community, just serves to confirm that mistrust. You've got a problem with anything on wikipedia? Say so on Wikipedia. DuncanHill (talk) 23:37, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

And I'll add this, to hell with the consequences

Filing a request for case on Christmas Eve looks shitty, however well-intentioned the person doing it actually is. Arbs should reject on the basis of idiotic timing. DuncanHill (talk) 23:49, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Gladys J Cortez

Although filing the request the day before Christmas was maybe a case of spectacularly sub-par timing, I would hope the Arbs could overlook that; the best analogy I can give to this disagreement is to compare it to an iceberg. The on-wiki stuff is the only part we see, but there's much more under the surface, it sounds like--and when you're steering a ship and see an iceberg ahead, you don't care WHAT day it is; you take action to avoid the dangers. It's clear from the extensive on-wiki discussion that this dispute has indeed become a distraction and a disruption to the community, and also that the principals have been unable to hash it out amongst themselves. I don't think it matters who does or does not choose to participate; unless this gets resolved we'll be hearing bits and echoes from it every time any of the parties makes any decision at all, controversial or not. Best to deal with it now, before more of this animosity spills over onto other pages. GJC 17:27, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Gatoclass

As it happens, I was considering making some sort of comment on this issue elsewhere, but since this RfAR has been filed, I might as well make it here. First of all, after seeing the charges made by FT2 and Alison against Jehochman during ACE2009, I was concerned enough to contact Jehochman to ask for a transcript of the emails in question. After reading them, I quickly came to the conclusion that there was no substance to the charges made, as in my view there are readily available alternative explanations for the statements made by Jehochman in the emails other than the bad faith interpretations made by FT2 and Alison. Having said that, I must say I was very disappointed to see Alison leap in to support the charges made by FT2 in ACE2009 without having the courtesy to at least first ask Jehochman in private for his own explanation. I think that ought to be done as a matter of course in such circumstances, in my opinion it was poor judgement by Alison not to do so and I hope that she will think twice before rushing to publicly condemn someone in such a hasty manner again.

I might add that I was also unimpressed by the means with which FT2 and Alison effectively sank Jehochman's candidacy, in making claims about alleged offsite misbehaviour that Jehochman was scarcely in a position to be able to refute (although he attempted to do so by opening a case at this page). Where I come from, that kind of tactic is usually labelled a smear, and there ought to be no place for such tactics on wikipedia.

It does seem to me however that in bringing this matter to RfAR, FT2 has simply lost his sense of perspective and is making a veritable mountain out of a molehill. Certainly I don't believe for a moment, even were arbcom to take this case, that it could possibly make any reliable finding of wrongdoing on Jehochman's part based on the evidence I have seen. But in the somewhat unlikely event that arbcom does decide to take on this case, I trust that the actions of both FT2 and Alison during ACE2009 will also be examined, as I think it would be undesirable to see a repeat of such tactics employed against any candidate in future elections. Gatoclass (talk) 09:00, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Mathsci

Most of the issues involved in this case are stale. Despite the constantly increasing length of FT2's presentation, it does not make any of its points clearly. This applies in particular to the reply to Stephen Bain: "It's multiple on-wiki incidents of gaming and abuse, some extreme, in different disputes and processes." FT2 has not provided any support or diffs for these innuendos, which presumably underlie his request. Some editors might consider Jehochman's admin actions on wikipedia as inconsistent and whimsical: that might be one factor that influenced votes during two successive ArbCom elections. Those actions, while possibly irritating to some, are nevertheless within wikipedia norms of administrative behaviour. It is not something that ArbCom can or should pronounce upon. If this case concerns events surrounding Elonka's actions one and a half years's ago, that is quite stale. Elonka has just returned to editing after a six month wikibreak and those events should not be re-examined at this stage. Grudges or grievances generated by off-wiki communications have nothing at all to do with this encyclopedia. FT2 has not given a detailed list of any specific administrative actions of Jehochman that he finds problematic. Presumably, if they were serious, he or other editors would have addressed them at the time. If this case is solely about off-wiki communications and interpersonal disputes, as appears to be the case at present, ArbCom should reject the request. Mathsci (talk) 11:29, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Moreschi

Put briefly: arbcom is here to arbitrate actual disputes, not to act as some sort of HR committee dealing with inter-admin wikipolitical catfights. A "hidden history of abuse" is simply not within arbcom's purview (and I have no idea how such a thing could be proved anyway). A genuine case would revolve around specific incidents in Jehochman's admin logs, and this may well be feasible - I wouldn't know, having missed out on most of 2009. But as it is, this should not be accepted.

More generally, Jehochman can be abrasive, and certainly I wouldn't like everyone to know how I talk off-wiki either. FT2 can lose his sense of perspective, and the bewildered comments of various arbitrators last time around (along the lines of "why is this wasting so much of everyone's time - including functionaries' time?") still hold true. Not a good combination, and I can see how problems have developed between the two. Arbcom is not therapy, however.

As a side-note, this tweaking from FT2 simply has to stop. It started off as an amusing quirk, descended into a minor nuisance, and is fast developing into outright esoterrorism. We have the preview button for a reason. Use it. Moreschi (talk) 18:44, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Jtrainor

Boy, is this ever some stupid crap. Can't you two just agree to avoid each other or something? FT2, seriously, GO OUTSIDE. Jtrainor (talk) 07:52, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Clerk notes

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

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (1/5/1/4)

• Comment - judging from the page history, the request is being actively edited and is not yet ready to be read. I'll check back tomorrow to see if it is finished, and will also await a statement from Jehochman. 01:53, 24 December 2009 (UTC) Thank you Bishonen. No need to tweak me. My initial comment was my way of expressing exasperation with FT2's tweaking, but obviously I was too dead-pan there. Really, FT2 should have prepared a statement before coming here, and tweaked it to his satisfaction before filing the request. And if that is not clear enough: I am saying that extensive tweaking of a request is not a good thing. Decide what you want to say and say it. Don't do the wiki equivalent of umm-ing and ahh-ing. Carcharoth (talk) 03:28, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Have been following this, and am declining. It seems to me that FT2 is pushing a bit too hard here to have something done, when it is still not clear what this is about. It appears to be FT2 saying that because he thinks something should be done (based on private evidence that has not been systematically reviewed by us), that we should accept a case. It should be possible to say in a brief statement why a case should be accepted - it should not need a long statement and multiple responses to everyone else commenting. I would suggest that if anything further is done (e.g. an RFC) that FT2 not be the one to initiate it - we need clarity and precision here, which is not what we are getting at the moment. If there are developments later in the year, it should be possible to make a clearer case either way. Carcharoth (talk) 01:16, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
    • Further brief response: agree with Mathsci and Gatoclass. Carcharoth (talk) 18:11, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
• Comment - Nobody should feel obliged to interrupt their planned activities to comment here over the coming few days; many are traveling or spending time with family over this Christmas weekend, a time of year where most people place their priorities on their off-wiki lives. I don't plan to make a decision on whether or not to accept this matter until late on December 26th at the earliest. Risker (talk) 05:46, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Decline. I have now reviewed this request fully and do not believe that there is a benefit to the encyclopedia in rehashing a dispute that relates to actions more than a year ago. The individuals most directly involved in this matter have moved on, or have indicated their desire to do so and to take lessons from the situation, which is the fundamental objective of dispute resolution. There is no evidence presented that Jehochman is currently behaving in a way that is harmful to the project or brings his administratorship into disrepute. There might have been a case here if the proposal included evidence of a pattern of questionable administrator actions over a range of matters including contemporaneous ones; that isn't what is presented here.

    As an additional comment, not specific to this case, I am becoming increasingly concerned at the tendency for editors, including administrators, to continue stoking disputes that either have been or should be considered to be long since resolved. That two editors disagreed about the interpretation of a reference source back in 2007, or that an administrator made an error in judgment in 2008 that he or she has already had brought to his/her attention and has not repeated, should not be a continuing issue perpetuated for all time. People need to move on, and failure to do so is, to me, as serious as some of the other matters that have been brought to the attention of this committee over the past year. Risker (talk) 20:28, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

• Comment - I too will give this a couple of days before looking at the issues. In the meantime, I'd appreciate it if the parties keep their statements short and to the point, with a minimum of on-going tweaking. Please also try to keep this on-wiki: only geninely private matters should be raised with ArbCom by email and emailed material not meeting this criterion is likely to be politely ignored.  Roger Davies ^talk 06:27, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Decline: I don't see a current issue here than couldn't be more sensibly resolved by other less drama-inducing means (like the main protagonists not rising to the bait and ignoring each other, for example).  Roger Davies ^talk 05:38, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
• Comment; for logistical reasons, this request should be held open for a couple of days with no action: the new arbitrators are taking their seat as we speak and it would be reasonable to let them opine given they are likely to end up with an eventual case, and the holidays slow things down because many editors are with family rather than online. — Coren ^(talk) 16:15, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Recuse I've made my statement above. SirFozzie (talk) 18:21, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

• Decline, at least tentatively. It took me a great deal of time when this matter was first brought here to figure out what the underlying dispute was actually about, and I'm still not sure I'm entirely clear. However, the original events underlying this request appear to be more than a year old, and thus, do not present a live dispute to arbitrate. The fact that the parties later disagreed with each other's characterizations of the earlier dispute on election pages does not mean that we have an ongoing dispute once again. I'm open to persuasion as further statements are submitted, but at the moment, I don't see how devoting the substantial time and attention that this case would draw would assist either the encyclopedia or the community. Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:40, 24 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Having read the additional statements, reaffirming my "decline" vote. Several of my colleagues, including Risker and Roger Davies, and commenters Mathsci and Moreschi have substantially summed up my view. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:56, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
• Comment. Similar to other arbs, it will be a few days before I offer a formal decline or accept. If this should be declined, convince me that the matters at hand do not rise to the level of arbitration need or can be handled by the community. If this should be accepted, convince me that there is a substantive case to be examined that cannot be handled at the community level and needs to be dealt with by the Arbitration Committee. One point I'm particularly interested in hearing is how and why private mediation and discussion efforts broke down. Also, I'd be keen to hear from Alison and Lar. As a general comment, we do need to take into account the holidays and allow interested or involved parties time to note and comment on this request. On the same note, even if accepted this case should not open until January 2. Vassyana (talk) 06:37, 25 December 2009 (UTC)
• Reject. It is apparent that one or both of the parties are unwilling or unable to either discuss matters like adults, bury the hatchet, or else use the proper dispute resolution process (which does not involve starting with arbitration as the first step). There is also the question of whether private communications between editors off-wiki are even justiciable here (as opposed to editors importing a personal dispute on-wiki, which is). And to address the inevitable reply: FT2 disavows the possibility of initiating a request for comment due to the unlikelihood of there being anyone able to certify a request over this particular incident, but also refers to "a hidden history of improper actions". Are we to understand that by "a hidden history of improper actions" you mean this one incident, and not any other actions? --bainer (talk) 00:29, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• Accept. While I see reasons to reject this (such as the core Elonka matters were 1.5 years ago, nor does she seem to be part of the off wiki discussions, though she did make stmts during the 2009 ACE); I also see reasons to accept, which are basically that there is indeed something going on here on one side or the other, though I'm not totally sure what (cf the diff above on the RFAR Jehochman filed just one month ago). I agree that if there is a case to arbitrate, the case should be filed, but this filing was no so urgent that it had to be filed on Christmas Eve when it's known the the party(ies) are in all likelihood people for whom Christmas is a major holiday. I share Bainer's concerns too about the email evidence but that can be handled privately if need be. FT2's constant tweaking of postings needs to stop too. It'd be better to make subsequent posts below the original one or to make a final draft before posting. Bottom line is that I think something serious is going on here and the sooner we nip it, the better. — Rlevse • Talk • 01:33, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

---

McCready edit warring topic ban

Initiated by User:Mccready at 04:51, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Mccready (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log), filing party

Statement by Mccready

I request that my topic ban for edit warring [39] [40] be lifted or modified on the grounds that 1) I have acknowledged my behaviour 2) my contributions to Wikipedia since the ban (see my talkpage for example) and 3) that the ban can quickly be reinstated if needed.

I give notice of an appeal on other grounds if this request fails. These other grounds would require a substantial amount of detailed work (going back to my history since joining wikipedia) which I hope we can all avoid. Vassyana has described my case as a battleground. For this reason I have not included attempts to get the ban lifted or modified because they have involved this history (irrelevant if we look to my contributions since the ban) and admins who have reached a point where they refuse to discuss the matter further. Kevin McCready (talk) 04:51, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to Vassyana Thank you for your decision to recuse, which I think should apply to the second leg of my appeal, should that be needed. However, I think it remains open to you to express a view on the quality of my edits since the ban. If you look at my edits since then, as if I were a new user, would they give grounds for concern?

Response to Carcharoth The admin who decided this non-arbitration related ban has a notice on their talkpage that they are semiretired. They have refused further involvement after I questioned their review.

Response to Wizardman I will show in my second leg of appeal, should that be needed, that it wasn't a "community ban". Since you have not yet heard my arguments on this score, it remains open to you to participate in the first leg of the appeal. ie 1) I have acknowledged my behaviour 2) my contributions to Wikipedia since the ban (see my talkpage for example) and 3) that the ban can quickly be reinstated if needed. This is a matter of AGF on my edits since the ban, edits which have contributed to the project.

Response to Risker As above to Wizardman. I think it would be more efficient to deal with the first leg first rather than waste time on the history.

Response to Middle 8 I obviously dispute your views and will refute them in the second leg if necessary.

Kevin McCready (talk) 01:49, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Question for clerk I'd be grateful if you could tell me what "should this be converted to an amendment request (as this doesn't seem like material for a full case)?" means? I'm unsure if this means I should amend my case. All I've ever wanted is for someone to look at it objectively without drama. Each admin that has looked at it has run away when I have asked for evidence for their position or shown how their conclusion is illogical.

Response again to Risker As I've just noted above I seek to make this as simple as possible with as little drama as possible. The question I'd like arbcom to answer, if I can put it this way, is that given my good record of edits since the ban, why not lift the ban or modify it? It can very quickly be reinstated if needed. The path you seem to want to go down is much more tortuous, and involves much more presentation of evidence going back to when I first joined wikipedia. In particular the disputed block log was referred to repeatedly during the discussion which morphed into my banning while I was blocked. Another way of arbcom setting a precedent might be simply to say: a user should not be topic banned while blocked and unable to properly present a case. Possibly the clerk's clarification as requested above might also help. Over to you. Kevin McCready (talk) 10:17, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to Carcharoth's of 23 December 2009 This is using a huge sledgehammer for a tiny nut. It is moving to the second stage before we have looked at the first. I invite you to look at my contributions since the ban. My talkpage gives an indication of the positive interactions and contributions since that time. My case allows arbcom to set a very simple precedent: a user should not be topic banned while blocked and unable to present a case. Can you tell me a reason why this path would not be acceptable to you? As I have said many times. The ban can quickly be reinstated if needed. I am trying to streamline this for everyone's sake. Thanks. Kevin McCready (talk) 23:59, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to Rlevse I'm worried that you may not have fully understood my position. The two track solution I am proposing will save a lot of work. Of course I can provide evidence (if necessary in the second stage). To phrase my case another way if you like, the first track can assume for the purpose of the exercise that the ban was validly applied. Then the question is whether my contributions since then are of a quality to have the ban removed or modified. The evidence for this is all on my talkpage. What is wrong, for example, with lifting the ban with the proviso that it can be reapplied immediately if needed? I'd appreciate your response to this. Kevin McCready (talk) 23:51, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Middle 8

Hi, just a quick comment from a mostly (re)tired user. This topic ban, imo, is an excellent example of the "preventative not punitive" model working. Prior to the topic ban, this editor engaged in protracted edit-warring in the banned topic areas (see summary here). Since then, he's been a low-key, wikignome-type editor, averaging one or two edits per day in diverse topics. However, he's also violated the topic ban since then[41], including with an IP[42][43] (see checkuser results).

I note that he has generally avoided other topic areas where he was previously under restricted editing, namely all pseudoscience and alternative medicine topics[44] [45]. I think the appropriate course would be to retain the topic ban on acu and chiro, and encourage him to try editing other alt-med a/o pseudoscience articles, possibly with a mentor. His recent edit history shows that he can wikignome, but he has not shown that he can stay within accepted bounds of dispute resolution while engaging with editors with whom he is in substantial disagreement. As his argumentation (culminating in a block) over this topic ban shows, it is quite possible that he simply lacks the competence to do so. At any rate, he needs to demonstrate it, and not expect to be taken at his word: he's said he's learned his lessons in the past (Feb. '08), and gone on to massively edit war (April '08) anyway.

With regard to Mccready's "disputed block log" (his term), what one finds with a little digging is that most of the blocks were for good reasons, like 3RR violations, but that he objected because in some cases the block was made by an involved admin. In other words, sometimes the blocks were made by the wrong person, but the blocks themselves were (with one or two exceptions) sound.

@Carcharoth: I believe this ban was a community ban (arising from much discussion at AN/I and elsewhere) and did not involve ArbCom. regards, Middle 8 (talk) 20:47, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment: I still believe that Mccready's recent wikignoming is insufficient evidence of his having changed his ways. User:JzG (aka Guy) stated it well here. If all Mccready intends to do is wikignome, then it shouldn't matter if the topic ban stands, because anyone can fix minor things; if he intends to make substantive changes in the topic ban areas, then he should first demonstrate his ability "engage properly with those of an opposing point of view" in other topics. There are many, many articles in the alt-med and so-called pseudoscience realms where he can do that, and then come back with some reliable evidence that he's changed his ways. Wikignoming is nice but doesn't meet that standard. --Middle 8 (talk) 00:52, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Atlan

I have no opinion on the imposed ban, but I would like the arbitrators to know, Mccready has been specifically directed to Arbcom on multiple occasions to appeal his ban. His most recent block was partly because Mccready refused to do so at first. To keep sending him back and forth between Arbcom and the community seems like poor treatment to me, whatever the merits of this topic ban.--Atlan (talk) 14:22, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Rich Farmbrough

Urge the committee to take this case, both supporting Atlan's comment above, and the reverse point that the community needs this matter resolving. As far as I can see several administrators have attempted to deal with the matter with limited or no success, and it has come up numerous times on AN/I. An ARBCOM support/extend/overturn/expire or indeed any clear outcome would be good for the community at large. Clearly one that returns Mccready to productive editing is preferable. Rich Farmbrough, 04:49, 15 December 2009 (UTC).

