Disputes involving Vintagekits have been brewing for several months. Vintagekits, an Irish editor, appears to have a strong aversion to articles about British nobility and titled commoners, such as baronets. This has brought Vintagekits into conflict with editors on WikiProject:Baronetcies such as Kittybrewster, who I believe self-identifies as a baronet in real life and who has written articles about numerous members of his extended family, some of which have been proposed for deletion on notability and/or sourcing grounds. Some editors had the initial reaction that these articles were being sought out and proposed for deletion on ideological grounds; however, further investigation led by previously uninvolved editors such as Giano and Mackensen, revealed that serious reason did exist for concern about these articles, justifying at least to some degree Vintagekits' position. Harsh language and other user conduct during that dispute was regrettable but that dispute, in and of itself, is probably too stale to be arbitrated.
The particular dispute quieted for awhile but I gather from Vintagekits' talkpage that he has been involved in some other controversies, also generally related to disputes between Irish and British editors. There were some prior blocks and, after discussion, unblocks and several admins including but not limited to Alison and SirFozzie have made strong good-faith attempts to salvage the situation, which regrettably seem to have been unsuccessful.
Most recently, Vintagekits clearly crossed the line of acceptable discourse very seriously in his edits cited above by Rockpocket. It is clear that some administrator action was warranted based on those edits, particularly in view of the conditions of his prior unblocking. There remains the issue of whether an indefinite block, as imposed by Alison, was the appropriate response. Alison has asserted on Vintagekits' talkpage that, in addition to improper comments such as those quoted above, Vintagekits has made very serious threats (in two edits now oversighted) involving another editor's real-life identity and address, mandating a definitive and permanent block. There have also been references to a series of abusive e-mails; it is not clear to me whether Vintagekits has admitted or denied having written these. Other editors on the talkpage have acknowledged that Vintagekits made at least some highly inappropriate edits but have urged that he was, to an extent, provoked into doing so.
On Vintagekits' talkpage, Alison has also stated that she believes that based on his conduct, it would be inappropriate for Vintagekits to be unblocked even for the limited purpose of participating in an arbitration case. My understanding is that Alison has communicated privately with one or more arbitrators concerning the content of the threats. Beyond that, neither I nor probably any other user can intelligently comment here because I have not seen the evidence and it does not seem appropriate to post it here.
The questions with which the arbitrators are presented, then, are (1) should the evidence against Vintagekits be considered privately or on-wiki and how should all interested parties be heard; (2) does the evidence against Vintagekits support an indefinite block or a formal ban; and (3) does this case present an appropriate vehicle to discuss any other issues beyond the narrow one of whether Vintagekits should remain blocked. Newyorkbrad 22:14, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
Earlier this year I was involved in trying to (unofficially) mediate between Vintagekits and some other users over Norman Stronge, Hugh Fraser, 1st Baron Fraser of Allander and divers Baronets. I can't comment on the more recent issues brought up but I did form the view that Vintagekits' tendency to view edits through the prism of the Anglo-Irish conflict was very damaging and made it very difficult for him to function effectively in a neutral encyclopaedia. I also felt he unduly personalised his dispute with Kittybrewster. However, he was able with some guidance to see others' points of view and move on. This case has many of the aspects of an 'appeal against community ban' which the committee takes up if there's a reason for believing the ban may be excessive. Pace Squeakbox, it may be that a wider finding would be of assistance. Sam Blacketer 22:35, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
A British editor once said to me that "Ireland needed a second dose of Cromwell". Was he blocked, no. Was he warned, no. But Vintagekits is editing in the Anglo-American-Centric Wikipedia. So Vk, you couldn't win this one. He was brought down by the pack. I don't agree with Vk on everything he writes, but it only boiled up a few times. Neither would I nobble anyone else under similar circumstances. -- Thepiper 10:36, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
Please advise which senior administrator or member of the ArbCom panel changed the title of the ArbCom case assessing the behaviour of a particular user and his indefinite ban, to a far broader title which basically encompasses a vast segment of Northern Irish politics. I have no wish to be involved in the latter. My comments were made in good faith regarding the heading of the original case, and I think it extremely bad form that the heading has been changed without first contacting all those who had already contributed a comment. If the arbitrarily changed heading is to remain I shall withdraw my comment. David Lauder 12:25, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
Moved from case page: *Later thought. This seems now to be turned into a discussion about "The Troubles" in which I have very little interest. I edited Bobby Sands a while ago and later contributed to a few afds on various terrorists / freedom fighters (depending on one's perspective). The consequence was that User:Vintagekits and User:Giano_II started attacking articles to which I had contributed. Bad game. Not interested. - Kittybrewster (talk) 13:07, 31 August 2007 (UTC) -- - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 13:10, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
Could a clerk comment on whether the committee is planning to consider the circumstances around and leading up to Vk's block, specifically, in this case? I ask because at least one committee member stated "I have no interest in examining the block of Vintagekits" in accepting the case. I have plenty of evidence to submit regarding Vk's behaviour, but if this is not being considered then there is little point me adding to what will be an already extremely evidence heavy case. In addition, much of the poor behaviour spanned not only articles relating to the Troubles, but migrated across to articles on baronetcies. Will the committee consider evidence from this subject area too? I ask because some of the most damaging sockpuppetry and meat-puppetry involving some of the major protagonists occurred on Afd's relating to these articles rather than those directly related to the Troubles. And while we are at it, there was some pretty poor behaviour on, for example, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Bhoys from Seville. Will evidence from these tangentially related subjects be considered also? Rockpocke t 17:54, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
On his talk page, Vintagekits has made a proposal:
-- Rockpocke t 20:10, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
Gave notice here that he was being added. SirFozzie 19:24, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
I'm not all that familiar with some of the more detailed aspects of Wikipedia's rules and regulations, so I'm just going to use this opportunity to make a statement, which may be quite verbose and may take me a couple of sessions to finish. This statement will be based on my observations, my experiences and my thoughts.
I started editing Wikipedia sometime in 2005 or 2004, well before I created this account. Quite unaware of the rules, I engaged in an edit war with User:Lapsed Pacifist on Northern Ireland Policing Board. That edit war was prompted by the Republican propaganda being employed there. Of course none of that matters any more. I also around that time started editing the wiki on politics.ie. User:Padraig is an administrator there, and as you will see of my user page there, I no longer wish to contribute to that project. I was the only unionist amongst a cabal of disparate nationalist contributors, most of whom conspired to ensure that the Irish Nationalist version of history prevails on that Irish political so called encyclopedia.
There is a dreadful campaign to eradicate the flag of Northern Ireland from wikipedia, leaving the article on Northern Ireland the only one possibly in the world without it's flag displayed. This is despite mounds of evidence that the flag is the de facto and fair use flag of Northern Ireland. And why does this campaign exist? As it suits Nationalists for the flag not to be there, as they don't believe that NI should exist at all.
Then we have the incident where nationalists tag teamed on Orange Institution (thereby ensuring that I got blocked but they didn't) to have the order described as sectarian in the opening paragraph, a statement backed up, not by a neutral author, but Michael Farrell. Now that we have a reasonable compromise, they refuse to have a quote in quotation marks. Such a use of the word sectarian is highly offensive to hundreds of thousands of Orangemen and Women across the world.
We have a situation were nationalist editors claim WP:MOS to say that things that don't exist do exists, for example the Lord Mayor of Derry in the NI Senate and the City of Derry County Grand Lodge. Clear POV pushes based on a falsehood Wikipedia has endorsed in WP:MOS, a situation that leads me to not support wholeheartedly the principle of consensus. It doesn't always work on an encyclopedia. What if I managed to get consensus that the holocaust didn't happen? It would be wikipeida policy, and presumably someone would go to jail in Austria.
We have a stupid, inane, pointless, tiresome, stupid again edit war over the flags used on FIFA 08 when there is a clear consensus which goes much much wider than wikipedia.
There is a cultural war in Northern Ireland at present. Republicans are much better than Unionists at educating their communities in the republican version of history. When I was at University I was amazed at the level of indoctrination that exists within the republican community. The sectarian orginisation the GAA is a brilliant vehicle for it. The Irish Language is brilliant weapon in the war to remove all Britishness from my region of the UK. This is relevant, as wikipedia has been made a battleground in this campaign. A user has made some comments that I do not wish to be associated with on Talk:Bobby Sands, but his reaction to the refusal by some to allow the mob who murdered a milkman when Bobby Sands committed suicided, be called nationalist was to say that people were looking for sources to say that the water is wet. The rules are being abused by nationalists, and they can be abused, as the Internet is awash with republican propaganda that can be used as sources. I hold wikipedia in high regard, it got me through many an essay during my undergraduate studies (shhh though), but Northern Ireland politics and history is fast becoming a lost cause. NPOV is trampled over for political reasons by Nationalist editors.
I wish to add something. What is very apparent amongst Nationalist editors, is a detailed and meticulous knowledge of the Wikipedia rules. There is nothing wrong with that per se, but it is being used in damaging ways. For examples Talk:Orange Institution is perfect, although there are others. I am adding this as it worries me. It is perfectly possible to follow the rules to the letter, yet still be wrong. This happens time after time after time, particularly it has to be said with references. There was an instance on Orange Institution where references were provided to say that the Institution is sectarian. This was all opinion, by commentators who could all be identified with some basic research to have some sort of connection with Nationalist Ireland. Yet the nationalist POV tag team insisted that this "evidence" was damming. It wasn't, it was opinion being dressed up as fact. The rules are not always right, and this is becoming an increasing problem around Northern Ireland issues.
I don't know where else to put this. I disagree with this. It is fair enough to reference opinion, so long as it is accredited as opinion. The problem we have, is that opinion is being dressed up as fact. It is also being done with a very clear agenda and in a worryingly increasing frequency. Traditional unionist 00:23, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Domers evidence ( a) relates to this; I agreed to mediation before this Arbcon surfaced [1]. I suspect his reasoning is all animals are equal at mediation but some animals are more equal than others at Arbcom.
My total edits to Orange Institution can be shown by one diff [2]. I suspected the Wolfpack would attack so I posted an ANI (and posted to Fred's page). Two admins, JzG and EliminatorJR, stepped in after me and actually got the consensus building process going. Some 7.5 Hours later Sir Fozzie comes weighing in blocking the page - protecting the pages that are under dispute my arse.
Regarding Alison's evidence ( b). I was not making a blatant and transparent attempt to paint Alison with the 'nationalist POV' brush. ; Counter-Revolutionary is not a colleague of mine ( c).
I can categorically state that I have never ever ever made any contact with Traditional Unionist or Counter Revolutionary but I have made false accusations of sockpuppetry against Astrotrain. As a result I was in email contact with ONiH who gave me the advice One thing you might need to take into account is Astrotrain's lengthy block-log as well - I didn't bother. That this the sum total of my conspiracies.
The remedy states that To address the extensive edit-warring that has taken place on articles relating to The Troubles, as well as the Ulster banner and British baronets, any user who hereafter engages in edit-warring or disruptive editing on these or related articles may be placed on Wikipedia:Probation by any uninvolved administrator. This may include any user who was a party to this case, or any other user after a warning has been given. The administrator shall notify the user on his or her talkpage and make an entry on Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Log of blocks, bans, and probations. The terms of probation, if imposed on any editor, are set forth in the enforcement ruling below. During the case itself, a discussion arose on the Proposed Decision page, that no arbitrator took part in, but consensus of the discussion was that the definition of "uninvolved" was for not being involved in "edit-warring or disruptive editing", since there was no finding in the ArbCom case that ANY administrator had been non-neutral.
Previously, myself and Tyrenius (who were both parties to the ArbCom) have used this remedy to try to keep folks calm, with no peep of protest. Now, three weeks after User:Aatomic1 was placed on a one-month probation by administrator User:Alison, User:Aatomic1 has attempted to remove himself from the terms of probation, because Alison was one of the parties who provided evidence and discussion for the case. This came after Aatomic1 attempted to incite an admin who WAS in an edit war with User:Domer48 to place "That troll" (ie Domer) on its terms. Could the ArbCom please clarify this remedy, as to whom may place it, and if my definition is correct? SirFozzie ( talk) 19:53, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
How do you go about requesting that an editor be included on the ArbCom list. I ask because of this edit and in light of this warning. That they have had final warnings and a history on Republican related articles, not to mention the view they have of themselves. -- Domer48 ( talk) 17:58, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
I just wanted to explain a little the basis behind this (since, I fear, it spiral and I may as well try and dampen it before that happens).
I have a large number Irish republican related articles on my watch list due to the fact I implemented a compromise about a categorization strategy for jailed paramilitaries a while back. As i'm sure most editors do, when changes appear on their watch list they will often check them out, especially when there has been a history of problems with such editors and such articles. I saw this edit [4] and had a look because Vk has been engaging in a slow revert war over Irish names of republicans. Damac ( talk · contribs) has been removing them as unsourced and requesting a discussion on the subject, Vk (and others) will add them back over periods of weeks while pretty much ignoring the discussion. I have been keeping and eye on it and, although it is still revert-warring and against the spirit of his probation, I have declined to comment or draw attention to it yet simply because the fuss it would cause is more trouble that it is worth. Anyway, I then checked Vk's history to see if he had added the names back en masse or just to this one individual.
That led me to see these edits [5] [6] both of which appeared to be the recreation of an article that had been deleted and merged by AfD consensus ( Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seamus Donnelly and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gerry O'Callaghan). I had a look around on those pages and could find no good reason why the AfD decision should not stand (Vk provided no rationale for the reversion in his edit summary), so I reverted and explained why in my summary [7] [8]. Now, normally I would have asked the editor if he could explain his reasoning before reverting, but Vk has made it perfectly clear he does not welcome communication from me, and more often than not any message I leave for him gets deleted without reply.
This led to Vk immediately reverting both [9] [10] (with the charming edit summaries "reverting editing who hasnt a clue what he is doing") the following exchange on my talk page:
- Usual nonsense from you. THose AfD were overturned because the delete votes and the nominator was a bigotted banned user!--Vintagekits (talk) 00:44, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Could you direct me to that discussion/decision, please? (Rockpocket unsigned)
- No I couldnt!--Vintagekits (talk) 00:47, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- I can find no evidence provided that an Afd was "overturned", as you say, and you are unwilling to direct me to the evidence then I am left with no choice to revert back to the AfD decision. I'll give you a few more minutes. Rockpocket 00:50, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Seek and you shall find - nothing shall be handed to those to eager to follow my edits!--Vintagekits (talk) 00:52, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- So, just to be absolutely clear - you have reverted my good faith edits which I fully explained in the edit summary - based on some evidence that you refuse to divulge to make some sort of WP:POINT. Again, I'll give you another chance to please provide evidence that this AfD was "overturned" before I re-revert. Please stop playing games. Rockpocket 00:55, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Gerry O'Callaghan on yer watch list as well? lol!!! Ask ONiH about those AfD's if your soooooooooo wooried about it. --Vintagekits (talk) 00:57, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- PLAYING GAMES!!! You are the one following me around like a fuckin stink! Your the one playing games! --Vintagekits (talk) 00:58, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
At this point I reverted back to the redirect, since I had asked for justification and none was forthcoming, moreover Vk was clearly being making a WP:POINT. The communications on my talkpage then continued:
- Have a look at Talk:Patrick Joseph Kelly, all the AfDs involved substantial sockpuppetry, see Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/O'Donoghue. Granted it's slightly out of process unmerging the other articles without asking, but we don't want to get bogged down in red tape and I don't believe it's unreasonable to give VK a short amount of time to improve the articles to where they are capable of being standalone articles. One Night In Hackney303 01:00, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Thank you, ONiH. Seems like a good call from Quarl. I have no issue with Vk being bold and improving those articles based on Quarl's statement. However, The lack of informative edit summaries and purposely obtuse responses to perfectly valid requests simply result in more drama, and draw Vk ever closer to a return to ArbCom. Its like watching a moth to a flame. Rockpocket 01:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
At this point, with thanks to ONiH I was going to revert myself back to Vk's original edit, since it was clear that the AfDs were stacked by sockpuppets, and without those consensus would have been to keep. However, Vk has already reverted both again. [11] [12]
Technically Vk has made 2 x 3 reverts this evening along, and thus is clearly in violation of his probation. I was aware of this immediately, obviously, but didn't pursue it because technically there were good edits. I didn't wish to field the inevitable accusations that my plan was to get him blocked by forcing him to revert. The problem, of course, is that irrespective of the merits of his original edit his actions on my talk page were purposely and willfully disruptive. It led to multiple reversions only because a simple response to my request for information, that he clearly had, was gleefully rebuffed.
Combine this with the ongoing personal attacks, [13] incivility, [14] [15] aggressive swearing [16] and childish games such as this and I'm left wondering who this is any different from the behaviour that brought this case in the first place. I fully acknowledge Vk has done nice work on boxing articles since he got back, and I applaud and appreciate that. If he sticks to those articles he is a net asset to the project, but it very much appears to me that despite the very last warning this probation was meant to enforce, we still have the underlying problems in the sphere of the Troubles.
I am now at a loss at how to proceed here without Vk getting further provoked. Either I have to curb my constructive editing and my watch list and go to lengths to avoid any contact with an editor simply because he cannot edit in a civil manner. In doing that I am essentially being restricted in my editing, despite the fact I have never been sanctioned, always been polite and policy compliant, and no-one has ever suggested than any of my edits have been problematic. At the same time leaving a clearly problematic editor to make (often good faith) but nevertheless problematic edits at will and uncorrected. I simply fail to comprehend how that is a good way forward, when the problem is clearly with Vk and his inability to remain civil to people he has a personal issue with. In fact, I don't see myself continuing here if we are in a place where good editors are being asked to make accommodations so problem editors can flourish. That is not a Wikipedia I wish to be a part of.
I have tried to explain all this to Vk, and plead with him that for his own good to either curb his temper or back away from these articles, but its obviously falling on deaf ears. My understanding is that other editors, particularly SirFozzie, has made the same pleas time and time again, yet to no avail. [17] [18] Despite what Vk will tell anyone that will listen, my aim is not to get Vk blocked (its clear that his boxing articles are a plus and I would not support a full block now since he has demonstrated that he can edit without without major problems), but this cannot continue. What now, is there any scope or support for a topic ban of sorts? Rockpocke t 03:26, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Rock you have said in your opening post that you have a number of Republican Related articles on your watch list, due to the fact you implemented a compromise on the Categories. Those categories have now bedded in and are working fine. All of the editors involved in that process are now in a position to direct editors to that compromise solution. Would it not now be appropriate to remove those Republican Articles from your watch list? The issue of cat’s has been addressed and resolved. This would reduce the amount of contact you would have with Vin, and the potential for a flare up. It would also address the perceived view that you are stalking Vin’s edits. Since you initial role in Republican related articles i.e. the Cat’s has been resolved, is there any other matters on the articles which has prompted you to retain them on your watch list? -- Domer48 ( talk) 09:39, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Since your work on the Cat's, would you say you have developed an intrest in Republican related Articles? There are enough Admin's to review what you consider to be "problematic edits." If Vin is such a good editor on articles unrelated to the Troubles, how is it his edits suddenly become "problematic." Do you think that if Vin makes an edit which you considered problematic, you would be the only one to notice it? The problem is that this has all become personal, in my opinion. Review your own contrabutions to the ArbCom, and seriously say that this is not personal. Now it is also true that you have ended up on articles that Vin had just edited, and on which you had no edit history? No matter what way you look at it, a certain preception under the circumstances become obvious? Weather it's true or not, that is just the way it is. So what do you see as your role on Republican Articles, are you an editor with an intrest in the subject? Is it to make sure policies are followed? Now might I make another suggestion? On the Great Hunger article, any edits which may become "problematic" are first put forward on the talk page. For example, Vin makes an edit you consider "problematic" you mention it on the talk page first, allow some time for a responce, before any revert. This would obviously work both ways. This could reduce the tension in a number of ways. It would allow editors with an intrest in the subject the oppertunity to become involved and help prevent the one to one on the reverts? It's just my comment / opinion / suggestion? -- Domer48 ( talk) 18:17, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't think we should tolerate a situation where a user can use emotional blackmail to scare other users away from participating in articles, or invoke
WP:STALK just because they cross paths. If an editor makes a good edit, then their action is acceptable. I think that applies to all parties, and for that reason also if an editor such as Vintagekits makes edits per, for example,
WP:MOS to articles such as baronets or nominates a weak article on them for AfD, he also deserves support. Vk has done some good work in this area and he too should not be scared off. The bottom line is - is it in the interests of creating an encyclopedia? I think as admins we should adopt pretty much a zero-tolerance approach to this situation. Vintagekits' recent edits have displayed a completely unacceptable level of incivility that should have received an instant block, as indeed I applied soon after the ArbCom case. This was truly preventative and I said that its overturning would only send the wrong signal and lead to trouble ahead to Vk's disadvantage. That is exactly what we are now witnessing. I don't intend to apply such a block myself again, but would certainly support anyone who did. The terms of the ArbCom probation are quite clear:
Participants placed on probation are limited to one revert per article per week with respect to the set of articles included in the probation. Any participant may be briefly banned for personal attacks or incivility. Reversion of edits by anonymous IPs do not count as a revert.
This is not a difficult problem to solve. No one wants to see Vk indef blocked. Instant short blocks for an infraction will serve the purpose. I suggest starting with an hour.
On that basis I propose unblocking Vk now, if no one objects, with the proviso that the block gets reapplied immediately maybe for a couple of hours next time, should he continue to be uncivil.
Tyrenius (
talk) 04:29, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
END OF COPIED TALK
The problem with the instant blocks is.. well, with a block of a half-hour or an hour, all that what could happen is the person saves up a half-hour or hour worth of anger, bile, and frustration, and lets it all out at once. Becoming a revolving door, in/out/in/out/in/out... (note: I'm not saying that WILL happen with VK, just that it could). The think that makes a longer block better is that it forces the person to get up, get away from the computer, sleep on it, and then come back to it. By then, it's not so angry-makin ;) SirFozzie ( talk) 05:08, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
After seeing VK's response on his talk page... I withdraw my offer for a solution. I really hate to say it but he just can't get along with certain editors. SirFozzie ( talk) 14:12, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
I have made another suggestion here which I consider reasonable? As Pádraig has mentioned, and I have also, you do seem to be on his case? Now the civility is an issue, but Rock you seem to be the only one at the minute who provokes this responce? Could the two things be related? Now there has been a period of relative calm, and now all of a sudden this happens. I have also noticed Rock that you have been contacting other editors looking for input, why? Lets not try blow this out of all proportion, and let me just suggest, if your not part of the problem, be part of the solution. -- Domer48 ( talk) 19:40, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
That is not what I suggested? The incivility is directed at you. You have been asked before to allow other Admin's to look after any problems, by Admin's. You following Vin around, and be honest you are, just adds fuel to the fire. Now read my constructive suggestion again, and lets move on. Because what you are not going to get is more sanctions. -- Domer48 ( talk) 20:47, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Fozz did you even read what I suggested? -- Domer48 ( talk) 21:12, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Firstly, entirely irrespective of who had made the edit I would have reverted back to the AfD consensus. When someone appears to have ignored an AfD without explaining why, its a good idea to revert. Its a better idea, of course, to leave a message asking why. But look what has happened in previous attempts make perfectly legitimate edits to Vk's page: [24] [25] [26] [27] As far as I am concerned, and editor who deletes requests without response (or replies incivily) loses that courtesy. So again, why should I be asked to restrict my good editing in the best interests of the project when the problem lies elsewhere? Its not about losing face or pride, its a matter of principle that we are asking editors who do good work to make restrict their editing for editors who have problems, when the problematic editor could and should be the one who is restricted. That hurts the encyclopaedia, it doesn't help it.
Secondly, its a bit of a red herring to base this upon this one incident. Have a look at this entirely unprovocative edit [28] Look at the mess the article was in until I copy edited it. This led to accusations of stalking too (despite the fact that I saw the article not by stalking his edits, but because Vk had messed up a move of an article on my watch list to create it). So, am I supposed to not copy edit this article because Vk might lose his temper? Am i supposed to leave the messed up move of an article I spent a long time editing, just because it was Vk who did it? How does that help the project? How about this one [29] another accusation of stalking. Again, it was on my watch list since last year and the edit was entirely unprovocative. Even more amazing, note the fact that there was two intervening edits between Vk and I, so his name didn't even appear on my watch list when I made this edit. So, if these types of edits are what you are asking I don't make in "backing off" then I despair. What you are actually asking is that any article that Vk choses to edit becomes off-limits to me (and John and anyone else that he decides to get upset over). I have a lot of time for you Scolaire and respect your opinion, but that this is even being suggested I find depressing. Rockpocke t 22:21, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Rock what about the articles which were not on your watch list? Are you saying you just happened by them? All anyone has to do is review your contributions to the ArbCom to see you and Vin are in conflict with each other. Now that is a fact, let’s be honest about it. Those changes you made, is wiki going to collapse if you don’t jump in and change them right away, of course not. As Fozz says, you don’t have to be right, right now. It’s like you know it’s going to freeze tonight, so you hose down the pavement outside your nasty neighbours house. What you’re saying is you can’t control the weather. What I saying is, in view of your history with Vin, if you see something you think needs fixing, let someone else do it. That goes for Vin to by the way. As to the civility, I’ve learned my lesson on that one, Vin should learn to keep it shut, because the only time you make a mistake is when you learn nothing from it. -- Domer48 ( talk) 23:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Just to clarify, I am not saying that anybody should not edit an article, in the sense of changing content, just because another editor might react badly. But, as Domer says, "those changes you made, is wiki going to collapse if you don’t jump in and change them right away?" This
[32] and this
[33] are copyedits - if you hadn't done them somebody else - in the first case a bot - would have done them. It's unfair of Sluzzelin to say "the implication here that a good content editor is being asked to 'back off' from improving content just because it might set off another editor's allergic reaction" (Tyrenius said essentially the same); we have established that improving content is not an issue here. All I'm saying is continue to improve content on those articles you are improving content on, and leave the tidying up of Vk's articles edits to somebody else. How does WP lose that way? Anyway, I am not going to argue about this any more. My suggestion was only by way of trying to help and I really have nothing more to add.
