As of 19:46, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
Username: Fayenatic london User groups: autoreviewer, reviewer First edit: Jun 18, 2006 18:06:44 Unique pages edited: 19,218 Average edits per page: 2.15 Live edits: 39,070 Deleted edits: 2,222 Total edits (including deleted): 41,292 Namespace Totals Article 26332 67.40% Talk 2311 5.92% User 440 1.13% User talk 2788 7.14% Wikipedia 1886 4.83% Wikipedia talk 215 0.55% File 152 0.39% File talk 3 0.01% MediaWiki talk 1 0.00% Template 428 1.10% Template talk 145 0.37% Help 5 0.01% Category 4118 10.54% Category talk 211 0.54% Portal 27 0.07% Portal talk 5 0.01% Month counts2006/06 5 2006/07 19 2006/08 5 2006/09 41 2006/10 115 2006/11 132 2006/12 472 2007/01 962 2007/02 656 2007/03 862 2007/04 475 2007/05 402 2007/06 343 2007/07 402 2007/08 580 2007/09 640 2007/10 578 2007/11 578 2007/12 817 2008/01 738 2008/02 508 2008/03 512 2008/04 539 2008/05 927 2008/06 666 2008/07 141 2008/08 503 2008/09 760 2008/10 1413 2008/11 593 2008/12 411 2009/01 539 2009/02 707 2009/03 802 2009/04 474 2009/05 607 2009/06 414 2009/07 322 2009/08 425 2009/09 853 2009/10 411 2009/11 192 2009/12 189 2010/01 458 2010/02 301 2010/03 619 2010/04 920 2010/05 752 2010/06 551 2010/07 801 2010/08 942 2010/09 398 2010/10 333 2010/11 407 2010/12 617 2011/01 243 2011/02 51 2011/03 170 2011/04 384 2011/05 683 2011/06 1637 2011/07 1360 2011/08 1630 2011/09 911 2011/10 711 2011/11 380 2011/12 817 2012/01 939 2012/02 322 Top edited pagesArticle 139 - Faye_Wong 120 - Christian 110 - Shrivastava 74 - Faye_Wong_discography 64 - John_3:16 61 - Chartered_Accountant 59 - Zechariah 58 - Rajmohan_Pillai 56 - Nathan 54 - Zack Talk 41 - Faye_Wong 17 - Christian 17 - Rajmohan_Pillai 13 - Varshney 13 - Three_wise_monkeys 13 - Faye_Wong_discography 12 - Chapters_and_verses_of_the_Bible 12 - John_3:16 12 - David_C._C._Watson 12 - Institute_of_Chartered_Accountants_of_India User 138 - Fayenatic_london 41 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox 34 - Fayenatic_london/ToDo 18 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox2 18 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox3 14 - Fayenatic_london/monobook.js 6 - Fayenatic_london/vector.js 6 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox4 4 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox6 3 - Fayenatic_london/BMA_Entertainment User talk 70 - Fayenatic_london/Archive06 48 - Fayenatic_london/Archive03 45 - Fayenatic_london/Archive04 45 - Fayenatic_london/Archive05 23 - Monika_London 23 - Fayenatic_london/Archive01 23 - Fayenatic_london/Archive02 22 - Fayenatic_london 18 - DGG 17 - Timrollpickering Wikipedia 52 - WikiProject_Anthroponymy/Home_backup 40 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_August_18 40 - WikiProject_Deletion_sorting/Christianity 37 - Categories_for_discussion/Speedy 23 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_August_22 19 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_July_13 19 - Requests_for_page_protection 18 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_August_5 17 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_September_10 17 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_September_14 Wikipedia talk 41 - WikiProject_Anthroponymy 25 - WikiProject_Star_Trek 19 - No_original_research 16 - WikiProject_Albums 7 - WikiProject_Christianity 5 - WikiProject_Literature 5 - WikiProject_Multi-sport_events 5 - WikiProject_Star_Trek/to_do 4 - WikiProject_Fictional_characters 4 - External_links File 7 - FayeNoEvil.jpg 7 - Cocteau_Twins_promo_sheet.jpg 6 - Smileangel.jpg 5 - Only_Love_Strangers.jpg 4 - YesAsia_logo.gif 4 - RethinkMentalIllnesslogo250_250.jpg 4 - Faye_Wong_Fable.jpg 4 - Faye_Wong_(1997_album)_coverart.gif 4 - Li_Lili_1930s.jpg 4 - MilkAndKisses.jpg File talk 3 - Train_scales_vert.jpg MediaWiki talk 1 - Spam-blacklist Template 28 - Prophets_of_the_Tanakh 8 - Adult_model 7 - Prophets_in_the_Qur'an 7 - Housing_associations_in_London 7 - FictionSetDecade 6 - Judges 6 - Kings_of_Judah 6 - Hebrew_Bible 6 - Prime_Ministers_of_South_Korea 6 - Afdnotice2/doc Template talk 54 - Did_you_know 15 - Prophets_of_the_Tanakh 8 - Christianity 7 - Housing_associations_in_London 7 - Did_you_know/South_Africa_Conciliation_Committee 6 - Books_of_the_Bible 4 - Wiktionary 4 - Cfr 3 - Hebrew-Bible-stub 2 - Zh-j Help 2 - Section 1 - Page_history 1 - Minor_edit 1 - A_quick_guide_to_templates Category 8 - Christian_martyrs_of_the_Early_Modern_era 8 - Catholic_martyrs 7 - Films_set_in_the_future 7 - Betazoids 6 - Cardassians 6 - Fictional_females 6 - Lists_of_songs_about_a_city 6 - Anglican_cemeteries 6 - Hebrew_Bible_templates 6 - People_from_Smara Category talk 8 - Shakespearean_phrases 5 - Early_Hebrew_Christians 4 - Books_about_regions 4 - Christian_martyrs 4 - Surnames 4 - Fantasy_books_by_series 3 - British_television_miniseries 3 - Arab 3 - Arabic_languages 3 - Adaptations_of_works_by_William_Shakespeare Portal 3 - Religion/Categories 3 - Contents/Glossaries/Culture_and_the_arts 2 - Star_Trek 1 - Star_Trek/Browsebar 1 - Food/Food_lists 1 - Star_Trek/Featured_article_September 1 - Star_Trek/Featured_article 1 - Religion/Selected_biography/20 1 - Palestine/Opentask 1 - England/Selected_Picture/12_2007 Portal talk 2 - Star_Trek 2 - Discworld 1 - England