Clerk notes

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

As a point of information for the Arbitrators, Mccready is currently blocked; the block is currently set to expire at 5:11 December 15, UTC. Also, should this be converted to an amendment request (as this doesn't seem like material for a full case)? Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 00:03, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Note: User has now been unblocked. Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:28, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to Mccready: You've not done anything wrong in filing this, don't worry. The reason I asked the arbs about that was because usually ban appeals such as this are handled as amendment requests (see Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment) because any action by the Committee would be changing (or amending) the original sanction. In general, a full arbitration case involves a multi-step process where parties to a dispute present evidence about the dispute, propose possible outcomes, and then the Arbitration Committee votes on a series of final drafts of those proposals. Cases like this typically take a month or two. An amendment request, on the other hand, usually is handled through simple motions by the Committee, and goes much faster without the need for any formal case. It seems as though from the comments below as though the Committee would rather handle this the more formal way, so I'll defer to their judgement. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 20:56, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to Risker: See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive581#Admin_Kevin. User_talk:Mccready#Topic_Ban and Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive519#Fresh_Admin_Eyes may also be applicable. - Penwhale | ^{dance in the air and follow his steps} 21:18, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (1/4/1/1)

• Recuse. Obviously involved in this matter. Vassyana (talk) 20:14, 7 December 2009 (UTC)
• Comment. It needs to be clarified whether the initial topic bans were done under discretionary arbitration sanctions, or whether they were non-arbitration related sanctions. If the former, then an amendment request related to the relevant case (after the current block expires) would be best. If the latter, then the first port of call would be those who imposed the sanctions - or, if you want to skip that step, ask those who imposed the sanctions to state here if they are willing to relax them, and (from what you have said) why they are unwilling to do so. Carcharoth (talk) 06:42, 10 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the links, Penwhale. I've looked at those, and what I see is a series of reviews of this topic ban by the same people (VirtualSteve, User:Kevin and a few others). It would have helped if someone different had done the reviews in each instance after the first one. What might be best is to direct Mccready to prepare a full appeal (the current one is not detailed enough), and to invite the previously involved admins and the community to comment on it, and then see what results from that. In other words, draw more eyes to this to get a more definitive verdict. Most of the work for this need to be done by Mccready (say two weeks to prepare something in his userspace), and he needs to accept that if this fails, then he cannot appeal again for a whole year. This will be better than a continuing cycle of AN or ANI threads where the same people comment, and hardly anyone else bothers to read or comment on the threads. Essentially, accept and leave Maccready to prepare a full on-wiki appeal to submit when he is ready, followed by discussion for a week, and then a verdict, and then leave the matter alone for a year. Of course, this is dependent on my colleagues agreeing with me that this is needed. If no-one else votes to accept or look at this, then I would suggest the community use a similar framework (allow Maccready to build a full appeal in his userspace), and then deliver their verdict, along with a restriction as to future appeals (e.g. fulfil certain conditions, and require evidence of changes in conduct, before appealing again). Carcharoth (talk) 01:08, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
• Decline. Seeing as how it's been 18 months and it was a community-instituted ban, I'd rather defer it to them. Wizardman 04:34, 12 December 2009 (UTC)
• Comment: On reading the user's talk page, I see reference to recent discussions with other administrators and/or the community about lifting of this ban. I'd like to see some links specifically to those recent discussions, please, and the administrators involved should be invited to comment on this page. Mccready, that's something you need to include here. Risker (talk) 01:07, 13 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Mccready, there won't be a second part if you do not provide enough information to support your contention. The fact that there is the appearance of your having raised the subject of your topic ban with the community prior to coming here may be a key factor in the Committee's decision whether or not to accept your case. Please provide the links. Risker (talk) 02:14, 13 December 2009 (UTC)
    • Decline. Risker (talk) 20:36, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
• Decline: If McCready can't supply evidence now as to why this was not a community ban, I do not see the reason to open a full case. He was asked to do so by Risker and did not supply an answer that cleared up this issue. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:57, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

@McCready-I see no reason for a custom made case, there's no reason you can't say "It's not community based because (1-2 sentences) [diff] [diff] [diff] — Rlevse • Talk • 00:22, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

• Decline I've been following this for some time and see no grounds for a case as currently framed.  Roger Davies ^talk 05:26, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

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Requests for clarification

Use this section to request further guidance or clarification about an existing completed Arbitration Committee case or decision. How to file a request (please use this format!): Go to this request template, and copy the text in the box at the bottom of the page. Click here to edit the clarification subpage, and paste the template immediately below this box and above any other outstanding requests. Using the format provided by the template, try to state your request and reasoning in 500 words or fewer, citing supporting diffs where necessary. Although it should be kept short, you may add to your statement in future if needed as the word limit is not rigidly enforced. List any other users affected or involved. Sign your statement with ~~~~. If your request will affect or involve other users, you must notify each involved person on their user talk page. Return to your request and provide diffs showing that other involved users have been notified in the section provided for notification. This is not a page for discussion. It may be to your advantage to paste the template into your user space or use an off-line text editor to compose your request before posting it here. The main Requests for arbitration page is not the place to work on rough drafts. Arbitrators or Clerks may summarily remove or refactor discussion without comment. Requests from banned users should be made by e-mail directly to the Committee. Only Arbitrators and Clerks may remove requests from this page. Do not remove a request unless you are one.

Requests for amendment

Use this section: To request changes to remedies or enforcement provisions, for example to make them stronger or deal with unforeseen problems. To request lifting of an existing Arbitration sanction that is no longer needed (banned users may email the Ban Appeals Subcommittee directly) How to file a request (please use this format!): Go to this request template, and copy the text in the box at the bottom of the page. Click here to edit the amendment subpage, and paste the template immediately below this box and above any other outstanding requests. Using the format provided by the template, try to show exactly what you want amended and state your reasoning for the change in 1000 words or fewer, citing supporting diffs where necessary. Although it should be kept short, you may add to your statement in future if needed as the word limit is not rigidly enforced. List any other users affected or involved. Sign your statement with ~~~~. If your request will affect or involve other users, you must notify each involved person on their user talk page. Return to your request and provide diffs showing that other involved users have been notified in the section provided for notification. This is not a page for discussion. It may be to your advantage to paste the template into your user space or use an off-line text editor to compose your request before posting it here. The main Requests for arbitration page is not the place to work on rough drafts. Arbitrators or Clerks may summarily remove or refactor discussion without comment. Requests that do not clearly state the following will be removed by Arbitrators or Clerks without comment: The name of the case to be amended (which should be linked in the request header), The clause(s) to be modified, referenced by number or section title as presented in the Final Decision, The desired modifications to the aforementioned clause(s), and A rationale for the change(s) of no more than 1000 words. Requests from banned users should be made by e-mail directly to the Committee. Only Arbitrators and Clerks may remove requests from this page. Do not remove a request unless you are one.

Request to amend prior case: Asmahan

Initiated by Supreme Deliciousness (talk) at 19:26, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Case affected 

Asmahan arbitration case (t) (ev/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t)

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Remedies

List of users affected by or involved in this amendment

• Supreme Deliciousness (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)
• Nefer Tweety (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that the above users are aware of this request

• Nefer Tweety is aware: [46]

Amendment 1

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Asmahan#Scope_of_case
• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Asmahan#Remedies

Statement by Supreme Deliciousness

The scope of case as posted above show that Nefer Tweety has been involved in this conflict but no remedy was suggested against him, I had previously posted evidence showing that almost the only thing the Nefer Tweety account is used for is to back up Arab Cowboys edits, do the exact same edits as Arab Cowboy and revert to his edits, now after the case has been closed it has happened again, Nefer Tweety reverted the article back 4 months to Arab Cowboys last edit, not caring about edits made by several people [47] Some of the edits he reverted: [48] [49] [50] [51] [52]

In this reversion he amongst other things reinserted copyrighted material, I had made a copyright violation report and a copyright admin removed the copyrighted material here, the exact same copy righted text was re added by Nefer tweety, personal life, section: [53] I had also corrected the sections according to previous collaborations and it was reverted: [54]

Nefer Tweety disrespect to other peoples edits and inputs in the article, only caring about reverting to Arab Cowboys edit, not about improving the article, I am therefore requesting that Nefer Tweety gets topic banned from the articles involved in this case or banned from wikipedia altogether for being an agenda account with only one purpose.

Initial editing of above section finished at 20:07, 23 December 2009

response below was by Supreme Deliciousness to Vassyana, moved here by Carcharoth (talk) 18:17, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

The case was about the disruption at the Asmahan article and related articles, the disruption continues with no remedy against Nefer Tweety. I have already used efforts to resolve the matter at the community level several times, I have already pointed out the 3O, rfc, mediations and interfering of admin al ameer son at the case, I filed an official plagiarism report and the CV was removed by admin and now Nefer Tweety has re added it, the article is on probation and no admin has interfered against the edit made by Nefer Tweety although I have pointed this out at the talkpage. It is this, the constant destruction of the Asmahan article, the constant going against collaborations by Arab Cowboy and Nefer Tweety. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 20:55, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by other editor

SD and AC have been warring over this article for a long time and SD took it to arbitration. As a result, on 15 Dec, SD was “prohibited from making changes to any article (specifically this one) about a person with respect to their ethnicity or nationality.” SD’s edits of 20 Dec. are the same as those he had made prior to his prohibition. SD’s latest edits, exactly as before his prohibition, are intended to dilute Asmahan's Egyptian nationality in favor of a Syrian one, which is a violation of his prohibition. He's inviting more edit wars and he should therefore be blocked at least for the remaining period of his prohibition as stated. He has been advised by the admins to leave this article alone and focus on others, but he is not complying. He's also changing his input on the Discussion page after people have responded to it! Nefer Tweety (talk) 06:05, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Amendment 2

• Link to principle, finding of fact, or remedy to which this amendment is requested
• Details of desired modification

Statement by your username (2)

{Statement by editor filing request for amendment. Contained herein should be an explanation and evidence detailing why the amendment is necessary.}

Statement by other editor (2)

{Other editors are free to comment on this amendment as necessary. Comments here should be directed only at the above proposed amendment.}

Further discussion

Statements here may address all the amendments, but individual statements under each proposed amendment are preferred. If there is only one proposed amendment, then no statements should be added here.

Statement by yet another editor

Clerk notes

This section is for administrative notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Just because ArbCom has reviewed an area or examined specific editors in the past does not mean that all related matters are ArbCom business. Even where we have previously intervened, efforts to resolve the matter at the community level are usually required before we will step in. Have you tried utilizing the available dispute resolution options, including requesting admin intervention? Is there any particular reason this cannot be resolved at the community level? Vassyana (talk) 20:41, 23 December 2009 (UTC)
• It's not clear what change you want other than you want some sort of sanction. Besides, WP:SPI may be a more suitable venue, if you have the evidence to support a filing there. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:51, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

---

Request to amend prior case: Lapsed Pacifist 2

Initiated by Steven Zhang ^{The clock is ticking....} at 11:26, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Case affected 

Lapsed Pacifist 2 arbitration case (t) (ev/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t)

Clauses to which an amendment is requested

1. Remedies

List of users affected by or involved in this amendment

• Steven Zhang (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)
• Lapsed Pacifist (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) Editor notified by initiator and me separately; mine was here (diff) - Penwhale | ^{dance in the air and follow his steps} 11:59, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

(all listed users notified)

Amendments

That the following additional remedy be implemented;

Lapsed Pacifist (talk · contribs) is banned from Wikipedia for a period of one year.

Statement by Steven Zhang

In a nutshell, the previous RFAR's remedies have done little to resolve the situation, if anything else, it has proved to be nothing but an obstacle that Lapsed Pacifist has done everything to avoid. They have been blocked twice since the RFAR [55], have had two AE threads [56][57], an ANI thread as well as several issues on their talk page. Others could detail other activities, but I am aware they have often reverted material without discussion (violation of remedy 5), has campaigned for POV material to be inserted into articles on talk pages (other editors will have the diffs). Now, I'd urge the committee to vote on a motion to implement this remedy. I'm not going to go out and say "I told you so", but you get the point. So please, think it over, and consider what the best decision would be here. Steven Zhang ^{The clock is ticking....} 11:26, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by GainLine

I fully support what Steve has brought up. The evidence presented is just barely a representative sample. Further examination of the RfE and ANI threads will show plenty more examples of poor behaviour. If anything some of the sanctions such as the the reverting discusion have only served to intensify poor behaviour as LP becomes more confrontational on talk pages. User:Snappy has fallen victim in particular to this but LP seems to have reignited past confrontations such as with Steve, Falcon9x5, YNHockey to name but a few. This makes for an unpleasant editing environment and is an overall negative on the project GainLine ♠ _♥ 12:03, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

As mentioned at RfE, I also would like to echo ONIHs sentiments, an indef block as well as SPI/Meat Puppet investigation may be necessary GainLine ♠ _♥ 15:12, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to ONIH ONIH makes a very good point. The problem isn't with the small number of edits made at the last RfE but more about LPs general approach to Wikipedia. One only has to look at the way in which LP dealt with their Conflict of Interest in relation to the Shell to Sea suite of articles as an example. Instead of editing with great caution LP, soapboxed and edit warred to the point where they were topic banned despite many appeals to stop and warnings. This is a very good example of how LP operates in a sensitive area and what they think of WP policy. GainLine ♠ _♥ 14:50, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by One Night In Hackney

While not opposed to a one year ban, I really don't think it's going to deal with the problem only delay the inevitable. Realistically, there's been 3 AE threads since Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive51#Lapsed Pacifist deals with one block, then further violations of sanctions after that block expired, to wit violating his topic ban and failing to discuss a revert less than 18 hours after his previous block expired. LP is tendentious in virtually every area where he contributes, despite being topic banned from two areas due to tendentious editing. A topic ban is supposed to be a wake up call, saying stop being disruptive. Instead LP just ignores the wake up call, and the topic bans quite often, and just finds another area to be disruptive. He's been encouraged to use edit summaries in volatile areas, and a request was also made here. Does LP use edit summaries? Extremely rarely, as his contribs show.

I would advise everyone to look at this edit and the additional of "vassals" and also the problems with the edit to Al-Shifa pharmaceutical factory detailed here, coming from an editor with a history of POV editing, two arbitration cases, two topic bans and a lengthy block log. LP cannot be reformed, he will not comply with any restriction, recommendation or even basic Wikipedia policies. It is more than past time he was indefinitely blocked in my opinion. 2 lines of K₃₀₃ 14:41, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Response to John Vandenberg. The problem with LP isn't really any one single incident, but a persistent failure to get the point and abide by Wikipedia policies and his topic bans and other restrictions. LP has a major problem with WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, for example where he wikilawyers in his unblock request that Fenian Rising is not covered by his topic ban, despite earlier being advised here that the topic ban be taken to mean the "Irish/British conflict over independence". It's hardly a huge leap of logic to realise that if someone is editing in a highly POV way in articles relating to the events in Northern Ireland post-1969, then it's obvious then they are going to be just as problematic on articles such as Easter Rising, Irish Republican Army and Irish War of Independence.

LP's flouting of his topic bans and other restrictions just never seem to stop, it's been one AE thread after another. If there's a way this can be resolved without "going nuclear" I'd support it, but I don't see a motion requiring him to use edit summaries as being sufficient to solve the underlying problems. 2 lines of K₃₀₃ 13:34, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by John Vandenberg

I don't see any reason for Arbcom to go nuclear on Lapsed Pacifist. If Arbcom is bored, please amend the case to require LP to provide edit summaries for each edit. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 16:26, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Statement by an univolved IP

I don't have the time or the patience to do a careful analysis, but it's pretty clear that LP is being targetyted for sanctions based on content disputes rather than conduct. GainLines contributions are biased, covering for real culprits such as Okedem. 86.180.59.163 (talk) 18:24, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Further discussion

Statements here may address all the amendments, but individual statements under each proposed amendment are preferred. If there is only one proposed amendment, then no statements should be added here.

Clerk notes

This section is for administrative notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Awaiting statement by Lapsed Pacifist. He is currently blocked, but if he posts an appropriate statement to his talkpage, any user may create an appropriate subsection in this thread and crosspost it, or of course Lapsed Pacifist may do so when the block expires. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:22, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
• Even where we have prior jurisdiction due to an arbitration case, community options still take precedence and must be utilized before seeking ArbCom's intervention. Absent some compelling reason that a community ban is not feasible, I am inclined to deny a request for further ArbCom involvement at this juncture. Vassyana (talk) 18:21, 13 December 2009 (UTC)
• Per Vassyana. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:47, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

---

Request to amend prior case: The Troubles

Initiated by Elonka at 04:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Case affected 

The Troubles arbitration case (t) (ev/ t) (w/ t) (p/ t)

Amendment 1: New remedy: Discretionary Sanctions

• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Remedies

Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working in the area of conflict if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, or any expected standards of behavior or decorum. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; temporary bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; temporary bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; temporary restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project.

The scope of these sanctions may include any article in conflict that could be reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, or British nationalism. When there is doubt as to whether or not an article falls within the scope of this case, assume it is related.

For the purpose of imposing sanctions under this provision, an administrator will be considered "uninvolved" if he or she is not engaged in a current, direct, personal conflict on the topic with the user receiving sanctions. Enforcing the provisions of this decision will not be considered to be participation in a dispute.

Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question must be given a warning with a link to this case; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines. This notification must be logged at the case page, as must any sanctions that are later imposed on the editor.

Statement by Elonka

Discretionary sanctions have been routinely authorized in other nationalist topic areas, such as Israel-Palestine, Armenia-Azerbaijan, Eastern Europe, Macedonia, and so forth. However, they were never specifically authorized in the Troubles topic area, possibly because the Troubles case is such an old one (from 2007, when ArbCom did not start routinely authorizing discretionary sanctions until 2008). This means that there is very little that administrators can do to reduce disruption in this topic area, other than enforcing 1RR or entirely blocking an editor from Wikipedia. However, if discretionary sanctions were authorized, uninvolved administrators could craft much more precisely targeted solutions, such as to simply remove a disruptive editor from one or more articles where they were causing problems. This would serve the project well, as with a discretionary sanction in place, a targeted editor would still be allowed and encouraged to edit constructively in other areas of the project.

I have personally used discretionary sanctions to good effect in multiple other topic areas, and can vouch for their effectiveness. A complete list of every formal warning or sanction I have placed is at User:Elonka/ArbCom log, but a few examples of creative sanctions include:

• Banning one editor from one article and its talkpage for one week.[58]
• Banning one editor from making Samaria-related reverts, or removing reliable citations, for 90 days.[59]
• Banning one editor from editing the lead section of one article for one month.[60]

I should point out though, that in actual practice, specific sanctions were rarely needed. Mainly it was the possibility of sanctions that was useful. In most cases, simply warning an editor that they were at risk of being placed under discretionary sanctions, was all that was needed to encourage them to voluntarily moderate their own behavior.

To see examples of sanctions which other administrators have used, see:

• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Palestine-Israel articles#Log of blocks and bans
• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren#Log of blocks and bans
• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan_2#Amended_Remedies_and_Enforcement

The Armenia-Azerbaijan situation is a good case study for this. I have never personally implemented sanctions in this topic area, but I did note that the first case, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan, in April 2007, did not include discretionary sanctions. The conflict in the topic area continued, and resulted in a second case a few months later, Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2. In the second case, discretionary sanctions were authorized, and with administrators empowered to use creative sanctions (example), a third Arbitration case has not been needed.

The Troubles case has been amended before via community discussion, such as in October 2008[61] and October-November 2009.[62] A recent (November 2009) attempt was made to authorize discretionary sanctions via community discussion at ANI, but though a majority of uninvolved editors were in support of the idea, there was not a clear consensus. So I'm bringing this here, for a formal determination by ArbCom. It is my hope that if discretionary sanctions can be authorized in the topic area of Irish and British nationalism, we can avoid a case with a name such as "The Troubles 2". --Elonka 04:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Elonka's reply to Vassyana

The articles within the topic area of Irish and British nationalism are subject to large quantities of tag team edit-warring. The articles are technically under 1RR (one revert per editor per article per day), but when teams of editors on each side engage in the battle, 1RR means very little, since we'll just get a stream of different editors coming through, all reverting each other. For example at Sinn Féin, there has been a longterm edit war about whether the infobox should state that the founding date of the organization was 1905 or 1970.[63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76][77][78][79] Other disputes overflow to articles that have a more tenuous connection to the topic area, but are still clearly the same editors battling over issues of nationalism. For example, Mooretwin (talk · contribs) created articles about soccer players from Northern Ireland, such as Trevor Thompson (Northern Irish footballer) and Bobby Campbell (Northern Irish footballer), and move wars erupted as to whether the articles should be disambiguated as "(Northern Irish footballer)" or "(Northern Ireland footballer)". The dispute has also overflowed to the Scotland article, with an edit war over Scotland's national anthem.[80][81][82][83][84][85] Another overflow article is at British National Party, about an extremist political group which has policies related to Northern Ireland. Though not directly related to "The Troubles", it is still an article in the British/Irish nationalism topic area,[86] and is a location where established editors continue to revert each other.[87][88][89][90][91][92][93][94][95]

Any action taken by an administrator in this topic area, no matter how minor or how clearly supported by policy, is usually immediately challenged by one side or the other of these battling editors. Challenges range from well-coordinated wiki-lawyering[96][97][98][99][100][101][102][103][104][105] and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT arguments,[106][107][108][109][110][111][112][113][114] to accusations of bias and incompetence, and sometimes out and out personal attacks.[115][116][117][118][119][120][121] It takes considerable fortitude for an administrator to deal with this, and the frustration is enhanced by the fact that administrators have very few tools at their disposal in this topic area. We can remind people of 1RR (1 revert per article per day) or put them on probation (1 revert per article per week), but with the coordinated tag team efforts, the edit-warring at the articles continues. If discretionary sanctions were authorized though, uninvolved administrators could implement more specific sanctions. For possible examples:

• Implementing 0RR on an article's infobox
• Banning an editor from reverting any good faith edits, unless they are already engaged in discussion at the article's talkpage (this in particular would help in eliminating "drive-by" reverts)
• Banning a particular editor from editing one or more articles, but still allowing them to participate at the talkpages.
• Banning an editor from creating new articles that use titles not supported by previous consensus
• Banning editors from removing reliable sources from an article

These kinds of sanctions would force the battling parties to cease their coordinated edit wars. This would (hopefully) encourage them to find other methods of dealing with disputes, such as to work through the steps of Wikipedia:Dispute resolution, and work on crafting an actual consensus version of each article. --Elonka 21:07, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Further discussion

Statement by GoodDay

The proposed amendment is acceptable. Afterall, my proposal of barring self-proclaimed British & Irish editors from those articles, hasn't been endorsed. GoodDay (talk) 23:54, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by MickMacNee

Discretionary sanctions are more than needed for ongoing disputes in the area of British - Irish relations, broadly construed, primarily because of the ongoing poor behaviour of the editors involved, rather than any inherent problem with the topic. However, I have extreme concerns over the potential scope of this, and the wording needs to be extremely precise. The committee should read User_talk:Elonka#Placing_British_National_Party_under_1RR for an example of where the scope of the term "...British nationalism in relation to Ireland" has already been taken way too far, to chilling effect, to impose a Troubles case restriction on an article which has barely anything to do with British - Irish relations, in order to deal with an ongoing dispute that didn't even encompass British-Irish relations in the slightest. MickMacNee (talk) 13:17, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

I would actually appereciate it if as part of these new remedies, the numerous instances of unsubstantiated soapboxing commentary were addressed by admins as and when they see it. Highking has been asked time and again to put up or shut up with regards to his pet theories over the result of the Ireland naming poll, and he has been reminded time and again who the authority is to which he needs to appeal if he thinks the result was an abuse or does not reflect the NPOV, so far he has done nothing except continue to make these unsubstantiated allegations, poisoning the atmosphere, presumably on the 'say it enought times and it becomes true' principle. MickMacNee (talk) 18:37, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

As with the BNP example, the Scotland example is another dispute that had nothing to do with British - Irish relations, on an article that had nothing to do with British - Irish relations. The common thread here is apparently editors, not article topics, so why are topic based sanctions such as placing articles on 1RR being used here? If a full case is needed to deal with editors so that we don't have to start labelling everything and anything they might ever touch as under Troubles restrictions, then lets have it. MickMacNee (talk) 03:19, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by LessHeard vanU

I suppose that I am one of the "fly in the ointment" opinion providers in the recent discretionary sanctions/Irish (anti)nationalism discussion. It was my suggestion that defining an uninvolved administrator within the English language Wikipedia is problematic - unlike the cultural or nationalism views of other cultures (the Baltic States issues, for example) it is both difficult to find admins that have not been exposed to (anti)establishment views regarding recent Irish history, and to have those unexposed sysops engage within the debate (because the first action appears to taint how they are perceived thereafter). Most of the resistance to the consensus noted by Elonka was that of those editors generally considered as being sympathetic to Irish nationalism sentiment, plus a few others including myself, who were concerned that one side of the process of dispute resolution were likely to attract a far greater fraction of such sanctions than another. What I am referring to is a potential application of Wikipedia:Systemic bias; where the status quo might be presented as the neutral pov, where in fact it may be the result of cultural conditioning for the last few centuries, and should be permitted to incorporate other viewpoints. Having said that, it does not seem to me to be an area in which ArbCom can definitively rule. Vandalism is vandalism, and can be dealt with as such, whereas the judgement of what may be considered good faith efforts to move the definition of "neutral viewpoint" is far more difficult. Efforts by the community, as noted by Elonka, to address these issues is riven by the same bias' and prejudices that is being sought to resolve. LessHeard vanU (talk) 13:51, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Tznkai

The Troubles case currently points to WP:Probation, apparently referencing this version. We have moved well beyond that, and we need some sort of update. As for "the community discussing this" you can urge as much as you want, but from where I am sitting, the community at large is not interested in the issue, although they are occasionally interested in the abstract topic of admin power. I appreciate the concerns that LessHeard vanU and those less eloquent but still in agreement with him have. I can only respond "tough." The intense partisanship in the topic area, combined with the already unpleasant topic (partisan bloodshed over the course of many years), combined with editors quick to point fingers and accuse of bias have made it impossible for any sort of "reasonable" solution. New editors to the area (the lifeblood of solving these sorts of problems) are quickly run out or simply frustrated the hostility of the editing environment. The goal at the end of the day is a good quality encyclopedia - to reach that end, we need a normalized editing environment, or as close as we're going to get, and discretionary sanctions are the only tool we have that can do that.

The only alternative is the community stepping up and really making a real effort. If twenty, or even ten completely disinterested neutral editors showed up everyday to work on the topic are, that would fix pretty much everything. I would welcome the community's interaction with open arms, and gladly put my tools away and STFU, and let them on their merry way if so asked. If arbcom has any brilliant ideas on how to achieve that, awesome. I've made a couple not-so-brilliant suggestions myself on this neglected RfC. Until we get the collective balls to really take on these situations though, I insist that the poor sods who try to keep the peace or at least stop the pressure from boiling over be given tools that don't reference an extinct procedure.--Tznkai (talk) 16:09, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Addendum:

I've been working on a model discretionary sanction remedy over here that others may want to comment on, but I bring it up here because of the comments I made concerning is construction. I repeat the juicy bit that I feel is most relevant: "This may seem like it is handing too much power to admins. That is a perfectly valid concern, but topic based discretionary sanctions are the nuclear option. It is to be used when the community at large has abandoned a topic area because of partisan behavior. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here level of disruption. The goals are (1) to contain the behavior to prevent the articles from a total slide into anarchy (2) quarantine the disruptive behavior into increasingly smaller areas and protect community resources from being expended and eventually (3) hopefully expunge partisan editors from the topic area enough so non-partisan editors will eventually return. Take, clear, hold. Lets hope it works better for us than it does for the military"

It is my strongest recommendation that the committee use my model provision or something similar to give the few admins who work the problem a green light to try creative sanctions that may bring about some stability to articles. This includes for example, taking a disputed article, banning all the warring parties from that article, (or protecting it outright because of edit warring), and shunting them all to a sandbox until they figure it out.

In the alternative, for those afraid of abusive admin power think of something else. I don't mean this as an attack, it is a genuine plea.

Statement by RashersTierney

I strongly oppose the extension of admin. powers in this area specifically because its terms of reference are so broad and are being interpreted in a way that was not intended. Special Restriction tags put off ordinary editors and will adversely affect the development of articles that may have been, for a limited time, the subject of disruption (for any number of reasons). Discussion on an article's Talk Page before this tag is applied might provide less draconian alternatives, with a similar process to have it removed. 'States of exception' on Wikipedia should be kept to an absolute minimum. RashersTierney (talk) 17:17, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by BritishWatcher

I also strongly oppose the extension of Admin powers on this case agreeing with many of the points raised in previous statements. The situation over at British National Party and the conversation that has taken place over at User_talk:Elonka#Placing_British_National_Party_under_1RR highlights the dangers of the current powers, the idea such power should be expanded is deeply concerning.

Here is the quote by Elonka on her talk page

"Per Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles, and the subsequent community amendment in October 2008, the scope of the case is defined as, "any article that could be reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland falls under 1RR. When in doubt, assume it is related." The article British National Party is clearly within that scope. Just search for the term "Ireland" in the article and read about the Party's policies."

That is basically saying that any article which mentions a policy on Ireland or mentions Ireland could fall foul of the troubles restrictions. I consider this a gross misinterpretation of the original ruling by Arbcom. This matter of the BNP article urgently needs to be addressed and could be considered here as its on this same topic. If the BNP is troubles related which is a political party in the UK but not related to Northern Ireland nationalism / loyalist groups then all UK and Ireland political parties must also have such restrictions.

Conservative Party (UK) - Mentions they support devolution for Northern Ireland. Labour Party (UK) - Mentions Northern Ireland on several occasions, including not allowing people in northern Ireland at one point to join the party. Liberal Democrats - Mentions the fact they do not contest elections in Northern Ireland.

These are just a couple of political parties. Every single political party in the UK and Ireland has a policy on Ireland. The idea we must apply restrictions to all those articles is simply a huge expansion of the current Arbcom ruling on the troubles issues. Again i strongly oppose the expansion of Admin powers on this matter as it has been proven current powers have been so clearly misused. BritishWatcher (talk) 18:15, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Today in this post [122] Elonka said..

"It doesn't have to be The Troubles-related to be within the scope of the case."

If that is currently the rules then god knows what will happen if the attempt to expand Admins powers is granted. How on earth can The troubles sanctions be applied to artciles that dont have anything to do with the troubles? This needs sorting out and clarifying to stop admins going around imposing martial law in such a way with threats that anyone can be banned or blocked without warning if they violate a 1RR. Authoritarian is too light a word to use.BritishWatcher (talk) 16:41, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by HighKing

I'm not a participant in this dispute although I have occasional reason to edit some of these articles. I oppose this amendment for the same reasons as outlined by LHvU, and also because I believe there is a simpler approach to encouraging article stabilization. It seems (and I've personally run foul of this) that any topic that touches on British-Irish relations can be unilaterally lumped into the broad topic of "The Troubles", even if the article has nothing to do with it. It is also apparent that British-majority editing can impose a British-POV onto many articles, even though it is incorrect, and all in the name of "consensus" (the recent discussion on the article name of the sovereign country "Ireland" is a great example). I suggest that the current 1RR restriction imposed on "The Troubles" is flawed and is different to the normal 1RR policy. If the objective is to stabilize articles and encourage discussion to reach consensus, then I believe that by imposing the normal 1RR policy of "No Revert of a Revert" will be much more effective. --HighKing (talk) 18:02, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

View by Giano

Certainly not. Admins more than enough power as it is; besides which there is nothing to prevent an Admin being any more biased than an ordinary editor. In my considerable experience as a very interested, non-editing observer of The Troubles' troubles I have seen some Admins that have indeed been prone to partisan bias on both sides. Many Admins have tried and failed to solve the problems here, and a super-empowered Elonka, or any other similarly ennobled Admin would merely be petrol on a fire.  Giano  18:05, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Rockpocket

I don't object to this amendment. I think for it to be successful, we would have to have a rather strict interpretation of "uninvolved" (for example, I wouldn't dream of using these sanctions myself). I think many of the participants fear admins who they have a history with would use these unfairly. It may put some minds at rest for those of us admins who have been active in this area to make it clear they would have no intention of using these.

I also think judicious and creative use of such sanctions can and would have a strong positive effect. For example, removing a single disruptive presence from an article and talk page can do wonders for improving the editing atmosphere. Often just one individual can be the driving force behind divisiveness. Remove that editor specifically, even for a short time, and other editors from both sides may find a consensus on an acceptable middle ground. As a practical example, see the section at Talk:Dunmanway killings#Use of "informer" and the one below, and compare with the discussions in the sections above it. Note the difference in tone and, consequently, how sensible editors coming from many perspectives managed to have a civil and constructive discussion and apply that to the article. Its my interpretation that the absence of a single editor from both the talk page and article was the key difference. I think is amendment could permit this type of progress to occur more often. Rockpocket 20:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

View by Rannpháirtí anaithnid

Definitely no. On the face of it this may seem like a good idea and I in no way doubt Elonka's sincerity in respect of it. The major issue facing British-Irish articles is the battlefield that they have become. Even among ostensibly cool-headed editors exists suspicion of the motives of others. A handful of editors occasionally flare into outright war-mode, drawing others into it. The way to resolve the issue is not to give admins a bigger stick, that only re-inforces the idea that a battle is being fought. We need to normalise the situation, not "abnormalise" it any further.

Outside admins, to their misery, have tried to resolve these issue before - go ask SirFozzie or Masem. God bless them, but anyone trying to "fix" this problem gets drawn into it and becomes an actor in it. We don't need a lone cowboy to put order on the Wild West. We certainly don't need to kit them out with bigger guns. What we need it a wet blanket, not more fire. 1RR is good because it acts as a wet blanket. Bigger sticks are bad because they encourage more warfare.

We need to normalise. Normal means assuming good faith and remaining civil. Normal rules. If someone breaches the normal rules, enforce the rules as normal. There's plenty of scope within the normal rules to enforce normal behavior. We don't need to make anyone feel special just because they behave incivilly. We definitely don't need to reinforce the idea that they are fighting a war.

The range of articles that this ruling has come to cover is so extensive that it now effectively covers the an entire chapter of the encyclopedia. We cannot square off a corner of the encyclopedia and label it as a battleground. That is how this ammendment would be interpreted and it is the kind of behavior that it would encourage.