Scolaire (
talk) 23:33, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Tyrenius ( talk) 00:53, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
(ec x 3) An RfC on you (Rockpocket) would be a complete waste of time as you are not the problem. Vk's response to your AfD enquiry was deliberately obstructive and blatantly provocative: in the circumstances it merited a block. I back enforcement of civility per earlier suggestions I made. Going to AN is a good way to get a difficult user banned indefinitely, so I vote keeping "in house" unless that proves unworkable. There is no reason why it should. I have started a page to centralise action at: Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles/Enforcement requests. If this seems viable, we should ask as many admins as possible to watchlist it. Re. ONIH's point - good one. The new page can be used for any violation. Tyrenius ( talk) 02:55, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) I'm simply quoting the ArbCom ruling. It's not my idea. I have advocated zero-tolerance for civility and see no reason why it shouldn't be applied to content. There is a page to post for enforcement, so that's the thing to do. Maybe it's time to stand for adminship and you can put your ideas into action. Tyrenius ( talk) 04:47, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent)Actually it isn't. What I was going to do was present evidence to prove what I was saying was true. However considering the vast majority of the edits are over a week old, none of it would be actionable anyway. So rather than waste time simply proving something that we've already established is true (to whatever extent), I'm probably going to finish the new article I've been finishing for the last few days. One Night In Hackney 303 19:19, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) Rockpocket's block log for a start shows him tackling policy violations wherever he finds them. The way Vk sees it is the problem. He does exactly the same things to others that he accuses others of doing to him. When he does them to others, he is outraged if he is criticised or questioned, as he considers the actions to be perfectly justified. When others do them to him, he is equally outraged and considers the same actions to be absolutely unjust. This is demonstrated quite clearly in a comparison with the baronet issue and a quick "review". Tyrenius ( talk) 23:33, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
The first thing is to warn them, but if they persist, then there doesn't seem much alternative to a block or some form of (topic or other) ban. It's a judgement call, depending on context, the editor's history, the extremity of the transgression etc. It's human nature that the people who make the most noise will get the most attention. I don't see anyone else in the vicinity who is displaying this kind of user page and user talk page. If they did, then they would get the same attention. Vintagekits is currently the most blatant case and the worst transgressor, so the spotlight is on him. At other times, it has been on other editors, e.g. at one point on Kittybrewster over WP:COI. It's not the responsibility of admins to do everything. Any editor can point out policy violations to another and ask them to desist: if they don't, despite requests, then a case is apparent against them, and it might be suitable to bring to admin attention. You want admins to go out proactively "policing" and in the area of article content, it seems. Probably the main reason that doesn't happen is lack of time and energy. It would be a 24/7 job. Hence GOFISHING. Again, it's not up to admins to do it all. Editors should take responsibility too. If they don't succeed in solving the problem, then it can be placed on WP:TER (Troubles Enforcement Requests). I've put the system in place, if people want to use it. You say, "I've see Rockpocket leave quite a few notes on VK's talk page with regard to transgressions, yet I've not seen him do the same with other editors." In that case, you must have seen those transgressions to know they exist. Did you leave a warning, and if not, why not? If there are any bad cases, why have you not drawn attention to them on WP:TER? This is team work, and experienced editors can play a powerful role, as in your recent checkuser request. Tyrenius ( talk) 02:27, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't know Vk or Rockpocket & won't prejudge them. But if any editor is causing problems on 'Troubles' related articles - give the offender(s) 'three warnings', if they don't heed it? 1-month block, then added another month if disruption continues after. There's no other way. GoodDay ( talk) 16:25, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm starting to know Vk better, as he's continously re-appearing via sockpuppets. I must say, his behaviour is disappointing & futile. GoodDay ( talk) 15:35, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
To the resident Administrators. Is it possible to upgrade Vk's status to 'protection' if he promises to stick to Boxing articles? Or does his Wiki behaviour history (including he continued creation of sockpuppets), damage that posibility? GoodDay ( talk) 18:41, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok. Thanks for responding. GoodDay ( talk) 19:15, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm with Rockpocket on this. Vk had had more "absolutely last last chances" than I can count, yet still indulged in sockpuppetry, and off-wiki campaigns of harrassment are unacceptable. I don't care what subject he is working on: he has had plenty of chances, and still seems to think that his predicament is everyone else's fault.
If someone wants to take this to arbcom, they are free to do so. I'm sure that arbcom will be absolutely thrilled to have the chance to welcome back someone who was on unblocked after a protracted arbitration and rewarded the trust placed in him by using sockpuppets to disrupt a vote, and particularly keen to facilitate the return of an editor who promises to "abuse" an admin "all day long". Hey, that's just the sort of thing arbcom sets out to promote.
When the arbcom closed, Vk was notified of the outcome by Penwhale " Due to the decisions, you are now no longer community banned. Make this chance count". If anyone thinks that meant trying to make his vote count more than once, then a quick call to arbcom should have the arbitrators showering him with barnstars. -- BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 01:39, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Rockpocket and BrownHairedGirl. This editor had too many last chances already. No, no, a thousand times no. -- John ( talk) 03:25, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Moved to TER. One Night In Hackney 303 23:16, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Can someone please look at this article Ulster Defence Regiment. I believe I and my attempts to rewrite this article sensibly have been embroiled in edit warring since day one because this article is linked to the northern ireland troubles. I'm trying everything in my power to come to a concensus but now I realise this has all happened before and I don't think I'm going to get anywhere. I haven't been getting anywhere anyway! GDD1000 ( talk) 19:20, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
GDD1000 is active as this report clearly shows. They even admit the IP's they were using were them. There has been edit-warring since their return. They are a self confessed ex member of the UDR and therefore have a WP:COI, illustrated by the edit-warring edits. They are now using a source from another ex member on the article, and going around crying and forum shopping like their last account when challanged. The last time their copy vio's were removed by two admins, they throw the rattle out of the cot and claim to leave the project. How many other sock accounts have been active now? Have any of the banned editors been allowed back under new accounts? -- Domer48 'fenian' 20:20, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
Great to see you back, now are you going to answer the questions left on your talk page or just ignore them? "ridiculous accusations" they admitted they were the same user! So don't tell me I'm being ridiculous! "baseless comments" "wanton reverts" and you tell me to leave out the accusations? Please! You may accept this crap, even though I've not edited the article since 24 July, but I don't. -- Domer48 'fenian' 21:49, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
The Troubles, are not as contentious as they once were, thanks to the tight lid on edit-warring that was created by User:Rlevse here, that subjected the whole subset of articles covered by The Troubles to a 1 RR. This has blunted a lot of the constant edit-warring. However, six months after the fix was applied, someone wants to rip the band-aid off and let the (metaphorical) blood flow anew. User:Sandstein has stated that he will not act on AE requests regarding this remedy, because it is not an ArbCom remedy. We've already seen several folks using IP's to edit war and then when the IP is blocked, use throw-away accounts. The sanctions are needed.. there are 10+ sections in the archives where this is used since December alone.
So, despite my utter distaste of time-wasting bureaucracy such as this, would the ArbCom please vote in the following as a formal ArbCom remedy, as posted by User:Rlevse:
List of times the Rlevse sanctions has been brought up on AE (there are another 5-10 where it's been mentioned in passing, but these are the ones that refer to the 1RR rule itself.)
[38], [39], [40], [41], [42], [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49], and the two latest ones on AE. If the Committee would look at the history of AE from archive 30 or so on, usually 2 or 3 or 4 sections per archive will have to do with this series of articles,
I don't believe that a new full fledged ArbCom would do anything more then to spend a couple months of time with the same parties arguing in the same way. Instead, what should be done is apply common sense. Use the Rlevse sanctions, and keep the peace in an area where there will be no peace if not applied.
If one admin chooses not to act on a particular enforcement request, it doesn't stop another administrator stepping in. Whilst Sandstein might not agree and therefore decide not to take action, if another administrator believes the editor in question has broken the case remedies (In this case it is enforcement of discretionary sanctions) then that is up to them and they may block for that. From what I can see, Sandstein hasn't said he'll overrule other administrators and I suspect he wouldn't even challenge other administrators if they made blocks as part of Rlevse's restriction. It looks like Sandstein merely doesn't agree and doesn't feel comfortable enforcing the decision - that's his prerogative and feel free to simply block if someone goes against the 1RR restriction. Ryan PostlethwaiteSee the mess I've created or let's have banter 22:44, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
I'm commenting in my capacity as admin patrolling WP:AE and responding to enforcement requests there. Ryan is right in that I won't (and have no authority to) overrule any admin enforcing the "Troubles" case as he or she sees fit. However, the "Troubles" decision does not, as Ryan seems to believe, provide for discretionary sanctions. Instead, at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Probation for disruptive editors, it provides that disruptive editors may be put on Wikipedia:Probation and, at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Enforcement, that these editors are then subject to 1RR. That is the arbitral decision that can and should be enforced at WP:AE, including by me.
The section entitled Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Final remedies for AE case, which purports to put all articles in the area of conflict under 1RR, on the other hand, is not an enforceable arbitral decision, since it was apparently never voted on by the Committee. Its author, Rlevse, has confirmed this at [50]. That is why I will not act on enforcement requests concerning it.
I recommend that the Committee:
Sandstein has summed up what I was going to say. Perhaps both sanction-schemes would be useful? Ncmvocalist ( talk) 05:45, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
As the unlucky administrator who started the long chain of events that lead there, I want to add two things. One, discretionary sanctions do exist in that dispute area, they are editor targeted however. Two, the broad 1RR was proposed as an alternative to using probation. It has, I believed, helped significantly in the topic area, and has set an objective standard for that all users can be held up to. I strongly urge the committee to consider endorsing the community remedy.-- Tznkai ( talk) 04:29, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
Having opposed the sanctions, or I should say how they came about I must concede that they have had a positive effect. They have reduced the edit warring and encouraged discussion. POV warriors have been marginalised with disruptive editing being quickly closed down most of the time. Some Admin’s with a particular bias (admin’s can and do have biased opinions) have been reluctant to address the actions of some editors but the 1RR has proved itself despite this. We all know what the sanctions entail, and have clarified through experience what 1RR is and how it operates. For example, a number of reverts without intermediate edits in between is considered to be 1 revert.
So what I’d suggest is that the sanctions be placed on a separate page with the block log transferred to it. It should include:
It should also include what we mean by 1RR, so there is no ambiguity. If it is felt that criteria no.1 is not clear enough expand it. The template be changed to direct editors to the appropriate page, including a link on Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/The_Troubles#Final_remedies_for_AE_case in case any templates are missed during the page change. That’s my 2 cents worth, as to simply remove the sanctions would be counter productive.-- Domer48 'fenian' 09:11, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
Maybe if Elonka was as quick to admit her mistake and clarify the log then we wouldn't have an edit war on this page. My edit was not comment it was a clarification of the block. As it stands it is ambiguous as to what happened. When it was an admin making a mistake and not the editor. BigDunc 19:38, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
There is an ongoing discussion at ANI about whether or not this case's remedies should be modified, to additionally authorize discretionary sanctions in the Troubles topic area. Anyone with an opinion on the matter is invited to comment at: Wikipedia:ANI#Discretionary sanctions for Troubles articles. -- El on ka 17:11, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
Where am i to post for an explanation about why British National Party has suddenly been described as a troubles related article. The BNP have nothing to do with the troubles, they are a far right political party in the UK not a loyalist paramilitary group.
WHy are people allowed to go around adding any article they like claiming its troubled related when it clearly isnt? BritishWatcher ( talk) 20:24, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Irvine22#Probation
This is the sort of thing that gets the project its reputation as an internet dog's breakfast. Nae wunner ye canna mak ony geld oot o'it. Irvine22 ( talk) 21:34, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
Initiated by Nate t/ c at 11:51, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
Several and I believe a large majority of users have stated views that the BNP is not particularly linked to The Troubles and not more so than any British or Irish political party, so adding the {{ Troubles restriction}} banner seems highly inappropriate. The article is currently being edited 'aggressively' by several editors, but also discussed, reasonably productively, on the talk page and while some editing restirction might be appropriate, but these should be brought though the normal methods, not by expanding another controversial area. -- Nate t/ c 11:51, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Having read more of the other discussions in an attempt to understand the reasoning for adding this tag. it seems to be that it is due to the article being edited by editors who have had disputes elsewhere. This seems again to be expanding the intent of the original ruling; if the Arbitrators wanted restrictions should be placed on specific editors then it would have been in the ruling, but it seems that as that was not the case, so the troubles template and rules was added to this article so as to enforce rules on them when editing in other areas; with the collateral effect on a large number of other editors who where not involved (or even aware) or the original dispute until the template was added. In the is case the creep seems to have been the use of rules aimed at a specific set of articles being used to control all edits by those editors in the original dispute. If an admin feels that the editors are expanding into to disrupting other articles then going back and asking for sanctions against those editors would be the sensible course of action. In this case I had not seen any significant disruptive behaviour, (I have not reviewed all edits by the contributors only looked at the history of the article) there were strong opinions, and possibly ill-judged comments and edits, but nothing that came across as Bad Faith edits and there was constructive progress on the talk page. -- Nate t/ c 17:13, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
How are we ment to resolve it "at community level"? There is a consensus on the talk page to remove the banner & a debate as to if the restrictions are helpful (in my view they are not), I came here as was suggested on the admin notice board and wanted to know if this was how to request a review of admin assigning the rules to an article. -- Nate t/ c 09:31, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
There is no reason at all for the BNP article to be listed as "troubles related". The British National Party is a right wing political party in the United Kingdom, they are not a loyalist paramilitary group in Northern Ireland. The article mentions the BNPs policy towards Ireland, but all political parties in the UK have policies towards Ireland Conservative party (UK), Liberal Democrats. Labour party (UK) all mention Ireland yet they would never be classed as troubles related. The edit wars that were taking place on that article had nothing to do with Ireland matters, it was about the fact the BNP is a right wing racist whites only political party.
If the BNP article can be considered troubles related then its clearly not what arbcom originally agreed to. The sanctions have been in place for about two years and only now has the BNP became a "troubles related article"? Its important to remember how this all came about.
The first mentions of the troubles on the BNP talk page from what i can see was on the 16th of November 2009 by User:Off2riorob. He was moaning about people being anti BNP and he said..
The suggestion that anyones position on that page was an "IRA thing" was rather offensive, i am certainly no supporter of a terrorist organisation and i do not think others involved on the article at the time were either. The vast majority of the British people hate the BNP, the idea that article is being influenced by IRA supporters was rather stange and this has nothing to do with "British nationalism towards Ireland". Anyway he went on to mention troubles related editors again [52], and then he said..
Is it really acceptable to claim an article is troubles related just because several editors are also involved in the troubles articles? If that is possible then any article we go to could have such sanctions imposed, even things that are nothing to do with Britain and Ireland. He made a couple more comments about The troubles editors and then Elonka came along and said the article was troubles related, with NO debate. [54] The only reason Elonka did that was because of Off2riorob.
This matter needs clearing up. I am concerned at this very moment Elonka is seeking to have admin powers expanded in relations to the troubles yet the current powers are being misused. Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment#Request_to_amend_prior_case:_The_Troubles Also some of Elonkas comments about the action taken concern me and i think the justification is clearly not in line with the current arbcom ruling.
That basically says if it mentions Ireland it can be considered related.
and
Which basically says The troubles sanctions can be imposed on articles that have nothing to do with The Troubles.
Anyway clarification on this matter would be very useful. In particular the BNP article needs to be correctly removed from "troubles related" articles, but a more general clarification about what is and is not reasonably connected to the troubles would be useful. Thanks BritishWatcher ( talk) 14:45, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
The link between this page and "the troubles" is tenuous at best. Moreover the dispute (and indead the complaint) that led to this had nothing to do with the rather limited amount the articel has to say about the troubles. It was in reaction to the appearance of some edds who had a history on "troubles" realted pages (the actual dispute was over mebership). This seems to me just to beplaying the system Slatersteven ( talk) 15:47, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Agree with the above two comments, as well as with the many others who have commented in two separate threads on Elonka's talk page. It is pretty hard to argue that the BNP page (which I have never edited btw) is a "Troubles-related" article, and the dispute in question there is most certainly not. Nor is it related to the broader question of "British nationalism in relation to Ireland". If this is how wide the net is going to be drawn, pretty much every article on Wikipedia can probably be brought under an existing ArbCom decision. In this case for example, there's a stronger argument for having the Conservative Party and Glasgow Rangers Football Club subjected to the Troubles regime, since the connections there are much stronger than for the BNP. Sure you have to have flexibility, and someone arguing for example that the Easter Rising or the Border Campaign, or even some parts of the Oliver Cromwell article, are not connected to The Troubles, is indeed probably Wikilawyering - but that's a very different situation.
On the wider point, I would also express concern that an admin has suddenly descended on the page to make a unilateral declaration of this sort and to start imposing special restrictions on the article, and potentially the editors there, without any sort of consensus from ArbCom or the wider community for them to start doing that. Furthermore, repeated observations to them from multiple editors that they might have made an error of fact are repeatedly stonewalled or even ignored with a repeated pro-forma response, eg here. If there are problems on that article - which there are fairly likely to be, after all - address them of course, possibly even with severe action, but don't do it under a regime designed explicitly for something else altogether.
The admin in question also appears to be deploying the argument that the terms of the Troubles ruling say "when in doubt, assume [the article] is related". Well, as has been pointed out, there isn't much doubt that the BNP is not a related article. I and others have provided examples of cases where there might be a genuine debate, and hence doubt, about the relevance of an article or parts of one, where one could perhaps invoke that principle and err on the side of inclusion. Ultimately though these decisions are actually fairly simple - eg the Bill Clinton page is not "Troubles-related", but that small part of the page which discusses his involvement in Northern Ireland is. To argue that because one editor/admin has asserted that the entire BNP page is related, the doubt as to whether it is or isn't therefore does now exist and consequently they are right to apply the template, is a rather classic example of self-serving sophistry, to be blunt. Any claims as well that their action has helped sort out problems on the article are also somewhat irrelevant as i) it is simply the wrong template to apply, regardless; and ii) it is simply an assertion of causality, without evidence. I think we need clarification of the issue in question, as well as some sort of comment on whether this sort of unilateral action, based on a pretty fundamental misjudgement and/or an overzealous interpretation of prior rulings, is appropriate in future. -- Nickhh ( talk) 16:17, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Up to a point - but I think this is sufficiently different, in that people here are asking for clarification of the current decision as it stands, and whether Elonka's unilateral and highly contentious action was appropriate, and whether it should stand (in my opinion, it should not and it should be struck immediately - this really is about whether ArbCom decisions mean what they say, or whether individual editors can come along and appropriate them seemingly for their own enforcement purposes, against reason and consensus. I don't see that it's a tough decision). Whether her proposed amendment to the Troubles decision - which includes as one part of it a request to extend the scope of the topic area - is subsequently accepted at some point, and therefore whether Elonka might effectively be granted retrospective approval for her action, is another matter. -- Nickhh ( talk) 18:58, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
My attention was drawn to the British National Party article because I'd been monitoring some other Troubles-related articles, and noticed that some of the editors had overflowed the dispute to the BNP article. I'll freely admit that I'm not intimately familiar with the nuances of the content dispute (which is probably as it should be, since I'm supposed to be uninvolved). I did scan the BNP article though, and saw that it included clear references to Ireland. That, combined with the facts that the article was the location of established editors repeatedly reverting each other, [57] [58] [59] [60] [61] [62] [63] [64] [65] and that some of those editors were known edit-warriors from the Troubles topic area, suggested that it would be reasonable to try and stabilize the article by reminding everyone that it was within the scope of the Troubles case restrictions. That scope was defined by community consensus in October 2008, as "any article that could be reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland . . . When in doubt, assume it is related." [66] The last sentence, "When in doubt, assume it is related," was the clincher for me. It's also worth pointing out that since I placed the tag on November 16, [67] the edit-warring has pretty much ceased, and the editors are instead continuing with more constructive editing. I have engaged several of the parties in discussion about what the restrictions mean, [68] [69] and how they can learn to edit in a more collaborative manner. [70] [71] [72] [73] [74] [75] [76] Other than talkpage discussion and a couple cautions though, [77] [78] I have not had to implement any blocks or bans in relation to that article. I've also informed the parties that if the article remains stable (meaning no edit-wars among established editors) for a period of time (30 days?), I believe it would be reasonable to remove the tag entirely. [79] As for what ArbCom should do here, it would be helpful either to clearly decline this clarification as unneeded, or simply confirm that it is reasonable for an administrator to have applied the {{ Troubles restriction}} template to the BNP article, as it seems to be within the case's scope. -- El on ka 19:00, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Elonka's statement is faulty, this is undoubtedly an article unrelated to "the troubles". The dispute at this article was minor and in no way invoved the troubles, and once again Elonka's actions have increased the heat and drawn drama where there was none before. This could have been dealt with by an admin quite easily without wikilawyering an unrelated arbcom probation to give absolute power and carte blanch to avoid oversight by other admins. This is disproportionate and disruptive, and against the spirt and intention, and in my view the letter, of the troubles case. Nothing more than usual admin tools and community norms were required. I fear by Elonka's actions "the troubles" may spread to other articles. Verbal chat 19:55, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
The BNP topic is not "British Nationalism in relation to Ireland". Perhaps a special clause could be added for such articles but as linking Irish Nationalism to British Nationalism could be misleading in many critical ideological ways, declaring such articles to be "Troubles related" or even Nationalist in relation to Irish Nationalism without a direct connection is bound to produce dissaproval. The list of diffs shown by Elonika appears to be an edit war started [80] and largely continued by me [81]. The issue, if it is of any consequence here, is wether to rely upon the disparity between third party sources and the primary source rather than providing information about the disparity, with barely even speculative relation to Ireland let alone The Troubles. Apologies... perhaps there is a model whereby these sanctions could be introduced to "Troubled Article"s without labelling them with any particular politic or ArbCom case?
Self-explanitory note: for any unassuming of the fact that political partys may be in no way connected to The Troubles in the manner that Monster Raving Looney Party is not, for instance.
As suggested by User:Nickhh above, there is much more direct scope for insertion of British political parties which have been in government during the Troubles period. Can't think of anything else. ~ R. T. G 23:32, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
As someone who has pointed out the considerable problems with Elonka's (and other) Admins proposals for a "troubles-creep" policy, I nonetheless see this as a clear example of a "troubles-related" article. The BNP is a racist virulently anti-Irish Party and were active during the period of the troubles. Their inclusion is much more appropriate than Irish articles about events that occurred dozens or even hundreds of years before the troubles. The sudden outcry by editors (who in many cases are themselves troubles-warriors) is risible. Just because Elonka, uninformed though she admits she is, can see the obvious fact that 'articles related to the British-Irish' dispute does not mean only Irish articles. And yes, of course this potentially extends to articles on US political parties as well - which is why I oppose Elonka's extensification proposal. But in the context of her and other Admins proposals "BNP" is definitely a legitimate target for the Arbcom scatter-gun. Sarah777 ( talk) 00:24, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
Please combine this with Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment#Request_to_amend_prior_case:_The_Troubles, as essentially the same issues are now under discussion in 2 different places, with quite a bit of repetition. MastCell Talk 00:36, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
Hi, not sure I quite understand the point being made here. Are you agreeing there was no need to invoke the ArbCom Troubles decision in dealing with any problems on the BNP page? Or are you saying that because it now has been, but by an individual admin rather than by ArbCom, any review should be at AN/ANI or using some form of DR rather than here? We tried reasoning with Elonka on her talkpage but were brushed off. We tried going to ANI and were told to ask for formal clarification here, which is what has been done, but no one seems willing to give it. A mixture of one editor/admin's astonishing stubborness and refusal to admit a mistake, combined with the usual bureaucratic "oh no mate, you want Dept 4B, other building", seem to be conspiring to make this all rather complicated when it's all rather simple really. Correcting a rather obvious mistake really shouldn't take this much time and effort. It is all quite surreal
Thanks, -- Nickhh ( talk) 20:23, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
And, further to this - the issue has already been discussed at length on Elonka's talk page, and on the BNP article page. Consensus from a mix of involved and uninvolved editors is about 15-2 that the page is not a Troubles-related article, but Elonka for some reason is standing her ground. One editor also went to ANI, and they were told to come here, which another editor then did. I'm not sure why we would go to AE - the point is not that we need enforcement of a decision, but rather "unenforcement", or, simply a clarification that the page is not related, confirming the rather clear decision that the "community" has already come to. If we have to go to yet another venue, spend hours collecting diffs and post all the same arguments for the fifth time, well fine. On the other hand, either ArbCom simply clarifying - on the Arbitration clarification page, after all - "no, that page has nothing to do with our decision on the Troubles" or Elonka having the good grace to admit an error and hit a single button to reverse a totally bizarre decision, would seem to be a much more obvious route to sorting this rather silly problem out. Cheers. -- Nickhh ( talk) 10:45, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
Please could the provided clarification to this problem be clarified.
Does an Admin have the right to label any article Troubles related because several editors from the troubles are involved at the article?
If an article mentions a sentence or two about a policy on Ireland and there is an edit war over something totally unreleated, can the fact there is one sentence on Ireland be used to justify placing that article under troubles related restrictions?
Yes or no to these two questions would be most helpful, its a pretty simple question that has been very well avoided in the extensive response below. BritishWatcher ( talk) 13:40, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
The clarification does not actually clarify the matter of the BNP article which is certainly the purpose of this request. Although not in the title, it does specifically say British National Party under the request. Can you clarify using the name "BNP article" or "British National Party article"? Cosensus seems to suggest, if I may, that BNP relation to The Troubles is only abstract and that even though the BNP have sought some public support on one occasion from a Troubles-related group, in issues not concerning The Troubles, support (if any) garnered appears to have little notability. The issue of white people being overrun isn't really valid in Ireland north or south where all the slaves were white, and even largely protestant in northern areas, anyway. We are too busy fighting amongst ourselves to be fighting the blacks over in England. ! ~ R. T. G 16:11, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
In response to Nate's question (and a number of others doubts), you resolve it at community level by first discussing it with the admin who imposed the action. Should that not work out, you use dispute resolution as necessary (such as RfC'ing the matter, which is most ideal in this case) or you make a community discussion at the appropriate admin noticeboard. That would usually be AE (though AN may also work). Of course, whichever venue or step in DR you choose, it would be a good idea to send neutral notices to notable venues (like AN/ANI/AE - i.e. not canvassing or specific users) so that you guys maximise the possibility of more uninvolved input being given. Only if there is difficulty interpreting or coming to a community consensus on the issue during these steps, should you escalate to ArbCom after which they can intervene. That is what is meant by Vassyana's comment: "only intervene when it is clear that the available options have exhausted and/or a dispute cannot be resolved at the community level". ArbCom are unlikely to (and are practically bound not to) provide any confirmation, reversal, or opinion in the absence of those community steps being proactively taken (and exhausted) in good faith. Some of the steps I've mentioned must've been missed, or I would've at least been aware of what venue was chosen - maximising the possibility of more uninvolved input being given is a must here. I hope that helps. Ncmvocalist ( talk) 17:53, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
Initiated by El on ka at 04:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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:
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:
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 [86] and October-November 2009. [87] 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". -- El on ka 04:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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. [88] [89] [90] [91] [92] [93] [94] [95] [96] [97] [98] [99] [100] [101] [102] [103] [104] 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. [105] [106] [107] [108] [109] [110] 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, [111] and is a location where established editors continue to revert each other. [112] [113] [114] [115] [116] [117] [118] [119] [120]
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 [121] [122] [123] [124] [125] [126] [127] [128] [129] [130] and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT arguments, [131] [132] [133] [134] [135] [136] [137] [138] [139] to accusations of bias and incompetence, and sometimes out and out personal attacks. [140] [141] [142] [143] [144] [145] [146] 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:
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. -- El on ka 21:07, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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)
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 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)
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.
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)
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
[147] Elonka said..
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)
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)
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)
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. Rockpocke t 20:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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:
-- Snowded TALK 02:43, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
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.
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)
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 [148] despite previous blocks here and here with Admin's obviously not being sanctioned [149].
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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.
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.
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.
A motion has been proposed that would amend a sanctions remedy in this case. It would replace the remedy in this case that allows administrators to unilaterally apply sanctions to editors within the designated topic area with a standardized remedy that essentially allows for the same thing. Any extant sanctions or warnings made according to the older wording found in those decisions (as applicable) remain unaffected. To comment on this proposal, please go to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Motions. NW ( Talk) 20:39, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
I wanted to flag up User:CommieMark, particularly after his edits here, which are potentially troublesome. I don't want to wade in with both feet, but I suspect that it wouldn't be received well. Someone should really speak to him. Traditional unionist ( talk) 20:55, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
Initiated by Seraphimblade Talk to me at 21:27, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
N/A
Following a recent appeal to arbitration enforcement [150] from a user who had been sanctioned under the Troubles discretionary sanctions, and objected to the portion of this which forbade editing of British baronets, a closer look was taken at this. Arbitrator Newyorkbrad confirmed that the Committee had not seen any issues arise from this area for at least a year and a half [151], and taking a check through the AE archives and case enforcement logs, I also can't find any trouble there recently. The administrators involved in the discussion regarding the appeal, including the one who closed the original request and placed the sanctions, agreed there was little purpose in the baronet portion of the ban and it ultimately was lifted for that editor. It's nice to see an area where sanctions have done their job and calmed things down, so I think it's time to give it a go without them. Accordingly, I'd propose something to this effect:
@Newyorkbrad: I realize the sanctions can be tailored on a case by case basis, based upon the type and area of misconduct they're being applied in response to. That is overhead to remember and/or process AE appeals if someone forgets when originally applying them though, and I think in general it's a good idea to have as few areas as possible have sanctions applied to them. There are some areas where it's likely that won't happen for many years, but if there are others where the problem that led to them is no longer a problem, I think we ought to scale them back, remove the "big scary notices" on the article edit pages and talk pages, etc. Seraphimblade Talk to me 14:32, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
This question arose because some of the editors involved in the Troubles case were people who largely edited articles on baronets, but who had made controversial edits to Troubles-related articles and AfDs, sometimes with inflammatory edit summaries, and there was some "revenge" editing of baronet articles. See in particular Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Statement by User:Vintagekits and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Statement by User:Kittybrewster. As far as I am aware, since the case concluded in October 2007, no editor in either area has strayed into the others' territory. There is no apparent need to continue to link them. Scolaire ( talk) 08:21, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
I endorse Scolaire's summary, except that there a further incident after 2007.