I recently had a dispute with user:Cusop Dingle ("CD") which spread over various talk pages. I am not proud of the exchange, but chose to proactively bring it to the attention of the RfA as the most questionable piece of my recent conduct which should not be overlooked in assessing my suitability.
Pseudofusulina raised legitimate questions about it at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Fayenatic london#Oppose and invited me to reply.
I was not the only editor who interpreted a series of edits by CD to Christian Concern on 28–29 January as giving an appearance of motivation to remove criticism of the subject from the article, or who found his subsequent messages offensive; see [1]. The main discussion was at NPOV Noticeboard, where I was specifically frustrated as I did not understand CD's explanation of why he had cited BLP in this edit. He explained it there on 3 Feb. After that, nothing more was said on that page, and we resumed discussion constructively on the article talk page.
Pseudofusulina asked me about my accusation on 1 Feb of "ulterior motives", perhaps seeing that as a throwaway remark adding fuel to the fire. It was not – CD and I both knew that it was the main point of that discussion on my talk page. Likewise, as for good faith, that was what I and another editor had been questioning all along. He had not answered my follow-up question about BLP so I thought he had something to hide. At that point on 1 Feb I still thought that CD had made POV edits and was maintaining a public denial of that, which is why I thought there was no point continuing the discussion. Meanwhile he thought he had explained himself and was angry at the continued questioning. Only on 3 Feb, when I repeated my specific question and he explained his reliance on BLP, did we move on.
The entire context is spread over various pages: NPOV Noticeboard, my talk page, SPI, article history and article talk page. No doubt I could have expressed myself in a more conciliatory way. Nevertheless IMHO my conduct does not rule out my fitness to be an admin, otherwise I would not have accepted the nomination. – Fayenatic (talk) 09:52, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- [en.wikipedia.org/?title=Christian_Concern&diff=next&oldid=473715221 Edit summary:] (→History: rm per WP:BLP, source cited has gone 404), subsequent edit summary: (→Controversy: source cited has gone 404).
My comments copied from RfA:
Oppose "It's a long time since I met another editor who was quite so adept at giving and taking offence. Thank you for your time."
Please click here to see the full exchange.
- If the editor was being offensive to others in the community, would your comments cool things down? If the editor excels at taking offense, are you accusing them of taking offense where none was intended? How about just saying "I think you took offense where none was intended?" Do you think your response was the helpful way for an administrator to deal with the situation?
- "Look. You made a couple of mistakes. You've graciously conceded that the article has been improved, but have maintained your denial of any ulterior motive and reacted angrily to criticism of your edit summaries." I italicized the part I discuss below.
- You've pointed out they made mistakes. You've pointed out that you were right. Was the additional accusation of "ulterior motives" necessary? What would have been the impact of assuming good faith instead of ulterior motives and saying, "Thank you for letting me know that you think my edits improved the article."
- Feel free to convince me otherwise.
Resolution of issue by both editors.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
02:30, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- I have replied on this RfA talk page. – Fayenatic (talk) 09:56, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Is it your understanding of BLP policy that "Dead links only need to be tagged, not removed," and that tagging a dead link, but not removing the associated text, complies with WP:BLP?
- "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality sources. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion.[2] Users who persistently or egregiously violate this policy may be blocked from editing."
- I think that showing other editors assumed CD was acting in bad faith does not establish bad faith on the part of CD, and it seems you are attempting to justify your assumption of bad faith.
- It seems to me that the reason behind "Assume Good Faith," is that, even if the other editor is acting in bad faith, your assumption that they are acting in good faith prevents you from inflaming the discussion. It's not about correctly identifying the real bad faith; [2] it's about how your own actions can keep a situation from becoming worse. Even if you have proof that the other party is acting in bad faith, even if they declare they are acting in bad faith, even if everyone else sees they are acting in bad faith, your moving forward under the assumption that they are acting in good faith gives you a professional attitude that can keep things cool. It keeps you in charge of your own actions during a heated discussion and does not allow you to assign responsibility to others when your own actions are the only thing you can control.