Think: wet blankets. Don't think: fire. --rannṗáirtí anaiṫnid (coṁrá) 19:18, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

View by Sarah777

Oppose. This isn't a "nationalist" conflict per I/P; Armenia/Azer; Balkans etc. This is NPOV v. the dominant systematic Anglo-American bias in Wiki. And the proposing Admins are partisans in the conflict, albeit they are not aware of the fact. They think they are "neutral", applying "rules" and "policies". They are not. The breadth and scope of potential conflict is so wide that we will inevitably end up with frustrated Admins targeting Irish editors in the mistaken belief that "Irish nationalism" is the problem even though it doesn't even exist in most cases. Supporting this proposal will either result in a blatant political censorship of all British-related articles or else chaos. As in RL; we need to admit that some problems have no easy solutions, there are no magic bullets. Just possibilities to make things much worse. Sarah777 (talk) 01:07, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by BrownHairedGirl

To my surprise, I find myself in agreement with Giano: the powers proposed here are far too sweeping, and will inflame the problems which they seek to resolve. Their unlimited scope reminds me of the Civil Authorities (Special Powers) Act (Northern Ireland) 1922, which allowed police to pretty much whatever they thought fit, and were applied overwhelmingly to nationalists. As a result, the manifest injustices of Special Powers Act became a significant factor in stoking further conflict, and the "remedies" proposed above will undoubtedly have a similarly destructive effect.

Per rannṗáirtí anaiṫnid, we need to normalise this area of wikipedia rather than adopt measures whose perceived injustices which will stoke the conflicts between editors. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 19:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Addendum by BrownHairedGirl

Having read the other contributions to this discussion, and thought about it further, I would like to offer a further observation.

To date, admin involvement in this area has overwhelmingly focused on policing technical infringements such as edit-warring, and conduct issues such as incivility. That sort of response can succeed only if it restores focus on a shared purpose, but the lack of that shared purpose is the source of the problem here. As such, technical and conduct-based enforcement will inevitably fail to resolve the disputes, because suppressing one set of symptoms merely produces another set of symptoms. Admins end up playing Whac-A-Mole, unsuccessfully.

The core issue here is that on both sides of this dispute there are editors with strongly-held points of view. This of itself is not a problem, because WP:NPOV is explicit that we should be representing fairly, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources ... but the most notable feature of this area is the presence of a number of editors on both sides who persistently and tenaciously work to ensure that articles either disprove or suppress viewpoints to which they are opposed. I have watched countless articles turn into battlegrounds as the opposing forces manoeuvre to slant an article on way or the other, when it is painfully obvious in most cases that the article concerned could be relatively easily constructed to give clear voice to all the significant viewpoints.

Unfortunately, this core problem is never addressed, because arbcom refuses (for good reason) to take a stand on content issues, reserving its remit to user conduct. As a result, countless warnings, rulings and sanctions in this area have not resolved the problem, because they never actually address it. So we find ourselves facing a proposal for draconian powers, which still fail to address the core issue.

Rather than looking for yet more ways of taking sledgehammers to symptoms, I suggest that these proposals be shelved and a wider discussion initiated on how the community should deal with editors who persistently take NPOV to mean that the opposing viewpoint may be represented only if it is demonstrated to be false. That's a huge undertaking — and maybe an impossible one — but I can see no other way to end the conflicts in this area. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:42, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf

I think that the amendment proposed by Elonka could work, but only if applied to a much smaller set of articles than they suggest. I would use wording along the lines of "1. an article about or directly related to the Troubles. 2. articles articles about Irish nationalism or British nationalism related to Ireland where there is no significant objection by established editors of that article not involved in Troubles-related disputes". This would avoid situations like the existing one over the BNP article. As a counterpart to the vastly reduced scope of article restrictions, I would say that restrictions on editors involved in the disputes should be used more, with blocks of several days in the first instance for engaging in Irish nationalist and/or British nationalist POV pushing in other articles.

This would need to be done carefully however to avoid accusations of bias against others by heavily biased editors resulting in blocks to innocent parties. In a dispute where everyone who did not agree with one editor's opinion was labelled as anti-Irish regardless of why they did not agree. In this situation, the user throwing around accusations of anti-Irish bias without merit should have been subject to restriction for their disruption. Thryduulf (talk) 01:00, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

View by Sswonk

At the recent AN/I discussion where Elonka first drew up this request as a proposal, I opposed with the notion that the boundaries of the scope of The Troubles in the encyclopedia were ill-defined and bound to become grossly inflated, and that the other European conflicts and the Mideast one shown as precedents for similar Wikipedia treatment were not nearly as "close to home" for many enforcers as this one. I formulated that opinion being uninvolved and frankly unaware of much of the previous discussion and actual evidential diffs shown, but essentially wrote along the same line as a more well-written rationale later expanded upon by LHV. Here, I came to a conclusion that the situation is what I thought I would describe as a bad road intersection, one where hiring more police and giving them stronger powers wouldn't solve a problem that really needs to be addressed by a redesign of the intersection itself. Coming to post those thoughts now, I see the view above by RA, which really sums that sentiment up very well. So, I am two for two: seeing these problems with the proposal and then now the amendment, independent of the other two editors but in broad agreement with them, indicates to me there is some truth in that view. If we are asked by John Vandenberg to offer a better solution, I would suggest following the advice of LessHeard VanU and Rannpháirtí anaithnid to not take a view that presents editing surrounding The Troubles and other elements of Irish independence movements as a war itself which needs a "crackdown". Rather, practicing a more calm and measured response is a solution that already is available, with the previous rulings in force and other existing tools ready to handle truly insidious behavior. Metaphorically, don't poke the bear. I could have linked to the essay of that title if that is what I meant. Essentially I mean that RA and LHV have it right and solutions are found when thinking along those lines presented by them, not by broadening the conflict with more potential avenues of dispute. Sswonk (talk) 02:15, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

View by Snowded

Something does need to be done, although overall the problem is not as bad as it has been at times. A series of wars on a range of Irish articles can be linked to provocative edits by a small number of editors - some of whom have been banned and not received progressive blocks for subsequent failures. Scotland has just got one of its 2/3 times a year debates about national anthems and country status, there is no need to extend this type of sanction to that article. The surge in interest in the BNP and EDL and other far right groups in the UK has put them in the news so they are active, but I wouldn't say that any of them are really out of hand given the contentious nature of the subject matter. The current debate on the "whites-only" membership rule and the related court case has nothing whatsoever to do with the Troubles and there is no case for a 1RR rule there at the moment. So I would suggest:

• Enforce WP:BRD and sanction anyone who reverts a revert, with the admin restoring the prior position. This was used well on British Isles but needed more enforcement. That is much better than a 1RR restriction which is too easily gamed
• Ban all IPs from editing any article put under this type of sanction. IPs can edit at will and frustrate established editors tempting them into a failure to follow IRR. Some of the IPs are socks anyway.
• Most of these articles really need admins who understand the political context. Its too easy to miss deliberate provocation, or misunderstand what is going on. I think there is a case for a small number of admins to look after some articles and agree sanctions collectively. They can also intervene to create a structure to debates.
• Keep the British National articles under watch, but don't impose on them yet, the connection to the Troubles is remote (ditto Scotland). Keep this to articles linked to the Troubles, or individual attempts to take issues related to the Troubles onto other pages.
• It is all too easy for a disruptive editor to make multiple small changes to an article, claiming that each is an attempt to improve the article. They don't fail the 1RR rule but place other editors who simply want to restore the prior version while discussion is taking place on the talk page in an invidious position. Any sanction should therefore clearly state that if an issue is disputed, then the ONLY place for discussion is the talk page, not progressive edits of the main article.

--Snowded ^TALK 02:43, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Comment: Yes, WP:BRD would be far superior to 1RR. If there is to be an amendment it should be that. 1RR is just asking to be gamed - although BRD requires genuine discussion, not a lock down on "consensus" by veto. That too would need to be enforced, which requires admins familiar with the topic to understand the nuances involved. I don't agree about blocking IPs for many reasons that don't need to be discussed here and would see the issue as being both British and Irish nationalism involving, say, Scotland but not the BNP (different kind of nationalism, different kinds of topics). --rannṗáirtí anaiṫnid (coṁrá) 18:53, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Nickhh

If the upshot of this amendment would be yet more swooping onto pages that have no serious relationship as such with the Troubles (like the BNP) to impose restrictions on editing or editors that would not otherwise be imposed, it is clearly a very bad idea, and is most certainly not a simple amendment to an "existing case". This kind of creeping extension of previous decisions, such that in this case it would now cover "British nationalism" generally, and so that individual admins would have the authority to arbitrarily decide that even where there is doubt about whether specific pages are included within that, their interpretation trumps everything else, is wholly inappropriate. And given that I have seen it suggested that Irish or British editors should be barred from editing such articles, as they have too much invested in them, I might similarly suggest that arbs and admins recuse themselves from proposing and then approving dramatic extensions of this sort to their own powers in specific areas. I also agree with Snowded about the inherent problems with 1RR as a remedy. And, going beyond that point, the proposer's self-certified assertion that they have "personally used discretionary sanctions to good effect", is, well, a little contentious - on many occasions those sanctions have simply allowed very poor content to accumulate on WP, and go unchallenged, even if they may have occasionally helped at the margins in terms of any conduct issues. --Nickhh (talk) 18:10, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Comment: On the last point, this is a serious matter. The purpose of this project is to write an encyclopedia, it's not social club. "Discretionary" powers emphasises keeping order, not writing/improving content. "Removing" an editor may have a very calming effect on an article but it does nothing to address genuine problems the content may have. It's an answer to a content dispute that relies on "removing" editors that say there is a problem with the content. That's doesn't solve anything, it just makes belief that there is no content dispute. --rannṗáirtí anaiṫnid (coṁrá) 19:02, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Addendum: As already noted, and per Mastcell below, there seem to be two themes to this request - first, the issue about discretionary sanctions, and second, a suggestion that the scope of the Troubles decision should be extended to anything to do with British or Irish "nationalism" (or even, it would seem from one reading of the request, any article with the word "Ireland" in it - although apparently not every one including the word "Britain". Yet). I'm sceptical about the first, though don't have that strong an opinion, and no involvement in Troubles-related issues. However, the second is of serious concern - on what basis is this extension being proposed? Is there a serious problem with either British or Irish nationalism in a broader sense on other WP articles? I'm sure there has been and will continue to be the odd flare-up related to either of those isses (and indeed English/Welsh/Scottish nationalism), but is there extensive edit-warring, abusive/disruptive behaviour and sockpuppeteering of the level that requires ArbCom attention where it doesn't already apply? I don't wish to pretend that all British and Irish people and WP editors are paragons of liberal virtues, or that WP doesn't have an Anglo and, more generally, a Western bias to it, but equally I don't see any current need for a creeping extension of the scope of a decision that was very specifically about the Troubles - a relatively recent manifestation of a specifically Irish-British dispute about a small-ish part of the north of Ireland. ArbCom is the court of last resort after all, not WP's ruling body. --Nickhh (talk) 18:48, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by SirFozzie

I am in favor of anything that would normalize the environment in this section of articles. I do not think that removing current sanctions would do that however. I think the only reason that John Vandenberg's suggestion below would work, was that everyone who is currently gaming 1RR and AE will now be gaming 3RR and ANI/3RR. IE, AE would stop being clobbered... and it would go back to ANI.

If you're thinking of that, tell us to make a full fledged case. Otherwise, what it will do, is ensnare more administrators (in ANI) into this area and send them down the path to being attacked, charged with bias, etcetera just like every other administrator who has gotten involved in this area.

Rather then wait a couple months for that to happen, let's do it now. Let's identify the high-level bad actors in this area, and remove them from the environment (Topic Ban, or siteblock, etcetera), and see if other editors improve (either from not being pushed as much into wars, or getting the hint that WP has had ENOUGH of the constant battles). If not, deal with them until either all the edit warriors have been removed from the battlefield or until everyone stops the Battleground mentality.

My thoughts are that these new sanctions would supersede the existing sanctions (ArbCom/Community). I do think that something needs to be in place. This is a good idea, but we really have three options: The current sanctions (ArbCom/Community), the newly proposed sanctions, or a full fledged Troubles 2 cases. Annulling the existing case is not a good option, in my opinion. SirFozzie (talk) 23:09, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

Suggestion for proposed motion

After discussion of this case with others, I do think the proposed discretionary sanctions would be useful in this area. I would be hesitant to completely drop the community restrictions "cold turkey", however, and prefer phasing them out if we can. So I would take Elonka's wording for the proposed restriction, with the following addendum.

The community-based restrictions put in place on articles in this area (1RR rule on all editors, etcetera) will be continued for a minimum of 60 days from the conclusion of this motion. 30 days after the conclusion of this motion, the ArbCom will invite comment on whether to continue these restrictions as they stand for a period of time, to modify them, or to let them expire. Involved editors are invited to discuss these restrictions, but the greater uninvolved community's thoughts and desires will take precedence.

This would allow us two months of phase in time, to see who gets placed under discretionary sanctions, etcetera, while continuing the general sanctions and seeing if they're still needed. SirFozzie (talk) 00:12, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Any update on this, prior to the US Thanksgiving break? SirFozzie (talk) 19:52, 24 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Domer48

Vassyana below asks what are the specific behavioral problems being encountered? It is a fact that behavioral problems in this area from the time of the original Troubles Arbcom have dramatically reduced. This is no doubt down to the number of sock abusing accounts that were closed down, (I'm not fully convinced that we got them all) which has resulted in this reduction. The current problems being encountered at the moment in addition to the normal issues is the "New Admin in the area" syndrome. The latest is User:Elonka who was preceded by User:Rd232, User:SarekOfVulcan, User:Tznkai etc etc... In this syndrome it seems to follow a typical pattern. They start by taking their Que from the sitting Admin's, a big mistake since these Admin's are neither uninvolved or without their own bias, they then wave a big stick, throw around a few blocks which get overturned, and then call for additional sanctions.

Now the latest problems started with a bad block, another common feature on these articles. This block here which then had to be lifted. The Admin, rather than accept that they were wrong, created a fuss and went off to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles looking for "clarity." Now everyone knows what 1RR on the Troubles is, and we know that they were dropped because one Admin did not want to block a sock abusing editor. We also know that the 1RR restriction is not part of the Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles decision which was Case Closed on 08:09, 30 October 2007, nor is it a discretionary sanction supported by the decision. Rather, it was a community-based remedy, established by consensus during this discussion. In addition to proposing amendments at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard they then posted this at Requests for arbitration/The Troubles.

This latest proposal is also based on a bad block and ban, and the same Admin's attempt to get retrospective support for them in the form of these additional “discretionary sanctions.” Here is the page ban and then the block. Now the block was very quickly overturned as been a bad block. Likewise the ban, however the Admin who issued it still has not got the good grace to admit they were wrong, with this comment supposed to signify that it has been dropped. Not to be thwarted though, they placed a “discretionary sanctions” here, with this call now for additional sanctioning powers to be given to them.

So what do they mean by “discretionary sanctions”? Is it like user:Angusmclellan's use of “discretionary sanctions” above to issue a bad block and ban on an editor who he is involved in a content dispute with? Or is it like User:Elonka's bad block above and placing probation on an editor who has challenged here misleading and disruptive comments? When sanctions are place at the discretion of Admin's they are going to be abused. Clear cases of edit warring will be ignored, violation of 1RR will also be ignored [123] despite previous blocks here and here with Admin's obviously not being sanctioned [124].

I agree with 1RR, but it can not be at the discretion of Admin's. If you violate 1RR you get sanctioned! These latest blocks and Bans illustrate why we should not give “discretionary sanctions” to Admin's.--Domer48_'fenian' 16:20, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

One very good reason to reject this attempt to censor wikipedia. That the like of Moreschi could be considered "uninvolved" shows this motion up for the joke that it is. To even suggest this motion illustrated how you and others have have seriously failed to adhere or understand the purpose of Wikipedia. --Domer48_'fenian' 10:56, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Comment by MastCell

I'm generally in favor of discretionary sanctions in problem areas, as I'm not aware of any more effective alternatives (though I'd be open to hearing bright ideas). I do agree with Coren that discretionary sanctions formalize, rather than extend, an admin's "power". If the admin enjoys a reasonable degree of community confidence, then their imposed sanctions will generally stick whether or not they're backed by a formal decree from ArbCom. On the other hand, if the community lacks confidence in an admin's discretion, then they shouldn't really be in the business of enforcing discretionary sanctions in the first place, so it's a moot issue.

That said: I think anyone voting on this proposal needs to pay close attention to the wording. The existing Troubles probation covers "British nationalism in relation to Ireland" (emphasis mine). Elonka's proposal would cover "British nationalism" categorically, regardless of relation to Ireland. That is a significant broadening of the scope of the existing case, and it appears to be one crux of dispute here and at Elonka's talk page (one current dispute is over whether to characterize the British National Party as "whites-only", which seems to have little to do with Ireland).

Let's take it as given that discretionary sanctions are an appropriate extension of the existing Troubles probation. I'd like to see more (rational) discussion on the proposed extension of scope, because that to me is the real debate. Perhaps discretionary sanctions should be extended to any issue of British nationalism; if that is the case, I would ArbCom to make that extension with eyes open. MastCell ^Talk 00:05, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Side comment by uninvolved Mathsci

Groups of editors may move randomly between articles in ways that are hard to fathom. Two articles that are directly related to the Troubles, far more than British National Party, Ukip or Monster Raving Loony Party, are Ulster Unionist Party and Democratic Unionist Party. These have no Troubles tags on their talk pages. If administrators are unfamiliar with British/Irish politics, it might perhaps be advisable to avoid this area. Mathsci (talk) 23:12, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Angus McLellan

There is a table like that mentioned by John Vandenberg at User:Angusmclellan/Troubles. Many thanks to Elonka.

While I have no objection to the changes Elonka proposes, I do not view them as essential. Policy on edit wars says that "...editors may be blocked if they edit war, with or without breaching 3RR". Other policies are equally broad in their applicability, such as biographies of living people and no personal attacks. As Rockpocket said, "removing a single disruptive presence from an article and talk page can do wonders for improving the editing atmosphere". So let's do it more often, if necessary.