There was a further flare-up of the Troubles-Baronets link in May 2009, involving me (BrownHairedGirl), Vintagekits and Kittybrewster. A request for abitration was opened, and dealt with by summary motion: http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case&oldid=289861526#Baronets_naming_dispute
So far as I am aware, there has been no further Troubles-related disputes wrt Baronets since then.
All of the troubles-related disputes wrt baronets involved Vintagekits ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), who is currently indef-blocked (and I think also perma-banned) after a very long series of conflicts. - BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 11:46, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
Initiated by 2 lines of K 303 at 12:41, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
I wish to appeal against a frankly bizarre decision where a "consensus of uninvolved administrators" in this discussion has topic banned me while providing virtually no evidence to support the decision.
The 3 month topic ban was proposed here detailing a series of edits to Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign 1969–1997. See User:One Night In Hackney/Appeal for analysis of that series:
The ban was proposed at the end of that series. So FergusM1970 made some bold changes, was reverted, then Portugalpete and SonofSetanta edit war to try and force those changes through without any attempt at discussion. And that's my fault how exactly? If I make one revert and other editors edit war after that, is that somehow my fault? Can I be held responsible for the actions of other editors? I asked for an explanation as to how making one edit to an article is somehow worthy of a 3 month topic ban, I never got a direct reply to that question. Make one revert to enforce content policy and get topic banned, makes no sense to me.
The history of 7 July 2005 London bombings is mentioned as evidence here. I'll be the first to admit my behaviour can be seen as less than stellar on that article, but there's others who are far worse. See User:One Night In Hackney/Appeal for analysis of that article.
Somewhat bizarrely, Flexdream's attempts to edit war OR into an article with unproductive talk page discussion get him just a final warning yet I get a topic ban. I can't really understand the logic of banning the person attempting to enforce content policy while giving the person attempting to violate it a slap on the wrist, anyone?
There's various comments falsely alleging I refused to take part in dispute resolution. The case was filed at 22:24, 3 August 2012 (that's a Friday night for the record). It was archived at 22:44, 4 August 2012, just over 24 hours later. My removal of the notice from my talk page has been falsely interpreted as a refusal to take part. I know where the page is without a link since I've posted there before (and I don't remove noticeboards from my watchlist), and me removing all comments from my talk page is something done repeatedly prior to that. It was a Saturday. During the Olympics. I was too busy to respond straight away since it required a bit of thought. Maybe I should have posted something to that effect, but the DRN volunteer could easily have asked if I was planning to respond, but he chose not to and just closed it assuming bad faith.
Rather than actually deal with the editors persistently violating policy, the admins have decided "sod it, we'll just ban everyone" without taking into account that some editors are simply trying to enforce content policy in the face of disruptive editors adding transparent violations of policy, and that removing the disruptive editors from the situation is all that's needed. I can't see how this topic ban is remotely justified by the "evidence" unless attempting to enforce content policy is now topic ban worthy? 2 lines of K 303 12:41, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
@Newyorkbrad. As can be seen from the discussion, the 3 month topic ban was suggested to apply to everyone supposedly involved, regardless of previous history. For example SonofSetanta ( talk · contribs) has two previous Troubles sanctions on his current account, as well as 5 previous blocks on Troubles related articles on his previous account The Thunderer ( talk · contribs) (see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/The Thunderer/Archive for details). So to give me the same length topic ban as SonofSetanta is perverse, when I have never even been blocked on Troubles related articles, save one erroneous block quickly overturned. I find myself in a bizarre situation where I have been topic banned for reasons that have not been explained based on "evidence" that hasn't even been fully divulged to me. How am I supposed to edit again under those circumstances? I'll only get topic banned again based on the whim of some admin who refuses to answer questions, as has happened here. 2 lines of K 303 11:08, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@AGK, I'm really struggling to understand this now. SonofSetanta twice tries to force through incorrect or policy violating changes made by FergusM1970. I revert the changes a full 7 days after Domer48 had edited them out, and that's somehow worthy of a 3 (or even 6!!) month topic ban? Seriously, can I have an explanation as to this thinking please? The message is still clear to me, don't bother trying to stop people forcing through disputed changes or you'll get topic banned. So what's the alternative? Let their disruptive, incorrect and/or policy violating changes stand while we go through dispute resolution and they refuse to compromise and insist their edits stand? Does the reader benefit from allowing those changes to stand while all this goes on? 2 lines of K 303 11:11, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@Various people. If the decision is "harsh", then why is a harsh decision being allowed to stand? I'm not simply asking for the ban to be overturned, reducing the length is a second option. 2 lines of K 303 11:13, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@Flexdream. I don't have the time or energy to pick apart your latest attempts to revise history, like when you claimed at editors previously blocked and topic banned "didn't realise at the time they were in breach of a rule" [1RR]. However your claim regarding RTÉ is incorrect, as you are well aware. At the time of the dispute there was no podcast copy of the show on the RTÉ website at all, that is an addition made since the edits in question. This is obvious to anyone reading the discussions about it. 2 lines of K 303 11:34, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@Slp1. Totally irrelevant in my opinion, unless you're of the opinion that topic bans should be handed out at a minimum of three months regardless of the supposed level of misconduct? 2 lines of K 303 11:40, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
On a personal note I have limited time for this particular thread after brining a request for clarification and making input on a RFAR and responding to 2 other declined AE appeals of the same ruling. I have no problem with ONiH appealing it, it's just I've answered for a group decision of 4 sysops 3 times now already - just as a suggestion there needs to be a better way of dealing with AE closers than singling them out when a group decision has been made.
ONiH was one of a series of editors topic banned for misconduct both in the WP:Troubles topic area (specifically tag teaming editwarring at
Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign 1969–1997, but also issues relating to
7 July 2005 London bombings and at AE itself). The ruling took into account the apparent use of AE to "win" content disputes (by multiple parties ONiH being only one).
Initially I was of a mind that FergusM1970 was the only problematic user, other sysops disagreed and wanted to see where DRN discussion would go - they explicitly cautioned all articles to engage in a constructive fashion. After the DRN discussion failed Steven Zhang sent the case back to AE. At that point on examination I came round to other sysops POV that stonewalling and/or process gaming was occurring on both sides of the content issues. No constructive attempts at reaching/building consensus were being made by either side and the dispute originating at
Corporals killings spilled over. Instead of following dispute resolution policies (ie disengaging for a start) multiple involved editors tried various brute force mechanisms: tag teaming edit warring; reversion without discussion; immediate reporting to AE; 'tit for tat' AE reports; 'tit for tat' reverts.
The crux of the sanction was due to the tag teaming at
Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign 1969–1997 while the case was open. It is not acceptable for a party to bring a case to AE for stated misconduct and then engage in such misconduct themselves - that is the definition of
unclean hands. Parties as well as previously uninvolved editors (e.g DagosNavy) jumped into an editwar in breach of WP:Editwar and circumventing the
single revert restriction by tag teaming -this was noted at the AE thread, perhaps ONiH doesn't see his edit was tag teaming 4 sysops disagreed (if Arbs see it otherwise I'd appreciate a note on it so we don't make the same decision again elsewhere). At that point and in this context those involved in the worst of the issue were considered for topic bans.
FergusM1970 & SonofSetanta were given longer bans for recidivism and abuse of AE respectively. I did argue for Flexdream to be banned (after he had been formally notified of discretionary sanctions days previously) but other sysops disagreed. There was no 'lumping together of editors'.
I'll also note that contrary to
policy ONiH has blanked the topic ban notification. I understand his wish not to have this on his talk page but how he treated it is against policy--
Cailil
talk 14:13, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
Note: I think its good for ONiH to use this process to review this AE decision and for the official ability to appeal to ArbCom to be used and I have no problem at all with him doing so. I'd appreciate your eyes on this as frankly it was the worst case I've seen at AE for a long while-- Cailil talk 14:13, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
I do not have time to analyse this case, but would like to note that User:One Night In Hackney is a long-term editor of articles relating to The Troubles, and one of the most scholarly content-creators in that field. His prolific contributions include the 1981 Irish hunger strike, which he massively expanded in 2007 and brought to featured article status.
It is a serious loss to Wikipedia that a contributor of this calibre should be banned from the topic where they have made such a significant contribution. I would ask all concerned to examine whether this can be avoided. -- BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 14:38, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
I don't know if I can post to this discussion? I hadn't been told about it, but I have just noticed it because I am named and misrepresented several times. Do the admins want my account here? I wont be able to supply it till Thursday. If one of the admins can let me know either way please by a comment here in my statement section, or a posting on my talk page. If it's not necessary then I wont needlessly add to what is already a very lengthy piece. However, if the decision on Hackney is to be revised, partly in response to these inaccurate accounts of my activity I think I have to respond. Thanks.-- Flexdream ( talk) 21:05, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
@Newyorkbrad - sorry this couldn't be shorter. I have tried to restrict it. For clarity I have grouped comments under article headings.
I change 'summarily executed' to 'killed' with the edit summary 'A summary execution is a variety of execution in which a person is accused of a crime' [ [220]]. That summary was lifted verbatim from wikipedia. Less than 15 minutes later Hackney reverts it [ [221]] with summary '..and that's what happened'. I then open a section on the talk page [ [222]]. On the talk page Talk:Corporals_killings#Summary_Execution I ask what crime they were charged with. Hackney replies "Please don't ask irrelevant questions. Reference for summary execution added, good day to you." I tell Hackney I quoted the wikipedia definition and say " If they weren't charged with a crime they couldn't be summarily executed". Hackney replies "They couldn't?". Judge for yourself which of us is trying to have a discussion.
Hackney cites "Peter Taylor Brits pages 294-295 "In a statement that evening, the IRA claimed responsibility for the 'execution' of 'two SAS members who launched an attack on the funeral cortège of our comrade"." I have pointed out before - this sources puts 'execution' in quotes and that is deliberate. I could describe the AE as a 'court case'. You would know what I meant, but you wouldn't think I meant it was a court case. In addition, the source doesn't use the word 'summarily'. Hackney also added a source to the article which which uses the term 'summarily executed'[ [223]]. It is a book on Yugolslavia, and is taken from the introduction. The source also described the funeral as being for three IRA gunmen, when it was actually for one. So the source seems flimsy support. Contrast that with [ [224]] who as well as identifying that 'killed' was used for years in the article, shows that there are relatively few sources for 'summarily executed'. Hinckley's response is here [ [225]]
Hackney states "However Flexdream then asks a totally different question on the talk page, "And the crime they were charged with was what?". There's a substantial difference between "accused" and "charged", thus making the question irrelevant. You don't need to be *charged* with a crime to be summarily executed" Totally different question from what? My summary states "A summary execution is a variety of execution in which a person is accused of a crime". My question is "And the crime they were charged with was what?" This he calls this a 'totally different question'? This is pedantry. Hackney still will not answer what crime they were accused of or charged with. And he maintains that 'executed' in quotes in a source equates to summarily executed?
Hackney states "summarily executed" was the consensus wording For years the word was 'killed'. It was changed to 'summarily executed' in March [ [226]]. It was changed to 'murdered' in April [ [227]] then changed back to 'summarily executed'. Then changed to 'killed' by me in August. I don't think 'summarily executed' has ever been the consensus wording.
Hackney states "There's various comments falsely alleging I refused to take part in dispute resolution." There's also comments like mine asking for you and others to be given more time [ [228]]
Hackney states "Yes the caveat was needed due to the number of inaccuracies in the request, and I wished to make it clear I had objections to those inaccuracies. Bear in mind there was nowhere for me to write my version of events unlike in say a request for arbitration, I simply added a caveat to make sure I disputed the accuracy of the request. What's the problem with that exactly?" I think the problem is that it's the only contribution and it seems unnecessary.
Hackney states "removing the disruptive editors from the situation is all that's needed" I agree. the article now uses the term 'shot' [ [229]]. I've no problem with that as it's accurate and straightforward. Since several editors were banned, no one seems to be wanting to change it to 'summarily executed'.
Hackney states " Flexdream attempted to remove an unsourced comparison with IRA bombings during the Troubles, Nick Cooper reverted his edit, then rather than attempt to discuss the inclusion of what he deemed to be irrelevant content, Flexdream added a bizarre comparison that you won't be able to find made by a reliable source. That's where I entered the picture. You appear to be suggesting that if I want to remove the content Flexdream added, I also have to join in an edit war on his behalf" I made clear in my first edit here that it was because I thought it irrelevant [230], it had nothing to do with sourcing. Nick Cooper reverted it as relevant [ [231]]. Accepting Nick's argument I added material [ [232]]. I don't see any edit war there for Hackney to join in and I never undid Nick's reversion. Hackney then chooses to remove just my addition [ [233]] as being unsourced even though I have a link to the wikipedia article. I then open a section on the talk page to discuss it [ [234]](do you see a pattern here, I edit, Hackney reverts, I create a section on the talk page to discuss). Judge again how the discussion goes and how collegiate it is.
Hackney states "Somewhat bizarrely, Flexdream's attempts to edit war OR into an article with unproductive talk page discussion" I still don't see how it's OR when I link to a wikipedia article for reference. Is it really better I go to the wikipedia article, find a source that's used there, come back and put that as a link. How does it help the reader to have a link that takes them out of wikipedia to a single source, instead of taking them to a wikipedia article that has multiple sources? Which makes wikipedia a better encyclopedia?
Hackney quotes ""if ONIH had applied the same verifibiality and NOR criteria to both parts of the sentence, and had supported Flexdream's concerns about and deletion of problematic material by removing it himself, the edit war that followed might easily have been avoided" - I did the former, as the talk page proves. As already stated, I was not willing to edit war on his behalf to make an edit he'd already attempted to make which had been reverted." There was no edit war before Hackney intervened as I've shown. It would have been better if Hackney had concerns about sourcing for him to be clear on that from the start, and explain why he was removing one edit but not the other. Instead he goes straight in and removes one edit saying it's unsourced, and says nothing about the other edit. I think it was reasonable for me to see this as selective.
Hackney states "Flexdream was bold in his removal, reverted, then didn't attempt to discuss but made a totally different bold edit. He was then reverted by me, and rather than discuss he started an edit war" What was 'bold' about it? I didn't discuss Nick's reversion because I accepted the argument given for the reversion. My next edit was consistent with that, and wasn't reverted by Nick. It was reverted by Hackney. I then started the discussion.
"Flexdream reverts twice to restore unverifiable material while not contributing to ongoing talk page discussion for another 4 hours." I still think that a broadcast BBC programme is a reliable source. I know from previous that Hackney will try to remove even direct links to a copy of a broadcast program where he doesn't want them in the article.[ [235]]. Again, judge for yourself how the discussion I started that time went[ [236]] and the dispute resolution [ [237]] .
Hackney states "FergusM1970 is nothing but a disruptive POV warrior in my opinion". I think there is a big contrast in Hackney's present action and Fergus' response to a ban [
[238]]. Fergus acknowledges "my behaviour fell below the acceptable standard", whereas Hackney states "my behaviour can be seen as less than stellar".
I think I was harshly treated, but I think the admins have a thankless task. I had probably got used to a level of behaviour among editors that is not typical, and I am encouraged that admins see it as appalling where tag-teaming is used to avoid the 1RR rule and edit-war. Where there is little effort to engage in discussion, which sometimes descends to little more than insult. My concern is that when blocks expire or are lifted some editors might revert to 'business as usual'. In meantime from what little I can see the Troubles articles are doing fine.--
Flexdream (
talk) 20:15, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
The following report was filed by ONIH on 2 August and was considered at the time by two Admin’s EdJohnston and Cailil on 3 August to be fairly cut and dry with Cailil noting that “…content is not relevant to ArbCom enforcement.” It was Heimstern here who suggested they “hold off on sanctions, let's find a way to resolve the content dispute via actual consensus first." NuclearWarfare asked did Admin’s “see anything by any party that looks like it would be called poor editing (POV writing, misrepresenting sources, etc.) by any objective observer?” and Seraphimblade asked “if there's clear POV editing, baiting, nastiness during discussions...” Heimstern said “no, nothing is blatantly obvious.”
While Slp1 makes the point that ONIH had filed two reports in 9hrs which becomes irrelevant as Slp1 noted that Flexdream "acknowledged that they had broken 1RR" and "the report closed as a warning" however, with two Admins having already seen a clear cut violation, and accepting that "FergusM1970 has broken 1RR" Slp1 makes the bizarre statement that "the 1RR rule as written and applied rewards editors who have a big gang to revert and who use battleground approaches to get their way in a topic area." Apart from the massive assumption of bad faith both these editors had violated 1RR and have been found by AE to have done so. Simple rule, don't edit war on a 1RR article, "they made me do it" is not a defense. Even Cailil noted what Slp1 was saying vis-a-vis gaming but don't see it here, and correctly pointing out that "FergusM1970 has already been topic-banned a breach of WP:TROUBLES is recidivism." and that the " openning of a DRN thread may have had the aim of forestalling this thread - if that were the case that would be a gaming issue."
It was EdJohnston at 16:35, 4 August who suggested holding off on closing while the DRN thread was open. With a number of Admin's agreeing Seraphimblade at 16:39, 4 August Heimstern at 20:40, 4 August The Blade of the Northern Lights at 20:46, 4 August Slp1 at 22:01, 4 August. The times and dates are important because at 22:35, 4 August, Steven Zhang actually closed the DNR. This makes these comments by Cailil all the more bizarre along with the agreement of John Carter. The DNR was over before it began and the claims of "stonewalling" are without foundation. You cannot find a "source based consensus" if the editor will not provide the required sources.
It is now that the editing history of editors is called into question. We still have a group of editors who insist on violating the 1RR even with threads already open on them [253] [254] [255] [256], and continuing to add un-sourced POV laden text and nothing is done. I do agree with the comments by AGK, "Topics subject to AE are demonstrably problematic areas of the encyclopedia, so misconduct reported here needs to be dealt with swiftly and effectively." In this case it was not! Admin's failed to act on this, and exasperated the situation by sitting on their hands failing in the one task they were assigned to do and have shifted this mess onto editors who have to deal with these editors. ONIH has ably demonstrated this with diff's and I've attempted to do the same. The more one looks at this, the more I question the fact that I have, along with ONIH been topic banned? I'll put up some diff's on my edits and request that Admins point to the ones that justify such a decision. -- Domer48 'fenian' 10:22, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
I was not intending to post in this discussion, however due to the fact One Night In Hackney was topic-banned for behavioural issues I feel that it needs to be mentioned that I have recently had to file a complaint in regards to uncivil comments by ONIH on a non-Troubles article. Mabuska (talk) 10:55, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).
It would be my feeling that the ban was imposed incorrectly because the sysops involved did not take me at my word. The detail of the complaint clearly shows I was having difficulty with a process, receiving help from others, engaging in discussion and most importantly, reverting edits which I clearly thought were vandalism. I made no alteration to the text of the article and my decision to nominate it for deletion wouldn't have taken effect immediately but would have required discussion which clearly could have resulted in another method of dealing with my concerns over the article. The situation wasn't helped by the intervention of an editor called Mo aimn. I believe his alterations were designed to invite reverts from me as he knew I would be under preessure and make mistakes. He wold have observed this from previous (unhappy) interaction with me.
From the text of the complaint you can see that sysops and some other editors argued for a ban because I had been consistently disruptive since 2008 and should have known by now how to nominate a page for deletion. They claim I have hidden two previous identities to avoid scrutiny by sysops. They appear to ignore the representations made by the other editors who were involved and who speak in support of me being confused but discussing. I am accused of causing a "Battle Royale" over image copyright. This is far from true. I was accused of deliberate copyright violation yes, but after several weeks of activity was able to prove that I had never violated copyright but had made mistakes in the pretty complicated area of Crown Copyright on images uploaded in 2008.
The facts are:
1. I have not edited constantly since 2008. I had a username for 2 months in 2008 before retiring under pressure from edit-warring gamers. A second identity was created in 2008 which lasted for around four months. My current identity was created in 2010 but used sparingly until May of this year with only a handful of edits in 2010, 2011 and 2012. The truth is my editing history spans 12 months since 2008 with substantial breaks.
2. My issues since 2008 have always revolved around articles concerning the Irish Troubles and my unsuccessful attempts to edit out POV where I saw it. A dedicated cabal was roaming the wiki ensuring that all of these articles were guarded and kept with their particular POV intact. My opposition to this was noted and I became a target for "gaming" to get me off the wiki. It sounds bizarre but it has happened to many people who have dared to edit these articles with a neutral POV. Why don't I just leave these articles alone? I am from Northern Ireland and am of very moderate views. I also have a passionate interest in the military of Ireland, our police forces and the British Military. Why should I not edit the articles? In my opinion, after examining what happens and being part of it, the thing to do is to stay involved and to try and assist admins in identifying what can be done to prevent this type of gaming.
3. I am not guilty of copyright violation or disruption but this is used against me by sysops and those supporting a call for me to be banned. All I did was to stand my ground, discuss, learn and save the images which were tagged for deletion. Why is this wrong?
4. The most important point is that I was not disruptive. I tried to nominate a page for deletion. Several AfD patrollers came at me from nowhere and so quickly that the situation was developing whist I was responding to them on the talk page of the article, their own talk pages and mine.
5. After the ban was applied I adjusted the licencing on image /info/en/?search=File:5_UDR_Record_Sleeve.jpg. I was not aware that such an action was a violation of the ban and pointed this out at Sandstein's talk page. Without warning I was then blocked. Was that fair?
Summary:
The real meat of the issue is at the article talk page: /info/en/?search=Talk:Shoot-to-kill_policy_in_Northern_Ireland#Tags The edit history will show me putting in headers including the 1RR Troubles Restriction before opening a discussion as required to debate the possible deletion of the page. I am experienced in 1RR and wouldn't have engaged in an edit war. My belief was that I was reverting vandalism and that can be seen in my edit summaries. The issue to me is that sysops are claiming I'm being disingenuous when all the evidence says otherwise. I think it has to be examined why an uninvolved user (Psychonaut), who is a copyright enforcer, came to file the complaint at AE and why Mo aimn became involved. Both of them excacerbating an issue which was by then under control and clealry needed no further intervention as an admin was already involved. If the admin didn't feel it necessary to file a complaint why did Psychonaut?
I request that the ban be overturned and my name cleared. If possible the block that was applied to my user name because I did not understand that image pages were not part of the ban should be expunged.
Only since May this year have I been able to edit at any pace on Wikipedia. My success in doing so had me feeling for the first time that I was a real and active part of the Wikipedia community. I brightened up my talk page for the first time ever by putting in colour and infoboxes. I want to stay as part of the community and I believe the outcome of my learning when I was thrust into copyright issues proves that I am willing to work hard to remain and be productive. Where I think the problem lies is that some editors still want to play games and sysops are too prone to looking for past demeanours to prove a knee jerk feeling that someone is being disruptive - that people like me can't learn to avoid being gamed. The central issue is that the content of an article wasn't the cause of my error. I was learning a new process, made mistakes, and thought what I was doing was subject to vandalism (for a short period). No credit has been given to me for backing down and following instruction given by other, concerned and helpful editors and admins.
I am very alarmed that a single administrator seems to have made a final decision here. Where's the discussion, the process? Does my submission not warrant comment
@ NW - Thank you for your comments. Yes: in the event of my appeal failing if it were possible to allow me to continuing editing at Ulster Defence Regiment to maintain my goal for GA status I would be grateful. I have made this request before. The UDR is a complicated subject however and it has at least another 18 pages associated with it which deal with the 15 battalions as per List of battalions and locations of the Ulster Defence Regiment and also List of attacks on the Ulster Defence Regiment plus Timeline of Ulster Defence Regiment operations. The ancillary articles could be raised to B Class at least, if not GA status with a comprehensive amount of work. Part of the peer review report suggested reducing the size of the article and to that end I have been considering removing the fairly substantial women's section here to an article which would probably have the title "Greenfinches (Women's UDR)". If I were allowed to edit in this area a topic ban on the troubles wouldn't matter to me because I had already (as the AE case shows) withdrawn voluntarily from that topic. whilst I may have the knowledge to contribute usefully in that area I find that I'm not able to find proper collegiate responses generally and would prefer to maintain a distance, even though my fingers twitch at the sight of some of the more glaring examples of POV and inaccuracy within many of those articles. SonofSetanta ( talk) 13:05, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
@ Salvio. In your statement you say: we should not substitute our own opinions to those of the admin(s), but that is exactly what I believe is required. The admins have stated that they based their opinion on the fact that I have been a user for five years and have treated me as an experienced user. If you read my statement above you will see that I contest that view. Even if it were true however it remains that some areas of Wikipedia are quite complicated and if one hasn't engaged in a particular process before it can prove to be difficult and need experimentation. I've always been encouraged to apply WP:BOLD and try new processes and I have learned a lot since 22nd of June this year when I commenced editing full time, something I've never done before. My editing history shows that I have made 4329 edits. Almost 3500 of those have been made since 22nd June. This is the only period since I first joined Wikipedia where I have enjoyed editing on a productive and collegiate basis without considerable WP:BATTLE taking place as a result of my edits. In my opinion this is clearly because of the absence of certain editors who opposed what I was doing on partisan grounds. In my previous identities the edit count of both equates to what I've done in the period June 22nd until now. It can clearly be seen from my interaction with other editors and admins that, for the first time, I can identify myself as part of the Wikipedia community and am behaving in a commensurate manner.
The issue at stake here is: did I conduct my editing in a disruptive manner and then try to be disingenuous in my comments, or did I simply make errors in good faith whilst attempting a new process ? Did the sysops involved treat my case on the basis of my editing history since 22nd June or was I topic banned because of what happened in a previous identity? Has my conduct changed from previous identities? Look at how I followed the guidance given to me during the incident. examine how I stopped reverting what I considered to be vandalism when it was explained how I should go about it. Did I change the content of the article or was I simply trying to make a case for deletion in the full knowledge that it would lead to a discussion on the talk page rather than an instant deletion of the article? Did I engage in discussion? Did I seek help from admin? (The answer to both of those questions is yes).
@ Sandstein. You claim: SonofSetanta does not recognize that the sanction is a result of their own conduct, and instead assigns blame to others. You state that: {SonofSetanta} has a relatively long record of blocks for disruption in the "Troubles" topic area, under three accounts. Did you not consider that I might have just made mistakes as I claim? Which would clearly fall into Wikipedia:Don't come down like a ton of bricks. That's not wikilawyering btw, the essay is there for all to read and you cannot blame an editor like me for quoting it to try and persuade you that you've got me wrong. Were you simply blinded by the fact that the article fall under Troubles Sanctions, an area which I worked in since 22nd June without similar difficulty (barring the copyright incident mentioned in my statement which is not Troubles related)? Nor was my attempt at nominating the page for deletion Troubles related. I feel I need to point out my opinion that {Troubles Restriction} was created to prevent edit warring over content on Troubles related argument. Not to prevent editors from learning and employing Wikipedia processes. The Troubles is an area where Wikipedia desperately needs editors. It is a very difficult area to work in. You've just lost me from that area because the Devil and all his imps couldn't persuade me to edit comprehensively on the subject again whilst you, as my personal Sword of Damocles, are going to come down on me like a ton of bricks every time I make a mistake which isn't content related.
FYI, and for the attention of all admins involved in this discussion. I am a disabled man. I know perfectly well that my private situation has no bearing on this case or upon my work in Wikipedia but it does mean: because I am unable to engage in gainful employment I have spent all day every day since 22nd June devoting my not inconsiderable intelligence, education, life experience and skills to improving Wikipedia, largely in a very difficult area to work in. I had no difficulties prior to the copyright incident. Would it not have been more prudent of you to encourage and cultivate my input rather than trying to portray me as a disruptive editor and applying draconian means to curtail my editing? I made a series of mistakes very quickly. Mo ainm's intervention wasn't helpful - if that's what you mean by me blaming others. Your wrongfully applied sanction could well have driven me away from Wikipedia: is that what you want?