- Do you see how I can consider this to be a very important quality in an administrator? Why not? is not sufficient, in my opinion. If you want to be an administrator, be one of the people making en.wiki a better to edit. Pseudofusulina ( talk) 18:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks for responding. I think we look at this differently, and I think you will create problems as an administrator by your understanding of assume good faith, and I think your implementation of BLP will be a problem. This is my opinion. I am fine if you do not continue this discussion, it's up to you (obviously!) Pseudofusulina ( talk) 18:27, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for this follow up. Yes, I do see. I'm still learning, and this is valuable training that I will not forget. It's going to be useful that it will always be here.
- Re AGF: In the above, I was explaining why I thought my message about "ulterior motive" was not making things worse than they were already. You've helpfully taken the matter back to the underlying trigger, which I now see was when I wrote "To be honest the balance of evidence is making it difficult for me to WP:AGF. It looks to me as if you made a series of edits claiming to be implementing policies but actually pursuing a POV agenda. ... – Fayenatic 18:38, 31 January". I see now that that was wrong of me, and whether or not (but especially if) I am made an admin, a higher standard is required. It took a few days for CD to explain his edits in a way that I understood, but in the meantime it was my failure to AGF that inflamed the situation. I do owe CD an apology.
- Yes, in this instance, after reading the entire affair, this is what it came down to, your failure to assume good faith made a tricky situation bad. I did not think you would see it, but I think your willingness to go head on and discuss the situation was initially sufficient to show good faith on your part in accepting the negative feedback I gave.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
23:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- That's encouraging. But please don't stop now—this is so useful. In fact a couple of more obviously contentious BLP cases came up on my watchlist tonight and I did some work there, so please review my contributions this evening in case they point up any more lessons. – Fayenatic (talk) 20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, in this instance, after reading the entire affair, this is what it came down to, your failure to assume good faith made a tricky situation bad. I did not think you would see it, but I think your willingness to go head on and discuss the situation was initially sufficient to show good faith on your part in accepting the negative feedback I gave.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
23:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Re AGF: In the above, I was explaining why I thought my message about "ulterior motive" was not making things worse than they were already. You've helpfully taken the matter back to the underlying trigger, which I now see was when I wrote "To be honest the balance of evidence is making it difficult for me to WP:AGF. It looks to me as if you made a series of edits claiming to be implementing policies but actually pursuing a POV agenda. ... – Fayenatic 18:38, 31 January". I see now that that was wrong of me, and whether or not (but especially if) I am made an admin, a higher standard is required. It took a few days for CD to explain his edits in a way that I understood, but in the meantime it was my failure to AGF that inflamed the situation. I do owe CD an apology.
- Re BLP: when I left that edit summary on 29 January, I was reading the deleted text as signifying merely that two named individuals worked for the new organisation having worked for the old one. I took those statements as unexceptionable, given that (i) they could still be demonstrated from other pages within the organisations' websites, and (ii) the dead citation had been checked in the past, by myself as well as by the editor who had added the citation in the first place (that's what I meant when I later described the dead link as verified even though not currently verifiable). If that had been the whole significance of the deleted text, and it was therefore neither contentious nor likely to be challenged, then I still think (but am open to correction) that it would have been sufficient to tag the link as dead, prompting a search for a replacement citation. However, CD subsequently demonstrated to me that the text had additional significance which was potentially more sensitive. I think I demonstrated respect for BLP by not reinstating the deleted text again after 29 Jan while I was asking what was sensitive about it. But feel free to keep going, this is very helpful. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
22:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is the purpose behind the policy, "Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." (I added italics.)
- Thank you. I understand that more widely now than I did before.
- With BLPs it's more important to remove the unsourced material first and ask questions later. Once CD removed the material, it was clear that he considered the material contentious, and that is sufficient under Wikipedia's BLP policy for complete removal of the material. As a matter of policy in editing, CD's removal was correct, and you should not have reverted any of the material. The article or user talk page (depending up the nature of the removed material) can be used to discuss before reverting material with an edit summary about a BLP violation.
- I have absorbed most of that. But if you mean I should not have reverted any of
this material, that still comes as a surprise to me. I saw the section on the Channel 4 documentary as notable coverage of the organisation rather than a BLP matter; the main discussion was about whether that should be included in the article because of NPOV, rather than because of BLP. (And that discussion in turn hinged on whether there was continuity between the activities covered in the film and the new organisation.) Did you just mean not any of the material which was removed citing BLP in the edit summary?
[3] if so then I do now understand and fully agree. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- The article has a talk page. Pseudofusulina ( talk) 02:20, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- I have absorbed most of that. But if you mean I should not have reverted any of
this material, that still comes as a surprise to me. I saw the section on the Channel 4 documentary as notable coverage of the organisation rather than a BLP matter; the main discussion was about whether that should be included in the article because of NPOV, rather than because of BLP. (And that discussion in turn hinged on whether there was continuity between the activities covered in the film and the new organisation.) Did you just mean not any of the material which was removed citing BLP in the edit summary?