I am not in favour of extending the scope of the decision which I think is broad enough, as I interpret it. I am fairly clear in my own mind as to what constitutes a Troubles article. It is one where the editorial disputes which can be seen in articles concerning the Troubles, narrowly defined (and I can't define the Troubles so narrowly as to exclude the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War, although others may do so), are imported. From that perspective the recent fun at British National Party or over the non-existence of a purely Scottish national anthem are not part of this problem even if they do share some of the same cast. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:50, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Jdorney

At the moment we have teams of people trying to re-write all kinds of articles for POV in this area. The only way this will change is if admins enforce NPOV - as well as general good article standards for readability and length. If admins need more powers then fine. If you're not edit-warring you've got nothing to fear

The problem with many Irish history articles right now is that, due to competing wars over pov, many have become unreadable, too long and contradict themselves. in those articles where one "side" has given up - as at Ulster Special Constabulary and Ulster Defence Regiment - not only is the quality of the articles terrible, they also extremely pov. In the USC article, for example, half the "disbandment" section currently argues the USC were Nazis!

With the current tag team edit wars going on, it's also impossible to revamp such articles, as your edits instantly get reverted by eds who assume you're on the "other" side.

What are we doing here? Are we playing a game, where antagonistic teams compete to see who can game the system best? Or are we supposed to be working together to produce quality, readable, npov articles? If its the latter then we need admins to be able to enforce non partisan editing. Jdorney (talk) 20:43, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This section is for administrative notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Explain it to me like I'm stupid. What are the specific behavioral problems being encountered? Are there editors exihibiting such problems who otherwise work productively and uncontroversially in other areas? Are the numbers of disruptive editors too high or too deeply engrained in the editing area to deal with them on a case by case basis? As a side note, the discussion linked demonstrates how the heavy participation of involved editors can derail outside input and make it extremely difficult to decipher the opinion of the broader community (as represented by participating uninvolved editors). I strongly encourage the community to address this issue, as it has deep negative consequences across most controversial areas. Beyond that, I await further statements. (As a note, please keep statements to a reasonable length and do not rehash the ANI discussion here.) Vassyana (talk) 08:09, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
• It would be helpful to have a table like this drawn up for all related AE threads over the last six months. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 08:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

  Based on the recent spat of statements, I am more inclined to believe that this amendment is required, because it has been effective when employed in more recent cases of this kind. I don't see careful consideration by the parties who should have the most valuable insight - just lots of FUD. There is no need to quickly add your statement to make sure your voice is heard; this is not an admin noticeboard. If you don't think this amendment is right, your statement should offer a better solution. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 20:23, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

  Note that I would also be very happy to "normalise" this area by annulling the case. That should be a shock to the system, and might mean that a few of the problem editors become saints. Those that dont will likely end up being brought back to Arbcom in due course. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 20:31, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

  Considering SirFozzie's suggestion on a practical level, if this amendment passes in the next week or so, the 30 day review will start when the new arbcom panel is just settling in, and are being inundated with requests from people hoping to obtain the attention of the newly appointed arbcom members who are both enthusiastic and .. umm .. relatively uninformed. ;-) As a result, I think it would be wiser to push the review out to mid- or late-February. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 02:14, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

• Personally, I think that the discretion Elonka asks us to enshrine already belongs to administrators; strictly speaking, the only thing discretionary sanctions add is provide a formal venue where such interventions are centralized (Arbitration Enforcement) and make it "more bad" for another admin to unilaterally overturn measures placed by one of their colleagues. — Coren ^(talk) 20:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
• First off, I do not believe that any "special" statement needs to be made to provide the degree of administrator flexibility being sought here, and I believe that administrators have ample tools now, although I do see a somewhat disappointing reliance on a few and little creativity that is currently within scope. I agree with several of the commenters that there has been progressive "creep" in the scope of this set of sanctions, and it is serving to spread the battle rather than to circumscribe it. This appears to be largely related to following the contributions of editors rather than because the articles involved are related to The Troubles. This creep needs to stop, as it deters uninvolved editors from developing, maintaining and improving the content of the encyclopedia. I suggest that enforcing administrators consider that if the battle is being taken elsewhere, then the issue is the editors and not the article, and the sanctions should be in line with that. For articles, BRD is generally more effective in attracting independent, uninvolved and knowledgeable editors, whereas 1RR will nearly always deter the uninvolved from editing—quality editing will frequently involve multiple "reverts" or removal of coatrack content. I am not seeing much that would make me inclined to support the original proposal or the motions being proposed by my colleagues. Risker (talk) 18:00, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

• I don't foresee any massive advantage to replacing a probation remedy with a discretionary sanctions remedy, given the problems that have been articulated here (coordinated edit warring, expanding areas of conflict, and attacks on administrators trying to implement the existing remedy). A remedy providing for article-specific sanctions might be useful, but it would also run up against some of the same problems. Rather, I agree with SirFozzie's (original) assessment that a new case may be needed. --bainer (talk) 06:25, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Motions

Motion 1: Discretionary sanctions

Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working in the area of conflict if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, or any expected standards of behavior or decorum. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; temporary bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; temporary bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; temporary restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project. Blocks and/or topic bans may initially be for up to one month in duration, escalating in stages to a maximum of one year if the misbehaviours continue.

For the purpose of imposing sanctions under this provision, an administrator will be considered "uninvolved" if he or she is not engaged in a current, direct, personal conflict on the topic with the user receiving sanctions. Enforcing the provisions of this decision will not be considered to be participation in a dispute.

Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question must be given a warning with a link to this case; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines. This notification must be logged at the case page, as must any sanctions that are later imposed on the editor.

Support

1. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 17:49, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
2. (With additional text}  Roger Davies ^talk 15:03, 30 November 2009 (UTC)
3. Including Roger's changes. Carcharoth (talk) 13:39, 6 December 2009 (UTC)
4. The opposers' points have merit, but I think it's worth trying this. Inclusion of the requirement of a warning before sanctions are imposed is a particularly helpful step that may help keep users in the affected areas away from the line. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:25, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
5. Very weakly. If this fails to help, then it just comes back here anyway so we'll see. Wizardman 16:45, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Not seeing value in this; the remedies from the existing case, as supplemented by later community actions, and the existing discretion allowed administrators are quite sufficient. I note, on reviewing logged bans and blocks, that multiple sanctions are included in that log that are routine administrator actions that just happen to relate to editing behaviours on the related articles; for example, blocks for making personal attacks are routine and not specific to the existing remedy or this proposed modification, which actually doesn't modify anything of significance. Risker (talk) 18:25, 6 December 2009 (UTC)
2. Per comment above, I see little value in this, and think a new case would be more appropriate. --bainer (talk) 06:26, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
3. I remain unconvinced that any part of this not already covered by the remedies of the existing case already falls well within the discretion afforded uninvolved administrators to prevent disruption anywhere within the project (and not just in one problematic area). Requiring the committee to craft remedies for every case where there is a dispute before administrators can enforce our policies is not helpful, and this motion would tend to encourage a mindset of "It's not a real sanction unless it was done by ArbCom". — Coren ^(talk) 14:33, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
4. Per bainer, so we can once again look in depth at this reoccurring issue. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:46, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Abstain

1. My only reservation is the fettering of admin discretion by way of arbitrary block and ban limits. Thus, I am abstaining instead of opposing. I note that I am entirely unconvinced that it is impossible to find uninvolved or unbiased admins in the English speaking world. For better and worse, the overwhelming majority of the English-speaking internet (including Wikipedia editors) is dominated by the United States. Assertions about the impossibility of finding neutral English speakers grossly overestimates the interest in and awareness of Irish and British politics in the United States. Even in Canada, where the awareness of the Isles' history is much higher, you'd be hard pressed to find that many people with a firm opinion about the Troubles. Vassyana (talk) 18:56, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Discussion

• I'm very happy to support this though the block and topic ban provisions should probably be more qualified. Perhaps add to paragraph one: "Blocks and/or topic bans may initially be for up to one month in duration, escalating in length in stages to a maximum of one year if the misbehaviour continues misbehaviours continue".  Roger Davies ^talk 08:32, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

  This could be interpreted as a second offense earning a year long block. I dont think that is reasonable in any but the most extreme cases, and those extreme cases are likely to be easily solved by the community. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 10:28, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

  Sure, but I'm not prepared to support a sanction that s currently drafted allows a year's site ban for a first offence at a single administrator's discretion. I've tweaked the proposed amendment to accommodate your comment.  Roger Davies ^talk 11:38, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

  Your proposed amendment works for me. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 13:54, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Motion 2: Scope

The scope of the discretionary sanctions may include any article in conflict that could be reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, or British nationalism. When there is doubt as to whether or not an article falls within the scope of this case, assume it is related.

Support

1. There is obvious sprawling from the main area into related areas of nationalism. I am not ignoring concerns about spreading the drama, but rather find them less convincing than arguments that the disruption is inclusive of these areas. Drama prevention should not be focused on inhibiting the ability of administrators to act, but rather on dispute resolution so that admins do not have to act. If behavioral issues are spreading and disruptive, it is the response to administrator intervention that is drama-laden and disruptive, not the impositions of sanctions themselves. It is not the admin's fault, nor that of other editors in the topic area, if an editor is launching personal attacks, edit-warring, tendentiously arguing, or so on. That responsibility falls squarely on the shoulders of the editor engaging in such conduct. Vassyana (talk) 18:50, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
2. While anyone reasonable would see what "[...] reasonably construed" should encompass, sometimes restating the obvious is necessary. If one is under a topic ban then the topic as a whole is verboten, regardless of the title of the article (though editing unrelated parts of a an article would normally not be problematic). — Coren ^(talk) 14:37, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Oppose

1. While I see the reason for this - to prevent wildfires spreading elsewhere - I'm uncomfortable about conflating the BNP with the Troubles. The topics are not really related though they may both offer similar opportunities for jingoism, and worse. I note though that under the "any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project" provision in Motion 1 is already sufficiently widely drawn to enable administrators to topic ban from editing in other topics/articles where the editor is causing trouble.  Roger Davies ^talk 08:43, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
2. The mention of British nationalism misses the point (that is more England-Scotland issues). The articles that cover Irish-British politics are more Ulster nationalism, Ulster loyalism, and Unionism in Ireland. Or indeed, Category:Politics of Northern Ireland. Politics in Northern Ireland is incredibly splintered and factional, and it does take a little bit of background reading to become acquainted with it. I would favour remedies focused on editor behaviour, rather than drawing too wide a net over too many articles. Find the editors who consistently push the boundaries, and deal with them. Ensure articles outside the topic area don't get affected and continue to function as normal. Impose stringent restrictions on the editing of articles within the topic area. Ensure that editing on an article remains relevant to that article. Consistently focus editors on improving articles (especially the non-contentious areas of the articles), instead of arguing over the controversial parts (or, indeed, manufacturing controversy where none exists). Carcharoth (talk) 13:32, 6 December 2009 (UTC)
3. If there is the sense that the battle is being carried beyond the confines of the original scope, then the problem is more likely the editors than the articles. Involving an ever-increasing number of good editors into this sanction mentality is destructive to the development of the encyclopedia and paints good editors as warriors in a battle in which they are uninvolved. Again, I point to the editors bringing an inappropriate mentality to peripheral articles as being the problem here, not the articles themselves. Risker (talk) 18:13, 6 December 2009 (UTC)
4. Per vote on #1. --bainer (talk) 06:26, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
5. Per Roger Davies, Carcharoth, and Risker. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:27, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
6. Wizardman 16:43, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
7. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:45, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Abstain

Discussion

Motion 3: Review of community-based restrictions

The community-based restrictions put in place on articles in this area (1RR rule on all editors, etcetera) will be continued for a minimum of 60 days from the conclusion of this motion. 45 days after the conclusion of this motion, the Arbitration Committee will invite comment on whether to continue these restrictions as they stand for a period of time, to modify them, or to let them expire. Involved editors are invited to discuss these restrictions, but the greater uninvolved community's thoughts and desires will take precedence.

Support

1. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 17:50, 28 November 2009 (UTC)
2.  Roger Davies ^talk 08:44, 29 November 2009 (UTC)
3. I think periodic review will help here. The discussion suggested by BrownHairedGirl would help, and I largely agree with her comments about normalising the topic area, remembering that the aim is to improve the articles, not just keep warring editors apart. Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

Oppose

1. I'm loathe to intervene in community decisions without a strongly compelling reason. I perceive no such need here. Vassyana (talk) 18:43, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
2. Per vote on #1. --bainer (talk) 06:26, 8 December 2009 (UTC)
3. I think that increased direct intervention from the Committee is unlikely to be useful in this case. — Coren ^(talk) 14:40, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
4. Per Vassyana and Coren. Wizardman 16:44, 11 December 2009 (UTC)
5. Per Vassyana and Coren. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:45, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Abstain

1. While I see some value in the community looking at how this is going, I think there's been some pretty good feedback both on AN/I and in this review from the broader community already, identifying that the spread of scope of this decision is not welcome. There is, however, benefit in reviewing the effectiveness of remedies on a periodic basis. Risker (talk) 18:28, 6 December 2009 (UTC)
2. This review should take place, but I'm not convinced it needs to take place under our auspices. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:28, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Discussion

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Motions

This section can be used by arbitrators to propose motions not related to any existing case or request. Motions are archived at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Index/Motions. Only arbitrators may propose motions in this section. However, you may comment on a motion in your own section. Reply to another person's comment in your section. See the relevant section of the arbitration guide. It may be to your advantage to paste the template into your user space or use an off-line text editor to compose your request before posting it here. The main Requests for arbitration page is not the place to work on rough drafts. Arbitrators or Clerks may summarily remove or refactor discussion without comment.

Shortcut: WP:A/R/M

Requests for enforcement

How to file a request (please use this format!): Enforcement requests against users may be brought if a user is likely to be acting in breach of the principles and decisions in a closed arbitration case, or a passed temporary injunction (for open cases). Enforcement is not "dispute resolution". ArbCom decisions are the last stop of dispute resolution. ArbCom has already decided that the actions and behaviors in the remedies are not constructive to our purpose of building an encyclopedia and has ruled they should not recur. The question here is whether or not that prohibition was breached. Requesting enforcement: Arbitration Enforcement is not the place for anything other than enforcement of a closed Arbitration Committee ruling. It is not for: Content disputes, unless (very rarely) there is a content dispute prohibition in place. Use Requests for Comments for content issues. Conduct not covered by the ruling. A Request for amendment may be filed if the existing sanctions are inadequate, or help may be requested at the administrators' incident noticeboard. Proposed decisions (other than passed temporary injunctions). A proposed decision is not enforceable until the case is formally closed. Bad behavior in an open case should be reported on the administrators' incident noticeboard and you should consider noting the behavior on the /Evidence page of the case, and in some cases requesting a temporary injunction until the case is completed. Community or administrator decisions, breach of these should be raised at the administrators' incident noticeboard or in exceptional cases, cited as evidence in a request for arbitration. Conduct at Arbitration Enforcement: Most editors under ArbCom sanction are neither trolls nor vandals and should be treated with the same respect as any other editor. We should still Assume Good Faith. ArbCom decisions are designed to be coercive, not punitive. Gaming the system at editors under ArbCom sanction is about as civilized as poking sticks at caged animals. Messages posted here that egregiously violate Wikipedia's civility or personal attacks policies will be redacted and may be deleted. Administrator information: If you participate on this page you should be prepared to mete out potentially long term bans and you should expect reactive behavior from those banned. In November 2008, the Arbitration Committee passed a motion which stated that administrators are prohibited from reversing or overturning (explicitly or in substance) any action taken by another administrator pursuant to the terms of an active arbitration remedy, and explicitly noted as being taken to enforce said remedy, except with the written authorization of the Committee, or following a clear, substantial, and active community consensus to do so. Provisionally (pending updates to the enforcement process), this applies only to specific administrative actions affecting specific users; it does not apply to notices, editor lists, warnings, broad topic area actions, or other "enforcement actions" that are not specific actions applied to specific editors. (Clarification motion) The enforcement measures in arbitration cases should be construed liberally in order to protect Wikipedia and keep it running efficiently. Not all enforcement requests will show behavior restricted by ArbCom. It may, however, violate other Wikipedia policies and guidelines which you may use administrative discretion to deal with. More than one side in a dispute may have arbcom conduct rulings applicable to them. Once an issue is resolved, close it and move it to the top of the Resolved issues section, whence a bot should archive it in 3 days. Using this page Click here to add a new request and follow the instructions that will appear above the edit box. Please be aware that as a user requesting arbitration enforcement, it is your responsibility to supply all information required for administrators to determine whether enforcement is required, as described in the instructions. Your request may otherwise be declined without further action.