1. No request has been made by me for an investigation into Psychonaut's comments however, given his intervention and his comments here I think it should be apparent to all the he has an axe to grind and should be given guidance on how too extend good faith and to be helpful to editors like me who occasionally get a little confused over processes.
2. Admins should clearly be able to understand why Psychonaut has little comprehension of the difficulties of trying to edit articles relate to the Troubles on an NPOV basis and why they would lead to blocks or bans as "cooling off periods" when discussions become heated, uncivil, or abusive.
3. Psychonaut is mistaken. I have never been blocked or banned in any shape or form for copyright violation. The images he refers to which he tagged are still on Wikipedia with several notable exceptions: one or two which I did not wish to retain and three where I made an error in my interpretation of a Creative Commons licence. I accepted the deletion of those with good grace and in reference to the latter three, learned something new. I have learned so much in fact that, as stated above, I have been assisting copyright enforcers this week in the weeding out, replacement and deletion of dozens (possibly coming close to 100) copyvio images.
4. With regards to the incident at Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland he is again wrong. The editing histories show that I posted this message to Shirt58 at 13:55 after I had been reverted for a second time. I left a message for a sysop here [257] seeking advice but prior to this had already begun to engage on the talk page which makes me wonder why Mo aimn made his revert of me at 14:55 when discussion had clearly been going on between myself and other helpful editors since 14:23 in the section I had started at 12:42 to specifically provide a discussion area for my deletion tag. Uncle Milty made a revert at 15:15 removing the tag again but gave an informed summary. The final tag which I placed at 16:11 was after I had been unable to list the page for deletion at AfD. After reading further instructions I was of the opinion that I needed to place {subst:prod|reason goes here} in order for the listing to become active. This tag was removed immediately by Mo aimn: his second revert on a 1RR page (a guideline he knows well).
5. He is again incorrect in claiming that I knew the ban affected images. If the request made to Sandstein on 25th August is examined here it can clearly be seen that I requested permission to change images ON the article Ulster Defence Regiment understanding that I couldn't edit the article page. At Wikipedia:Banning_policy#Topic_ban it does not state that images are part of the ban however and I had concluded that while it would not be permissible to add or remove images from article pages it would be acceptable to update the licencing on images which were already in the article. Psychonaut was quick to inform Sandstein of this mistake on my part which can be seen at the same link on Sandstein's talk page. Which led to the "without warning" block. After this I became convinced that I couldn't edit ANY images until it was pointed out to me that Commons wasn't included in the ban. I then created File:Ulster_Defence_Regiment_Crest.png and requested assistance from several other users before finding one who was prepared to replace the .jpg format image already on pages with UDR in the title. As you can see Psychonaut continues to try and assert that I am trying to circumvent the ban by editing an image into Northern Ireland Security Guard Service even though, as he admits himself, the organisation was formed post- Good Friday Agreement and therefore is not included in {Troubles Sanctions}. Although another editor has helpfully informed me that there could be a grey area so I have not returned to complete the formatting of the image but instead have asked him would he be kind enough.
Summary. As you can see the situation was quite complicated. I have said before I became confused (no wonder) and was of the opinion that the reverts I was making were outside 1RR because I was reverting vandalism (of Peridon and Mo aimn}, or as in the last one, following instruction from AfD. My edit summary here [258] after my first revert couldn't be clearer. If the other editors had stayed away from it instead of creating the impression of WP:TAGTEAM I am confident that Peridon and I could have sorted my misunderstandings out quite quickly on the article talk page because I was seeking help.
I keep wondering why Psychonaut is following my edit history and making multiple complaints about me. If he thinks I am prone to making errors why then doesn't he interface with me rather than converting my mistakes into ANI or AE cases? Although he did state on the ANI board that he will never engage with me again. I am no longer engaging with SonofSetanta because my many weeks of doing so patiently and politely have led me to believe that it is futile. If I were completely incapable of making productive and useful contribution to Wikipedia I would have realised this a long time ago and simply left the site. The opposite is true however. The vast majority of my edits (and images) are productive, useful and in volume.
I think it's got to be noted that it was ME who tagged Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland as WP:1RR. Why would I do that and then be disingenuous about {Troubles Restriction}? SonofSetanta ( talk) 14:40, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
@ SilkTork. Your point would be valid if indeed I had been making regular contributions for three years but I haven't. Between October 2010 and June 2013 I made less than 1200 edits. Most of them on articles such as White Island, County Fermanagh, Joe Dolan, RAF Greencastle (created by me, now C Class), Herbert Westmacott, Provisional Irish Republican Army, Brian Kenny (British Army officer), John Strawson (British Army officer) (created by me]], Battle of the Imjin River, Winston Churchill, Denis Ormerod (created by me), Harry Baxter (created by me), Imber, Lists of shipwrecks, Bill Bellamy (British Army officer) (created by me - B Class, listed at the Template:Did you know, 8th King's Royal Irish Hussars, HMS Dasher (D37), MV Princess Victoria, Black Watch, Viola Grosvenor, Duchess of Westminster (created by me), Arthur Denaro (all images from my own personal collection), Tannenberg Memorial (C Class), Queen's Royal Irish Hussars (most images from my personal collection).
So, given this knowledge and the fact that I made very few contributions to The Troubles until 22nd June this year in this identity would you be kind enough to explain your comments regarding confusion and ignorance and poor understanding of procedures? Perhaps you could elaborate on how a poor ignorant soul such as me could have an article up for GA status? (see Ulster Defence Regiment, almost completely rewritten by me between June and August). I put it to you that you have completely misunderstood the situation as the admins who imposed the ban also did. I have uploaded 63 unique images on Commons since 13th July, created 32 new articles on the Wiki (over three identities) and God knows how many unique images, most of which I have donated from my personal collection taken by me during military service.
Educate this poor old thicko then. Why would someone of my ilk believe that a topic ban is the least they can expect in order to prevent further disruption.
Are you aware of the disruption caused on articles pertaining to The Troubles which led to DS being imposed after a very long and convoluted ArbCom case? Are you cognisant of the fact that tag-teamers roamed articles related to The Troubles to game new users (at that time) like me into making mistakes and getting blocks and bans to prevent us from removing partisan views from articles?
Lastly: can you see the annoyance in the words that I use when replying to you? Annoyed that you haven't actually bothered to examine the detail of what happened at Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland but based your statement on preconceived prejudices because I admitted to having the occasional problem with new processes? I respectfully urge you too to read Wikipedia:Don't come down like a ton of bricks where it quite clearly states that: policies and guidelines are not the law and do not need to be ruthlessly enforced. You obviously haven't read a word of what I've posted in my defence or you would know, despite my manifold contributions, I've only really been editing Wikipedia since 22nd June this year because of the difficulties I've had in my two previous identities. I didn't know that editing articles on my own country, county and town would be so difficult in a project which professes to be as well run as this one is. My frustration at being defeated in my efforts to change that over three identities has been expressed on many occasions. Yet with all, people like you are able to post twisted and incorrect opinions about me whenever it pleases you without fear of repercussion, because you are an admin and I'm just a pleb editor. You use the block log to judge me without knowing what I, and others, went through to try and make genuine contributions. We welcomed the DS. We didn't think it went far enough and are very happy to comply with it. It has a flaw however: it can still be gamed and I fell for it in a moment of confusion. Read the detail. Go to Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland and see who discussed what and when. SonofSetanta ( talk) 15:54, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
@ Newyorkbrad and T. Canens. May I ask what logic you applied to reach a "decline" opinion. Have you examined the incident in detail or is your response one of backing up a fellow administrator's decision? I have proved beyond doubt in my various submissions that much of what has been asserted about me being disruptive is untrue. Do you not feel that a deeper investigation into these allegations is warranted? Have you examined the incident in detail to see if my statement is true? While I certainly and very much appreciate the inclusion of an offer to allow me to continue editing certain articles whilst the ban continues I still maintain my innocence from any wrongdoing and that is really what this appeal is about. Don't judge me as The Thunderer; judge me on my achievements, input and modified behaviour in this identity. Is it not possible, in your opinion, beyond all conceivable doubt, that I could actually be telling the truth? SonofSetanta ( talk) 14:23, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
POINT OF ORDER - As per Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Discretionary_sanctions#Guidance:
administrators should use their judgment and balance the need to assume good faith and avoid biting genuinely inexperienced editors, and the desire to allow responsible contributors maximum freedom to edit,
Has good faith been exercised towards me by Sandstein? Have I been "bitten" because I was inexperienced in a particular process?
I would like this to be considered please. SonofSetanta ( talk) 15:00, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
I refer to the rationale I provided for the topic ban in the AE thread that led up to the ban on 24 August 2013, and to the conclusions reached by my administrator colleagues when they declined an appeal of the ban at WP:AE on 26 August 2013.
The appeal does not address the disruptive conduct by SonofSetanta identified in these proceedings, notably, edit-warring to reinstate a frivolous speedy deletion nomination of a "Troubles"-related article after several administrators had declined the speedy deletion request, as per the evidence provided in the AE request linked to above. In imposing the topic ban I considered that SonofSetanta has a relatively long record of blocks for disruption in the "Troubles" topic area, under three accounts:
In this appeal, SonofSetanta does not recognize that the sanction is a result of their own conduct, and instead assigns blame to others. For this reason, the topic ban is still, in my view, a necessary and proportionate measure to prevent further disruption by SonofSetanta in this topic area. Accordingly, I recommend that the appeal be declined. Sandstein 16:06, 5 September 2013 (UTC)
I see that SonofSetanta's appeal contains a request for investigation into my conduct (though I was never notified of same). I had hoped to avoid any further discussion of this user, but as he seems to have dragged me into this one I'm not sure it's avoidable.
I endorse Sandstein's conclusion that SonofSetanta seems unable to recognize his own disruptive behaviour, and that it was this behaviour (and not others' reports of it) which is the reason for his current and past sanctions. This lack of awareness is demonstrated most saliently by points 3, 4, and 5 of his appeal:
In (3) he flatly states that he is "not guilty of copyright violation or disruption", though this is precisely what he has been repeatedly blocked for; one needs only consult his various accounts' block logs and user talk pages here and on Commons to appreciate the scope of the problem. I was one (but neither the first, nor the most prolific) of several users who tagged his infringing images for deletion.
In (4) he claims he was "not disruptive" in the incident that led to his latest topic ban, which flies in the face of his next claim that "several AfD patrollers" had to engage with him in order to get him to stop edit warring over the deletion tag.
Finally in (5) he claims his latest block (for violating the topic ban) was unfair because it was without warning; however, he had been conspicuously notified of the topic ban on "everything related to The Troubles" (emphasis in original) on his user talk page on 24 August. The notice made it clear that noncompliance would result in blocks. In fact, a quick check over SonofSetanta's recent contributions shows that he still may not be complying with the topic ban. He's made a number of edits, for example, to Northern Ireland Security Guard Service, who according to the article are best noted for their controversial defence of a post- Good Friday attack by the Real IRA.
I have no opinion or recommendation concerning the outcome of this appeal; I just wanted to voice my support of Sandstein's observations and to rebut some of the claims made in the appeal. — Psychonaut ( talk) 12:49, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
This is an enquiry. Are the terms of this arbitration still in force about restricting the number of reversions allowed (and the wider issue of slow-motion edit-warring) on articles that include the "Flag of Northern Ireland"? I raise it because some editors are insisting on repeatedly adding the purported flag to articles when they can give no reliable source that there is one, and on many of the relevant articles, there is a long-standing consensus that Northern Ireland does not have any such flag. In some cases, these editors also refuse to discuss the issues on relevant talk pages or have used insults and outrage when action has been taken against them (by myself) when, admittedly, I did not realise that these articles were covered by this arbitration. One editor that I know of has already been blocked on more than one occasion though in the long past for similar kinds of editing concerning the flag of Northern Ireland. I am mostly referring to: Template:UKFlags with edit history here just now, but similar slow-motion edit wars with a refusal to discuss much has happened on other articles where flgs of the UK have been included. Thanks DDStretch (talk) 12:05, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
I am not acting out of political motivations you seem to imply I am, even when you point to a comment on Snowded's talk page where I comment to another administrator that someone is under a 1rr restriction already and that perhaps more action is needed to prevent further disruption. This is allowed! Note that I have protected a relevant page to prevent further disruption and warned editors to discuss things and provide reliable sources for any changes they want to make on contentious matters (see relevant discussion here).
Rather than speculating on political motivations or speculating that I am trying to coordinate administrator action as part of some underlying so-called political action, it is better to focus on demonstrable facts (rather than theories) which are:
(a) There is a long-standing consensus that a small number of disgruntled editors now seem to object to. That consensus doesn't get destroyed just by disruptive action on the part of these disgruntled editors. But it is one reason why there is a 1rr restriction on these kinds of articles. These disgruntled editors can object, but their objections can only have force if my next point is satisfied:
(b) When requests are made to find reliable sources to back up including a flag for Norther Ireland, silence happens, and after a break, the repeated adding and slow-motion edit war by a small number of editors then resumes.
Consensus does exist, and it can change only by acceptable arguments, and that means by the inclusion of reliable sources in discussions which other editors can reasonably accept. I have asked for these, but none have been forthcoming. Just a resumed slow-motion edit war. Where are the reliable sources?
(c) You and the other editors concerned do this slow-motion edit-war at just enough frequency to avoid the strictly legal restrictions of 1rr editing. (see here, and here for the ones I have found so far, where others will see numerous editors removing the flags being repeatedly added
You accuse me of political motivations. However, in essense by alleging political motivations, you are trying to rule anyone out of order who tries to take action against the gaming of the system by the particular slow-motion edit wars used by editors, including yourself on one occasion. You would be better off by making use of your time on this matter by finding and posting the reliable sources. I urge you to do so, because you also refuse to engage in the normal wikipedia process of providing reliable sources for the changes you want after they have been requested, instead you have become a participant in this slow-motion edit war!
I give an undertaking here that if reliable sources are found and posted, and if they are persuasive for myself, then of course I will not object to the flags being added if the consensus then changes (I might add, although I may change my mind, the consensus may not, in which case, I accept the wikipedia policy that one must go with the consensus view so long as it is reasonable, and I think that you and the others seem not to accept this.)
I am solely concerned with the disruption caused by these disruptive actions which continue even after requests to discuss the matter and to provide reliable sources have been made. I formally ask some other administrator to look at what is happening and take what action they feel is appropriate.
I finally ask that Miles Creagh withdraws his unfounded allegation that I am acting from some political motivation, because it is unfounded by reasonable scrutiny of what I have done, above. As such, it is demeaning of him and the other disruptive editors to continue to reply to legitimate requests with silence and continued edit-warring, making unfounded allegations towards me or some others, who object to their actions, or both. DDStretch (talk) 18:56, 10 May 2016 (UTC)
Here [261] [262], incidentally, is an exhaustive and exhausting prior structured discussion pursuant to a Request for Mediation on this matter, which doesn't seem to have arrived at a consensus. Where are the Requests for Mediation, Comment, prior discussions etc that evidence this claimed consensus? Miles Creagh ( talk) 21:23, 10 May 2016 (UTC)
I must apologize for making the mistake of assuming that Snowded was an administrator. I would not have posted a message on his talk page discussing the edit warring that has been taking place if I had not made this error. However, this does not have any effect on the substantive issues under discussion here.
In particular, this apology does not absolve Miles Creagh for his assumption about political motivation, because making such assumptions just should not be made at all!
Similarly, it does not absolve him or the other editors for their failure up to now, in this section, of attempting to provide reliable sources for the changes they insist on making in a slow-motion edit war without engaging in any discussion on the relevant talk pages.
For all these reasons, it is still appropriate the action be considered by another administrator for what has been happening.
If the reliable sources are placed on the relevant talk pages and a proper discussion takes place, with no allegations of political motivations, then a way forward might be achievable, but it is still possible that some action can happen because of violations of 1rr editing restrictions or game-playing by apparent tag-teaming edits across a number of pages at just the right frequency to evade breaching the 1rr restriction within a 24 hour period.
The requirement for an apology, therefore, still stands because making comments in an attempt to undermine another editor by alleging political motivations on their part is simply unacceptable. It is one main reason why such restrictions have been imposed on all articles that are in some way connected with "The Troubles". DDStretch (talk) 19:47, 11 May 2016 (UTC)
My question is two-fold:
Other similar edits have been made by Gateshead001 ( talk · contribs), but since I am not an expert, I do not wish to take unilateral action except in the most blatant cases of non-verifiability. -- Redrose64 🌹 ( talk) 21:17, 11 November 2017 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Initiated by Swarm at 00:39, 15 May 2018 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
Greetings. So, WP:TROUBLES#Guide to enforcement contains a 2011 provision that places all pages in the topic area under a blanket 1RR page restriction that is specifically enforceable without warning, provided {{ Troubles restriction}} has been placed on the talk page. This directly contradicts the current awareness criteria for enforcing page restrictions, and it's unclear to me whether that provision is exempt from, or has been superseded by, the modern awareness criteria that were implemented in 2014 and 2018. In spite of the contradiction with standard practice, it continues to be advertised as an active sanction on many articles, which is apparently validated on the case page. However, there's no apparent record, anywhere, of an intentional exemption to ArbCom's now-standardized procedure regarding awareness. It also claims to derive its authority, at least in part, from a community decision, but there is no record of such a restriction at WP:GS or on the case page, so it's unclear as to whether the "no warning" provision is actually the will of the community. Thanks in advance.
The 1RR restriction originated from an AE discussion in 2008 and was clarified in an ANI discussion in 2009. It's not clear whether the 2011 motion superseding "all extant remedies" actually superseded these restrictions, since these aren't actually arbcom remedies, but looking at the history of User:Coren/draft this appears to be the intent.
Additionally, it is not clear whether and how the later changes to the DS system impact a page restriction imposed in 2011 given the provisions in
WP:AC/DS#Continuity (Nothing in this current version of the discretionary sanctions process constitutes grounds for appeal of a remedy or restriction imposed under prior versions of it.
and All sanctions and restrictions imposed under earlier versions of this process remain in force.
).
T. Canens (
talk) 08:51, 21 May 2018 (UTC)
As the Committee noted in adopting the most recent amendments to the DS procedure, the point of having warnings is that it's fundamentally unfair to subject people to penalties for violating sanctions they didn't know about. That's what notifications and alerts are all about. There's nothing stopping admins from using the existing, well-functioning procedure to tag each page with 1RR and alerting each editor before using the blunt tool of AE sanctions against them, just like in (almost) every other topic area that the Committee has imposed DS in. In my view, any disruption in this area can be handled with existing discretionary sanctions. I suggest that the Committee vacate any Troubles topic-wide 1RR that may (or may not) be currently in effect for the sake of clarity and fairness.
Also, I strongly believe that the recent motion concerning page sanctions applies to all previous page sanctions, too. The Committee didn't technically vacate or invalidate the page restrictions – it simply placed restrictions on enforcing them by sanctioning editors, going forward. (The motion provided that "There are additional requirements in place when sanctioning editors for breaching page restrictions." – this doesn't invalidate the page sanctions, but it does create new restrictions on enforcing them.) If that argument sounds too wikilawyery, the more pure argument is that the clear intent of the Committee was to make the change applicable to existing sanctions, too. Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 21:48, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
From the earlier statements by arbs and other admins, it is evident that we don't yet agree on whether the existing sanctions on The Troubles-related articles are subject to the awareness principle or not. Hence this clarification request is valid and necessary.
Gnomish editors are prone to falling foul of 1RR restrictions if there isn't an awareness clause. I often make reverts on articles I pass by, only to find out afterwards that the article is subject to 1RR. The recent fiasco with the block against seasoned administrator User:Jorm, which could have been averted if there was an explicit requirement to warn before blocking, also springs to mind. I strongly recommend ArbCom to amend this case and other old case with bespoke 1RR sanctions, to enshrine the awareness principle and standardise them to standard 1RR discretionary sanctions. Deryck C. 17:59, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.
The Arbitration Committee clarifies the following: All sanctions placed under remedy 3.2 of The Troubles prior to its replacement with remedy 5 are considered discretionary sanctions. Specifically, the 1RR sanction affecting the topic area is considered a form of page restriction placed as a discretionary sanction, and the additional awareness requirements regarding page restrictions apply.
Enacted - Mini apolis 14:30, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Initiated by Thryduulf at 17:18, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
As there are no specific other people involved, I have left notifications at:
In The Troubles arbitration case the committee authorised a remedy that was effectively discretionary sanctions (this was before standardised discretionary sanctions as we know them today had evolved) and as part of that a general 1RR restriction was imposed. Later, the old remedy was replaced by discretionary sanctions, incorporating the 1RR restriction. However, because of the way these sanctions have evolved the scope of the DS topic area is stated differently in different places and this is causing confusion (see for example [[Talk:#DS notice]]). What I believe to be the full history of the scope(s) and where I found them is detailed at User:Thryduulf/Troubles scope but what I understand to be the differing scopes presently in force are (numbered for ease of reference only):
British Baronets were formerly part of some of the scopes, but that was unambiguously removed by a previous committee.
I am asking the committee to:
Request 1 does lead to the need to determine what the scope should be. In my view, formed following some discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Ireland and Talk:Great Famine (Ireland) and looking at various articles and talk pages is that there are only two that need considering:
The Ulster Banner does not need to be separately mentioned - the Ulster Banner article is quiet and is not even tagged and while the Flag of Northern Ireland article would benefit from continued inclusion in the discretionary sanctions regime it is firmly within either scope suggested above.
The Easter Rising topic area is unquestionably within the scope of suggestion B and is reasonably interpreted as also being within the scope of suggestion A as crucial background to it.
Whether the Great Famine (Ireland) is within the scope of either A or B is less clear, nor is there clear consensus whether it should be - more input than I was able to attract prior to the request is needed here. Thryduulf ( talk) 17:18, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
@ Black Kite, GoodDay, EdJohnston, and Scolaire: letting you know about the suggested motion below in case you have any more comments. Thryduulf ( talk) 21:46, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
Per SilkTork's request, here is my suggestion for the salient points of a clarification motion. It needs some introductory text and may need some wordsmithing
Note to the clerks: If this (or some similar motion) passes the scope of the DS authorisation will need to be updated at Template:Ds/topics and Template:ArbCom Troubles restriction as well as the case pages linked. Thryduulf ( talk) 19:44, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
(B) would be better, in my opinion ... one could argue for the second section to specifically include the use of the term "British Isles", but that will probably be sufficient.
If I remember correctly, the issues with the Ulster Banner weren't particularly on that article itself, but edit-warring to include the Banner instead of the Irish flag / Union Jack (depending on context) and vice-versa on BLPs and other articles that included flags and flagicons. Black Kite (talk) 17:44, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I would caution that 1RR may need to be kept in place, during the Brexit process which effects the British/Irish border & thus related articles. GoodDay ( talk) 19:30, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I'm for anything, that'll prevent 'edit wars' around this topic. GoodDay ( talk) 21:53, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
Per a motion passed this year, the 1RR which is currently in place for Troubles articles is due to the decision by an administrator to impose it under discretionary sanctions. (Most likely it is due to this log entry by User:Timotheus Canens in the fall of 2011. The idea of a blanket Troubles 1RR didn't originate with him, it used to be a community sanction before that). So, if anybody thinks that the blanket 1RR should be adjusted they could (in theory) appeal it at AE. Personally, I can see the advantages of single-page 1RRs that could be applied by individual administrators.
According to Canens, the scope of the case is "..reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland.." In my view, this is an adequate description of the scope and I wouldn't advise the committee to get really specific as to which articles are in or out. Admins shouldn't take action unless the nature of the edits suggests that nationalism is at work in the minds of at least some of the editors. Modern nationalism can cause problems with articles that seem tangential, as when editors who are warned about WP:ARBMAC get into wars about Alexander the Great, since the word 'Macedonia' occurs there. Yet the ARBMAC decision did not mention our article on Alexander the Great, nor should it. Even so, the ARBMAC sanctions would reasonably apply to any nationally-motivated editing of that article. EdJohnston ( talk) 20:09, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I have nothing extra to bring to the general discussion. It was always my belief that the scope of the sanctions should be B, and this seems to be the arbs' view as well. I would just note that, in the Famine article, there was this edit within the last week. The historiography of the famine is still very much a battleground between Irish nationalists and British nationalists. The article has had a Troubles restriction template on the talk page since 2009. I don't see any point in removing it now. Scolaire ( talk) 15:00, 1 February 2019 (UTC)
@ Thryduulf: Is "'Ireland' has the standard geographical and political meanings" a phrase that has commonly been used in the past? It's not clear to me what it's saying. Where are the standard meanings posted and who set the standards? And is there a political meaning that's different from the geographical meaning(s) – one that includes Boston, Massachusetts or Celtic Park, Glasgow, for instance? If there is no bureaucratic reason for having this, I would leave it out. If there is, I would rephrase it so it is unambiguous. Scolaire ( talk) 11:56, 3 February 2019 (UTC)
@ Thryduulf and Joe Roe: I have already pointed out the ambiguity in the word "country" in regard to Ireland. Building ambiguity into a "clarification" makes no sense. The word "state" is used exclusively in the Irish Manual of Style. It was also the word used in the 2009 Poll on Ireland article names authorised by Arbcom, and in any number of discussions on WT:IE and WT:IECOLL. If you're going to go ahead with 6b (which I still think is just wordiness for the sake of wordiness), please change "country" to "state". Scolaire ( talk) 10:14, 6 February 2019 (UTC)
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Initiated by The C of E at 07:36, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
I would like to request removal of my Troubles restrictions because I do feel that the lesson has been learned. I feel I have shown in the past I am able to edit in these areas evenhandedly with John Brady (Sinn Féin politician) and Gerry Mullan (politician) being some examples. The crux of the ban was based on me allegedly trying to get Londonderry on DYK on a politically sensitive day which was not desirable to consensus. While I have been under the ban, 1831 Londonderry City by-election ran on DYK on Ulster Day so I feel its not been done consistently. As for the judicial review article, I already explained that was an unfortunate coincidence and I had not been thinking about it at the time I wrote the article.
If removal is not acceptable, can I request then that it be amended to permit editing of sporting articles. The reason I ask is because I asked @ Barkeep49: if I could edit GAA articles and he said no because of the sport's political culture. But most players and clubs are not political and I have done work in there previously without concern ( Seán Quigley, Killian Clarke, Ian Burke, Gerry Culliton, Cillian O'Connor, PSNI GAA and Irish Guards GAA). So, if full removal is not desired, I would like it amended for clarity and so I am able to continue working on sporting articles please. The C of E God Save the Queen! ( talk) 07:36, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
The
WP:AE request mentioned a parallel discussion which is now at
WP:AN archive. That WP:AN discussion was closed with the restrictions at
WP:Editing restrictions#The C of E. Those restrictions handle my greatest concern as they seem to prevent further problems regarding DYK. Accordingly I am relaxed about whatever the Committee wants to do regarding the WP:AE topic ban. Nevertheless, I have to record that "allegedly trying to get Londonderry on DYK on a politically sensitive day
" is an own-goal in an appeal.
Johnuniq (
talk) 09:14, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
I participated in the AE discussion, and gave my reasons for why I supported imposing a topic ban there. I don't have anything in particular to add to that. I will say that the fact that a community discussion at AN also came to the conclusion that there was disruptive behavior which merited sanctions shows that outcome to be a reasonable one. I think best at this time if the editor does productive editing in other topic areas, and then revisits this in six months or a year. Seraphimblade Talk to me 06:13, 30 November 2020 (UTC)
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Remedy 6 of the The Troubles case ("One-revert rule") is amended to read as follows:
A one revert restriction (1RR), subject to the usual exceptions, is applied to all pages relating to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland, broadly construed.
For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 1 arbitrator abstaining, 5 support or oppose votes are a majority.