[3] if so then I do now understand and fully agree. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- If the material is contentious, then it requires a reliable outside party reporting it, not an organization's website. For a BLP, remove the text, find a solid reference with a working link, then add the text back if it is otherwise appropriate to the article.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
23:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- So can an organisation's website or press releases never be cited about the departure of its staff? What about the appointment of staff? –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality sources. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation." Do we allow people to write articles about their organizations, assert the notability on their organization's website, then claim it is a reliable source? The fact is, not only was the material "likely to be challenged," it was challenged--by CD. :::::If the departure of the staff is notable, a news organization, not Wikipedia, can and will use the material in the news. If it's not notable, then it stays a press release.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
02:20, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- I was thinking of other cases.
WP:SELFPUB says "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities", subject to caveats. Thinking of how this applies to other pages that I've edited, those caveats are not currently met for
Tony Anthony (evangelist), which uses mainly self-published sources or sources that have published his own account apparently without investigation/verification, and is likely to be deleted again. In contrast, high-profile whistleblower
Michael Woodford (executive) has masses of top-quality sources about his departure, but company sources may add a few points of detail about his previous career history... I think I've got it now. Thanks very much for mentoring me like this. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
17:39, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- The Tony Anthony article comes under "other stuff," the material should be deleted from wikipedia to comply with our BLP policy; it should not be cited to justify inclusion elsewhere
- Not all policies on wikipedia have the same weight. The BLP policy, in my opinion, could hardly be clearer that the issue is to protect living persons from unsourced data by keeping the unsourced data off of wikipedia. Sometimes you have to stop doing and think about what is behind a policy.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
00:41, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- I did not mean to give the impression that I was citing the Tony Anthony article to justify anything else. I mentioned it to show that I understand the conditions included in WP:SELFPUB. I don't think I have lost sight of what is behind BLP. IMHO one of my strengths is keeping the big picture in view at the same time as I am giving attention to detail; I think this is why my activity in closing CFDss is valued so highly by the admins who nominated me.
- One of the troubles with BLP is that editors perceive it being cited as an excuse to remove valid material, e.g.
[4] (I'm not expressing any opinion on that one, just citing it as another recent example of the recurring perception). As discussed above, that was my own perception of one of the edits to
Christian Concern on 28-29 January, but you have cured me of that, and I will give much more weight to BLP and AGF in future. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
14:29, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- I think you'll do fine as an administrator. I can't image why anyone would want to be one, but I feel comfortable with your less-than-stellar, but generally excellent, editing and interaction record, and your responses here: you're human, you'll make mistakes, you'll move on because you will allow others to point them out to you, and you won't be afraid to help out in messes that might stain perfection. One piece of advice: don't get too invested in whether someone understands you or not, especially when what's usually at stake in a mess is whether you understand them. You're trying to do the latter, which is a good thing, so it's okay to slack on the former. That's entirely based upon my opinion. Pseudofusulina ( talk) 21:58, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- I was thinking of other cases.
WP:SELFPUB says "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities", subject to caveats. Thinking of how this applies to other pages that I've edited, those caveats are not currently met for
Tony Anthony (evangelist), which uses mainly self-published sources or sources that have published his own account apparently without investigation/verification, and is likely to be deleted again. In contrast, high-profile whistleblower
Michael Woodford (executive) has masses of top-quality sources about his departure, but company sources may add a few points of detail about his previous career history... I think I've got it now. Thanks very much for mentoring me like this. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
17:39, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality sources. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation." Do we allow people to write articles about their organizations, assert the notability on their organization's website, then claim it is a reliable source? The fact is, not only was the material "likely to be challenged," it was challenged--by CD. :::::If the departure of the staff is notable, a news organization, not Wikipedia, can and will use the material in the news. If it's not notable, then it stays a press release.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
02:20, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- So can an organisation's website or press releases never be cited about the departure of its staff? What about the appointment of staff? –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is the purpose behind the policy, "Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." (I added italics.)