Request to modify topic ban (User:Thomas Basboll)

Statement by Thomas Basboll

On April 21, 2008, I was topic-banned for POV-pushing. Although I received no warning, and although this was the first administrative action that had been taken against me since I started editing in July of 2006, the topic-ban is nonetheless indefinite. So I'd like to request that the ban be modified to run out on April 21, 2010. I will then have been banned from 9/11-related pages for exactly two years . Although I have wholly respected the letter of ban (I did not edit the pages), I misunderstood its spirit (I suggested changes to a number of individual editors), which created a bit of disturbance in April of this year. That incident, then, will be about a year old by the time the ban runs out.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 16:31, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

That is an ArbCom restriction. I would be rather hesitant to see it changed at AE. I would suggest that you file an ArbCom Clarification/amendment request instead. SirFozzie (talk) 16:36, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

I contacted ArbCom by email about this and Roger Davies referred me to AE for a "public sounding".--Thomas Basboll (talk) 21:07, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Comments by others about the request concerning Thomas Basboll

The concern that led to the topic ban was that you were using Wikipedia solely as a venue for advocacy, in a way that conflicted with the site's content and conduct policies. At the time, it looks like you were advised to explore some other areas of Wikipedia; I don't see evidence in your contrib history that you've done this. There was a problem that led to the topic ban, and I guess from my perspective I'd like to see a reason to believe that the problem won't recur if the topic ban is lifted. The passage of time alone doesn't quite do it for me, since you haven't (yet) given an indication that you understand the rationale behind it (instead, you question the legitimacy of the topic ban). MastCell ^Talk 16:42, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

While I continue to reject the characterization of my work as "advocacy", I have come to understand why people might think that's what I have been doing. That is, I would do things differently in the future to avoid this misunderstanding. The "solely", however, has always been a stretch and it simply has no basis in reality. I think the balance of my edits show that I have a substantial contribution to make. There is still much of my writing in the involved articles. While I have tried to explain this before, I don't think anyone really bothers to look at the evidence. It is normally suggested, instead, that we "look forward". That's what my rather humble request here is about.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 16:57, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Basboll is not going to change his agenda just because he has been unable to promote his conspiracy theories on this website...if Wikipedia mattered to Basboll, then he could have spent his time topic banned demonstrating his true interest in promoting a NPOV encyclopedia by editing outside his primary area of "interest". He has not done this ...instead he has been contributing a sum total of one edit between May 1 and December 7th of this year...I anticipate that we'll be back to the usual conspiracy theory POV pushing in short order...Basboll has a knack for being very subtle with his agenda...most who haven't bothered to familiarize themselves with his efforts could be easily fooled.--MONGO 03:25, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

We already discussed the tenaciousness of his editing back in April...here, where he withdrew his request to be unbanned after it was clear that there little support to allow him to return to this topic. Even his own userpage makes it clear he is a self admitted single purpose account.--MONGO 04:06, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

I haven't worked on the World Trade Center articles much, but until retirement, I worked as an engineer and I am familiar with some of the techniques used in building failure analysis. I have read portions of the NIST report that have been the subject of much discussion on article talk pages. One of the reasons that I contributed little to the WTC collapse articles was the tendentious editing of Thomas Basboll and others. In my opinion, he is unlikely ever contribute constructively to those articles. I see no reason to rescind his topic ban. If he wishes to contribute constructively, millions of other articles are available. Walter Siegmund (talk) 05:52, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

The ban has not been lifted, it's been suspended for a month to evaluate what happens. There'll be a new discussion to examine that decision in a month's time. henrik•talk 06:45, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

May I ask why the ban was suspended after only one day of comment, please? Since the ban has been in place for more than a year, allowing a week for comment hardly seems excessive and is in keeping with our custom on matters of less significance. I share Hipocrite's hope (below). Walter Siegmund (talk) 17:08, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

This does seem like a very brief discussion to justify taking such a step. This topic ban has been appealed several times in the past - including to the arbitration committee - and it has always been upheld. The arbitration case in question cautions administrators not to reverse sanctions without "engaging in extensive discussion and consensus-building", and we certainly haven't had that here - we haven't even notified the admin who imposed the ban. --Hut 8.5 20:12, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

I certainly respect your view, but I must disagree a bit. In my mind, a temporary suspension of a ban is an entirely different matter than lifting it entirely: Yes; the discussion was perhaps a bit light for that - but that is not was what done. This is a strictly limited temporary suspension, with a definite expire date, so that we can evaluate and come to a conclusion whether the original reasons for imposing it are still valid. For such a limited decision, I think there was sufficient discussion: Basically the only thing done was to say "let's gather more data for a bit", and then come to an informed decision rather than basing it solely on an edit record 18 months old. henrik•talk 21:42, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Henrik, Thomas Basboll has been around for 3.5 years...it would be incorrect to state that he has never edited anything outside the scope of 9/11 related articles, but they have nevertheless been his primary focus. His topic ban was just that, topical...he was never banned from other areas and I had always encouraged him, since he is obviously articulate and understands how to write, build a reference base and is fluent in wikilinking, etc., to venture forth in other areas. He has not done this, so it is hard to see him as, for lack of a better way to put it, reformed, when we have nothing outside his topic ban to evaluate his ability to follow our NPOV policies, and in particular our undue weight clause of the NPOV policy...and/or the section of NPOV titled Giving "equal validity"...Thomas Basboll has been very problematic in understanding that fringe views in articles not dedicated to fringe views is a violation of these clauses...that has been the biggest issue with him overall. In general, we tend to not worry about SPA's if they have a history of editing a particular subject that they are an expert in, so long as they maintain compliance with our policies...however, an SPA that has had a tendency to be problematic and fails to follow our policies, has a bias that undermines the encyclopedic integrity and factual reliablity of our articles, or has been repeatedly found to be engaged in an effort to give fringe views more "weight" than they deserve, then we ban them or do what I have done previously...which was to politely ask folks like Thomas Basboll to edit something else, and by doing that, we might then be able to see if we can allow him some more latitude in those areas he/she was previously found to be troublesome. Now, to be a little less than polite about this, I have had numerous editors tell me that with Thomas Basboll and others of a similar vein editing 9/11 related articles, it has been a tedious, less enjoyable experience and some of these articles have not been able to become rated as good articles much less FA's simply because many of the editors that would normally want to help get these articles to higher standards are turned off and or give up. Here's what I would be more interested in seeing...have other editors than myself encourage Thomas Basboll to edit outside his topic ban for 60 days...maybe even areas that have a tendency to be difficult and or have strong biases...see how he deals with those issues, whether he is still trying to encourage fringe views and is violating undue weight issues, and then if he shows a better understanding, then permit him to make comments at 9/11 related articles for 30 days and then if thats fine, allow him to edit under supervision those articles. Now, if you're familiar with 9/11 related articles and can spot the sometimes not so overt but still fringe viewpoint issues that are endemic to this subject, then perhaps you might be willing to mentor him...otherwise, we'll need some other volunteer to do so...but as it stands now, I can see no evidence that Thomas Basboll has any intention of changing his direction because he has provided us only with pleas to be unbanned...I have yet to see him admit that he understands why he was topic banned or that he intends to follow a different course of conduct.--MONGO 00:44, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Of course, fringe views can be included in articles not dedicated to them, provided that (a) they are notable as evidenced by reliable sources (b) are presented in a way that is consistent with their due weight (c) they are described as fringe views, not presented as facts. I'd like to add my experience to this discussion here: Recently, I ran into troubles with another editor, and a temporary mutual revert restriction has been placed on both of us. I also, for a period of two weeks, had been restricted from editing articles in the 9/11 area. In the arbitration enforcement case, several editors have complained that the articles were in a bad state, and brought forward the idea that I would be the editor that would have caused them to be in that state. However, during my two-week long absence, the articles have not changed in any way (some trivial edits have been made to some of them). I therefore doubt that these editors generally think that the articles in that topic area are actually in a bad state (as they made no effort to change them), and I must asssume, based on my experience, that this is an argument that is deliberately being used to create the impression that the articles would have the potential to be greatly improved, if only certain editors would be banned or topic banned. Lumping together editors that have continuously contributed to that topic area with IP editors and some new and often very temporary accounts that are sometimes vandalizing these pages or are making other inappropriate edits at these pages also does not help to resolve the problems in that topic area.  Cs32en  09:17, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Mongo, as always, speaks in unequivocal terms about my effect on the editing environment here. I just want to note that the topic ban was implemented unilaterally, without warning (or discussion), on the advice of an editor that I was engaged in a civil content dispute with. Until then no administrative action had ever been taken against me and no RFC had ever been filed. Since I will not agree to the terms MONGO suggests, I will make a counter proposal: let someone review my editing history, including my DR skills. Point out my mistakes. Again, Mongo's assuring tone notwithstanding, no evidence has ever been offered for the bias he suggests. What one is offered, instead, is a list of (and here just a gesture at) respected editors who complain about me, not examples of behavior worth complaining about. I won't claim that my record is spotless, but I'd love to see someone actually try to put together a case for the claim that my presence overall is detrimental. I've been away for a year and a half. The article has not gone even to GA in my absence. Returning now, I've crafted some prose for inclusion in the article and posted some (I think MONGO will agree) typical commentary on the talk page. Have a look. How's my driving?--Thomas B (talk) 16:41, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Arbcom supported your topic ban just this year...Raul just did what needed to be done a long time ago...if his action was so unilateral, then arbcom would have overturned it back in April.--MONGO 02:56, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm not at all interested in letting rampantly problematic users run wild on controversial articles. Our articles are not the place for a crusader of any sort, and largely, yes, I agree with you that those who can not be reformed must sooner or later be shown the door. However, I'm not at all convinced yet that Thomas B belongs to that category of users. Had any of his recent edits shown an obvious problem, I'm sure you'd have pointed them out by now. If this truly is how he intends to build the article, I must say I fail to see a problem that is so grave that we can not afford a few weeks of trial. But yes, I quite agree with your last point. Thomas B could make his, and our life, much easier by finding a few other topics outside the 9/11 area to edit with - if nothing else, it should provide a less stressful environment to enjoy the more fun aspects of editing. henrik•talk 21:27, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Henrik...this is a complex matter...truthfully and respectfully, I already provided a detailed summary of why Basboll was banned (banned by Raul no less) and a link showing the last effort by Thomas Basboll to be un topic banned, which was not supported by arbcom..I have no idea why they sent this mess here...but it is disheartening that they would do so. IF Thomas Basboll wanted to show examples of edits made outside the realm of 9/11 related articles which might demonstrate that he understands why he was banned and that he has reformed, then I might support your decision to, for lack of a better way of putting it, almost unilaterally, now give this guy a 30 day trial period...he'll probably behave himself for that period...but ultimately, we'll be back where we started...if you aren't aware of the topic issues and the serious POV pushing by a plethora of conspiracy theorists related to this topic, then you should recluse from handing down any topic ban suspensions related to this area...seriously. I have been on this website for almost 5 years, have numerous FAs (none related to 9/11 BTW) and have started hundreds of articles...Basboll has a track record of POV pushing, violations of the NPOV policies and has never once understood the reasons why we don't give more time to conspiracy theories in articles where we have known scientific evidence....we have articles that are dedicated to that issue...let him edit those if he is so interested in giving his "take" or slant on what happened.--MONGO 01:52, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

I certainly hope the intrepid admins who have decided that this latest Randy from Boise needs to be accomodated by other editors with better things to do are going to actually do their jobs - yes, I'm assigning work this time - and evaluate when the sword-skeleton theory has gone overboard. Hipocrite (talk) 14:48, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Calling editors names does not help consensus. As I understand it, there is a request for arbcom right now that started when one editor called an arbcom a "WP:Randy from Boise". Ikip 13:19, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

I am guessing that everyone concerned would be happier if the month trial doesnt involve the core articles, where even participation in the discussion page can result in disruption. Maybe Thomas could find and nominate a few articles that interest him, and work on them for the first month. Alternative, or he should be prohibited from working on FA or GA articles, and top-importance articles as rated by the 9/11 wikiproject.

back in April, I recommended that Thomas work on articles around this topic, rather than the main contentious articles.[125] I mentioned Operation Northwoods, World Trade Center (PATH station), Minoru Yamasaki, Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, but I am sure that there are a number of articles which deeply interest him, and are currently in need of improvement. e.g. Conspiracy Theory (TV series), 911: In Plane Site, A Few Days in September, Mystery of the Urinal Deuce. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 05:58, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Thomas Basboll is an intelligent and articulate man, and a good writer. That's what made his participation on the 9/11 articles such an extraordinary time-wasting nuisance. (That, and his unwillingness to stay off my talk page even after I made it clear his comments there had become, and remain, unwelcome. We'll see if that's changed...) His individual edits were fine, but together over time they slanted the page in favor of the conspiracy theories. I haven't seen where he's acknowledged he did anything wrong, but I might have missed it. There's no doubt he can behave himself for a month, but from his choice of articles to work on he still wants to legitimize the conspiracy theories, and cast doubt on the mainstream. Arbs, please don't let this foolishness waste any more time of the remaining people who are willing to work on these pages. Tom Harrison ^Talk 12:19, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Tom sums up this entire topic ban:

"His individual edits were fine, but together over time they slanted the page in favor of the conspiracy theories."

This was, and always has been a content dispute.

There is a kind of legal fiction that arbitration does not get involved in content disputes. Intended or not, arbitration gave the majority the tools needed to finally silence the minority.

I have already discussed the possible conflict of interest of the admin who blocked Thomas. I won't repeat it here.

Since being a 9/11 conspiracy theorists is a scarlet letter. I feel compelled to once again close with this caveat: I strongly think 99.9% of these 9/11 conspiracy theories are absurd. I just feel that those views, supported by a sizable minority in the world, should have a small amount of WP:WEIGHT here. These minority editors should not be persecuted and banished by the veteran majority. Unfortunately in my experience, many of these majority editors will only allow their view on Wikipedia, and have absolutely no tolerance for opposing views. Ikip 13:06, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

If Wikipedia were intolerant of opposing views, there wouldn't be so many pages and pages dedicated to them. That's like someone hollering loudly about how they're being stifled. Tom Harrison ^Talk 13:37, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

I acknowledge that Tom Harrison and I disagree about what the content of the article on the collapse of the World Trade Center should be. I am of course flattered by the rest of it, except the part about wasting his time, which is certainly not how I feel about the discussions we had. Discussing things with Tom, and others, has improved both my understanding of the WTC collapses and the Wikipedia articles about them. I will also repeat what I said before: the allegedly "slanted" articled have been free of any input from me (with the exception of the incident already noted) for over a year and a half. I haven't seen any concerted effort (i.e., time either spent or wasted) to remove things that I managed to get in there while working on it. As luck would have it, MONGO and I are currently engaged in an exemplary content dispute [126]. If what I'm doing there violates either policy or the 9/11 arbcom ruling, do let me know. It's precisely the sort of thing (I think) that MONGO and Tom are talking about. It's part what I'd like to do here. The other part can be seen by looking at my edits to the article this month.--Thomas B (talk) 14:05, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Ikip, are you asserting that there is a POV problem? If so, the first step to solving it is to highlight the problem. Thomas is not a magic bullet to solve any POV problem that you perceive but don't articulate.

It is pointless bring up the possibility of the blocking admin having a COI; the topic ban was reviewed by Arbcom, and upheld.

As Arbcom has now recommended that AE reviews the topic ban, opinions from the contributors who work in that topical area of the project are very important.

John Vandenberg ^(chat) 14:14, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Thomas just highlighted the problem.[127] I agree that "Thomas is not a magic bullet to solve any POV problem", I don't recall saying this, and I am sorry, I need to be more clearer on what I am saying because of the confusion.

Despite calling my sentence "pointless", my mention of the arbcom decision was not "pointless" in that I personally feel this is one example of how arbcom indirectly decides content disputes, and this has always, at its core, been a fundamental content dispute.

I worked in the 9/11 area years ago, mostly editing articles that many of these editors had actual lists to delete, and was involved with Toms edits, so I feel it is important to include context as I see it.

Ikip 15:35, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Result concerning Thomas Basboll

Thomas Basboll is away until December 29, 2009.John Vandenberg ^(chat) 03:01, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Previous discussion here. Two years is a long time, and I would support setting an end date and giving this user a second chance. If I am mistaken; the error can be easily remedied: The standard of editors on controversial topics is high. I would expect Thomas Basboll to edit within both the spirit and letter of WP:NPOV, WP:WEIGHT, WP:FRINGE and other applicable content policies. henrik•talk 22:05, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Why don't we try a temporary suspension of the ban, and see how Thomas Basboll edits for oh, a month?--Tznkai (talk) 22:17, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Makes sublime sense. Perpetual bans seem fundamentally excessive. Collect (talk) 11:08, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Good thought, so implemented. I've suspended the ban, per Tznkai, for one month and asked that User:Thomas Basboll post a new request here at the end of that period for review. henrik•talk 12:23, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks.--Thomas B (talk) 13:16, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Nableezy

Tenmei

Request concerning Nickhh, Nishidani, and Nableezy

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

User requesting enforcement

--Epeefleche (talk) 16:32, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Users against whom enforcement is requested

• Nickhh (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) Diff of notice [136]
• Nishidani (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) Diff of notice [137]
• Nableezy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) Diff of notice [138]

Sanction or remedy that this user violated

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/West Bank - Judea and Samaria

• Nickhh: "placed under an editing restriction indefinitely. He is prohibited from editing any article in the area of conflict, commenting on any talk page attached to such an article, or participating in any community discussion substantially concerned with such articles."[139]
• Nishidani: same as Nickhh, immediately above.[140]
• Nableezy: Nableezy's ban arose separately. Originally, on October 29—"per the provisions of this remedy of the Palestine-Israel articles arbitration case, ... banning ... for 4 months from editing all pages (including both article and article talk pages) within those topic areas which relate to the Palestine-Israel articles case."[141]

Then Nableezy's ban was reduced on November 3, as follows—"I have included in the sanction on Nableezy all articles within the subject area in question.... I am adjusting my initial sanction... The ban on editing article content is reduced from six months to two; and the ban on editing article talk pages is reduced to one. These times are relative to the initial sanction".[142]

Background

Despite their I-P conflict topic-bans, Nickhh and Nishidani actively participated in an AfD discussion regarding Jonathan Cook, a freelance journalist whose notability arises (as is clear from the first sentence of his article) from his writing on the I-P conflict.

Nishidani left his comments up for 7 days. Only crossing them out a few hours before the AfD closed (w/the accurate edit summary: "Striking out comment written in breach of my ban, as indeed I should have when this was first complained of").[143] This was IMHO willful flouting of his ban with intent to influence the AfD. Nishidani also said at the Request for Clarification that the reason he weighed in was because the vote at the time was "in favour of deletion". That reflects his desire to influence the outcome of the AfD, which—mildly speaking—he was not allowed to do.

And Nickhh left his AfD comments up for the entire course of the AfD, never striking them out.