Support:
Oppose:
Abstain:
Disputes involving Vintagekits have been brewing for several months. Vintagekits, an Irish editor, appears to have a strong aversion to articles about British nobility and titled commoners, such as baronets. This has brought Vintagekits into conflict with editors on WikiProject:Baronetcies such as Kittybrewster, who I believe self-identifies as a baronet in real life and who has written articles about numerous members of his extended family, some of which have been proposed for deletion on notability and/or sourcing grounds. Some editors had the initial reaction that these articles were being sought out and proposed for deletion on ideological grounds; however, further investigation led by previously uninvolved editors such as Giano and Mackensen, revealed that serious reason did exist for concern about these articles, justifying at least to some degree Vintagekits' position. Harsh language and other user conduct during that dispute was regrettable but that dispute, in and of itself, is probably too stale to be arbitrated.
The particular dispute quieted for awhile but I gather from Vintagekits' talkpage that he has been involved in some other controversies, also generally related to disputes between Irish and British editors. There were some prior blocks and, after discussion, unblocks and several admins including but not limited to Alison and SirFozzie have made strong good-faith attempts to salvage the situation, which regrettably seem to have been unsuccessful.
Most recently, Vintagekits clearly crossed the line of acceptable discourse very seriously in his edits cited above by Rockpocket. It is clear that some administrator action was warranted based on those edits, particularly in view of the conditions of his prior unblocking. There remains the issue of whether an indefinite block, as imposed by Alison, was the appropriate response. Alison has asserted on Vintagekits' talkpage that, in addition to improper comments such as those quoted above, Vintagekits has made very serious threats (in two edits now oversighted) involving another editor's real-life identity and address, mandating a definitive and permanent block. There have also been references to a series of abusive e-mails; it is not clear to me whether Vintagekits has admitted or denied having written these. Other editors on the talkpage have acknowledged that Vintagekits made at least some highly inappropriate edits but have urged that he was, to an extent, provoked into doing so.
On Vintagekits' talkpage, Alison has also stated that she believes that based on his conduct, it would be inappropriate for Vintagekits to be unblocked even for the limited purpose of participating in an arbitration case. My understanding is that Alison has communicated privately with one or more arbitrators concerning the content of the threats. Beyond that, neither I nor probably any other user can intelligently comment here because I have not seen the evidence and it does not seem appropriate to post it here.
The questions with which the arbitrators are presented, then, are (1) should the evidence against Vintagekits be considered privately or on-wiki and how should all interested parties be heard; (2) does the evidence against Vintagekits support an indefinite block or a formal ban; and (3) does this case present an appropriate vehicle to discuss any other issues beyond the narrow one of whether Vintagekits should remain blocked. Newyorkbrad 22:14, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
Earlier this year I was involved in trying to (unofficially) mediate between Vintagekits and some other users over Norman Stronge, Hugh Fraser, 1st Baron Fraser of Allander and divers Baronets. I can't comment on the more recent issues brought up but I did form the view that Vintagekits' tendency to view edits through the prism of the Anglo-Irish conflict was very damaging and made it very difficult for him to function effectively in a neutral encyclopaedia. I also felt he unduly personalised his dispute with Kittybrewster. However, he was able with some guidance to see others' points of view and move on. This case has many of the aspects of an 'appeal against community ban' which the committee takes up if there's a reason for believing the ban may be excessive. Pace Squeakbox, it may be that a wider finding would be of assistance. Sam Blacketer 22:35, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
A British editor once said to me that "Ireland needed a second dose of Cromwell". Was he blocked, no. Was he warned, no. But Vintagekits is editing in the Anglo-American-Centric Wikipedia. So Vk, you couldn't win this one. He was brought down by the pack. I don't agree with Vk on everything he writes, but it only boiled up a few times. Neither would I nobble anyone else under similar circumstances. -- Thepiper 10:36, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
Please advise which senior administrator or member of the ArbCom panel changed the title of the ArbCom case assessing the behaviour of a particular user and his indefinite ban, to a far broader title which basically encompasses a vast segment of Northern Irish politics. I have no wish to be involved in the latter. My comments were made in good faith regarding the heading of the original case, and I think it extremely bad form that the heading has been changed without first contacting all those who had already contributed a comment. If the arbitrarily changed heading is to remain I shall withdraw my comment. David Lauder 12:25, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
Moved from case page: *Later thought. This seems now to be turned into a discussion about "The Troubles" in which I have very little interest. I edited Bobby Sands a while ago and later contributed to a few afds on various terrorists / freedom fighters (depending on one's perspective). The consequence was that User:Vintagekits and User:Giano_II started attacking articles to which I had contributed. Bad game. Not interested. - Kittybrewster (talk) 13:07, 31 August 2007 (UTC) -- - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 13:10, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
Could a clerk comment on whether the committee is planning to consider the circumstances around and leading up to Vk's block, specifically, in this case? I ask because at least one committee member stated "I have no interest in examining the block of Vintagekits" in accepting the case. I have plenty of evidence to submit regarding Vk's behaviour, but if this is not being considered then there is little point me adding to what will be an already extremely evidence heavy case. In addition, much of the poor behaviour spanned not only articles relating to the Troubles, but migrated across to articles on baronetcies. Will the committee consider evidence from this subject area too? I ask because some of the most damaging sockpuppetry and meat-puppetry involving some of the major protagonists occurred on Afd's relating to these articles rather than those directly related to the Troubles. And while we are at it, there was some pretty poor behaviour on, for example, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Bhoys from Seville. Will evidence from these tangentially related subjects be considered also? Rockpocke t 17:54, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
On his talk page, Vintagekits has made a proposal:
-- Rockpocke t 20:10, 7 September 2007 (UTC)
Gave notice here that he was being added. SirFozzie 19:24, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
I'm not all that familiar with some of the more detailed aspects of Wikipedia's rules and regulations, so I'm just going to use this opportunity to make a statement, which may be quite verbose and may take me a couple of sessions to finish. This statement will be based on my observations, my experiences and my thoughts.
I started editing Wikipedia sometime in 2005 or 2004, well before I created this account. Quite unaware of the rules, I engaged in an edit war with User:Lapsed Pacifist on Northern Ireland Policing Board. That edit war was prompted by the Republican propaganda being employed there. Of course none of that matters any more. I also around that time started editing the wiki on politics.ie. User:Padraig is an administrator there, and as you will see of my user page there, I no longer wish to contribute to that project. I was the only unionist amongst a cabal of disparate nationalist contributors, most of whom conspired to ensure that the Irish Nationalist version of history prevails on that Irish political so called encyclopedia.
There is a dreadful campaign to eradicate the flag of Northern Ireland from wikipedia, leaving the article on Northern Ireland the only one possibly in the world without it's flag displayed. This is despite mounds of evidence that the flag is the de facto and fair use flag of Northern Ireland. And why does this campaign exist? As it suits Nationalists for the flag not to be there, as they don't believe that NI should exist at all.
Then we have the incident where nationalists tag teamed on Orange Institution (thereby ensuring that I got blocked but they didn't) to have the order described as sectarian in the opening paragraph, a statement backed up, not by a neutral author, but Michael Farrell. Now that we have a reasonable compromise, they refuse to have a quote in quotation marks. Such a use of the word sectarian is highly offensive to hundreds of thousands of Orangemen and Women across the world.
We have a situation were nationalist editors claim WP:MOS to say that things that don't exist do exists, for example the Lord Mayor of Derry in the NI Senate and the City of Derry County Grand Lodge. Clear POV pushes based on a falsehood Wikipedia has endorsed in WP:MOS, a situation that leads me to not support wholeheartedly the principle of consensus. It doesn't always work on an encyclopedia. What if I managed to get consensus that the holocaust didn't happen? It would be wikipeida policy, and presumably someone would go to jail in Austria.
We have a stupid, inane, pointless, tiresome, stupid again edit war over the flags used on FIFA 08 when there is a clear consensus which goes much much wider than wikipedia.
There is a cultural war in Northern Ireland at present. Republicans are much better than Unionists at educating their communities in the republican version of history. When I was at University I was amazed at the level of indoctrination that exists within the republican community. The sectarian orginisation the GAA is a brilliant vehicle for it. The Irish Language is brilliant weapon in the war to remove all Britishness from my region of the UK. This is relevant, as wikipedia has been made a battleground in this campaign. A user has made some comments that I do not wish to be associated with on Talk:Bobby Sands, but his reaction to the refusal by some to allow the mob who murdered a milkman when Bobby Sands committed suicided, be called nationalist was to say that people were looking for sources to say that the water is wet. The rules are being abused by nationalists, and they can be abused, as the Internet is awash with republican propaganda that can be used as sources. I hold wikipedia in high regard, it got me through many an essay during my undergraduate studies (shhh though), but Northern Ireland politics and history is fast becoming a lost cause. NPOV is trampled over for political reasons by Nationalist editors.
I wish to add something. What is very apparent amongst Nationalist editors, is a detailed and meticulous knowledge of the Wikipedia rules. There is nothing wrong with that per se, but it is being used in damaging ways. For examples Talk:Orange Institution is perfect, although there are others. I am adding this as it worries me. It is perfectly possible to follow the rules to the letter, yet still be wrong. This happens time after time after time, particularly it has to be said with references. There was an instance on Orange Institution where references were provided to say that the Institution is sectarian. This was all opinion, by commentators who could all be identified with some basic research to have some sort of connection with Nationalist Ireland. Yet the nationalist POV tag team insisted that this "evidence" was damming. It wasn't, it was opinion being dressed up as fact. The rules are not always right, and this is becoming an increasing problem around Northern Ireland issues.
I don't know where else to put this. I disagree with this. It is fair enough to reference opinion, so long as it is accredited as opinion. The problem we have, is that opinion is being dressed up as fact. It is also being done with a very clear agenda and in a worryingly increasing frequency. Traditional unionist 00:23, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
Domers evidence ( a) relates to this; I agreed to mediation before this Arbcon surfaced [1]. I suspect his reasoning is all animals are equal at mediation but some animals are more equal than others at Arbcom.
My total edits to Orange Institution can be shown by one diff [2]. I suspected the Wolfpack would attack so I posted an ANI (and posted to Fred's page). Two admins, JzG and EliminatorJR, stepped in after me and actually got the consensus building process going. Some 7.5 Hours later Sir Fozzie comes weighing in blocking the page - protecting the pages that are under dispute my arse.
Regarding Alison's evidence ( b). I was not making a blatant and transparent attempt to paint Alison with the 'nationalist POV' brush. ; Counter-Revolutionary is not a colleague of mine ( c).
I can categorically state that I have never ever ever made any contact with Traditional Unionist or Counter Revolutionary but I have made false accusations of sockpuppetry against Astrotrain. As a result I was in email contact with ONiH who gave me the advice One thing you might need to take into account is Astrotrain's lengthy block-log as well - I didn't bother. That this the sum total of my conspiracies.
The remedy states that To address the extensive edit-warring that has taken place on articles relating to The Troubles, as well as the Ulster banner and British baronets, any user who hereafter engages in edit-warring or disruptive editing on these or related articles may be placed on Wikipedia:Probation by any uninvolved administrator. This may include any user who was a party to this case, or any other user after a warning has been given. The administrator shall notify the user on his or her talkpage and make an entry on Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Log of blocks, bans, and probations. The terms of probation, if imposed on any editor, are set forth in the enforcement ruling below. During the case itself, a discussion arose on the Proposed Decision page, that no arbitrator took part in, but consensus of the discussion was that the definition of "uninvolved" was for not being involved in "edit-warring or disruptive editing", since there was no finding in the ArbCom case that ANY administrator had been non-neutral.
Previously, myself and Tyrenius (who were both parties to the ArbCom) have used this remedy to try to keep folks calm, with no peep of protest. Now, three weeks after User:Aatomic1 was placed on a one-month probation by administrator User:Alison, User:Aatomic1 has attempted to remove himself from the terms of probation, because Alison was one of the parties who provided evidence and discussion for the case. This came after Aatomic1 attempted to incite an admin who WAS in an edit war with User:Domer48 to place "That troll" (ie Domer) on its terms. Could the ArbCom please clarify this remedy, as to whom may place it, and if my definition is correct? SirFozzie ( talk) 19:53, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
How do you go about requesting that an editor be included on the ArbCom list. I ask because of this edit and in light of this warning. That they have had final warnings and a history on Republican related articles, not to mention the view they have of themselves. -- Domer48 ( talk) 17:58, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
I just wanted to explain a little the basis behind this (since, I fear, it spiral and I may as well try and dampen it before that happens).
I have a large number Irish republican related articles on my watch list due to the fact I implemented a compromise about a categorization strategy for jailed paramilitaries a while back. As i'm sure most editors do, when changes appear on their watch list they will often check them out, especially when there has been a history of problems with such editors and such articles. I saw this edit [4] and had a look because Vk has been engaging in a slow revert war over Irish names of republicans. Damac ( talk · contribs) has been removing them as unsourced and requesting a discussion on the subject, Vk (and others) will add them back over periods of weeks while pretty much ignoring the discussion. I have been keeping and eye on it and, although it is still revert-warring and against the spirit of his probation, I have declined to comment or draw attention to it yet simply because the fuss it would cause is more trouble that it is worth. Anyway, I then checked Vk's history to see if he had added the names back en masse or just to this one individual.
That led me to see these edits [5] [6] both of which appeared to be the recreation of an article that had been deleted and merged by AfD consensus ( Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seamus Donnelly and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gerry O'Callaghan). I had a look around on those pages and could find no good reason why the AfD decision should not stand (Vk provided no rationale for the reversion in his edit summary), so I reverted and explained why in my summary [7] [8]. Now, normally I would have asked the editor if he could explain his reasoning before reverting, but Vk has made it perfectly clear he does not welcome communication from me, and more often than not any message I leave for him gets deleted without reply.
This led to Vk immediately reverting both [9] [10] (with the charming edit summaries "reverting editing who hasnt a clue what he is doing") the following exchange on my talk page:
- Usual nonsense from you. THose AfD were overturned because the delete votes and the nominator was a bigotted banned user!--Vintagekits (talk) 00:44, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Could you direct me to that discussion/decision, please? (Rockpocket unsigned)
- No I couldnt!--Vintagekits (talk) 00:47, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- I can find no evidence provided that an Afd was "overturned", as you say, and you are unwilling to direct me to the evidence then I am left with no choice to revert back to the AfD decision. I'll give you a few more minutes. Rockpocket 00:50, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Seek and you shall find - nothing shall be handed to those to eager to follow my edits!--Vintagekits (talk) 00:52, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- So, just to be absolutely clear - you have reverted my good faith edits which I fully explained in the edit summary - based on some evidence that you refuse to divulge to make some sort of WP:POINT. Again, I'll give you another chance to please provide evidence that this AfD was "overturned" before I re-revert. Please stop playing games. Rockpocket 00:55, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Gerry O'Callaghan on yer watch list as well? lol!!! Ask ONiH about those AfD's if your soooooooooo wooried about it. --Vintagekits (talk) 00:57, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- PLAYING GAMES!!! You are the one following me around like a fuckin stink! Your the one playing games! --Vintagekits (talk) 00:58, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
At this point I reverted back to the redirect, since I had asked for justification and none was forthcoming, moreover Vk was clearly being making a WP:POINT. The communications on my talkpage then continued:
- Have a look at Talk:Patrick Joseph Kelly, all the AfDs involved substantial sockpuppetry, see Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/O'Donoghue. Granted it's slightly out of process unmerging the other articles without asking, but we don't want to get bogged down in red tape and I don't believe it's unreasonable to give VK a short amount of time to improve the articles to where they are capable of being standalone articles. One Night In Hackney303 01:00, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
- Thank you, ONiH. Seems like a good call from Quarl. I have no issue with Vk being bold and improving those articles based on Quarl's statement. However, The lack of informative edit summaries and purposely obtuse responses to perfectly valid requests simply result in more drama, and draw Vk ever closer to a return to ArbCom. Its like watching a moth to a flame. Rockpocket 01:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
At this point, with thanks to ONiH I was going to revert myself back to Vk's original edit, since it was clear that the AfDs were stacked by sockpuppets, and without those consensus would have been to keep. However, Vk has already reverted both again. [11] [12]
Technically Vk has made 2 x 3 reverts this evening along, and thus is clearly in violation of his probation. I was aware of this immediately, obviously, but didn't pursue it because technically there were good edits. I didn't wish to field the inevitable accusations that my plan was to get him blocked by forcing him to revert. The problem, of course, is that irrespective of the merits of his original edit his actions on my talk page were purposely and willfully disruptive. It led to multiple reversions only because a simple response to my request for information, that he clearly had, was gleefully rebuffed.
Combine this with the ongoing personal attacks, [13] incivility, [14] [15] aggressive swearing [16] and childish games such as this and I'm left wondering who this is any different from the behaviour that brought this case in the first place. I fully acknowledge Vk has done nice work on boxing articles since he got back, and I applaud and appreciate that. If he sticks to those articles he is a net asset to the project, but it very much appears to me that despite the very last warning this probation was meant to enforce, we still have the underlying problems in the sphere of the Troubles.
I am now at a loss at how to proceed here without Vk getting further provoked. Either I have to curb my constructive editing and my watch list and go to lengths to avoid any contact with an editor simply because he cannot edit in a civil manner. In doing that I am essentially being restricted in my editing, despite the fact I have never been sanctioned, always been polite and policy compliant, and no-one has ever suggested than any of my edits have been problematic. At the same time leaving a clearly problematic editor to make (often good faith) but nevertheless problematic edits at will and uncorrected. I simply fail to comprehend how that is a good way forward, when the problem is clearly with Vk and his inability to remain civil to people he has a personal issue with. In fact, I don't see myself continuing here if we are in a place where good editors are being asked to make accommodations so problem editors can flourish. That is not a Wikipedia I wish to be a part of.
I have tried to explain all this to Vk, and plead with him that for his own good to either curb his temper or back away from these articles, but its obviously falling on deaf ears. My understanding is that other editors, particularly SirFozzie, has made the same pleas time and time again, yet to no avail. [17] [18] Despite what Vk will tell anyone that will listen, my aim is not to get Vk blocked (its clear that his boxing articles are a plus and I would not support a full block now since he has demonstrated that he can edit without without major problems), but this cannot continue. What now, is there any scope or support for a topic ban of sorts? Rockpocke t 03:26, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Rock you have said in your opening post that you have a number of Republican Related articles on your watch list, due to the fact you implemented a compromise on the Categories. Those categories have now bedded in and are working fine. All of the editors involved in that process are now in a position to direct editors to that compromise solution. Would it not now be appropriate to remove those Republican Articles from your watch list? The issue of cat’s has been addressed and resolved. This would reduce the amount of contact you would have with Vin, and the potential for a flare up. It would also address the perceived view that you are stalking Vin’s edits. Since you initial role in Republican related articles i.e. the Cat’s has been resolved, is there any other matters on the articles which has prompted you to retain them on your watch list? -- Domer48 ( talk) 09:39, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Since your work on the Cat's, would you say you have developed an intrest in Republican related Articles? There are enough Admin's to review what you consider to be "problematic edits." If Vin is such a good editor on articles unrelated to the Troubles, how is it his edits suddenly become "problematic." Do you think that if Vin makes an edit which you considered problematic, you would be the only one to notice it? The problem is that this has all become personal, in my opinion. Review your own contrabutions to the ArbCom, and seriously say that this is not personal. Now it is also true that you have ended up on articles that Vin had just edited, and on which you had no edit history? No matter what way you look at it, a certain preception under the circumstances become obvious? Weather it's true or not, that is just the way it is. So what do you see as your role on Republican Articles, are you an editor with an intrest in the subject? Is it to make sure policies are followed? Now might I make another suggestion? On the Great Hunger article, any edits which may become "problematic" are first put forward on the talk page. For example, Vin makes an edit you consider "problematic" you mention it on the talk page first, allow some time for a responce, before any revert. This would obviously work both ways. This could reduce the tension in a number of ways. It would allow editors with an intrest in the subject the oppertunity to become involved and help prevent the one to one on the reverts? It's just my comment / opinion / suggestion? -- Domer48 ( talk) 18:17, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't think we should tolerate a situation where a user can use emotional blackmail to scare other users away from participating in articles, or invoke
WP:STALK just because they cross paths. If an editor makes a good edit, then their action is acceptable. I think that applies to all parties, and for that reason also if an editor such as Vintagekits makes edits per, for example,
WP:MOS to articles such as baronets or nominates a weak article on them for AfD, he also deserves support. Vk has done some good work in this area and he too should not be scared off. The bottom line is - is it in the interests of creating an encyclopedia? I think as admins we should adopt pretty much a zero-tolerance approach to this situation. Vintagekits' recent edits have displayed a completely unacceptable level of incivility that should have received an instant block, as indeed I applied soon after the ArbCom case. This was truly preventative and I said that its overturning would only send the wrong signal and lead to trouble ahead to Vk's disadvantage. That is exactly what we are now witnessing. I don't intend to apply such a block myself again, but would certainly support anyone who did. The terms of the ArbCom probation are quite clear:
Participants placed on probation are limited to one revert per article per week with respect to the set of articles included in the probation. Any participant may be briefly banned for personal attacks or incivility. Reversion of edits by anonymous IPs do not count as a revert.
This is not a difficult problem to solve. No one wants to see Vk indef blocked. Instant short blocks for an infraction will serve the purpose. I suggest starting with an hour.
On that basis I propose unblocking Vk now, if no one objects, with the proviso that the block gets reapplied immediately maybe for a couple of hours next time, should he continue to be uncivil.
Tyrenius (
talk) 04:29, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
END OF COPIED TALK
The problem with the instant blocks is.. well, with a block of a half-hour or an hour, all that what could happen is the person saves up a half-hour or hour worth of anger, bile, and frustration, and lets it all out at once. Becoming a revolving door, in/out/in/out/in/out... (note: I'm not saying that WILL happen with VK, just that it could). The think that makes a longer block better is that it forces the person to get up, get away from the computer, sleep on it, and then come back to it. By then, it's not so angry-makin ;) SirFozzie ( talk) 05:08, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
After seeing VK's response on his talk page... I withdraw my offer for a solution. I really hate to say it but he just can't get along with certain editors. SirFozzie ( talk) 14:12, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
I have made another suggestion here which I consider reasonable? As Pádraig has mentioned, and I have also, you do seem to be on his case? Now the civility is an issue, but Rock you seem to be the only one at the minute who provokes this responce? Could the two things be related? Now there has been a period of relative calm, and now all of a sudden this happens. I have also noticed Rock that you have been contacting other editors looking for input, why? Lets not try blow this out of all proportion, and let me just suggest, if your not part of the problem, be part of the solution. -- Domer48 ( talk) 19:40, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
That is not what I suggested? The incivility is directed at you. You have been asked before to allow other Admin's to look after any problems, by Admin's. You following Vin around, and be honest you are, just adds fuel to the fire. Now read my constructive suggestion again, and lets move on. Because what you are not going to get is more sanctions. -- Domer48 ( talk) 20:47, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Fozz did you even read what I suggested? -- Domer48 ( talk) 21:12, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Firstly, entirely irrespective of who had made the edit I would have reverted back to the AfD consensus. When someone appears to have ignored an AfD without explaining why, its a good idea to revert. Its a better idea, of course, to leave a message asking why. But look what has happened in previous attempts make perfectly legitimate edits to Vk's page: [24] [25] [26] [27] As far as I am concerned, and editor who deletes requests without response (or replies incivily) loses that courtesy. So again, why should I be asked to restrict my good editing in the best interests of the project when the problem lies elsewhere? Its not about losing face or pride, its a matter of principle that we are asking editors who do good work to make restrict their editing for editors who have problems, when the problematic editor could and should be the one who is restricted. That hurts the encyclopaedia, it doesn't help it.
Secondly, its a bit of a red herring to base this upon this one incident. Have a look at this entirely unprovocative edit [28] Look at the mess the article was in until I copy edited it. This led to accusations of stalking too (despite the fact that I saw the article not by stalking his edits, but because Vk had messed up a move of an article on my watch list to create it). So, am I supposed to not copy edit this article because Vk might lose his temper? Am i supposed to leave the messed up move of an article I spent a long time editing, just because it was Vk who did it? How does that help the project? How about this one [29] another accusation of stalking. Again, it was on my watch list since last year and the edit was entirely unprovocative. Even more amazing, note the fact that there was two intervening edits between Vk and I, so his name didn't even appear on my watch list when I made this edit. So, if these types of edits are what you are asking I don't make in "backing off" then I despair. What you are actually asking is that any article that Vk choses to edit becomes off-limits to me (and John and anyone else that he decides to get upset over). I have a lot of time for you Scolaire and respect your opinion, but that this is even being suggested I find depressing. Rockpocke t 22:21, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Rock what about the articles which were not on your watch list? Are you saying you just happened by them? All anyone has to do is review your contributions to the ArbCom to see you and Vin are in conflict with each other. Now that is a fact, let’s be honest about it. Those changes you made, is wiki going to collapse if you don’t jump in and change them right away, of course not. As Fozz says, you don’t have to be right, right now. It’s like you know it’s going to freeze tonight, so you hose down the pavement outside your nasty neighbours house. What you’re saying is you can’t control the weather. What I saying is, in view of your history with Vin, if you see something you think needs fixing, let someone else do it. That goes for Vin to by the way. As to the civility, I’ve learned my lesson on that one, Vin should learn to keep it shut, because the only time you make a mistake is when you learn nothing from it. -- Domer48 ( talk) 23:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Just to clarify, I am not saying that anybody should not edit an article, in the sense of changing content, just because another editor might react badly. But, as Domer says, "those changes you made, is wiki going to collapse if you don’t jump in and change them right away?" This
[32] and this
[33] are copyedits - if you hadn't done them somebody else - in the first case a bot - would have done them. It's unfair of Sluzzelin to say "the implication here that a good content editor is being asked to 'back off' from improving content just because it might set off another editor's allergic reaction" (Tyrenius said essentially the same); we have established that improving content is not an issue here. All I'm saying is continue to improve content on those articles you are improving content on, and leave the tidying up of Vk's articles edits to somebody else. How does WP lose that way? Anyway, I am not going to argue about this any more. My suggestion was only by way of trying to help and I really have nothing more to add.
Scolaire (
talk) 23:33, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Tyrenius ( talk) 00:53, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
(ec x 3) An RfC on you (Rockpocket) would be a complete waste of time as you are not the problem. Vk's response to your AfD enquiry was deliberately obstructive and blatantly provocative: in the circumstances it merited a block. I back enforcement of civility per earlier suggestions I made. Going to AN is a good way to get a difficult user banned indefinitely, so I vote keeping "in house" unless that proves unworkable. There is no reason why it should. I have started a page to centralise action at: Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles/Enforcement requests. If this seems viable, we should ask as many admins as possible to watchlist it. Re. ONIH's point - good one. The new page can be used for any violation. Tyrenius ( talk) 02:55, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) I'm simply quoting the ArbCom ruling. It's not my idea. I have advocated zero-tolerance for civility and see no reason why it shouldn't be applied to content. There is a page to post for enforcement, so that's the thing to do. Maybe it's time to stand for adminship and you can put your ideas into action. Tyrenius ( talk) 04:47, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent)Actually it isn't. What I was going to do was present evidence to prove what I was saying was true. However considering the vast majority of the edits are over a week old, none of it would be actionable anyway. So rather than waste time simply proving something that we've already established is true (to whatever extent), I'm probably going to finish the new article I've been finishing for the last few days. One Night In Hackney 303 19:19, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) Rockpocket's block log for a start shows him tackling policy violations wherever he finds them. The way Vk sees it is the problem. He does exactly the same things to others that he accuses others of doing to him. When he does them to others, he is outraged if he is criticised or questioned, as he considers the actions to be perfectly justified. When others do them to him, he is equally outraged and considers the same actions to be absolutely unjust. This is demonstrated quite clearly in a comparison with the baronet issue and a quick "review". Tyrenius ( talk) 23:33, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
The first thing is to warn them, but if they persist, then there doesn't seem much alternative to a block or some form of (topic or other) ban. It's a judgement call, depending on context, the editor's history, the extremity of the transgression etc. It's human nature that the people who make the most noise will get the most attention. I don't see anyone else in the vicinity who is displaying this kind of user page and user talk page. If they did, then they would get the same attention. Vintagekits is currently the most blatant case and the worst transgressor, so the spotlight is on him. At other times, it has been on other editors, e.g. at one point on Kittybrewster over WP:COI. It's not the responsibility of admins to do everything. Any editor can point out policy violations to another and ask them to desist: if they don't, despite requests, then a case is apparent against them, and it might be suitable to bring to admin attention. You want admins to go out proactively "policing" and in the area of article content, it seems. Probably the main reason that doesn't happen is lack of time and energy. It would be a 24/7 job. Hence GOFISHING. Again, it's not up to admins to do it all. Editors should take responsibility too. If they don't succeed in solving the problem, then it can be placed on WP:TER (Troubles Enforcement Requests). I've put the system in place, if people want to use it. You say, "I've see Rockpocket leave quite a few notes on VK's talk page with regard to transgressions, yet I've not seen him do the same with other editors." In that case, you must have seen those transgressions to know they exist. Did you leave a warning, and if not, why not? If there are any bad cases, why have you not drawn attention to them on WP:TER? This is team work, and experienced editors can play a powerful role, as in your recent checkuser request. Tyrenius ( talk) 02:27, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't know Vk or Rockpocket & won't prejudge them. But if any editor is causing problems on 'Troubles' related articles - give the offender(s) 'three warnings', if they don't heed it? 1-month block, then added another month if disruption continues after. There's no other way. GoodDay ( talk) 16:25, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm starting to know Vk better, as he's continously re-appearing via sockpuppets. I must say, his behaviour is disappointing & futile. GoodDay ( talk) 15:35, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
To the resident Administrators. Is it possible to upgrade Vk's status to 'protection' if he promises to stick to Boxing articles? Or does his Wiki behaviour history (including he continued creation of sockpuppets), damage that posibility? GoodDay ( talk) 18:41, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok. Thanks for responding. GoodDay ( talk) 19:15, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm with Rockpocket on this. Vk had had more "absolutely last last chances" than I can count, yet still indulged in sockpuppetry, and off-wiki campaigns of harrassment are unacceptable. I don't care what subject he is working on: he has had plenty of chances, and still seems to think that his predicament is everyone else's fault.