- Re BLP: when I left that edit summary on 29 January, I was reading the deleted text as signifying merely that two named individuals worked for the new organisation having worked for the old one. I took those statements as unexceptionable, given that (i) they could still be demonstrated from other pages within the organisations' websites, and (ii) the dead citation had been checked in the past, by myself as well as by the editor who had added the citation in the first place (that's what I meant when I later described the dead link as verified even though not currently verifiable). If that had been the whole significance of the deleted text, and it was therefore neither contentious nor likely to be challenged, then I still think (but am open to correction) that it would have been sufficient to tag the link as dead, prompting a search for a replacement citation. However, CD subsequently demonstrated to me that the text had additional significance which was potentially more sensitive. I think I demonstrated respect for BLP by not reinstating the deleted text again after 29 Jan while I was asking what was sensitive about it. But feel free to keep going, this is very helpful. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
22:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
As of 19:46, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
Username: Fayenatic london User groups: autoreviewer, reviewer First edit: Jun 18, 2006 18:06:44 Unique pages edited: 19,218 Average edits per page: 2.15 Live edits: 39,070 Deleted edits: 2,222 Total edits (including deleted): 41,292 Namespace Totals Article 26332 67.40% Talk 2311 5.92% User 440 1.13% User talk 2788 7.14% Wikipedia 1886 4.83% Wikipedia talk 215 0.55% File 152 0.39% File talk 3 0.01% MediaWiki talk 1 0.00% Template 428 1.10% Template talk 145 0.37% Help 5 0.01% Category 4118 10.54% Category talk 211 0.54% Portal 27 0.07% Portal talk 5 0.01% Month counts2006/06 5 2006/07 19 2006/08 5 2006/09 41 2006/10 115 2006/11 132 2006/12 472 2007/01 962 2007/02 656 2007/03 862 2007/04 475 2007/05 402 2007/06 343 2007/07 402 2007/08 580 2007/09 640 2007/10 578 2007/11 578 2007/12 817 2008/01 738 2008/02 508 2008/03 512 2008/04 539 2008/05 927 2008/06 666 2008/07 141 2008/08 503 2008/09 760 2008/10 1413 2008/11 593 2008/12 411 2009/01 539 2009/02 707 2009/03 802 2009/04 474 2009/05 607 2009/06 414 2009/07 322 2009/08 425 2009/09 853 2009/10 411 2009/11 192 2009/12 189 2010/01 458 2010/02 301 2010/03 619 2010/04 920 2010/05 752 2010/06 551 2010/07 801 2010/08 942 2010/09 398 2010/10 333 2010/11 407 2010/12 617 2011/01 243 2011/02 51 2011/03 170 2011/04 384 2011/05 683 2011/06 1637 2011/07 1360 2011/08 1630 2011/09 911 2011/10 711 2011/11 380 2011/12 817 2012/01 939 2012/02 322 Top edited pagesArticle 139 - Faye_Wong 120 - Christian 110 - Shrivastava 74 - Faye_Wong_discography 64 - John_3:16 61 - Chartered_Accountant 59 - Zechariah 58 - Rajmohan_Pillai 56 - Nathan 54 - Zack Talk 41 - Faye_Wong 17 - Christian 17 - Rajmohan_Pillai 13 - Varshney 13 - Three_wise_monkeys 13 - Faye_Wong_discography 12 - Chapters_and_verses_of_the_Bible 12 - John_3:16 12 - David_C._C._Watson 12 - Institute_of_Chartered_Accountants_of_India User 138 - Fayenatic_london 41 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox 34 - Fayenatic_london/ToDo 18 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox2 18 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox3 14 - Fayenatic_london/monobook.js 6 - Fayenatic_london/vector.js 6 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox4 4 - Fayenatic_london/Sandbox6 3 - Fayenatic_london/BMA_Entertainment User talk 70 - Fayenatic_london/Archive06 48 - Fayenatic_london/Archive03 45 - Fayenatic_london/Archive04 45 - Fayenatic_london/Archive05 23 - Monika_London 23 - Fayenatic_london/Archive01 23 - Fayenatic_london/Archive02 22 - Fayenatic_london 18 - DGG 17 - Timrollpickering Wikipedia 52 - WikiProject_Anthroponymy/Home_backup 40 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_August_18 40 - WikiProject_Deletion_sorting/Christianity 37 - Categories_for_discussion/Speedy 23 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_August_22 19 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_July_13 19 - Requests_for_page_protection 18 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_August_5 17 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_September_10 17 - Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_September_14 Wikipedia talk 41 - WikiProject_Anthroponymy 25 - WikiProject_Star_Trek 19 - No_original_research 16 - WikiProject_Albums 7 - WikiProject_Christianity 5 - WikiProject_Literature 5 - WikiProject_Multi-sport_events 5 - WikiProject_Star_Trek/to_do 4 - WikiProject_Fictional_characters 4 - External_links File 7 - FayeNoEvil.jpg 7 - Cocteau_Twins_promo_sheet.jpg 6 - Smileangel.jpg 5 - Only_Love_Strangers.jpg 4 - YesAsia_logo.gif 4 - RethinkMentalIllnesslogo250_250.jpg 4 - Faye_Wong_Fable.jpg 4 - Faye_Wong_(1997_album)_coverart.gif 4 - Li_Lili_1930s.jpg 4 - MilkAndKisses.jpg File talk 3 - Train_scales_vert.jpg MediaWiki talk 1 - Spam-blacklist Template 28 - Prophets_of_the_Tanakh 8 - Adult_model 7 - Prophets_in_the_Qur'an 7 - Housing_associations_in_London 7 - FictionSetDecade 6 - Judges 6 - Kings_of_Judah 6 - Hebrew_Bible 6 - Prime_Ministers_of_South_Korea 6 - Afdnotice2/doc Template talk 54 - Did_you_know 15 - Prophets_of_the_Tanakh 8 - Christianity 7 - Housing_associations_in_London 7 - Did_you_know/South_Africa_Conciliation_Committee 6 - Books_of_the_Bible 4 - Wiktionary 4 - Cfr 3 - Hebrew-Bible-stub 2 - Zh-j Help 2 - Section 1 - Page_history 1 - Minor_edit 1 - A_quick_guide_to_templates Category 8 - Christian_martyrs_of_the_Early_Modern_era 8 - Catholic_martyrs 7 - Films_set_in_the_future 7 - Betazoids 6 - Cardassians 6 - Fictional_females 6 - Lists_of_songs_about_a_city 6 - Anglican_cemeteries 6 - Hebrew_Bible_templates 6 - People_from_Smara Category talk 8 - Shakespearean_phrases 5 - Early_Hebrew_Christians 4 - Books_about_regions 4 - Christian_martyrs 4 - Surnames 4 - Fantasy_books_by_series 3 - British_television_miniseries 3 - Arab 3 - Arabic_languages 3 - Adaptations_of_works_by_William_Shakespeare Portal 3 - Religion/Categories 3 - Contents/Glossaries/Culture_and_the_arts 2 - Star_Trek 1 - Star_Trek/Browsebar 1 - Food/Food_lists 1 - Star_Trek/Featured_article_September 1 - Star_Trek/Featured_article 1 - Religion/Selected_biography/20 1 - Palestine/Opentask 1 - England/Selected_Picture/12_2007 Portal talk 2 - Star_Trek 2 - Discworld 1 - England
I recently had a dispute with user:Cusop Dingle ("CD") which spread over various talk pages. I am not proud of the exchange, but chose to proactively bring it to the attention of the RfA as the most questionable piece of my recent conduct which should not be overlooked in assessing my suitability.