Multiple participants in the AfD voiced concern that this violated their topic ban,[144][145] and removed the banned users’ comments from the AfD.[146][147][148] The banned users' comments were re-inserted into the AfD; more than once by Nableezy, who was himself subject to a similar topic ban, arising from a different Arbitration Enforcement.[149] Nableezy even went so far as to delete my questions—as to the appropriateness of banned editors commenting—from the AfD page,[150] insisting on moving them to the AfD's discussion page, without my permission,[151] and refusing to restore them or allow me to restore them.

Nickhh and Nishidani themselves acknowledged that their participation was questionable (e.g., Nickhh: “I wonder if I'm allowed to say anything here, given the topics the man tends to write about”[152]; Nishidani: “Yes, technically we should keep out of it.”[153]

At the Request for Clarification on this matter, the arbitrators unanimously indicated that the banned editors violated their bans.[154]

Arb Vassanya made clear that this applied not only to the Nickhh/Nableezy topic ban, but also to the Nishidani topic ban ("Neither topic ban makes an exception for discussing unrelated issues on related pages. They are prohibitions on editing related pages. Full stop."). However, the matter is confused a bit by the fact that apparently (however the Nishidani ban may appear to me and to the arbitrators on its face), the banning admin did not view it the way we did, and at a concurrent WP:AE on the same facts, which took place as the arbitrators were taking the above position, enforcement was declined.[155] I'm therefore uncertain whether as to Nableezy, despite the arbitrators' above clarification, the matter is now moot as to whether Nableezy violated his ban, or whether it is appropriate to consider sanctions against him for violating his ban. In any event, among Nableezy's edits were repeated insertions of clearly banned editors' comments into the AfD, as is reflected in the below diffs. He thereby facilitated violations of their ban. Finally, he edited the AfD page as early as November 28, which was clearly a violation of his ban, even under the most generous interpretation. I leave the determination as to whether it is appropriate to sanction Nableezy completely to the arbitrators closing admin, without expressing a strong view.

It is important to note, btw, that Nableezy's Palestine-Israel articles ban was only reduced after arguments and testimonials about him were made by the very same two editors who were already banned from commenting on any community discussions related to the I/P conflict—Nickhh and Nishidani! See [156], [157], [158], and [159]. I believe this constitutes another series of violations of their ban.

Diffs of edits that violate it, and an explanation how they do so

1. [160] Nickhh at AfD
2. [161] Nickhh at AfD
3. [162] Nickhh at AfD
4. [163] Nishidani at AfD
5. [164] Nishidani at AfD
6. [165] Nableezy reinserting banned editor's (Nickhh's) comments on November 28
7. [166] Nableezy reinserting banned editors' (Nickhh's and Nishidani's) comments
8. [167] Nableezy at AfD
9. [168] Nableezy at AfD
10. [169] Nableezy removing others' comments at AfD
11. [170] Nableezy reinserting comments of banned editor (Nickhh) into AfD
12. [171] Nableezy deleting my comments (and others' responses) from AfD (and moving them to discussion page)
13. [172] Nableezy deleting my comments (and others') from AfD
14. [173] Nableezy reinserting comments of banned editor (Nickhh) into AfD
15. [174] Nableezy commenting at AfD
16. [175] Nableezy commenting at AfD as to why his comments and those of the other banned editors were appropriate
17. [176] Nableezy insertion at AfD talk page of material he deleted from AfD
18. [177] Nableezy at AfD talk page

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

Not applicable

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction)

Per Arbitrators' discretion. But i It would seem that the only thing left with Nickhh and Nishidani, as their topic ban is already indefinite, would be to for some period enlarge the scope of their ban beyond that of the I/P issue.

As to Nishidani, it may well be enough, if sanction is appropriate (and if this is the correct place to pursue it), for a temporal extension of his ban from the I/P issue.

Additional comments

The basis for this enforcement is set forth in the arbitrators' responses to a Request for Clarification on the conduct at issue here.

---

At the Request for Clarification, Nishidani wrote: "If you think my ban should extend beyond the I/P area, to elsewhere, I won't object. Indeed, it would be logical"; and "I ... expressed my readiness to suffer any further sanction an arbiter might wish to impose on me for my egregious lapse"; and "I expressed my guilt and readiness to be punished"; and "I've waited to be banned from all wiki articles ... I suggest the way to stop this bickering is to act immediately and extend my perma-ban."[178]

And Nickhh wrote:

"I don't think anyone's claiming that relevant AfD pages - in principle - are not covered by the topic ban as worded. I'm certainly not, and agree that they pretty clearly would be."[179]

The pertinent language at the Request for Clarification from arb Vassanya (w/whom arbs Bainer, Wizardman, and Risker agreed) was:

"AfD discussions about IP-related articles quite clearly falls under "participating in any community discussion substantially concerned with such articles". There is no grey area. An AfD is about as perfect of an example as you get for a "community discussion substantially concerned with such articles".... Shifting discussion over to user talk pages or other venues is at bare minimum a gross violation of the spirit of a topic ban. ... As far as I'm concerned, the confusion here is only arising from splitting hairs and trying to look for grey areas where they do not exist. The topic bans are perfectly clear and AfD is unquestionably included even in a strict reading of the sanction language.... "[A]ll pages ... which relate" seems to make the scope inclusive and clear in a similar fashion. Neither topic ban makes an exception for discussing unrelated issues on related pages. They are prohibitions on editing related pages. Full stop."[180]

And arb Carcharoth (w/whom arb Wizardman agreed) wrote:

"When someone is given a topic ban in a particular area, they are meant to move away from that topic area...If... an editor shows an inability to move away from a topic area, then sanctions should be enforced.... The normal response would be to either extend the topic ban (if it is not already indefinite), or to move on to harsher sanctions."[181]

And arb Coren (w/whom arb Wizardman agreed) wrote:

"Agreed with my colleagues; an AfD discussion of an article within the topic area definitely and unambiguously falls into that topic area. The only case where I would consider any ambiguity is if the topic ban specifically excluded talk pages or was explicitly limited to articles; and even then it could be argued that a discussion about deletion is too "close" to the topic ban to be confortable."[182]

--Epeefleche (talk) 21:20, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

• Reply to Nickhh—Yes, readers are encouraged, if they like, to read the full 47 quotes and diffs I provided, as all have been truncated for purposes of brevity. The links are provided at each quote or diff, or in the preceding text. Furthermore, while Nickhh made points at the Clarification which he repeats here, the arbs responded emphatically as indicated above. As to timing, it seemed logical to raise this AE only after the Clarification was closed, which is what was promptly done. As DGG mentions below, he indicated that AE would be the appropriate next step. As to points raised regarding other editors, as to whom I am completely unfamiliar, that would appear to be irrelevant to the proper treatment of violation bans in the Cook AfD—the subject of this AE. Finally, the arbs did not think the ban violations were at all borderline, and support was voiced for enforcement, which is what is sought here.—Epeefleche (talk) 18:51, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

• Additional topic ban violations by Nableezy — here on November 13, here on November 14, and here on November 14, all approximately two weeks after Nableezy's ban was put in place, "warning" another editor with regard to edits on the subject of whether certain regions of Israel are "occupied".—Epeefleche (talk) 04:37, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

• Reply to question by Nableezy, as to why Nableezy warning another editor for a putative 3RR violation for editing regarding use of the phrase "occupied" when referring to territories within the I-P conflict is a violation of his topic ban. Yes, I can provide further clarification. As arb Vassanya (w/whom arbs Bainer, Wizardman, and Risker agreed) pointed out at the Clarification at which your similar behavior was raised:

  "Shifting discussion over to user talk pages or other venues is at bare minimum a gross violation of the spirit of a topic ban.... [your] confusion here is only arising from splitting hairs and trying to look for grey areas where they do not exist. The topic bans are perfectly clear ... Neither topic ban makes an exception for discussing unrelated issues on related pages. They are prohibitions on editing related pages. Full stop."[183]

  —Epeefleche (talk) 05:33, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

(cont'd) Do you actually believe that your I/P topic ban allowed you to snipe at an editor who was editing an I/P issue, in an I/P article, by giving that editor a 3RR warning for his edits there? And a 3RR warning that is baseless, to boot? If so, I think you may not be taking to heart the comments that the arbitrators directed at you, and perhaps could benefit from some greater guidance by the closing admin here as to the appropriateness of your behavior.--Epeefleche (talk) 19:31, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Reply by Nableezy

This is dumb. But it is what Epeefleche and Gilabrand should have done instead of edit war out comments that they are not qualified to decide are a violation of anybody's topic ban. As to my own topic ban, AGK has clarified that my topic ban does not include AfDs and my actions here have already been addressed in an earlier AE thread. While it is nice having fans, two frivolous AE threads within the span of 12 hours is too much for even me. nableezy - 17:10, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

But since we are here, below is a rundown of what happened at the AfD (apologies if I miss a revert in there):

Gila removes Nick and Nishidanis comments, reverted by Jeppiz, again removed by Gila, anon removed others, reverted by Mackan79, removed again by Gila, again by Gila, restored by Jeppiz (who at this point went to ANI where the closing admin said that this is an AE issue), I restored, removed by Mr. Hicks The III (now known to be another NoCal100 sock), I reverted, This stops for a while. When Hicks is discovered to be a NoCal100 sock I remove his comment and vote (something that any user, not only uninvolved admins, can do as he was site-banned). Gila then removes Nick and Nishi's comments again. I restore. I then move comments not relevant to the AfD but rather about the AfD itself to the talk page. Gila then again removes the comments relevant to the AfD to the talk page [184]. I revert. Epeefleche now joins the fun by removing the comments, and then removing my comments though my topic ban did not include AfDs. SlimVirgin reverts.

This entire time I asked each person who removed the comments to instead go to WP:AE with their complaints so that an uninvolved admin could make a determination of whether or not the comments were in violation of the topic ban and what to do if they were. Instead Gilabrand and Epeefleche, both highly involved and non-admins, took it upon themselves to make that determination and to enforce their own decision. All they had to do was to come here, instead they choose to continually revert. If anybody deserves an admonishment for what happened there it is Gilabrand and Epeefleche. nableezy - 17:37, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Epeefleche, would you care to explain how informing a "new" user about the 3 revert rule after they have made 3 quick reversions is a violation of my topic ban? nableezy - 05:11, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Breein, you yourself have written that you are not a new user (see here), so why would you take exception to that? nableezy - 05:20, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Apologies, but, fyi, sarcasm often does not translate well in text. nableezy - 05:24, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Ep - the content of the edits is immaterial, I did not discuss the content of the edits, I did not discuss whether or not a place was occupied, what I did do was inform a "new" user of what they could expect if they continued repeatedly reverting. I think I am qualified to do so. I did not edit a "related page". Breein was not given the notice because he or she added or removed the word occupied, Breein was given the notice because he or she made 3 quick reversions. nableezy - 05:38, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I was not "sniping" at another user, I did not raise any issue about the content of that users edits. And the 3RR warning was not "baseless". Unlike everything you have written above. I am not wasting more time on this or on you. Bye. nableezy - 19:38, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved editor Breein1007

I take exception to those quotation marks, Nableezy! Breein1007 (talk) 05:16, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Here, take a quick look at this. Breein1007 (talk) 05:22, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough! Breein1007 (talk) 05:26, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Reply/Comment by Nickhh

Just so that I'm not seen to be ignoring this altogether, my response to this is the same as that to the original clarification, posted here. In response to a couple of further points -

• Epeefleche, you quote me as saying AfDs are definitely included in the topic ban in principle, suggesting that as a result I was knowingly in breach of the ban, but neglect to quote the following sentence - "The point is more about whether making a general comment about journalistic notability in an AfD debate about one journalist's page is indeed a breach of a ban that stops editors discussing I-P issues". That was the issue in my view that needed clarification. As you also do quote me saying, I wasn't sure at the time. Once it has that clarification (although it has to be said, no arb made this point explicitly), it would seem more sensible for all involved to leave it there, rather than susbequently demanding enforcement in some manner some three weeks after the original event, when nothing much has happened since - I didn't even go back and look at the AfD once I'd made the brief initial comments. No one for example is running around demanding that enforcement action is taken against User:Jayjg for their one-off action in actually closing a far more contentious AfD recently.

• DGG, you appear to be conflating my and Nishidani's case with Nableezy's - for the former of course AfDs in principle were included in our topic ban (as acknowledged rather than "challenged" - the point was slightly different, see above); for the latter they were not, on the basis that Nab was allowed to comment on talk pages, as the terms of their ban were different.

Following all the drama and the clarification I think it unlikely I or Nishidani will do something similar. At the time I knew my comment was borderline (and was quite open about that), and with hindsight would probably not have skirted so close to the border. The only qualification I would put on that is that of course this whole incident had the unexpected bonus of flushing out a rather wide sock farm, which has ranged across I-P pages for a long, long time, making it such an unpleasant place for initially passing editors such as myself whose main interest has never been the Middle East conflicts particularly, and ultimately drawing them into rather daft conflicts that end with us all where we are now. --Nickhh (talk) 16:45, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved editor Sm8900

I think that any such topic ban should have a specific end date as well as a start date. I think that this one has run its course. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 17:41, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Comments by Tznkai

There appears to be a major misunderstanding of what goes on here. First, with very rare exception, Arbitrators do not patrol enforcement requests, other admins do. I am an admin, I am not an Arbitrator. Second, enforcement requests are not meant to handle general troublemaking, they are meant to handle specific violations of arbitration remedies. This is why it is important that you link the exact remedy. Third, we do not relitigate, retry, or reargue cases. We do not expand, or minimize remedies unless they explicitly invite us to do so. While we may accept or deny requests to enforce on our own discretion, we are not in the buisness of arbitrating ourselves.

In this case, Nableezy is not sanctioned under Westbank Judea-Samaria, and no action will be taken against him under this request. You can see me comments in an above section for what will or will not bring sanctions down on his head.

As to the other two, there was already a clarification requested and it came down clear enough that Jonathan Cook afd was within the Westbank - Judea and Samaria topic ban, this issue is mooted - its already been decided and I'm not sure what harm additional sanctions would prevent. To reiterate the point from the clarification: Knock it off! If there are recent issues I am unaware of, please update the request to make me aware of them. I'm going to wait 24 hours for more information or another administrator to come in and take over.--Tznkai (talk) 19:14, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

I still really don't know what action it is I'm supposed to take here, but I'll throw this one on the table - I'll make a 1 second block on NickH and Nishidani, with a link to the clarification request and making it clear that AfDs of journalists involved in the IP conflict are off limits.--Tznkai (talk) 20:13, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by Mackan79

I hope that ArbCom's clarification will settle any questions that remained about these sanctions, until the sanctions may be reevaluated. I do not see why we would seek to apply the clarification retroactively, particularly considering that it was brought by a banned sock puppet under the same restrictions, who was using another account to participate in the same AfD (if indeed we're going to review for technicalities). Epeefleche seems to remain unaware of this, as they quote the sock (Mr. Hicks The III) to show concern about the Jonathan Cook AfD, so I think it bears mentioning. Mackan79 (talk) 22:27, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

To DGG, my comment is based on the fact that it is not the only "close call" (or what I would also have called a clear violation) that has preceded the recent clarification. I consider Nickh's comment a clear violation in that, even though he tried to limit the scope of his comment relating to an article that is not wholly within the area of conflict, he still couldn't help briefly mentioning the political motivations for the nomination. I consider Nishidani's comments a clear violation in that, while his presentation of sources itself on this AfD should in some format be protected under WP:IAR, he also couldn't help making a similar comment about motivations in passing. And yet, I am no less clear that Jayjg's edit here, removing material which argues that the Washington Times is "pro-Israel" is at least equally a violation of the restriction. If the latter was deemed not a violation, then notwithstanding the Arbitrators' comments, the remedy was not sufficiently clear that we editors knew how to implement it. I hope it now is, but unless we're going to reevaluate every incident, I don't think you take a recent clarification to go back and look at just one of them, especially considering that the clarification itself was brought about by a sock puppet who was very specifically trying to game the system. The much better option is to look forward. Mackan79 (talk) 18:59, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Comment by JoshuaZ

I've already told Mackan why the comparison to Jayjg's edits isn't accurate. Since I don't have much time right now, I'll simply link to that comment. JoshuaZ (talk) 16:48, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Result concerning Nickh, Nishidani, and Nableezy

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

• I'm a little confused by some of the rejoinders above. Eppefleche asked my advice what was the appropriate step after the ArbCom clarification motion closed. I advised him that it would be to request enforcement here. Th people involved made engaged in an AfD. Arb Com had previously t said they were not to participate in that subject area. Enforcement was requested and challenged on the grounds that arb com had not meant to include afds within the topic ban. Several of the members of arb com replied, all saying that it did, and that it was totally obvious that it had been included from the start--none expressed the least doubt about it. (And, frankly, that seems the obvious view to me as well.). It was not a matter of extending their ban to additional areas, it was saying what it had been all along. In essence, they were saying that it had been a proper case for AE all along, and action should have been taken there. (Being arbcom ,they didnt simply refer it back, which would have simplified things.) I don't see how the editors involved can now try to say it was ex post facto, or moot; it was always part of the ban, and they violated it. Action is now expected of us. Having advised Eppefleche about procedure, I'm not uninvolved enough to do what should be done. (And personally, I wish arb com would start enforcing its own remedies or designating someone or some small group to do so--throwing it back to the community tends to have the effect it did here, of reopening the issue from the start and continuing the problem. ) DGG ( talk ) 09:52, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Nefer Tweety

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

Request concerning Nefer Tweety

User requesting enforcement 

Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 13:24, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

User against whom enforcement is requested 

Nefer Tweety (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Asmahan#Consensus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Asmahan#Neutral_point_of_view_and_undue_weight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Asmahan#Decorum

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

# Several editors mediated between me and Arab Cowboy at the Asmahan article, after the last mediation ended with admin al ameer son you can see here the sections of the article was, "career" section and in that section a subsection of "Egypt's influence", and "immigration to Egypt" was a subsection of "early life", I made an edit and explained this at the talkpage yet it has been reverted by Nefer Tweety against the the mediations/collaborations/consensus [185] and also undue weight, texts about her career are put in "Egypt's influence on Asmahan’s career". Nefer Tweety is an account which is almost exclusively used to do the same edits as Arab Cowboy, Nefer Tweety reverted the entire article back 4 months to Arab Cowboys edit, not caring about edits made by several people [186] I had also made a copyright violation request and a copyright admin removed the copyrighted material here, the exact copy righted text has been re added by Nefer tweety , personal life, section: [187]

Update: Assumption of bad faith is a violation against a principle: "to promote his POV and Syrian agenda" [188] --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 10:29, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

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

Not applicable.