If someone wants to take this to arbcom, they are free to do so. I'm sure that arbcom will be absolutely thrilled to have the chance to welcome back someone who was on unblocked after a protracted arbitration and rewarded the trust placed in him by using sockpuppets to disrupt a vote, and particularly keen to facilitate the return of an editor who promises to "abuse" an admin "all day long". Hey, that's just the sort of thing arbcom sets out to promote.
When the arbcom closed, Vk was notified of the outcome by Penwhale " Due to the decisions, you are now no longer community banned. Make this chance count". If anyone thinks that meant trying to make his vote count more than once, then a quick call to arbcom should have the arbitrators showering him with barnstars. -- BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 01:39, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with Rockpocket and BrownHairedGirl. This editor had too many last chances already. No, no, a thousand times no. -- John ( talk) 03:25, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Moved to TER. One Night In Hackney 303 23:16, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Can someone please look at this article Ulster Defence Regiment. I believe I and my attempts to rewrite this article sensibly have been embroiled in edit warring since day one because this article is linked to the northern ireland troubles. I'm trying everything in my power to come to a concensus but now I realise this has all happened before and I don't think I'm going to get anywhere. I haven't been getting anywhere anyway! GDD1000 ( talk) 19:20, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
GDD1000 is active as this report clearly shows. They even admit the IP's they were using were them. There has been edit-warring since their return. They are a self confessed ex member of the UDR and therefore have a WP:COI, illustrated by the edit-warring edits. They are now using a source from another ex member on the article, and going around crying and forum shopping like their last account when challanged. The last time their copy vio's were removed by two admins, they throw the rattle out of the cot and claim to leave the project. How many other sock accounts have been active now? Have any of the banned editors been allowed back under new accounts? -- Domer48 'fenian' 20:20, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
Great to see you back, now are you going to answer the questions left on your talk page or just ignore them? "ridiculous accusations" they admitted they were the same user! So don't tell me I'm being ridiculous! "baseless comments" "wanton reverts" and you tell me to leave out the accusations? Please! You may accept this crap, even though I've not edited the article since 24 July, but I don't. -- Domer48 'fenian' 21:49, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
The Troubles, are not as contentious as they once were, thanks to the tight lid on edit-warring that was created by User:Rlevse here, that subjected the whole subset of articles covered by The Troubles to a 1 RR. This has blunted a lot of the constant edit-warring. However, six months after the fix was applied, someone wants to rip the band-aid off and let the (metaphorical) blood flow anew. User:Sandstein has stated that he will not act on AE requests regarding this remedy, because it is not an ArbCom remedy. We've already seen several folks using IP's to edit war and then when the IP is blocked, use throw-away accounts. The sanctions are needed.. there are 10+ sections in the archives where this is used since December alone.
So, despite my utter distaste of time-wasting bureaucracy such as this, would the ArbCom please vote in the following as a formal ArbCom remedy, as posted by User:Rlevse:
List of times the Rlevse sanctions has been brought up on AE (there are another 5-10 where it's been mentioned in passing, but these are the ones that refer to the 1RR rule itself.)
[38], [39], [40], [41], [42], [43], [44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49], and the two latest ones on AE. If the Committee would look at the history of AE from archive 30 or so on, usually 2 or 3 or 4 sections per archive will have to do with this series of articles,
I don't believe that a new full fledged ArbCom would do anything more then to spend a couple months of time with the same parties arguing in the same way. Instead, what should be done is apply common sense. Use the Rlevse sanctions, and keep the peace in an area where there will be no peace if not applied.
If one admin chooses not to act on a particular enforcement request, it doesn't stop another administrator stepping in. Whilst Sandstein might not agree and therefore decide not to take action, if another administrator believes the editor in question has broken the case remedies (In this case it is enforcement of discretionary sanctions) then that is up to them and they may block for that. From what I can see, Sandstein hasn't said he'll overrule other administrators and I suspect he wouldn't even challenge other administrators if they made blocks as part of Rlevse's restriction. It looks like Sandstein merely doesn't agree and doesn't feel comfortable enforcing the decision - that's his prerogative and feel free to simply block if someone goes against the 1RR restriction. Ryan PostlethwaiteSee the mess I've created or let's have banter 22:44, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
I'm commenting in my capacity as admin patrolling WP:AE and responding to enforcement requests there. Ryan is right in that I won't (and have no authority to) overrule any admin enforcing the "Troubles" case as he or she sees fit. However, the "Troubles" decision does not, as Ryan seems to believe, provide for discretionary sanctions. Instead, at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Probation for disruptive editors, it provides that disruptive editors may be put on Wikipedia:Probation and, at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Enforcement, that these editors are then subject to 1RR. That is the arbitral decision that can and should be enforced at WP:AE, including by me.
The section entitled Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Final remedies for AE case, which purports to put all articles in the area of conflict under 1RR, on the other hand, is not an enforceable arbitral decision, since it was apparently never voted on by the Committee. Its author, Rlevse, has confirmed this at [50]. That is why I will not act on enforcement requests concerning it.
I recommend that the Committee:
Sandstein has summed up what I was going to say. Perhaps both sanction-schemes would be useful? Ncmvocalist ( talk) 05:45, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
As the unlucky administrator who started the long chain of events that lead there, I want to add two things. One, discretionary sanctions do exist in that dispute area, they are editor targeted however. Two, the broad 1RR was proposed as an alternative to using probation. It has, I believed, helped significantly in the topic area, and has set an objective standard for that all users can be held up to. I strongly urge the committee to consider endorsing the community remedy.-- Tznkai ( talk) 04:29, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
Having opposed the sanctions, or I should say how they came about I must concede that they have had a positive effect. They have reduced the edit warring and encouraged discussion. POV warriors have been marginalised with disruptive editing being quickly closed down most of the time. Some Admin’s with a particular bias (admin’s can and do have biased opinions) have been reluctant to address the actions of some editors but the 1RR has proved itself despite this. We all know what the sanctions entail, and have clarified through experience what 1RR is and how it operates. For example, a number of reverts without intermediate edits in between is considered to be 1 revert.
So what I’d suggest is that the sanctions be placed on a separate page with the block log transferred to it. It should include:
It should also include what we mean by 1RR, so there is no ambiguity. If it is felt that criteria no.1 is not clear enough expand it. The template be changed to direct editors to the appropriate page, including a link on Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/The_Troubles#Final_remedies_for_AE_case in case any templates are missed during the page change. That’s my 2 cents worth, as to simply remove the sanctions would be counter productive.-- Domer48 'fenian' 09:11, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
Maybe if Elonka was as quick to admit her mistake and clarify the log then we wouldn't have an edit war on this page. My edit was not comment it was a clarification of the block. As it stands it is ambiguous as to what happened. When it was an admin making a mistake and not the editor. BigDunc 19:38, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
There is an ongoing discussion at ANI about whether or not this case's remedies should be modified, to additionally authorize discretionary sanctions in the Troubles topic area. Anyone with an opinion on the matter is invited to comment at: Wikipedia:ANI#Discretionary sanctions for Troubles articles. -- El on ka 17:11, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
Where am i to post for an explanation about why British National Party has suddenly been described as a troubles related article. The BNP have nothing to do with the troubles, they are a far right political party in the UK not a loyalist paramilitary group.
WHy are people allowed to go around adding any article they like claiming its troubled related when it clearly isnt? BritishWatcher ( talk) 20:24, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Irvine22#Probation
This is the sort of thing that gets the project its reputation as an internet dog's breakfast. Nae wunner ye canna mak ony geld oot o'it. Irvine22 ( talk) 21:34, 16 November 2009 (UTC)
Initiated by Nate t/ c at 11:51, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
Several and I believe a large majority of users have stated views that the BNP is not particularly linked to The Troubles and not more so than any British or Irish political party, so adding the {{ Troubles restriction}} banner seems highly inappropriate. The article is currently being edited 'aggressively' by several editors, but also discussed, reasonably productively, on the talk page and while some editing restirction might be appropriate, but these should be brought though the normal methods, not by expanding another controversial area. -- Nate t/ c 11:51, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Having read more of the other discussions in an attempt to understand the reasoning for adding this tag. it seems to be that it is due to the article being edited by editors who have had disputes elsewhere. This seems again to be expanding the intent of the original ruling; if the Arbitrators wanted restrictions should be placed on specific editors then it would have been in the ruling, but it seems that as that was not the case, so the troubles template and rules was added to this article so as to enforce rules on them when editing in other areas; with the collateral effect on a large number of other editors who where not involved (or even aware) or the original dispute until the template was added. In the is case the creep seems to have been the use of rules aimed at a specific set of articles being used to control all edits by those editors in the original dispute. If an admin feels that the editors are expanding into to disrupting other articles then going back and asking for sanctions against those editors would be the sensible course of action. In this case I had not seen any significant disruptive behaviour, (I have not reviewed all edits by the contributors only looked at the history of the article) there were strong opinions, and possibly ill-judged comments and edits, but nothing that came across as Bad Faith edits and there was constructive progress on the talk page. -- Nate t/ c 17:13, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
How are we ment to resolve it "at community level"? There is a consensus on the talk page to remove the banner & a debate as to if the restrictions are helpful (in my view they are not), I came here as was suggested on the admin notice board and wanted to know if this was how to request a review of admin assigning the rules to an article. -- Nate t/ c 09:31, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
There is no reason at all for the BNP article to be listed as "troubles related". The British National Party is a right wing political party in the United Kingdom, they are not a loyalist paramilitary group in Northern Ireland. The article mentions the BNPs policy towards Ireland, but all political parties in the UK have policies towards Ireland Conservative party (UK), Liberal Democrats. Labour party (UK) all mention Ireland yet they would never be classed as troubles related. The edit wars that were taking place on that article had nothing to do with Ireland matters, it was about the fact the BNP is a right wing racist whites only political party.
If the BNP article can be considered troubles related then its clearly not what arbcom originally agreed to. The sanctions have been in place for about two years and only now has the BNP became a "troubles related article"? Its important to remember how this all came about.
The first mentions of the troubles on the BNP talk page from what i can see was on the 16th of November 2009 by User:Off2riorob. He was moaning about people being anti BNP and he said..
The suggestion that anyones position on that page was an "IRA thing" was rather offensive, i am certainly no supporter of a terrorist organisation and i do not think others involved on the article at the time were either. The vast majority of the British people hate the BNP, the idea that article is being influenced by IRA supporters was rather stange and this has nothing to do with "British nationalism towards Ireland". Anyway he went on to mention troubles related editors again [52], and then he said..
Is it really acceptable to claim an article is troubles related just because several editors are also involved in the troubles articles? If that is possible then any article we go to could have such sanctions imposed, even things that are nothing to do with Britain and Ireland. He made a couple more comments about The troubles editors and then Elonka came along and said the article was troubles related, with NO debate. [54] The only reason Elonka did that was because of Off2riorob.
This matter needs clearing up. I am concerned at this very moment Elonka is seeking to have admin powers expanded in relations to the troubles yet the current powers are being misused. Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment#Request_to_amend_prior_case:_The_Troubles Also some of Elonkas comments about the action taken concern me and i think the justification is clearly not in line with the current arbcom ruling.
That basically says if it mentions Ireland it can be considered related.
and
Which basically says The troubles sanctions can be imposed on articles that have nothing to do with The Troubles.
Anyway clarification on this matter would be very useful. In particular the BNP article needs to be correctly removed from "troubles related" articles, but a more general clarification about what is and is not reasonably connected to the troubles would be useful. Thanks BritishWatcher ( talk) 14:45, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
The link between this page and "the troubles" is tenuous at best. Moreover the dispute (and indead the complaint) that led to this had nothing to do with the rather limited amount the articel has to say about the troubles. It was in reaction to the appearance of some edds who had a history on "troubles" realted pages (the actual dispute was over mebership). This seems to me just to beplaying the system Slatersteven ( talk) 15:47, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Agree with the above two comments, as well as with the many others who have commented in two separate threads on Elonka's talk page. It is pretty hard to argue that the BNP page (which I have never edited btw) is a "Troubles-related" article, and the dispute in question there is most certainly not. Nor is it related to the broader question of "British nationalism in relation to Ireland". If this is how wide the net is going to be drawn, pretty much every article on Wikipedia can probably be brought under an existing ArbCom decision. In this case for example, there's a stronger argument for having the Conservative Party and Glasgow Rangers Football Club subjected to the Troubles regime, since the connections there are much stronger than for the BNP. Sure you have to have flexibility, and someone arguing for example that the Easter Rising or the Border Campaign, or even some parts of the Oliver Cromwell article, are not connected to The Troubles, is indeed probably Wikilawyering - but that's a very different situation.
On the wider point, I would also express concern that an admin has suddenly descended on the page to make a unilateral declaration of this sort and to start imposing special restrictions on the article, and potentially the editors there, without any sort of consensus from ArbCom or the wider community for them to start doing that. Furthermore, repeated observations to them from multiple editors that they might have made an error of fact are repeatedly stonewalled or even ignored with a repeated pro-forma response, eg here. If there are problems on that article - which there are fairly likely to be, after all - address them of course, possibly even with severe action, but don't do it under a regime designed explicitly for something else altogether.
The admin in question also appears to be deploying the argument that the terms of the Troubles ruling say "when in doubt, assume [the article] is related". Well, as has been pointed out, there isn't much doubt that the BNP is not a related article. I and others have provided examples of cases where there might be a genuine debate, and hence doubt, about the relevance of an article or parts of one, where one could perhaps invoke that principle and err on the side of inclusion. Ultimately though these decisions are actually fairly simple - eg the Bill Clinton page is not "Troubles-related", but that small part of the page which discusses his involvement in Northern Ireland is. To argue that because one editor/admin has asserted that the entire BNP page is related, the doubt as to whether it is or isn't therefore does now exist and consequently they are right to apply the template, is a rather classic example of self-serving sophistry, to be blunt. Any claims as well that their action has helped sort out problems on the article are also somewhat irrelevant as i) it is simply the wrong template to apply, regardless; and ii) it is simply an assertion of causality, without evidence. I think we need clarification of the issue in question, as well as some sort of comment on whether this sort of unilateral action, based on a pretty fundamental misjudgement and/or an overzealous interpretation of prior rulings, is appropriate in future. -- Nickhh ( talk) 16:17, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Up to a point - but I think this is sufficiently different, in that people here are asking for clarification of the current decision as it stands, and whether Elonka's unilateral and highly contentious action was appropriate, and whether it should stand (in my opinion, it should not and it should be struck immediately - this really is about whether ArbCom decisions mean what they say, or whether individual editors can come along and appropriate them seemingly for their own enforcement purposes, against reason and consensus. I don't see that it's a tough decision). Whether her proposed amendment to the Troubles decision - which includes as one part of it a request to extend the scope of the topic area - is subsequently accepted at some point, and therefore whether Elonka might effectively be granted retrospective approval for her action, is another matter. -- Nickhh ( talk) 18:58, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
My attention was drawn to the British National Party article because I'd been monitoring some other Troubles-related articles, and noticed that some of the editors had overflowed the dispute to the BNP article. I'll freely admit that I'm not intimately familiar with the nuances of the content dispute (which is probably as it should be, since I'm supposed to be uninvolved). I did scan the BNP article though, and saw that it included clear references to Ireland. That, combined with the facts that the article was the location of established editors repeatedly reverting each other, [57] [58] [59] [60] [61] [62] [63] [64] [65] and that some of those editors were known edit-warriors from the Troubles topic area, suggested that it would be reasonable to try and stabilize the article by reminding everyone that it was within the scope of the Troubles case restrictions. That scope was defined by community consensus in October 2008, as "any article that could be reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland . . . When in doubt, assume it is related." [66] The last sentence, "When in doubt, assume it is related," was the clincher for me. It's also worth pointing out that since I placed the tag on November 16, [67] the edit-warring has pretty much ceased, and the editors are instead continuing with more constructive editing. I have engaged several of the parties in discussion about what the restrictions mean, [68] [69] and how they can learn to edit in a more collaborative manner. [70] [71] [72] [73] [74] [75] [76] Other than talkpage discussion and a couple cautions though, [77] [78] I have not had to implement any blocks or bans in relation to that article. I've also informed the parties that if the article remains stable (meaning no edit-wars among established editors) for a period of time (30 days?), I believe it would be reasonable to remove the tag entirely. [79] As for what ArbCom should do here, it would be helpful either to clearly decline this clarification as unneeded, or simply confirm that it is reasonable for an administrator to have applied the {{ Troubles restriction}} template to the BNP article, as it seems to be within the case's scope. -- El on ka 19:00, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
Elonka's statement is faulty, this is undoubtedly an article unrelated to "the troubles". The dispute at this article was minor and in no way invoved the troubles, and once again Elonka's actions have increased the heat and drawn drama where there was none before. This could have been dealt with by an admin quite easily without wikilawyering an unrelated arbcom probation to give absolute power and carte blanch to avoid oversight by other admins. This is disproportionate and disruptive, and against the spirt and intention, and in my view the letter, of the troubles case. Nothing more than usual admin tools and community norms were required. I fear by Elonka's actions "the troubles" may spread to other articles. Verbal chat 19:55, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
The BNP topic is not "British Nationalism in relation to Ireland". Perhaps a special clause could be added for such articles but as linking Irish Nationalism to British Nationalism could be misleading in many critical ideological ways, declaring such articles to be "Troubles related" or even Nationalist in relation to Irish Nationalism without a direct connection is bound to produce dissaproval. The list of diffs shown by Elonika appears to be an edit war started [80] and largely continued by me [81]. The issue, if it is of any consequence here, is wether to rely upon the disparity between third party sources and the primary source rather than providing information about the disparity, with barely even speculative relation to Ireland let alone The Troubles. Apologies... perhaps there is a model whereby these sanctions could be introduced to "Troubled Article"s without labelling them with any particular politic or ArbCom case?
Self-explanitory note: for any unassuming of the fact that political partys may be in no way connected to The Troubles in the manner that Monster Raving Looney Party is not, for instance.
As suggested by User:Nickhh above, there is much more direct scope for insertion of British political parties which have been in government during the Troubles period. Can't think of anything else. ~ R. T. G 23:32, 20 November 2009 (UTC)
As someone who has pointed out the considerable problems with Elonka's (and other) Admins proposals for a "troubles-creep" policy, I nonetheless see this as a clear example of a "troubles-related" article. The BNP is a racist virulently anti-Irish Party and were active during the period of the troubles. Their inclusion is much more appropriate than Irish articles about events that occurred dozens or even hundreds of years before the troubles. The sudden outcry by editors (who in many cases are themselves troubles-warriors) is risible. Just because Elonka, uninformed though she admits she is, can see the obvious fact that 'articles related to the British-Irish' dispute does not mean only Irish articles. And yes, of course this potentially extends to articles on US political parties as well - which is why I oppose Elonka's extensification proposal. But in the context of her and other Admins proposals "BNP" is definitely a legitimate target for the Arbcom scatter-gun. Sarah777 ( talk) 00:24, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
Please combine this with Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment#Request_to_amend_prior_case:_The_Troubles, as essentially the same issues are now under discussion in 2 different places, with quite a bit of repetition. MastCell Talk 00:36, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
Hi, not sure I quite understand the point being made here. Are you agreeing there was no need to invoke the ArbCom Troubles decision in dealing with any problems on the BNP page? Or are you saying that because it now has been, but by an individual admin rather than by ArbCom, any review should be at AN/ANI or using some form of DR rather than here? We tried reasoning with Elonka on her talkpage but were brushed off. We tried going to ANI and were told to ask for formal clarification here, which is what has been done, but no one seems willing to give it. A mixture of one editor/admin's astonishing stubborness and refusal to admit a mistake, combined with the usual bureaucratic "oh no mate, you want Dept 4B, other building", seem to be conspiring to make this all rather complicated when it's all rather simple really. Correcting a rather obvious mistake really shouldn't take this much time and effort. It is all quite surreal
Thanks, -- Nickhh ( talk) 20:23, 22 November 2009 (UTC)
And, further to this - the issue has already been discussed at length on Elonka's talk page, and on the BNP article page. Consensus from a mix of involved and uninvolved editors is about 15-2 that the page is not a Troubles-related article, but Elonka for some reason is standing her ground. One editor also went to ANI, and they were told to come here, which another editor then did. I'm not sure why we would go to AE - the point is not that we need enforcement of a decision, but rather "unenforcement", or, simply a clarification that the page is not related, confirming the rather clear decision that the "community" has already come to. If we have to go to yet another venue, spend hours collecting diffs and post all the same arguments for the fifth time, well fine. On the other hand, either ArbCom simply clarifying - on the Arbitration clarification page, after all - "no, that page has nothing to do with our decision on the Troubles" or Elonka having the good grace to admit an error and hit a single button to reverse a totally bizarre decision, would seem to be a much more obvious route to sorting this rather silly problem out. Cheers. -- Nickhh ( talk) 10:45, 24 November 2009 (UTC)
Please could the provided clarification to this problem be clarified.
Does an Admin have the right to label any article Troubles related because several editors from the troubles are involved at the article?
If an article mentions a sentence or two about a policy on Ireland and there is an edit war over something totally unreleated, can the fact there is one sentence on Ireland be used to justify placing that article under troubles related restrictions?
Yes or no to these two questions would be most helpful, its a pretty simple question that has been very well avoided in the extensive response below. BritishWatcher ( talk) 13:40, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
The clarification does not actually clarify the matter of the BNP article which is certainly the purpose of this request. Although not in the title, it does specifically say British National Party under the request. Can you clarify using the name "BNP article" or "British National Party article"? Cosensus seems to suggest, if I may, that BNP relation to The Troubles is only abstract and that even though the BNP have sought some public support on one occasion from a Troubles-related group, in issues not concerning The Troubles, support (if any) garnered appears to have little notability. The issue of white people being overrun isn't really valid in Ireland north or south where all the slaves were white, and even largely protestant in northern areas, anyway. We are too busy fighting amongst ourselves to be fighting the blacks over in England. ! ~ R. T. G 16:11, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
In response to Nate's question (and a number of others doubts), you resolve it at community level by first discussing it with the admin who imposed the action. Should that not work out, you use dispute resolution as necessary (such as RfC'ing the matter, which is most ideal in this case) or you make a community discussion at the appropriate admin noticeboard. That would usually be AE (though AN may also work). Of course, whichever venue or step in DR you choose, it would be a good idea to send neutral notices to notable venues (like AN/ANI/AE - i.e. not canvassing or specific users) so that you guys maximise the possibility of more uninvolved input being given. Only if there is difficulty interpreting or coming to a community consensus on the issue during these steps, should you escalate to ArbCom after which they can intervene. That is what is meant by Vassyana's comment: "only intervene when it is clear that the available options have exhausted and/or a dispute cannot be resolved at the community level". ArbCom are unlikely to (and are practically bound not to) provide any confirmation, reversal, or opinion in the absence of those community steps being proactively taken (and exhausted) in good faith. Some of the steps I've mentioned must've been missed, or I would've at least been aware of what venue was chosen - maximising the possibility of more uninvolved input being given is a must here. I hope that helps. Ncmvocalist ( talk) 17:53, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
Initiated by El on ka at 04:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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:
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:
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 [86] and October-November 2009. [87] 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". -- El on ka 04:22, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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. [88] [89] [90] [91] [92] [93] [94] [95] [96] [97] [98] [99] [100] [101] [102] [103] [104] 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. [105] [106] [107] [108] [109] [110] 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, [111] and is a location where established editors continue to revert each other. [112] [113] [114] [115] [116] [117] [118] [119] [120]
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 [121] [122] [123] [124] [125] [126] [127] [128] [129] [130] and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT arguments, [131] [132] [133] [134] [135] [136] [137] [138] [139] to accusations of bias and incompetence, and sometimes out and out personal attacks. [140] [141] [142] [143] [144] [145] [146] 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:
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. -- El on ka 21:07, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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)
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 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)
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.
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)
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
[147] Elonka said..
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)
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)
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)
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. Rockpocke t 20:42, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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:
-- Snowded TALK 02:43, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
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)
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)
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)
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.
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)
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 [148] despite previous blocks here and here with Admin's obviously not being sanctioned [149].
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)
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)
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)
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)
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)
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.
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.
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.
A motion has been proposed that would amend a sanctions remedy in this case. It would replace the remedy in this case that allows administrators to unilaterally apply sanctions to editors within the designated topic area with a standardized remedy that essentially allows for the same thing. Any extant sanctions or warnings made according to the older wording found in those decisions (as applicable) remain unaffected. To comment on this proposal, please go to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Motions. NW ( Talk) 20:39, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
I wanted to flag up User:CommieMark, particularly after his edits here, which are potentially troublesome. I don't want to wade in with both feet, but I suspect that it wouldn't be received well. Someone should really speak to him. Traditional unionist ( talk) 20:55, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
Initiated by Seraphimblade Talk to me at 21:27, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
N/A
Following a recent appeal to arbitration enforcement [150] from a user who had been sanctioned under the Troubles discretionary sanctions, and objected to the portion of this which forbade editing of British baronets, a closer look was taken at this. Arbitrator Newyorkbrad confirmed that the Committee had not seen any issues arise from this area for at least a year and a half [151], and taking a check through the AE archives and case enforcement logs, I also can't find any trouble there recently. The administrators involved in the discussion regarding the appeal, including the one who closed the original request and placed the sanctions, agreed there was little purpose in the baronet portion of the ban and it ultimately was lifted for that editor. It's nice to see an area where sanctions have done their job and calmed things down, so I think it's time to give it a go without them. Accordingly, I'd propose something to this effect:
@Newyorkbrad: I realize the sanctions can be tailored on a case by case basis, based upon the type and area of misconduct they're being applied in response to. That is overhead to remember and/or process AE appeals if someone forgets when originally applying them though, and I think in general it's a good idea to have as few areas as possible have sanctions applied to them. There are some areas where it's likely that won't happen for many years, but if there are others where the problem that led to them is no longer a problem, I think we ought to scale them back, remove the "big scary notices" on the article edit pages and talk pages, etc. Seraphimblade Talk to me 14:32, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
This question arose because some of the editors involved in the Troubles case were people who largely edited articles on baronets, but who had made controversial edits to Troubles-related articles and AfDs, sometimes with inflammatory edit summaries, and there was some "revenge" editing of baronet articles. See in particular Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Statement by User:Vintagekits and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Statement by User:Kittybrewster. As far as I am aware, since the case concluded in October 2007, no editor in either area has strayed into the others' territory. There is no apparent need to continue to link them. Scolaire ( talk) 08:21, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
I endorse Scolaire's summary, except that there a further incident after 2007.