Pseudofusulina raised legitimate questions about it at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Fayenatic london#Oppose and invited me to reply.
I was not the only editor who interpreted a series of edits by CD to Christian Concern on 28–29 January as giving an appearance of motivation to remove criticism of the subject from the article, or who found his subsequent messages offensive; see [1]. The main discussion was at NPOV Noticeboard, where I was specifically frustrated as I did not understand CD's explanation of why he had cited BLP in this edit. He explained it there on 3 Feb. After that, nothing more was said on that page, and we resumed discussion constructively on the article talk page.
Pseudofusulina asked me about my accusation on 1 Feb of "ulterior motives", perhaps seeing that as a throwaway remark adding fuel to the fire. It was not – CD and I both knew that it was the main point of that discussion on my talk page. Likewise, as for good faith, that was what I and another editor had been questioning all along. He had not answered my follow-up question about BLP so I thought he had something to hide. At that point on 1 Feb I still thought that CD had made POV edits and was maintaining a public denial of that, which is why I thought there was no point continuing the discussion. Meanwhile he thought he had explained himself and was angry at the continued questioning. Only on 3 Feb, when I repeated my specific question and he explained his reliance on BLP, did we move on.
The entire context is spread over various pages: NPOV Noticeboard, my talk page, SPI, article history and article talk page. No doubt I could have expressed myself in a more conciliatory way. Nevertheless IMHO my conduct does not rule out my fitness to be an admin, otherwise I would not have accepted the nomination. – Fayenatic (talk) 09:52, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- [en.wikipedia.org/?title=Christian_Concern&diff=next&oldid=473715221 Edit summary:] (→History: rm per WP:BLP, source cited has gone 404), subsequent edit summary: (→Controversy: source cited has gone 404).
My comments copied from RfA:
Oppose "It's a long time since I met another editor who was quite so adept at giving and taking offence. Thank you for your time."
Please click here to see the full exchange.
- If the editor was being offensive to others in the community, would your comments cool things down? If the editor excels at taking offense, are you accusing them of taking offense where none was intended? How about just saying "I think you took offense where none was intended?" Do you think your response was the helpful way for an administrator to deal with the situation?
- "Look. You made a couple of mistakes. You've graciously conceded that the article has been improved, but have maintained your denial of any ulterior motive and reacted angrily to criticism of your edit summaries." I italicized the part I discuss below.
- You've pointed out they made mistakes. You've pointed out that you were right. Was the additional accusation of "ulterior motives" necessary? What would have been the impact of assuming good faith instead of ulterior motives and saying, "Thank you for letting me know that you think my edits improved the article."
- Feel free to convince me otherwise.
Resolution of issue by both editors.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
02:30, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- I have replied on this RfA talk page. – Fayenatic (talk) 09:56, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Is it your understanding of BLP policy that "Dead links only need to be tagged, not removed," and that tagging a dead link, but not removing the associated text, complies with WP:BLP?
- "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality sources. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion.[2] Users who persistently or egregiously violate this policy may be blocked from editing."
- I think that showing other editors assumed CD was acting in bad faith does not establish bad faith on the part of CD, and it seems you are attempting to justify your assumption of bad faith.
- It seems to me that the reason behind "Assume Good Faith," is that, even if the other editor is acting in bad faith, your assumption that they are acting in good faith prevents you from inflaming the discussion. It's not about correctly identifying the real bad faith; [2] it's about how your own actions can keep a situation from becoming worse. Even if you have proof that the other party is acting in bad faith, even if they declare they are acting in bad faith, even if everyone else sees they are acting in bad faith, your moving forward under the assumption that they are acting in good faith gives you a professional attitude that can keep things cool. It keeps you in charge of your own actions during a heated discussion and does not allow you to assign responsibility to others when your own actions are the only thing you can control.