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction) 

block or bann.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint 

<Your text>

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested 

[189]

Discussion concerning Nefer Tweety

Statement by Nefer Tweety

User: Supreme Deliciousness is presently under disciplinary probation for one year for edit warring and other violations specifically related to Asmahan and other articles. On 20 December, Supreme Deliciousness returned to his old ways of making biased and inflammatory edits into Asmahan to promote his POV and Syrian agenda while claiming copyright violation about any text does not suit his agenda. There's no more copyright violation, the article had been rebuilt by Arab Cowboy without any copyright violations while Cactus Writer was closely watching. Supreme Deliciousness's probation must be enforced as well as the probation on Asmahan and he had better leave this article alone. I am dedicating my time on Wikipedia to protecting Egypt related articles from Supreme Deliciousness's vandalism. Nefer Tweety (talk) 11:23, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Comments by others about the request concerning Nefer Tweety

Result concerning Nefer Tweety

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

• I am inclined to dismiss this report as Stale. There have only been 4 edits to the article in the past week, and the edit warring seems to have died down. I would be interested in hearing any other outside opinions though. NW (Talk) 17:57, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

NuclearWarfare, at the talkpage there has been comments which are in direct violation against the cases principles Decorum, incivility and assumptions of bad faith in principle: [190] comment: "to promote his POV and Syrian agenda" "Supreme Deliciousness's vandalism" [191] The scope of the case shows that Nefer Tweety has been involved in this: [192] Is no action gonna be taken against this violation against a principle? What are the principles for if that is the case? So people can violate them and get away with it? --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 19:22, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

I looked over the recent edits to the talk page. As there have been no edits to even the talk page since December 25, I am still inclined to not give any sanctions here. I shall watchlist the page and keep an eye on any discussions. If any administrator disagrees with my (lack of) action, they are of course free to use their judgment to take what they feel is the appropriate course. NW (Talk) 21:00, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Brews ohare

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

Request concerning Brews ohare

User requesting enforcement 

JohnBlackburne (talk) 17:30, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

User against whom enforcement is requested 

Brews ohare (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated 

1. Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Speed of light#Brews ohare topic banned

2. Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Speed of light#Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions

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

1. [193] Edit of a physics related page

2. [194] Edit of a physics related page

I could provide any number of these: all of his edits in the last week are on physics related pages or relate to those pages.

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

Not applicable

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction) 

A further restriction to his own user pages

Additional comments by editor filing complaint 

The problem with his edits (apart from them going against his ban) is his level of expertise is not enough for the article he's editing. He seem to be trying to compensate for this by relying heavily on sources, assembling the article paragraph by paragraph rather than writing it as a whole. The result is a mess that any editor will have to largely re-write from scratch. He doesn't seem able to take my hints on the talk page that he should not be writing the article this way. --JohnBlackburne (talk) 17:30, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested 

[195]

Discussion concerning Brews ohare

Statement by Brews ohare

The article Bivector is a mathematics article that I created in response to discussion among other parties on Talk: p-vector. No physics discussion takes place in Bivector, although many possible applications of this topic to physics do exist, and I invited JohnBlackburne to discuss them in the article. (He has not.) No sanction against me has been violated, and this article constitutes a worthy addition to WP, indicating my good faith efforts to improve WP.

The present situation resembles in some ways the earlier restriction review, which also revolved about a distinction between math and science. That review is about to be updated, and presumably can include JohnBlackburne's complaint. Brews ohare (talk) 19:18, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

In my opinion, the article Bivector as it now stands is fairly complete, apart from example applications that I cannot add due to sanctions, and I have no more mathematics to add to it. So I'd guess there is little need for administrative intervention in this matter. Brews ohare (talk) 18:56, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

JohnBlackburne wishes to raise the issue of my competence to write this article. My competence is a matter separate from violation of sanctions, which should be separately conducted. Although this charge is not relevant here, I wish to point out that no evidence is provided that the present article Bivector in any way presents incorrect arguments. The many sources I have provided to support various points seem necessary in view of the challenges brought by JohnBlackburne, which challenges of his he has universally abandoned on Talk: Bivector upon his further reflection. Brews ohare (talk) 17:51, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Dicklyon says: "He edits fast and furious, adding his own interpretations of things, and won't slow down enough to allow space to incorporate the views of others. He makes collaboration impossible, ignoring the input of people". I find these remarks at variance with the evidence on Talk: Bivector, which shows I have fully addressed JohnBlackburne's observations and provided civil, sourced, and extensive response to him, including some direct questions to him about his views. My editing has not in any way impeded collaboration: rather, attempts at collaboration have been impeded by JohnBlackburne's failure to address my responses to and direct questions about his views and, instead of engaging in shaping the article, filing this complaint. Brews ohare (talk) 03:52, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Comments by others about the request concerning Brews ohare

• Strong OPPOSE Ok folks, seriously again? When is this nitpicking ever going to stop. Literally will you try to ban Brews for writing in english? Physics is described by english, to the administrator editor responsible for this renewed farce Shame on you. Hell In A Bucket (talk) 19:18, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Question Administrator? Who? Dougweller (talk) 21:10, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• No basis for action I'm more familiar than I would like with Brews Ohare's history and sanctions, but I don't believe them to apply here. These are mathematical topics, not physics ones. The fact that Wikiproject Physics has tagged them as theirs does not alter that, nor does the fact that the areas of maths he is working on may have physics applications.

  I have not made more than a cursory glance through Brews' recent activity but what I saw did not seem overly disruptive to me: a dispute is not necessarily someone causing a nuisance. However, even if it was there are other avenues that would be better pursued than this. His contribution record does not reveal him to have recently breached his topic ban. If further action needs taking against him then people should go through the proper channels rather than attempting to short-circuit the process by applying his sanction in an inappropriate manner. CrispMuncher (talk) 21:24, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

• It would be very helpful – for Brews and for the entire community – if you wouldn't go off half-cocked, Hell in a Bucket. Anyone can post a request for enforcement, but that doesn't mean that they'll get it. That's why we're having a discussion. I think that Brews' editing on this topic is fine, however I would strongly encourage Bucket to find something else to do. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:01, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Funny thing about the methodology if you can't counter the arguement you find a way to silence the opposition. Sometimes the easiest way to do that is discredit them. How's that going? Hell In A Bucket (talk) 02:07, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

• Formally, Dr. Brews's edit where he added a mention of general relativity can seen as a violation of his topic ban. As always, however, I think the topic ban doesn't make much sense, and completely missed the point of how he is disruptive. The interaction with JohnBlackburne on bivector is just more of the same. He edits fast and furious, adding his own interpretations of things, and won't slow down enough to allow space to incorporate the views of others. He makes collaboration impossible, ignoring the input of people who understand the topic at least as well as he does (probably better in this case). Instead of trying to "enforce" the silly topic ban, we should be looking for some other way to coach him toward more reasonable behavior. Dicklyon (talk) 22:37, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
• Whether these are physics-related is debatable. These are mathematics articles first and foremost, and they happen to have uses in physics. So no (sane) reading of the topic ban would make this within the scope of the topic ban IMO. However, Brews was also on general probation, which DO include having the same behaviour that lead to the Arbcom/SoL case, and this behaviour is (again) present. (This edit however IS a violation of the topic ban, albeit a very minor one). Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 23:58, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

That being said, going to ARBCOM enformcement rather than WP:MATH to seek a third opinion is probably jumping the gun here. Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 00:07, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose: This is a pure math article. The charge is "Edit of a physics related page"; this isn't one, and a Project Physics template doesn't make one. Brews created the article from scratch (the page was a redirect when he found it), and he created another of his beautiful graphics to illustrate it. More importantly, Brews' behavior, both in editing the article and in discussion on Talk:Bivector, has been collaborative and cooperative, not disruptive or tendentious. The complainant here has some criticisms of Brews' treatment of the math. Attention from other Project Math participants should be able to resolve these issues through normal editing and discussion; in my opinion, that is where JohnBlackburne should have turned. More importantly still, and although it took him a while to do so, Brews dropped the stick about a month ago, and since then has been peacefully and productively creating and editing articles. Because of that, the rest of us should stop picking up the stick and beating him with it.—Finell 00:05, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. I agree with what Finell wrote above. I also note that during the Arbcom case, both my and Dicklyon's proposals to deal with Brews' editing style were rejected. Arbcom decided to tackle the problem via a topic ban. There have been no substantial (or otherwise problematic) violations of that topic ban, so this arbitration enforcement request is not warranted. Count Iblis (talk) 00:46, 27 December 2009 (UTC)
• This is not a vote. Make your comments, preferably helpful ones, but leave the bold text at home.--Tznkai (talk) 06:12, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
• Comment The edits by Brews to bivector are hopeless mathematically. The article is completely misleading at the moment. Brews makes the inexplicable error of assuming that the ambient space is 3-dimensional, whereas the correct mathematical context is n dimensions. It is completely perverse for him to have done this. It is not easy to see a reference to the more general article p-vector, to which the article was formerly a redirect. The mass of references is arbitrary, unscholarly and unhelpful. The article could be nominated for deletion with a request to redirect to p-vector. If Brews' other edits to mathematics articles are like these, he should be topic banned from mathematics articles. His editing here is just disruptive. Mathsci (talk) 20:52, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

  Comment You can't be disruptive at Wikipedia simply for not being an expert and making mistakes while editing a page. Everyone can edit Wikipedia. Given that Mathsci is an experienced Wiki-editor who should know this, I don't understand why he is complaining about Brews here instead of fixing the bivector page. Count Iblis (talk) 22:01, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Iblis. Indeed, why is anyone even mentioning whether the math is right or wrong here? This is the Arbitration Enforcement page.—Finell 02:16, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Purely an individual opinion. The complaint and discussion seems side-tracked on the topic ban issue. However, some editors have commented that while the topic ban does not apply, there are continuing behavioral patterns that need to be addressed. I would ask that editors and any reviewing administrators consider this core aspect of the situation, rather than focus purely on the regulatory details of a topic restriction. Either there is a continuing problematic pattern of behavior, or there is not. If it is establish that there is an ongoing problem, Brews ohare is under a general conduct probation. Any uninvolved administrator may implement (as examples):

• a binding user conduct RfC
• a requirement for some minimum time for responses and/or number of editors responding before continuing after an edit dispute and/or acting on proposals
• an editing speed limit
• a requirement to defer to the consensus at a relevant WikiProject talk page or content noticeboard
• a size and/or speed limit on discussion contributions
• a requirement to stop editing when encountering disagreement and develop consensus with the assistance of dispute resolution as needed (essentially requiring WP:BRD)

Any number of editing conditions and sanctions can be imposed in order to provide any necessary boundaries and/or imposed guidance. The discussion should focus on whether or not there is a ongoing pattern of problematic conduct. If there is a continuing issue, focus on what conditions will help provide Brews ohare with the guidance and boundaries necessary and best insulate the project from disruption. Vassyana (talk) 02:43, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Result concerning Brews ohare

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

• Bivector is clearly math, not physics, and thus does not fall under arbitration restrictions. Any other problems with the content or Brews ohare's understanding of the same are not under the remit of this board. May I suggest inviting more participants from WP:WPMATH to discuss? Assuming there are no contrary comments in a day or so, I'll archive this request then. henrik•talk 22:48, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Nableezy

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

Request concerning Nableezy

User requesting enforcement 

Cptnono (talk) 00:00, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

User against whom enforcement is requested 

Nableezy (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy that this user violated 

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Palestine-Israel_articles#Discretionary_sanctions

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

Nableezy is continuing to make the topic area a hostile environment for other editors. Over the last month or so he has called other editors "duchebags", told editors that he can't comment on them since he would be breaking civility guidelines (close enough to breaking it), and harassed another editor since he felt their was Wikihounding. All that could be in the past since several of us have gone through this arbitration process with reminders, Wikibreaks, and blocks to because of inappropriate behavior is to be avoided. Unfortunately, the pattern is repeated over and over again.

Nableezy took offence to my assertion that the International Committee of the Red Cross's webpage on Palestine and the Occupied Territories was not an appropriate external think under the WP:ELNO provision "Avoid undue weight on particular points of view". The Red Cross is only concerned with the humanitarian concerns of the conflict. It doesn't matter why people are blowing their hands off while making bombs or why babies are getting killed by tanks. The focus is that it is happening and there is suffering. I called it bias and having an agenda (oops). I've attempted to clarify my reasoning with more palatable terms (goal, mission) but Nableeezy appears to want to continue arguing and is making some personal attacks that have crossed the line. This is a particular concern because he has just recently had his sanction on talk pages lifted and has voluntarily taken some additional time away from the article. One of his first series of comments upon returning is full of insults, assuming the worst, and continuation of the battlefield mentality.

1. [196] "Uninformed editors should not be allowed to edit these pages." - This is uncivil and spits in the face of what Wikipeida is. I don't believe I am uninformed but simply look at the subject form a different perspective. His comments were insulting and I recieved a sanction for similar venting.

1. [197] "But perhaps it is too much to ask that you do the slightest bit of reading about an organization before you write about it." Completely inappropriate remark. Just to admit when I have dome something inappropriate, in this edit difference you will see that I referred to Nableezy's previous comment, Tiamut commenting on my intentions (something I am not allowed to do since she opened an arbitration case when I did), and Romac's sarcastic edit summary and use of an image on the talk page (which he has been asked not to do). I later apologized for using the term bullshit and admitted that less crass language would have been better. Nableezy also believed I was implying that he was a sole purpose account. He actually does have a focus on a few select topics (nothing wrong with that) but my comment was completely unrelated and an attempt to illustrate what I was trying to say.

1. [198] "Uninformed editors should not be allowed to edit these pages..." After I attempted to clarify my position and recommended that all four of us stop, Nableezy again makes a comment that is against the collaborative nature of Wikipedia and is simply insulting.

1. [199] "your comments undermine the very idea of what this 'project' purports to be" - Wikipeida falsely claims to be collaborative (he would later verify that this was indeed what he meant) and "and, yes, others agree that the link should not be included, but not because of the inane idea that the ICRC is 'biased'" - Calling another editors opinion "inane" is not appropriate. Even if he disagrees that is a personal attack.
2. [200] "...unlike others I know the meaning of what it is I write and am careful to make sure I do not say incredibly stupid things." - This was the point where I thought seeking enforcement would be appropriate. It is one thing to disagree with another editor, but stating that others (presumably me) were writing "incredibly stupid things" was too much.

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

[201] This diff shows a couple comments by me. I tried to diffuse the situation by admitting to a mistake I made while asking other editors to stop. I thought everything would be OK but it stoked the fire.

[202] My attempt to explain that his comments were not appropriate

Enforcement action requested (block, topic ban or other sanction) 

I have requested a 1rr restriction and reminders to stop edit warring on Nableezy previously. I even made mentions that I have not been seeking his block. This time is different. This incivility on the talk page shows to me that the reduction in his talk page sanction was, in hindsight at least, premature. We all need to try harder to be civil but Nableezy has proven that he either cannot or will not. If that is too much to request, a simple "Hey, you all need to be more civil" would be great. Not saying we need to frolic through meadows together but this stuff is going to far.

Additional comments by editor filing complaint 

I think it would be nice if Romac removed the image from the talk page and if Tiamut was reminded that the talk page is not for commenting on other editors intentions. I was pretty pissed when I saw their comments but they haven't continued and would be lame of me to not get over it. Nableezy's just get worse and worse, though. Apologies to pile it on. I see that there are two others up above but I believe this incident is unrelated. I'm sure that will cause frustration and would have been happy to take it to the Wikietiquette noticeboard if this wasn't the proper venue. Cptnono (talk) 00:00, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

In response to Nableezy, that was sometime ago and I have gone out of my way to express apologies, knock it off, and not repeat such mistakes. It is continually brought up in discussions but there is nothing I can do to take it back. You have continued being disruptive. That is why this AE is about you. Although it sucks that I was a jerk in the past it doesn't excuse you from continuing with this sort of behavior.

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested 

[203]

Discussion concerning Nableezy

Statement by Nableezy

Cptnono has problems understanding basic things, I did not say that Wikipedia is not collaborative. I also did not believe that he was calling me a SPA, not that I give two shits if he does feel that way. And the idea that the ICRC is "biased" is in fact inane. That is all I have to say about this. And the "venting" that Cptnono was "sanctioned" for was calling another user a dirty liar (something that should have already been covered by NPA, but apparently he needed a sanction specifically telling him not call another editor a dirty liar) and for saying that If you have Palestinian stuff on your user page you shouldn't be editing such pages. Not exactly the same thing as saying that uninformed editors should not be allowed to edit pages that they have no knowledge about. nableezy - 01:07, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

I was not looking for an excuse, I was pointing out that your comparison that your behavior which led to your laughable "sanction" is in no way comparable to me saying that uninformed editors should not be allowed to edit those pages. Just showing the comparison made was bogus. nableezy - 03:50, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Comments by others about the request concerning Nableezy

Result concerning Nableezy

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