There was a further flare-up of the Troubles-Baronets link in May 2009, involving me (BrownHairedGirl), Vintagekits and Kittybrewster. A request for abitration was opened, and dealt with by summary motion: http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case&oldid=289861526#Baronets_naming_dispute
So far as I am aware, there has been no further Troubles-related disputes wrt Baronets since then.
All of the troubles-related disputes wrt baronets involved Vintagekits ( talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), who is currently indef-blocked (and I think also perma-banned) after a very long series of conflicts. - BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 11:46, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
Initiated by 2 lines of K 303 at 12:41, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
I wish to appeal against a frankly bizarre decision where a "consensus of uninvolved administrators" in this discussion has topic banned me while providing virtually no evidence to support the decision.
The 3 month topic ban was proposed here detailing a series of edits to Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign 1969–1997. See User:One Night In Hackney/Appeal for analysis of that series:
The ban was proposed at the end of that series. So FergusM1970 made some bold changes, was reverted, then Portugalpete and SonofSetanta edit war to try and force those changes through without any attempt at discussion. And that's my fault how exactly? If I make one revert and other editors edit war after that, is that somehow my fault? Can I be held responsible for the actions of other editors? I asked for an explanation as to how making one edit to an article is somehow worthy of a 3 month topic ban, I never got a direct reply to that question. Make one revert to enforce content policy and get topic banned, makes no sense to me.
The history of 7 July 2005 London bombings is mentioned as evidence here. I'll be the first to admit my behaviour can be seen as less than stellar on that article, but there's others who are far worse. See User:One Night In Hackney/Appeal for analysis of that article.
Somewhat bizarrely, Flexdream's attempts to edit war OR into an article with unproductive talk page discussion get him just a final warning yet I get a topic ban. I can't really understand the logic of banning the person attempting to enforce content policy while giving the person attempting to violate it a slap on the wrist, anyone?
There's various comments falsely alleging I refused to take part in dispute resolution. The case was filed at 22:24, 3 August 2012 (that's a Friday night for the record). It was archived at 22:44, 4 August 2012, just over 24 hours later. My removal of the notice from my talk page has been falsely interpreted as a refusal to take part. I know where the page is without a link since I've posted there before (and I don't remove noticeboards from my watchlist), and me removing all comments from my talk page is something done repeatedly prior to that. It was a Saturday. During the Olympics. I was too busy to respond straight away since it required a bit of thought. Maybe I should have posted something to that effect, but the DRN volunteer could easily have asked if I was planning to respond, but he chose not to and just closed it assuming bad faith.
Rather than actually deal with the editors persistently violating policy, the admins have decided "sod it, we'll just ban everyone" without taking into account that some editors are simply trying to enforce content policy in the face of disruptive editors adding transparent violations of policy, and that removing the disruptive editors from the situation is all that's needed. I can't see how this topic ban is remotely justified by the "evidence" unless attempting to enforce content policy is now topic ban worthy? 2 lines of K 303 12:41, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
@Newyorkbrad. As can be seen from the discussion, the 3 month topic ban was suggested to apply to everyone supposedly involved, regardless of previous history. For example SonofSetanta ( talk · contribs) has two previous Troubles sanctions on his current account, as well as 5 previous blocks on Troubles related articles on his previous account The Thunderer ( talk · contribs) (see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/The Thunderer/Archive for details). So to give me the same length topic ban as SonofSetanta is perverse, when I have never even been blocked on Troubles related articles, save one erroneous block quickly overturned. I find myself in a bizarre situation where I have been topic banned for reasons that have not been explained based on "evidence" that hasn't even been fully divulged to me. How am I supposed to edit again under those circumstances? I'll only get topic banned again based on the whim of some admin who refuses to answer questions, as has happened here. 2 lines of K 303 11:08, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@AGK, I'm really struggling to understand this now. SonofSetanta twice tries to force through incorrect or policy violating changes made by FergusM1970. I revert the changes a full 7 days after Domer48 had edited them out, and that's somehow worthy of a 3 (or even 6!!) month topic ban? Seriously, can I have an explanation as to this thinking please? The message is still clear to me, don't bother trying to stop people forcing through disputed changes or you'll get topic banned. So what's the alternative? Let their disruptive, incorrect and/or policy violating changes stand while we go through dispute resolution and they refuse to compromise and insist their edits stand? Does the reader benefit from allowing those changes to stand while all this goes on? 2 lines of K 303 11:11, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@Various people. If the decision is "harsh", then why is a harsh decision being allowed to stand? I'm not simply asking for the ban to be overturned, reducing the length is a second option. 2 lines of K 303 11:13, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@Flexdream. I don't have the time or energy to pick apart your latest attempts to revise history, like when you claimed at editors previously blocked and topic banned "didn't realise at the time they were in breach of a rule" [1RR]. However your claim regarding RTÉ is incorrect, as you are well aware. At the time of the dispute there was no podcast copy of the show on the RTÉ website at all, that is an addition made since the edits in question. This is obvious to anyone reading the discussions about it. 2 lines of K 303 11:34, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
@Slp1. Totally irrelevant in my opinion, unless you're of the opinion that topic bans should be handed out at a minimum of three months regardless of the supposed level of misconduct? 2 lines of K 303 11:40, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
On a personal note I have limited time for this particular thread after brining a request for clarification and making input on a RFAR and responding to 2 other declined AE appeals of the same ruling. I have no problem with ONiH appealing it, it's just I've answered for a group decision of 4 sysops 3 times now already - just as a suggestion there needs to be a better way of dealing with AE closers than singling them out when a group decision has been made.
ONiH was one of a series of editors topic banned for misconduct both in the WP:Troubles topic area (specifically tag teaming editwarring at
Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign 1969–1997, but also issues relating to
7 July 2005 London bombings and at AE itself). The ruling took into account the apparent use of AE to "win" content disputes (by multiple parties ONiH being only one).
Initially I was of a mind that FergusM1970 was the only problematic user, other sysops disagreed and wanted to see where DRN discussion would go - they explicitly cautioned all articles to engage in a constructive fashion. After the DRN discussion failed Steven Zhang sent the case back to AE. At that point on examination I came round to other sysops POV that stonewalling and/or process gaming was occurring on both sides of the content issues. No constructive attempts at reaching/building consensus were being made by either side and the dispute originating at
Corporals killings spilled over. Instead of following dispute resolution policies (ie disengaging for a start) multiple involved editors tried various brute force mechanisms: tag teaming edit warring; reversion without discussion; immediate reporting to AE; 'tit for tat' AE reports; 'tit for tat' reverts.
The crux of the sanction was due to the tag teaming at
Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign 1969–1997 while the case was open. It is not acceptable for a party to bring a case to AE for stated misconduct and then engage in such misconduct themselves - that is the definition of
unclean hands. Parties as well as previously uninvolved editors (e.g DagosNavy) jumped into an editwar in breach of WP:Editwar and circumventing the
single revert restriction by tag teaming -this was noted at the AE thread, perhaps ONiH doesn't see his edit was tag teaming 4 sysops disagreed (if Arbs see it otherwise I'd appreciate a note on it so we don't make the same decision again elsewhere). At that point and in this context those involved in the worst of the issue were considered for topic bans.
FergusM1970 & SonofSetanta were given longer bans for recidivism and abuse of AE respectively. I did argue for Flexdream to be banned (after he had been formally notified of discretionary sanctions days previously) but other sysops disagreed. There was no 'lumping together of editors'.
I'll also note that contrary to
policy ONiH has blanked the topic ban notification. I understand his wish not to have this on his talk page but how he treated it is against policy--
Cailil
talk 14:13, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
Note: I think its good for ONiH to use this process to review this AE decision and for the official ability to appeal to ArbCom to be used and I have no problem at all with him doing so. I'd appreciate your eyes on this as frankly it was the worst case I've seen at AE for a long while-- Cailil talk 14:13, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
I do not have time to analyse this case, but would like to note that User:One Night In Hackney is a long-term editor of articles relating to The Troubles, and one of the most scholarly content-creators in that field. His prolific contributions include the 1981 Irish hunger strike, which he massively expanded in 2007 and brought to featured article status.
It is a serious loss to Wikipedia that a contributor of this calibre should be banned from the topic where they have made such a significant contribution. I would ask all concerned to examine whether this can be avoided. -- BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 14:38, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
I don't know if I can post to this discussion? I hadn't been told about it, but I have just noticed it because I am named and misrepresented several times. Do the admins want my account here? I wont be able to supply it till Thursday. If one of the admins can let me know either way please by a comment here in my statement section, or a posting on my talk page. If it's not necessary then I wont needlessly add to what is already a very lengthy piece. However, if the decision on Hackney is to be revised, partly in response to these inaccurate accounts of my activity I think I have to respond. Thanks.-- Flexdream ( talk) 21:05, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
@Newyorkbrad - sorry this couldn't be shorter. I have tried to restrict it. For clarity I have grouped comments under article headings.
I change 'summarily executed' to 'killed' with the edit summary 'A summary execution is a variety of execution in which a person is accused of a crime' [ [220]]. That summary was lifted verbatim from wikipedia. Less than 15 minutes later Hackney reverts it [ [221]] with summary '..and that's what happened'. I then open a section on the talk page [ [222]]. On the talk page Talk:Corporals_killings#Summary_Execution I ask what crime they were charged with. Hackney replies "Please don't ask irrelevant questions. Reference for summary execution added, good day to you." I tell Hackney I quoted the wikipedia definition and say " If they weren't charged with a crime they couldn't be summarily executed". Hackney replies "They couldn't?". Judge for yourself which of us is trying to have a discussion.
Hackney cites "Peter Taylor Brits pages 294-295 "In a statement that evening, the IRA claimed responsibility for the 'execution' of 'two SAS members who launched an attack on the funeral cortège of our comrade"." I have pointed out before - this sources puts 'execution' in quotes and that is deliberate. I could describe the AE as a 'court case'. You would know what I meant, but you wouldn't think I meant it was a court case. In addition, the source doesn't use the word 'summarily'. Hackney also added a source to the article which which uses the term 'summarily executed'[ [223]]. It is a book on Yugolslavia, and is taken from the introduction. The source also described the funeral as being for three IRA gunmen, when it was actually for one. So the source seems flimsy support. Contrast that with [ [224]] who as well as identifying that 'killed' was used for years in the article, shows that there are relatively few sources for 'summarily executed'. Hinckley's response is here [ [225]]
Hackney states "However Flexdream then asks a totally different question on the talk page, "And the crime they were charged with was what?". There's a substantial difference between "accused" and "charged", thus making the question irrelevant. You don't need to be *charged* with a crime to be summarily executed" Totally different question from what? My summary states "A summary execution is a variety of execution in which a person is accused of a crime". My question is "And the crime they were charged with was what?" This he calls this a 'totally different question'? This is pedantry. Hackney still will not answer what crime they were accused of or charged with. And he maintains that 'executed' in quotes in a source equates to summarily executed?
Hackney states "summarily executed" was the consensus wording For years the word was 'killed'. It was changed to 'summarily executed' in March [ [226]]. It was changed to 'murdered' in April [ [227]] then changed back to 'summarily executed'. Then changed to 'killed' by me in August. I don't think 'summarily executed' has ever been the consensus wording.
Hackney states "There's various comments falsely alleging I refused to take part in dispute resolution." There's also comments like mine asking for you and others to be given more time [ [228]]
Hackney states "Yes the caveat was needed due to the number of inaccuracies in the request, and I wished to make it clear I had objections to those inaccuracies. Bear in mind there was nowhere for me to write my version of events unlike in say a request for arbitration, I simply added a caveat to make sure I disputed the accuracy of the request. What's the problem with that exactly?" I think the problem is that it's the only contribution and it seems unnecessary.
Hackney states "removing the disruptive editors from the situation is all that's needed" I agree. the article now uses the term 'shot' [ [229]]. I've no problem with that as it's accurate and straightforward. Since several editors were banned, no one seems to be wanting to change it to 'summarily executed'.
Hackney states " Flexdream attempted to remove an unsourced comparison with IRA bombings during the Troubles, Nick Cooper reverted his edit, then rather than attempt to discuss the inclusion of what he deemed to be irrelevant content, Flexdream added a bizarre comparison that you won't be able to find made by a reliable source. That's where I entered the picture. You appear to be suggesting that if I want to remove the content Flexdream added, I also have to join in an edit war on his behalf" I made clear in my first edit here that it was because I thought it irrelevant [230], it had nothing to do with sourcing. Nick Cooper reverted it as relevant [ [231]]. Accepting Nick's argument I added material [ [232]]. I don't see any edit war there for Hackney to join in and I never undid Nick's reversion. Hackney then chooses to remove just my addition [ [233]] as being unsourced even though I have a link to the wikipedia article. I then open a section on the talk page to discuss it [ [234]](do you see a pattern here, I edit, Hackney reverts, I create a section on the talk page to discuss). Judge again how the discussion goes and how collegiate it is.
Hackney states "Somewhat bizarrely, Flexdream's attempts to edit war OR into an article with unproductive talk page discussion" I still don't see how it's OR when I link to a wikipedia article for reference. Is it really better I go to the wikipedia article, find a source that's used there, come back and put that as a link. How does it help the reader to have a link that takes them out of wikipedia to a single source, instead of taking them to a wikipedia article that has multiple sources? Which makes wikipedia a better encyclopedia?
Hackney quotes ""if ONIH had applied the same verifibiality and NOR criteria to both parts of the sentence, and had supported Flexdream's concerns about and deletion of problematic material by removing it himself, the edit war that followed might easily have been avoided" - I did the former, as the talk page proves. As already stated, I was not willing to edit war on his behalf to make an edit he'd already attempted to make which had been reverted." There was no edit war before Hackney intervened as I've shown. It would have been better if Hackney had concerns about sourcing for him to be clear on that from the start, and explain why he was removing one edit but not the other. Instead he goes straight in and removes one edit saying it's unsourced, and says nothing about the other edit. I think it was reasonable for me to see this as selective.
Hackney states "Flexdream was bold in his removal, reverted, then didn't attempt to discuss but made a totally different bold edit. He was then reverted by me, and rather than discuss he started an edit war" What was 'bold' about it? I didn't discuss Nick's reversion because I accepted the argument given for the reversion. My next edit was consistent with that, and wasn't reverted by Nick. It was reverted by Hackney. I then started the discussion.
"Flexdream reverts twice to restore unverifiable material while not contributing to ongoing talk page discussion for another 4 hours." I still think that a broadcast BBC programme is a reliable source. I know from previous that Hackney will try to remove even direct links to a copy of a broadcast program where he doesn't want them in the article.[ [235]]. Again, judge for yourself how the discussion I started that time went[ [236]] and the dispute resolution [ [237]] .
Hackney states "FergusM1970 is nothing but a disruptive POV warrior in my opinion". I think there is a big contrast in Hackney's present action and Fergus' response to a ban [
[238]]. Fergus acknowledges "my behaviour fell below the acceptable standard", whereas Hackney states "my behaviour can be seen as less than stellar".
I think I was harshly treated, but I think the admins have a thankless task. I had probably got used to a level of behaviour among editors that is not typical, and I am encouraged that admins see it as appalling where tag-teaming is used to avoid the 1RR rule and edit-war. Where there is little effort to engage in discussion, which sometimes descends to little more than insult. My concern is that when blocks expire or are lifted some editors might revert to 'business as usual'. In meantime from what little I can see the Troubles articles are doing fine.--
Flexdream (
talk) 20:15, 24 August 2012 (UTC)
The following report was filed by ONIH on 2 August and was considered at the time by two Admin’s EdJohnston and Cailil on 3 August to be fairly cut and dry with Cailil noting that “…content is not relevant to ArbCom enforcement.” It was Heimstern here who suggested they “hold off on sanctions, let's find a way to resolve the content dispute via actual consensus first." NuclearWarfare asked did Admin’s “see anything by any party that looks like it would be called poor editing (POV writing, misrepresenting sources, etc.) by any objective observer?” and Seraphimblade asked “if there's clear POV editing, baiting, nastiness during discussions...” Heimstern said “no, nothing is blatantly obvious.”
While Slp1 makes the point that ONIH had filed two reports in 9hrs which becomes irrelevant as Slp1 noted that Flexdream "acknowledged that they had broken 1RR" and "the report closed as a warning" however, with two Admins having already seen a clear cut violation, and accepting that "FergusM1970 has broken 1RR" Slp1 makes the bizarre statement that "the 1RR rule as written and applied rewards editors who have a big gang to revert and who use battleground approaches to get their way in a topic area." Apart from the massive assumption of bad faith both these editors had violated 1RR and have been found by AE to have done so. Simple rule, don't edit war on a 1RR article, "they made me do it" is not a defense. Even Cailil noted what Slp1 was saying vis-a-vis gaming but don't see it here, and correctly pointing out that "FergusM1970 has already been topic-banned a breach of WP:TROUBLES is recidivism." and that the " openning of a DRN thread may have had the aim of forestalling this thread - if that were the case that would be a gaming issue."
It was EdJohnston at 16:35, 4 August who suggested holding off on closing while the DRN thread was open. With a number of Admin's agreeing Seraphimblade at 16:39, 4 August Heimstern at 20:40, 4 August The Blade of the Northern Lights at 20:46, 4 August Slp1 at 22:01, 4 August. The times and dates are important because at 22:35, 4 August, Steven Zhang actually closed the DNR. This makes these comments by Cailil all the more bizarre along with the agreement of John Carter. The DNR was over before it began and the claims of "stonewalling" are without foundation. You cannot find a "source based consensus" if the editor will not provide the required sources.
It is now that the editing history of editors is called into question. We still have a group of editors who insist on violating the 1RR even with threads already open on them [253] [254] [255] [256], and continuing to add un-sourced POV laden text and nothing is done. I do agree with the comments by AGK, "Topics subject to AE are demonstrably problematic areas of the encyclopedia, so misconduct reported here needs to be dealt with swiftly and effectively." In this case it was not! Admin's failed to act on this, and exasperated the situation by sitting on their hands failing in the one task they were assigned to do and have shifted this mess onto editors who have to deal with these editors. ONIH has ably demonstrated this with diff's and I've attempted to do the same. The more one looks at this, the more I question the fact that I have, along with ONIH been topic banned? I'll put up some diff's on my edits and request that Admins point to the ones that justify such a decision. -- Domer48 'fenian' 10:22, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
I was not intending to post in this discussion, however due to the fact One Night In Hackney was topic-banned for behavioural issues I feel that it needs to be mentioned that I have recently had to file a complaint in regards to uncivil comments by ONIH on a non-Troubles article. Mabuska (talk) 10:55, 3 September 2012 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).
It would be my feeling that the ban was imposed incorrectly because the sysops involved did not take me at my word. The detail of the complaint clearly shows I was having difficulty with a process, receiving help from others, engaging in discussion and most importantly, reverting edits which I clearly thought were vandalism. I made no alteration to the text of the article and my decision to nominate it for deletion wouldn't have taken effect immediately but would have required discussion which clearly could have resulted in another method of dealing with my concerns over the article. The situation wasn't helped by the intervention of an editor called Mo aimn. I believe his alterations were designed to invite reverts from me as he knew I would be under preessure and make mistakes. He wold have observed this from previous (unhappy) interaction with me.
From the text of the complaint you can see that sysops and some other editors argued for a ban because I had been consistently disruptive since 2008 and should have known by now how to nominate a page for deletion. They claim I have hidden two previous identities to avoid scrutiny by sysops. They appear to ignore the representations made by the other editors who were involved and who speak in support of me being confused but discussing. I am accused of causing a "Battle Royale" over image copyright. This is far from true. I was accused of deliberate copyright violation yes, but after several weeks of activity was able to prove that I had never violated copyright but had made mistakes in the pretty complicated area of Crown Copyright on images uploaded in 2008.
The facts are:
1. I have not edited constantly since 2008. I had a username for 2 months in 2008 before retiring under pressure from edit-warring gamers. A second identity was created in 2008 which lasted for around four months. My current identity was created in 2010 but used sparingly until May of this year with only a handful of edits in 2010, 2011 and 2012. The truth is my editing history spans 12 months since 2008 with substantial breaks.
2. My issues since 2008 have always revolved around articles concerning the Irish Troubles and my unsuccessful attempts to edit out POV where I saw it. A dedicated cabal was roaming the wiki ensuring that all of these articles were guarded and kept with their particular POV intact. My opposition to this was noted and I became a target for "gaming" to get me off the wiki. It sounds bizarre but it has happened to many people who have dared to edit these articles with a neutral POV. Why don't I just leave these articles alone? I am from Northern Ireland and am of very moderate views. I also have a passionate interest in the military of Ireland, our police forces and the British Military. Why should I not edit the articles? In my opinion, after examining what happens and being part of it, the thing to do is to stay involved and to try and assist admins in identifying what can be done to prevent this type of gaming.
3. I am not guilty of copyright violation or disruption but this is used against me by sysops and those supporting a call for me to be banned. All I did was to stand my ground, discuss, learn and save the images which were tagged for deletion. Why is this wrong?
4. The most important point is that I was not disruptive. I tried to nominate a page for deletion. Several AfD patrollers came at me from nowhere and so quickly that the situation was developing whist I was responding to them on the talk page of the article, their own talk pages and mine.
5. After the ban was applied I adjusted the licencing on image /info/en/?search=File:5_UDR_Record_Sleeve.jpg. I was not aware that such an action was a violation of the ban and pointed this out at Sandstein's talk page. Without warning I was then blocked. Was that fair?
Summary:
The real meat of the issue is at the article talk page: /info/en/?search=Talk:Shoot-to-kill_policy_in_Northern_Ireland#Tags The edit history will show me putting in headers including the 1RR Troubles Restriction before opening a discussion as required to debate the possible deletion of the page. I am experienced in 1RR and wouldn't have engaged in an edit war. My belief was that I was reverting vandalism and that can be seen in my edit summaries. The issue to me is that sysops are claiming I'm being disingenuous when all the evidence says otherwise. I think it has to be examined why an uninvolved user (Psychonaut), who is a copyright enforcer, came to file the complaint at AE and why Mo aimn became involved. Both of them excacerbating an issue which was by then under control and clealry needed no further intervention as an admin was already involved. If the admin didn't feel it necessary to file a complaint why did Psychonaut?
I request that the ban be overturned and my name cleared. If possible the block that was applied to my user name because I did not understand that image pages were not part of the ban should be expunged.
Only since May this year have I been able to edit at any pace on Wikipedia. My success in doing so had me feeling for the first time that I was a real and active part of the Wikipedia community. I brightened up my talk page for the first time ever by putting in colour and infoboxes. I want to stay as part of the community and I believe the outcome of my learning when I was thrust into copyright issues proves that I am willing to work hard to remain and be productive. Where I think the problem lies is that some editors still want to play games and sysops are too prone to looking for past demeanours to prove a knee jerk feeling that someone is being disruptive - that people like me can't learn to avoid being gamed. The central issue is that the content of an article wasn't the cause of my error. I was learning a new process, made mistakes, and thought what I was doing was subject to vandalism (for a short period). No credit has been given to me for backing down and following instruction given by other, concerned and helpful editors and admins.
I am very alarmed that a single administrator seems to have made a final decision here. Where's the discussion, the process? Does my submission not warrant comment
@ NW - Thank you for your comments. Yes: in the event of my appeal failing if it were possible to allow me to continuing editing at Ulster Defence Regiment to maintain my goal for GA status I would be grateful. I have made this request before. The UDR is a complicated subject however and it has at least another 18 pages associated with it which deal with the 15 battalions as per List of battalions and locations of the Ulster Defence Regiment and also List of attacks on the Ulster Defence Regiment plus Timeline of Ulster Defence Regiment operations. The ancillary articles could be raised to B Class at least, if not GA status with a comprehensive amount of work. Part of the peer review report suggested reducing the size of the article and to that end I have been considering removing the fairly substantial women's section here to an article which would probably have the title "Greenfinches (Women's UDR)". If I were allowed to edit in this area a topic ban on the troubles wouldn't matter to me because I had already (as the AE case shows) withdrawn voluntarily from that topic. whilst I may have the knowledge to contribute usefully in that area I find that I'm not able to find proper collegiate responses generally and would prefer to maintain a distance, even though my fingers twitch at the sight of some of the more glaring examples of POV and inaccuracy within many of those articles. SonofSetanta ( talk) 13:05, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
@ Salvio. In your statement you say: we should not substitute our own opinions to those of the admin(s), but that is exactly what I believe is required. The admins have stated that they based their opinion on the fact that I have been a user for five years and have treated me as an experienced user. If you read my statement above you will see that I contest that view. Even if it were true however it remains that some areas of Wikipedia are quite complicated and if one hasn't engaged in a particular process before it can prove to be difficult and need experimentation. I've always been encouraged to apply WP:BOLD and try new processes and I have learned a lot since 22nd of June this year when I commenced editing full time, something I've never done before. My editing history shows that I have made 4329 edits. Almost 3500 of those have been made since 22nd June. This is the only period since I first joined Wikipedia where I have enjoyed editing on a productive and collegiate basis without considerable WP:BATTLE taking place as a result of my edits. In my opinion this is clearly because of the absence of certain editors who opposed what I was doing on partisan grounds. In my previous identities the edit count of both equates to what I've done in the period June 22nd until now. It can clearly be seen from my interaction with other editors and admins that, for the first time, I can identify myself as part of the Wikipedia community and am behaving in a commensurate manner.
The issue at stake here is: did I conduct my editing in a disruptive manner and then try to be disingenuous in my comments, or did I simply make errors in good faith whilst attempting a new process ? Did the sysops involved treat my case on the basis of my editing history since 22nd June or was I topic banned because of what happened in a previous identity? Has my conduct changed from previous identities? Look at how I followed the guidance given to me during the incident. examine how I stopped reverting what I considered to be vandalism when it was explained how I should go about it. Did I change the content of the article or was I simply trying to make a case for deletion in the full knowledge that it would lead to a discussion on the talk page rather than an instant deletion of the article? Did I engage in discussion? Did I seek help from admin? (The answer to both of those questions is yes).
@ Sandstein. You claim: SonofSetanta does not recognize that the sanction is a result of their own conduct, and instead assigns blame to others. You state that: {SonofSetanta} has a relatively long record of blocks for disruption in the "Troubles" topic area, under three accounts. Did you not consider that I might have just made mistakes as I claim? Which would clearly fall into Wikipedia:Don't come down like a ton of bricks. That's not wikilawyering btw, the essay is there for all to read and you cannot blame an editor like me for quoting it to try and persuade you that you've got me wrong. Were you simply blinded by the fact that the article fall under Troubles Sanctions, an area which I worked in since 22nd June without similar difficulty (barring the copyright incident mentioned in my statement which is not Troubles related)? Nor was my attempt at nominating the page for deletion Troubles related. I feel I need to point out my opinion that {Troubles Restriction} was created to prevent edit warring over content on Troubles related argument. Not to prevent editors from learning and employing Wikipedia processes. The Troubles is an area where Wikipedia desperately needs editors. It is a very difficult area to work in. You've just lost me from that area because the Devil and all his imps couldn't persuade me to edit comprehensively on the subject again whilst you, as my personal Sword of Damocles, are going to come down on me like a ton of bricks every time I make a mistake which isn't content related.
FYI, and for the attention of all admins involved in this discussion. I am a disabled man. I know perfectly well that my private situation has no bearing on this case or upon my work in Wikipedia but it does mean: because I am unable to engage in gainful employment I have spent all day every day since 22nd June devoting my not inconsiderable intelligence, education, life experience and skills to improving Wikipedia, largely in a very difficult area to work in. I had no difficulties prior to the copyright incident. Would it not have been more prudent of you to encourage and cultivate my input rather than trying to portray me as a disruptive editor and applying draconian means to curtail my editing? I made a series of mistakes very quickly. Mo ainm's intervention wasn't helpful - if that's what you mean by me blaming others. Your wrongfully applied sanction could well have driven me away from Wikipedia: is that what you want?