- Do you see how I can consider this to be a very important quality in an administrator? Why not? is not sufficient, in my opinion. If you want to be an administrator, be one of the people making en.wiki a better to edit. Pseudofusulina ( talk) 18:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thanks for responding. I think we look at this differently, and I think you will create problems as an administrator by your understanding of assume good faith, and I think your implementation of BLP will be a problem. This is my opinion. I am fine if you do not continue this discussion, it's up to you (obviously!) Pseudofusulina ( talk) 18:27, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Thank you very much for this follow up. Yes, I do see. I'm still learning, and this is valuable training that I will not forget. It's going to be useful that it will always be here.
- Re AGF: In the above, I was explaining why I thought my message about "ulterior motive" was not making things worse than they were already. You've helpfully taken the matter back to the underlying trigger, which I now see was when I wrote "To be honest the balance of evidence is making it difficult for me to WP:AGF. It looks to me as if you made a series of edits claiming to be implementing policies but actually pursuing a POV agenda. ... – Fayenatic 18:38, 31 January". I see now that that was wrong of me, and whether or not (but especially if) I am made an admin, a higher standard is required. It took a few days for CD to explain his edits in a way that I understood, but in the meantime it was my failure to AGF that inflamed the situation. I do owe CD an apology.
- Yes, in this instance, after reading the entire affair, this is what it came down to, your failure to assume good faith made a tricky situation bad. I did not think you would see it, but I think your willingness to go head on and discuss the situation was initially sufficient to show good faith on your part in accepting the negative feedback I gave.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
23:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- That's encouraging. But please don't stop now—this is so useful. In fact a couple of more obviously contentious BLP cases came up on my watchlist tonight and I did some work there, so please review my contributions this evening in case they point up any more lessons. – Fayenatic (talk) 20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- Yes, in this instance, after reading the entire affair, this is what it came down to, your failure to assume good faith made a tricky situation bad. I did not think you would see it, but I think your willingness to go head on and discuss the situation was initially sufficient to show good faith on your part in accepting the negative feedback I gave.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
23:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- Re AGF: In the above, I was explaining why I thought my message about "ulterior motive" was not making things worse than they were already. You've helpfully taken the matter back to the underlying trigger, which I now see was when I wrote "To be honest the balance of evidence is making it difficult for me to WP:AGF. It looks to me as if you made a series of edits claiming to be implementing policies but actually pursuing a POV agenda. ... – Fayenatic 18:38, 31 January". I see now that that was wrong of me, and whether or not (but especially if) I am made an admin, a higher standard is required. It took a few days for CD to explain his edits in a way that I understood, but in the meantime it was my failure to AGF that inflamed the situation. I do owe CD an apology.
- Re BLP: when I left that edit summary on 29 January, I was reading the deleted text as signifying merely that two named individuals worked for the new organisation having worked for the old one. I took those statements as unexceptionable, given that (i) they could still be demonstrated from other pages within the organisations' websites, and (ii) the dead citation had been checked in the past, by myself as well as by the editor who had added the citation in the first place (that's what I meant when I later described the dead link as verified even though not currently verifiable). If that had been the whole significance of the deleted text, and it was therefore neither contentious nor likely to be challenged, then I still think (but am open to correction) that it would have been sufficient to tag the link as dead, prompting a search for a replacement citation. However, CD subsequently demonstrated to me that the text had additional significance which was potentially more sensitive. I think I demonstrated respect for BLP by not reinstating the deleted text again after 29 Jan while I was asking what was sensitive about it. But feel free to keep going, this is very helpful. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
22:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is the purpose behind the policy, "Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." (I added italics.)
- Thank you. I understand that more widely now than I did before.
- With BLPs it's more important to remove the unsourced material first and ask questions later. Once CD removed the material, it was clear that he considered the material contentious, and that is sufficient under Wikipedia's BLP policy for complete removal of the material. As a matter of policy in editing, CD's removal was correct, and you should not have reverted any of the material. The article or user talk page (depending up the nature of the removed material) can be used to discuss before reverting material with an edit summary about a BLP violation.
- I have absorbed most of that. But if you mean I should not have reverted any of
this material, that still comes as a surprise to me. I saw the section on the Channel 4 documentary as notable coverage of the organisation rather than a BLP matter; the main discussion was about whether that should be included in the article because of NPOV, rather than because of BLP. (And that discussion in turn hinged on whether there was continuity between the activities covered in the film and the new organisation.) Did you just mean not any of the material which was removed citing BLP in the edit summary?
[3] if so then I do now understand and fully agree. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- The article has a talk page. Pseudofusulina ( talk) 02:20, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- I have absorbed most of that. But if you mean I should not have reverted any of
this material, that still comes as a surprise to me. I saw the section on the Channel 4 documentary as notable coverage of the organisation rather than a BLP matter; the main discussion was about whether that should be included in the article because of NPOV, rather than because of BLP. (And that discussion in turn hinged on whether there was continuity between the activities covered in the film and the new organisation.) Did you just mean not any of the material which was removed citing BLP in the edit summary?
[3] if so then I do now understand and fully agree. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- If the material is contentious, then it requires a reliable outside party reporting it, not an organization's website. For a BLP, remove the text, find a solid reference with a working link, then add the text back if it is otherwise appropriate to the article.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
23:12, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
- So can an organisation's website or press releases never be cited about the departure of its staff? What about the appointment of staff? –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality sources. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation." Do we allow people to write articles about their organizations, assert the notability on their organization's website, then claim it is a reliable source? The fact is, not only was the material "likely to be challenged," it was challenged--by CD. :::::If the departure of the staff is notable, a news organization, not Wikipedia, can and will use the material in the news. If it's not notable, then it stays a press release.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
02:20, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- I was thinking of other cases.
WP:SELFPUB says "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities", subject to caveats. Thinking of how this applies to other pages that I've edited, those caveats are not currently met for
Tony Anthony (evangelist), which uses mainly self-published sources or sources that have published his own account apparently without investigation/verification, and is likely to be deleted again. In contrast, high-profile whistleblower
Michael Woodford (executive) has masses of top-quality sources about his departure, but company sources may add a few points of detail about his previous career history... I think I've got it now. Thanks very much for mentoring me like this. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
17:39, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- The Tony Anthony article comes under "other stuff," the material should be deleted from wikipedia to comply with our BLP policy; it should not be cited to justify inclusion elsewhere
- Not all policies on wikipedia have the same weight. The BLP policy, in my opinion, could hardly be clearer that the issue is to protect living persons from unsourced data by keeping the unsourced data off of wikipedia. Sometimes you have to stop doing and think about what is behind a policy.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
00:41, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- I did not mean to give the impression that I was citing the Tony Anthony article to justify anything else. I mentioned it to show that I understand the conditions included in WP:SELFPUB. I don't think I have lost sight of what is behind BLP. IMHO one of my strengths is keeping the big picture in view at the same time as I am giving attention to detail; I think this is why my activity in closing CFDss is valued so highly by the admins who nominated me.
- One of the troubles with BLP is that editors perceive it being cited as an excuse to remove valid material, e.g.
[4] (I'm not expressing any opinion on that one, just citing it as another recent example of the recurring perception). As discussed above, that was my own perception of one of the edits to
Christian Concern on 28-29 January, but you have cured me of that, and I will give much more weight to BLP and AGF in future. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
14:29, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- I think you'll do fine as an administrator. I can't image why anyone would want to be one, but I feel comfortable with your less-than-stellar, but generally excellent, editing and interaction record, and your responses here: you're human, you'll make mistakes, you'll move on because you will allow others to point them out to you, and you won't be afraid to help out in messes that might stain perfection. One piece of advice: don't get too invested in whether someone understands you or not, especially when what's usually at stake in a mess is whether you understand them. You're trying to do the latter, which is a good thing, so it's okay to slack on the former. That's entirely based upon my opinion. Pseudofusulina ( talk) 21:58, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
- I was thinking of other cases.
WP:SELFPUB says "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities", subject to caveats. Thinking of how this applies to other pages that I've edited, those caveats are not currently met for
Tony Anthony (evangelist), which uses mainly self-published sources or sources that have published his own account apparently without investigation/verification, and is likely to be deleted again. In contrast, high-profile whistleblower
Michael Woodford (executive) has masses of top-quality sources about his departure, but company sources may add a few points of detail about his previous career history... I think I've got it now. Thanks very much for mentoring me like this. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
17:39, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- "We must get the article right. Be very firm about the use of high quality sources. All quotations and any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be explicitly attributed to a reliable, published source, which is usually done with an inline citation." Do we allow people to write articles about their organizations, assert the notability on their organization's website, then claim it is a reliable source? The fact is, not only was the material "likely to be challenged," it was challenged--by CD. :::::If the departure of the staff is notable, a news organization, not Wikipedia, can and will use the material in the news. If it's not notable, then it stays a press release.
Pseudofusulina (
talk)
02:20, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
- So can an organisation's website or press releases never be cited about the departure of its staff? What about the appointment of staff? –
Fayenatic
(talk)
20:30, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
- This is the purpose behind the policy, "Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." (I added italics.)
- Re BLP: when I left that edit summary on 29 January, I was reading the deleted text as signifying merely that two named individuals worked for the new organisation having worked for the old one. I took those statements as unexceptionable, given that (i) they could still be demonstrated from other pages within the organisations' websites, and (ii) the dead citation had been checked in the past, by myself as well as by the editor who had added the citation in the first place (that's what I meant when I later described the dead link as verified even though not currently verifiable). If that had been the whole significance of the deleted text, and it was therefore neither contentious nor likely to be challenged, then I still think (but am open to correction) that it would have been sufficient to tag the link as dead, prompting a search for a replacement citation. However, CD subsequently demonstrated to me that the text had additional significance which was potentially more sensitive. I think I demonstrated respect for BLP by not reinstating the deleted text again after 29 Jan while I was asking what was sensitive about it. But feel free to keep going, this is very helpful. –
Fayenatic
(talk)
22:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)