1. No request has been made by me for an investigation into Psychonaut's comments however, given his intervention and his comments here I think it should be apparent to all the he has an axe to grind and should be given guidance on how too extend good faith and to be helpful to editors like me who occasionally get a little confused over processes.
2. Admins should clearly be able to understand why Psychonaut has little comprehension of the difficulties of trying to edit articles relate to the Troubles on an NPOV basis and why they would lead to blocks or bans as "cooling off periods" when discussions become heated, uncivil, or abusive.
3. Psychonaut is mistaken. I have never been blocked or banned in any shape or form for copyright violation. The images he refers to which he tagged are still on Wikipedia with several notable exceptions: one or two which I did not wish to retain and three where I made an error in my interpretation of a Creative Commons licence. I accepted the deletion of those with good grace and in reference to the latter three, learned something new. I have learned so much in fact that, as stated above, I have been assisting copyright enforcers this week in the weeding out, replacement and deletion of dozens (possibly coming close to 100) copyvio images.
4. With regards to the incident at Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland he is again wrong. The editing histories show that I posted this message to Shirt58 at 13:55 after I had been reverted for a second time. I left a message for a sysop here [257] seeking advice but prior to this had already begun to engage on the talk page which makes me wonder why Mo aimn made his revert of me at 14:55 when discussion had clearly been going on between myself and other helpful editors since 14:23 in the section I had started at 12:42 to specifically provide a discussion area for my deletion tag. Uncle Milty made a revert at 15:15 removing the tag again but gave an informed summary. The final tag which I placed at 16:11 was after I had been unable to list the page for deletion at AfD. After reading further instructions I was of the opinion that I needed to place {subst:prod|reason goes here} in order for the listing to become active. This tag was removed immediately by Mo aimn: his second revert on a 1RR page (a guideline he knows well).
5. He is again incorrect in claiming that I knew the ban affected images. If the request made to Sandstein on 25th August is examined here it can clearly be seen that I requested permission to change images ON the article Ulster Defence Regiment understanding that I couldn't edit the article page. At Wikipedia:Banning_policy#Topic_ban it does not state that images are part of the ban however and I had concluded that while it would not be permissible to add or remove images from article pages it would be acceptable to update the licencing on images which were already in the article. Psychonaut was quick to inform Sandstein of this mistake on my part which can be seen at the same link on Sandstein's talk page. Which led to the "without warning" block. After this I became convinced that I couldn't edit ANY images until it was pointed out to me that Commons wasn't included in the ban. I then created File:Ulster_Defence_Regiment_Crest.png and requested assistance from several other users before finding one who was prepared to replace the .jpg format image already on pages with UDR in the title. As you can see Psychonaut continues to try and assert that I am trying to circumvent the ban by editing an image into Northern Ireland Security Guard Service even though, as he admits himself, the organisation was formed post- Good Friday Agreement and therefore is not included in {Troubles Sanctions}. Although another editor has helpfully informed me that there could be a grey area so I have not returned to complete the formatting of the image but instead have asked him would he be kind enough.
Summary. As you can see the situation was quite complicated. I have said before I became confused (no wonder) and was of the opinion that the reverts I was making were outside 1RR because I was reverting vandalism (of Peridon and Mo aimn}, or as in the last one, following instruction from AfD. My edit summary here [258] after my first revert couldn't be clearer. If the other editors had stayed away from it instead of creating the impression of WP:TAGTEAM I am confident that Peridon and I could have sorted my misunderstandings out quite quickly on the article talk page because I was seeking help.
I keep wondering why Psychonaut is following my edit history and making multiple complaints about me. If he thinks I am prone to making errors why then doesn't he interface with me rather than converting my mistakes into ANI or AE cases? Although he did state on the ANI board that he will never engage with me again. I am no longer engaging with SonofSetanta because my many weeks of doing so patiently and politely have led me to believe that it is futile. If I were completely incapable of making productive and useful contribution to Wikipedia I would have realised this a long time ago and simply left the site. The opposite is true however. The vast majority of my edits (and images) are productive, useful and in volume.
I think it's got to be noted that it was ME who tagged Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland as WP:1RR. Why would I do that and then be disingenuous about {Troubles Restriction}? SonofSetanta ( talk) 14:40, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
@ SilkTork. Your point would be valid if indeed I had been making regular contributions for three years but I haven't. Between October 2010 and June 2013 I made less than 1200 edits. Most of them on articles such as White Island, County Fermanagh, Joe Dolan, RAF Greencastle (created by me, now C Class), Herbert Westmacott, Provisional Irish Republican Army, Brian Kenny (British Army officer), John Strawson (British Army officer) (created by me]], Battle of the Imjin River, Winston Churchill, Denis Ormerod (created by me), Harry Baxter (created by me), Imber, Lists of shipwrecks, Bill Bellamy (British Army officer) (created by me - B Class, listed at the Template:Did you know, 8th King's Royal Irish Hussars, HMS Dasher (D37), MV Princess Victoria, Black Watch, Viola Grosvenor, Duchess of Westminster (created by me), Arthur Denaro (all images from my own personal collection), Tannenberg Memorial (C Class), Queen's Royal Irish Hussars (most images from my personal collection).
So, given this knowledge and the fact that I made very few contributions to The Troubles until 22nd June this year in this identity would you be kind enough to explain your comments regarding confusion and ignorance and poor understanding of procedures? Perhaps you could elaborate on how a poor ignorant soul such as me could have an article up for GA status? (see Ulster Defence Regiment, almost completely rewritten by me between June and August). I put it to you that you have completely misunderstood the situation as the admins who imposed the ban also did. I have uploaded 63 unique images on Commons since 13th July, created 32 new articles on the Wiki (over three identities) and God knows how many unique images, most of which I have donated from my personal collection taken by me during military service.
Educate this poor old thicko then. Why would someone of my ilk believe that a topic ban is the least they can expect in order to prevent further disruption.
Are you aware of the disruption caused on articles pertaining to The Troubles which led to DS being imposed after a very long and convoluted ArbCom case? Are you cognisant of the fact that tag-teamers roamed articles related to The Troubles to game new users (at that time) like me into making mistakes and getting blocks and bans to prevent us from removing partisan views from articles?
Lastly: can you see the annoyance in the words that I use when replying to you? Annoyed that you haven't actually bothered to examine the detail of what happened at Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland but based your statement on preconceived prejudices because I admitted to having the occasional problem with new processes? I respectfully urge you too to read Wikipedia:Don't come down like a ton of bricks where it quite clearly states that: policies and guidelines are not the law and do not need to be ruthlessly enforced. You obviously haven't read a word of what I've posted in my defence or you would know, despite my manifold contributions, I've only really been editing Wikipedia since 22nd June this year because of the difficulties I've had in my two previous identities. I didn't know that editing articles on my own country, county and town would be so difficult in a project which professes to be as well run as this one is. My frustration at being defeated in my efforts to change that over three identities has been expressed on many occasions. Yet with all, people like you are able to post twisted and incorrect opinions about me whenever it pleases you without fear of repercussion, because you are an admin and I'm just a pleb editor. You use the block log to judge me without knowing what I, and others, went through to try and make genuine contributions. We welcomed the DS. We didn't think it went far enough and are very happy to comply with it. It has a flaw however: it can still be gamed and I fell for it in a moment of confusion. Read the detail. Go to Shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland and see who discussed what and when. SonofSetanta ( talk) 15:54, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
@ Newyorkbrad and T. Canens. May I ask what logic you applied to reach a "decline" opinion. Have you examined the incident in detail or is your response one of backing up a fellow administrator's decision? I have proved beyond doubt in my various submissions that much of what has been asserted about me being disruptive is untrue. Do you not feel that a deeper investigation into these allegations is warranted? Have you examined the incident in detail to see if my statement is true? While I certainly and very much appreciate the inclusion of an offer to allow me to continue editing certain articles whilst the ban continues I still maintain my innocence from any wrongdoing and that is really what this appeal is about. Don't judge me as The Thunderer; judge me on my achievements, input and modified behaviour in this identity. Is it not possible, in your opinion, beyond all conceivable doubt, that I could actually be telling the truth? SonofSetanta ( talk) 14:23, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
POINT OF ORDER - As per Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Discretionary_sanctions#Guidance:
administrators should use their judgment and balance the need to assume good faith and avoid biting genuinely inexperienced editors, and the desire to allow responsible contributors maximum freedom to edit,
Has good faith been exercised towards me by Sandstein? Have I been "bitten" because I was inexperienced in a particular process?
I would like this to be considered please. SonofSetanta ( talk) 15:00, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
I refer to the rationale I provided for the topic ban in the AE thread that led up to the ban on 24 August 2013, and to the conclusions reached by my administrator colleagues when they declined an appeal of the ban at WP:AE on 26 August 2013.
The appeal does not address the disruptive conduct by SonofSetanta identified in these proceedings, notably, edit-warring to reinstate a frivolous speedy deletion nomination of a "Troubles"-related article after several administrators had declined the speedy deletion request, as per the evidence provided in the AE request linked to above. In imposing the topic ban I considered that SonofSetanta has a relatively long record of blocks for disruption in the "Troubles" topic area, under three accounts:
In this appeal, SonofSetanta does not recognize that the sanction is a result of their own conduct, and instead assigns blame to others. For this reason, the topic ban is still, in my view, a necessary and proportionate measure to prevent further disruption by SonofSetanta in this topic area. Accordingly, I recommend that the appeal be declined. Sandstein 16:06, 5 September 2013 (UTC)
I see that SonofSetanta's appeal contains a request for investigation into my conduct (though I was never notified of same). I had hoped to avoid any further discussion of this user, but as he seems to have dragged me into this one I'm not sure it's avoidable.
I endorse Sandstein's conclusion that SonofSetanta seems unable to recognize his own disruptive behaviour, and that it was this behaviour (and not others' reports of it) which is the reason for his current and past sanctions. This lack of awareness is demonstrated most saliently by points 3, 4, and 5 of his appeal:
In (3) he flatly states that he is "not guilty of copyright violation or disruption", though this is precisely what he has been repeatedly blocked for; one needs only consult his various accounts' block logs and user talk pages here and on Commons to appreciate the scope of the problem. I was one (but neither the first, nor the most prolific) of several users who tagged his infringing images for deletion.
In (4) he claims he was "not disruptive" in the incident that led to his latest topic ban, which flies in the face of his next claim that "several AfD patrollers" had to engage with him in order to get him to stop edit warring over the deletion tag.
Finally in (5) he claims his latest block (for violating the topic ban) was unfair because it was without warning; however, he had been conspicuously notified of the topic ban on "everything related to The Troubles" (emphasis in original) on his user talk page on 24 August. The notice made it clear that noncompliance would result in blocks. In fact, a quick check over SonofSetanta's recent contributions shows that he still may not be complying with the topic ban. He's made a number of edits, for example, to Northern Ireland Security Guard Service, who according to the article are best noted for their controversial defence of a post- Good Friday attack by the Real IRA.
I have no opinion or recommendation concerning the outcome of this appeal; I just wanted to voice my support of Sandstein's observations and to rebut some of the claims made in the appeal. — Psychonaut ( talk) 12:49, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
This is an enquiry. Are the terms of this arbitration still in force about restricting the number of reversions allowed (and the wider issue of slow-motion edit-warring) on articles that include the "Flag of Northern Ireland"? I raise it because some editors are insisting on repeatedly adding the purported flag to articles when they can give no reliable source that there is one, and on many of the relevant articles, there is a long-standing consensus that Northern Ireland does not have any such flag. In some cases, these editors also refuse to discuss the issues on relevant talk pages or have used insults and outrage when action has been taken against them (by myself) when, admittedly, I did not realise that these articles were covered by this arbitration. One editor that I know of has already been blocked on more than one occasion though in the long past for similar kinds of editing concerning the flag of Northern Ireland. I am mostly referring to: Template:UKFlags with edit history here just now, but similar slow-motion edit wars with a refusal to discuss much has happened on other articles where flgs of the UK have been included. Thanks DDStretch (talk) 12:05, 9 May 2016 (UTC)
I am not acting out of political motivations you seem to imply I am, even when you point to a comment on Snowded's talk page where I comment to another administrator that someone is under a 1rr restriction already and that perhaps more action is needed to prevent further disruption. This is allowed! Note that I have protected a relevant page to prevent further disruption and warned editors to discuss things and provide reliable sources for any changes they want to make on contentious matters (see relevant discussion here).
Rather than speculating on political motivations or speculating that I am trying to coordinate administrator action as part of some underlying so-called political action, it is better to focus on demonstrable facts (rather than theories) which are:
(a) There is a long-standing consensus that a small number of disgruntled editors now seem to object to. That consensus doesn't get destroyed just by disruptive action on the part of these disgruntled editors. But it is one reason why there is a 1rr restriction on these kinds of articles. These disgruntled editors can object, but their objections can only have force if my next point is satisfied:
(b) When requests are made to find reliable sources to back up including a flag for Norther Ireland, silence happens, and after a break, the repeated adding and slow-motion edit war by a small number of editors then resumes.
Consensus does exist, and it can change only by acceptable arguments, and that means by the inclusion of reliable sources in discussions which other editors can reasonably accept. I have asked for these, but none have been forthcoming. Just a resumed slow-motion edit war. Where are the reliable sources?
(c) You and the other editors concerned do this slow-motion edit-war at just enough frequency to avoid the strictly legal restrictions of 1rr editing. (see here, and here for the ones I have found so far, where others will see numerous editors removing the flags being repeatedly added
You accuse me of political motivations. However, in essense by alleging political motivations, you are trying to rule anyone out of order who tries to take action against the gaming of the system by the particular slow-motion edit wars used by editors, including yourself on one occasion. You would be better off by making use of your time on this matter by finding and posting the reliable sources. I urge you to do so, because you also refuse to engage in the normal wikipedia process of providing reliable sources for the changes you want after they have been requested, instead you have become a participant in this slow-motion edit war!
I give an undertaking here that if reliable sources are found and posted, and if they are persuasive for myself, then of course I will not object to the flags being added if the consensus then changes (I might add, although I may change my mind, the consensus may not, in which case, I accept the wikipedia policy that one must go with the consensus view so long as it is reasonable, and I think that you and the others seem not to accept this.)
I am solely concerned with the disruption caused by these disruptive actions which continue even after requests to discuss the matter and to provide reliable sources have been made. I formally ask some other administrator to look at what is happening and take what action they feel is appropriate.
I finally ask that Miles Creagh withdraws his unfounded allegation that I am acting from some political motivation, because it is unfounded by reasonable scrutiny of what I have done, above. As such, it is demeaning of him and the other disruptive editors to continue to reply to legitimate requests with silence and continued edit-warring, making unfounded allegations towards me or some others, who object to their actions, or both. DDStretch (talk) 18:56, 10 May 2016 (UTC)
Here [261] [262], incidentally, is an exhaustive and exhausting prior structured discussion pursuant to a Request for Mediation on this matter, which doesn't seem to have arrived at a consensus. Where are the Requests for Mediation, Comment, prior discussions etc that evidence this claimed consensus? Miles Creagh ( talk) 21:23, 10 May 2016 (UTC)
I must apologize for making the mistake of assuming that Snowded was an administrator. I would not have posted a message on his talk page discussing the edit warring that has been taking place if I had not made this error. However, this does not have any effect on the substantive issues under discussion here.
In particular, this apology does not absolve Miles Creagh for his assumption about political motivation, because making such assumptions just should not be made at all!
Similarly, it does not absolve him or the other editors for their failure up to now, in this section, of attempting to provide reliable sources for the changes they insist on making in a slow-motion edit war without engaging in any discussion on the relevant talk pages.
For all these reasons, it is still appropriate the action be considered by another administrator for what has been happening.
If the reliable sources are placed on the relevant talk pages and a proper discussion takes place, with no allegations of political motivations, then a way forward might be achievable, but it is still possible that some action can happen because of violations of 1rr editing restrictions or game-playing by apparent tag-teaming edits across a number of pages at just the right frequency to evade breaching the 1rr restriction within a 24 hour period.
The requirement for an apology, therefore, still stands because making comments in an attempt to undermine another editor by alleging political motivations on their part is simply unacceptable. It is one main reason why such restrictions have been imposed on all articles that are in some way connected with "The Troubles". DDStretch (talk) 19:47, 11 May 2016 (UTC)
My question is two-fold:
Other similar edits have been made by Gateshead001 ( talk · contribs), but since I am not an expert, I do not wish to take unilateral action except in the most blatant cases of non-verifiability. -- Redrose64 🌹 ( talk) 21:17, 11 November 2017 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Initiated by Swarm at 00:39, 15 May 2018 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
Greetings. So, WP:TROUBLES#Guide to enforcement contains a 2011 provision that places all pages in the topic area under a blanket 1RR page restriction that is specifically enforceable without warning, provided {{ Troubles restriction}} has been placed on the talk page. This directly contradicts the current awareness criteria for enforcing page restrictions, and it's unclear to me whether that provision is exempt from, or has been superseded by, the modern awareness criteria that were implemented in 2014 and 2018. In spite of the contradiction with standard practice, it continues to be advertised as an active sanction on many articles, which is apparently validated on the case page. However, there's no apparent record, anywhere, of an intentional exemption to ArbCom's now-standardized procedure regarding awareness. It also claims to derive its authority, at least in part, from a community decision, but there is no record of such a restriction at WP:GS or on the case page, so it's unclear as to whether the "no warning" provision is actually the will of the community. Thanks in advance.
The 1RR restriction originated from an AE discussion in 2008 and was clarified in an ANI discussion in 2009. It's not clear whether the 2011 motion superseding "all extant remedies" actually superseded these restrictions, since these aren't actually arbcom remedies, but looking at the history of User:Coren/draft this appears to be the intent.
Additionally, it is not clear whether and how the later changes to the DS system impact a page restriction imposed in 2011 given the provisions in
WP:AC/DS#Continuity (Nothing in this current version of the discretionary sanctions process constitutes grounds for appeal of a remedy or restriction imposed under prior versions of it.
and All sanctions and restrictions imposed under earlier versions of this process remain in force.
).
T. Canens (
talk) 08:51, 21 May 2018 (UTC)
As the Committee noted in adopting the most recent amendments to the DS procedure, the point of having warnings is that it's fundamentally unfair to subject people to penalties for violating sanctions they didn't know about. That's what notifications and alerts are all about. There's nothing stopping admins from using the existing, well-functioning procedure to tag each page with 1RR and alerting each editor before using the blunt tool of AE sanctions against them, just like in (almost) every other topic area that the Committee has imposed DS in. In my view, any disruption in this area can be handled with existing discretionary sanctions. I suggest that the Committee vacate any Troubles topic-wide 1RR that may (or may not) be currently in effect for the sake of clarity and fairness.
Also, I strongly believe that the recent motion concerning page sanctions applies to all previous page sanctions, too. The Committee didn't technically vacate or invalidate the page restrictions – it simply placed restrictions on enforcing them by sanctioning editors, going forward. (The motion provided that "There are additional requirements in place when sanctioning editors for breaching page restrictions." – this doesn't invalidate the page sanctions, but it does create new restrictions on enforcing them.) If that argument sounds too wikilawyery, the more pure argument is that the clear intent of the Committee was to make the change applicable to existing sanctions, too. Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 21:48, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
From the earlier statements by arbs and other admins, it is evident that we don't yet agree on whether the existing sanctions on The Troubles-related articles are subject to the awareness principle or not. Hence this clarification request is valid and necessary.
Gnomish editors are prone to falling foul of 1RR restrictions if there isn't an awareness clause. I often make reverts on articles I pass by, only to find out afterwards that the article is subject to 1RR. The recent fiasco with the block against seasoned administrator User:Jorm, which could have been averted if there was an explicit requirement to warn before blocking, also springs to mind. I strongly recommend ArbCom to amend this case and other old case with bespoke 1RR sanctions, to enshrine the awareness principle and standardise them to standard 1RR discretionary sanctions. Deryck C. 17:59, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.
The Arbitration Committee clarifies the following: All sanctions placed under remedy 3.2 of The Troubles prior to its replacement with remedy 5 are considered discretionary sanctions. Specifically, the 1RR sanction affecting the topic area is considered a form of page restriction placed as a discretionary sanction, and the additional awareness requirements regarding page restrictions apply.
Enacted - Mini apolis 14:30, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Initiated by Thryduulf at 17:18, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
As there are no specific other people involved, I have left notifications at:
In The Troubles arbitration case the committee authorised a remedy that was effectively discretionary sanctions (this was before standardised discretionary sanctions as we know them today had evolved) and as part of that a general 1RR restriction was imposed. Later, the old remedy was replaced by discretionary sanctions, incorporating the 1RR restriction. However, because of the way these sanctions have evolved the scope of the DS topic area is stated differently in different places and this is causing confusion (see for example [[Talk:#DS notice]]). What I believe to be the full history of the scope(s) and where I found them is detailed at User:Thryduulf/Troubles scope but what I understand to be the differing scopes presently in force are (numbered for ease of reference only):
British Baronets were formerly part of some of the scopes, but that was unambiguously removed by a previous committee.
I am asking the committee to:
Request 1 does lead to the need to determine what the scope should be. In my view, formed following some discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Ireland and Talk:Great Famine (Ireland) and looking at various articles and talk pages is that there are only two that need considering:
The Ulster Banner does not need to be separately mentioned - the Ulster Banner article is quiet and is not even tagged and while the Flag of Northern Ireland article would benefit from continued inclusion in the discretionary sanctions regime it is firmly within either scope suggested above.
The Easter Rising topic area is unquestionably within the scope of suggestion B and is reasonably interpreted as also being within the scope of suggestion A as crucial background to it.
Whether the Great Famine (Ireland) is within the scope of either A or B is less clear, nor is there clear consensus whether it should be - more input than I was able to attract prior to the request is needed here. Thryduulf ( talk) 17:18, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
@ Black Kite, GoodDay, EdJohnston, and Scolaire: letting you know about the suggested motion below in case you have any more comments. Thryduulf ( talk) 21:46, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
Per SilkTork's request, here is my suggestion for the salient points of a clarification motion. It needs some introductory text and may need some wordsmithing
Note to the clerks: If this (or some similar motion) passes the scope of the DS authorisation will need to be updated at Template:Ds/topics and Template:ArbCom Troubles restriction as well as the case pages linked. Thryduulf ( talk) 19:44, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
(B) would be better, in my opinion ... one could argue for the second section to specifically include the use of the term "British Isles", but that will probably be sufficient.
If I remember correctly, the issues with the Ulster Banner weren't particularly on that article itself, but edit-warring to include the Banner instead of the Irish flag / Union Jack (depending on context) and vice-versa on BLPs and other articles that included flags and flagicons. Black Kite (talk) 17:44, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I would caution that 1RR may need to be kept in place, during the Brexit process which effects the British/Irish border & thus related articles. GoodDay ( talk) 19:30, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I'm for anything, that'll prevent 'edit wars' around this topic. GoodDay ( talk) 21:53, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
Per a motion passed this year, the 1RR which is currently in place for Troubles articles is due to the decision by an administrator to impose it under discretionary sanctions. (Most likely it is due to this log entry by User:Timotheus Canens in the fall of 2011. The idea of a blanket Troubles 1RR didn't originate with him, it used to be a community sanction before that). So, if anybody thinks that the blanket 1RR should be adjusted they could (in theory) appeal it at AE. Personally, I can see the advantages of single-page 1RRs that could be applied by individual administrators.
According to Canens, the scope of the case is "..reasonably construed as being related to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland.." In my view, this is an adequate description of the scope and I wouldn't advise the committee to get really specific as to which articles are in or out. Admins shouldn't take action unless the nature of the edits suggests that nationalism is at work in the minds of at least some of the editors. Modern nationalism can cause problems with articles that seem tangential, as when editors who are warned about WP:ARBMAC get into wars about Alexander the Great, since the word 'Macedonia' occurs there. Yet the ARBMAC decision did not mention our article on Alexander the Great, nor should it. Even so, the ARBMAC sanctions would reasonably apply to any nationally-motivated editing of that article. EdJohnston ( talk) 20:09, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
I have nothing extra to bring to the general discussion. It was always my belief that the scope of the sanctions should be B, and this seems to be the arbs' view as well. I would just note that, in the Famine article, there was this edit within the last week. The historiography of the famine is still very much a battleground between Irish nationalists and British nationalists. The article has had a Troubles restriction template on the talk page since 2009. I don't see any point in removing it now. Scolaire ( talk) 15:00, 1 February 2019 (UTC)
@ Thryduulf: Is "'Ireland' has the standard geographical and political meanings" a phrase that has commonly been used in the past? It's not clear to me what it's saying. Where are the standard meanings posted and who set the standards? And is there a political meaning that's different from the geographical meaning(s) – one that includes Boston, Massachusetts or Celtic Park, Glasgow, for instance? If there is no bureaucratic reason for having this, I would leave it out. If there is, I would rephrase it so it is unambiguous. Scolaire ( talk) 11:56, 3 February 2019 (UTC)
@ Thryduulf and Joe Roe: I have already pointed out the ambiguity in the word "country" in regard to Ireland. Building ambiguity into a "clarification" makes no sense. The word "state" is used exclusively in the Irish Manual of Style. It was also the word used in the 2009 Poll on Ireland article names authorised by Arbcom, and in any number of discussions on WT:IE and WT:IECOLL. If you're going to go ahead with 6b (which I still think is just wordiness for the sake of wordiness), please change "country" to "state". Scolaire ( talk) 10:14, 6 February 2019 (UTC)
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should opine whether and how the Committee should clarify or amend the decision or provide additional information.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Initiated by The C of E at 07:36, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
I would like to request removal of my Troubles restrictions because I do feel that the lesson has been learned. I feel I have shown in the past I am able to edit in these areas evenhandedly with John Brady (Sinn Féin politician) and Gerry Mullan (politician) being some examples. The crux of the ban was based on me allegedly trying to get Londonderry on DYK on a politically sensitive day which was not desirable to consensus. While I have been under the ban, 1831 Londonderry City by-election ran on DYK on Ulster Day so I feel its not been done consistently. As for the judicial review article, I already explained that was an unfortunate coincidence and I had not been thinking about it at the time I wrote the article.
If removal is not acceptable, can I request then that it be amended to permit editing of sporting articles. The reason I ask is because I asked @ Barkeep49: if I could edit GAA articles and he said no because of the sport's political culture. But most players and clubs are not political and I have done work in there previously without concern ( Seán Quigley, Killian Clarke, Ian Burke, Gerry Culliton, Cillian O'Connor, PSNI GAA and Irish Guards GAA). So, if full removal is not desired, I would like it amended for clarity and so I am able to continue working on sporting articles please. The C of E God Save the Queen! ( talk) 07:36, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
The
WP:AE request mentioned a parallel discussion which is now at
WP:AN archive. That WP:AN discussion was closed with the restrictions at
WP:Editing restrictions#The C of E. Those restrictions handle my greatest concern as they seem to prevent further problems regarding DYK. Accordingly I am relaxed about whatever the Committee wants to do regarding the WP:AE topic ban. Nevertheless, I have to record that "allegedly trying to get Londonderry on DYK on a politically sensitive day
" is an own-goal in an appeal.
Johnuniq (
talk) 09:14, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
I participated in the AE discussion, and gave my reasons for why I supported imposing a topic ban there. I don't have anything in particular to add to that. I will say that the fact that a community discussion at AN also came to the conclusion that there was disruptive behavior which merited sanctions shows that outcome to be a reasonable one. I think best at this time if the editor does productive editing in other topic areas, and then revisits this in six months or a year. Seraphimblade Talk to me 06:13, 30 November 2020 (UTC)
Other editors are free to make relevant comments on this request as necessary. Comments here should address why or why not the Committee should accept the amendment request or provide additional information.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Remedy 6 of the The Troubles case ("One-revert rule") is amended to read as follows:
A one revert restriction (1RR), subject to the usual exceptions, is applied to all pages relating to The Troubles, Irish nationalism, and British nationalism in relation to Ireland, broadly construed.
For this motion there are 10 active arbitrators. With 1 arbitrator abstaining, 5 support or oppose votes are a majority.
Support:
Oppose:
Abstain: