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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Flcelloguy (talk | contribs) at 21:32, 26 September 2005 (→Statement by third party Flcelloguy: Oops, the statement was by me- got logged out randomly). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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The last step of dispute resolution is a request for arbitration. Please review other avenues you should take. If you do not follow any of these routes, it is highly likely that your request will be rejected. If all other steps have failed, and you see no reasonable chance that the matter can be resolved in another manner, you may request that it be decided by the Arbitration Committee.

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Request name Motions  Case Posted
Amendment request: Armenia-Azerbaijan_3 none (orig. case) 4 January 2025
Motion name Date posted
Arbitrator workflow motions 1 December 2024

The procedure for accepting requests is described in the Arbitration policy. If you are going to make a request here, you must be brief and cite supporting diffs. New requests to the top, please. You are required to place a notice on the user talk page of each person you lodge a complaint against.

0/0/0/0 corresponds to Arb Com member votes to accept/reject/recuse/other.

This is not a page for discussion, and Arbitrators may summarily remove discussion without comment.

Current requests

Template

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

If not, then explain why that would be fruitless

Statement by party 1

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Statement by party 2

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (0/0/0/0)

The Bogdanov Affair Affair

Involved Parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

They will be made aware. I promise.

Statement by Snowspinner

The Bogdanov Affair article has been plagued by vicious POV warrioring from a number of sides, including IPs belonging to Igor Bogdanov, the subject of the article. The short form is this: The Bogdanovs published some physics papers, which were eventually widely recognized by the physics community as nonsense. Bogdanovs stand by their papers. Hilarity ensues. The article has been under near-constant revert warring recently, as Bogdanov and people allied with him remove all criticism, and Bogdanov's critics revert frantically. The mediation cabal failed to solve this one. I ask for short term injunctive relief, specifically that the Bogdanovs, YBM, LLL, Laurence67, and XAL all be banned from the article in question. A sample of problematic edits include [1] [2] (A new user who immediately shows up in the firefight) [3] and [4] (For personal attacks). The odds of sockpuppets being involved in editing here is quite high - a lot of users who do nothing other than edit Bogdanov pages.

Statement from third party Ral315

I haven't edited the article, but I was one of the admins who was involved in blocking. As part of a routine 3RR request on WP:AN/3RR (made by Rbj), I blocked Rbj and an IP purportedly belonging to Igor. Both editors acted badly afterward; Igor reverted the article under different IPs, and Rbj was, in his own words, "proud" of the block. The whole thing is a mess, and I would support blocking at least a few of these editors (Bogdanovs and Rbj, I'm not really sure on how the rest are involved) from editing the article. I would also encourage the ArbCom to clarify on whether this is a violation of WP:AB (though this is only a guideline, it would help to clarify how far the vanity/autobiography guidelines reach. Ral315 WS 19:44, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Question from Bishonen: an injunction for XAL?

Oops. I didn't realize that the Bogdanov Affair affair had made it to RFAR; I just blocked XAL for the third time for unrepentant personal attacks. 72 hours. Should I unblock her so she can respond to this RFAR? I'd appreciate it if she could get an injunction against editing anywhere else, though (especially not on Talk:Bogdanov Affair), for what would have been the duration of the block. I'm not happy about all this vitriol she spreads, and, from past experience, I'd expect it to be worse now that I've gotten her worked up with a new block. Bishonen | talk 20:42, 26 September 2005 (UTC) PS, re Snowspinner's request above that XAL along with other users be banned from editing the article: she never has edited it. Never edited any article on wikipedia. I want her banned from the article's talkpage.[reply]

For what it is worth, I support this motion. XAL has contributed nothing to the discussion, in stark contraindistinction to most of the other users like Igor or rbj or ybm, and often stirs things up. --Maru (talk) 21:03, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (0/0/0/0)

Zephram Stark

Involved parties

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

Statement by Carbonite

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Zephram Stark's behavior has been a serious problem for many months. In addition to the complete lack of respect for the idea of consensus, he had made personal attacks, used disruptive sockpuppets and made frequent rants against Wikipedia administrators. One extremely offensive edit summary [8] made by Zephram was "This place is a joke. It's too bad, because it had possibilities before all you fucking Jews came along. The funny thing is, I never had anything against you before this. Now I see what people mean."

His behavior has been especially poor on Terrorism, where he has consistently made edits and additions that are opposed by virtually every other editor of the article. He's created sockpuppets to support his positions and completely ignores consensus. Carbonite | Talk 16:57, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Zephram Stark

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Carbonite, don't you get tired of shooting yourself in the foot? If you don't want people to call you on your corruption, stop being corrupt. It's that simple. Trying to kill the messenger won't do you any good because everything you do on Wikipedia is transparent. That's the beauty of it. Anyone who wants to see if your accusations have merit is going to come to the same conclusion that they did the last time: that your accusations of "sockpuppets" are unfounded, that you are the one disrupting terrorism while I am actively trying to resolve differences, and that your allegations fall squarely into the definition of idiocy (most notably because everyone knows I'm Jewish). --Zephram Stark 17:22, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

One more thing, please look up the word consensus before trying to use it again in a sentence. --Zephram Stark 17:38, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

[Moved from other party's area James F. (talk) 03:04, 24 September 2005 (UTC)][reply]

All I ask is that people take nothing Commodore Sloat says at face value. I always try to find something that is true or at least an exaggeration in a critique, but the good commodore has got me stumped.
  • Talk:Terrorism is currently more active than normal
  • I am engaging no personal attacks, although I defend myself when attacked when no other options are available
  • I have made no sockpuppets, and from what I have read, people affected are taking these accusations up with Wikipedia founders
  • EKBK contributes to many discussions on subjects that I know nothing about. His claim that he heard the term FISA:Terrorism is not unlikely because I have heard the term used since the late seventies to describe the difference between dictionary-defined terrorism and the official USA version. EKBK is only one of over a dozen users that have been blocked for doing nothing but expressing their opinion.
  • I certainly did not invent the neologism FISA-Terrorism. Anyone who has heard the term used in colleges and discussion around the country can verify that. This, of course, is irrelevant because the term has been dropped from that proposal for weeks.
  • The section that was deleted had only verified quotes and summaries from the U.S. President, Osama bin Laden, and a New York Times bestseller. How anyone could call that original research is beyond me.
  • I made no racial attack, as would be evident if Commodore Sloat or Carbonite would bother quoting me in context.
  • My only agenda is to help create an article for terrorism that conveys information, the same as everyone else who is honestly trying to improve the article (as evidenced by actually contributing to it instead of just deleting whole sections of relevant and fully cited information).
  • The last time Commodore Sloat accused me of hijacking the discussion, I had listed the four proposals and asked for each member's feelings on them, which many people gave and we got much closer to a consensus. After Commodore Sloat interupted the conversation to make accusations and allegations that something was wrong with discussing the proposals, people started talking about his accusations instead. Don't take my word for it, look at Talk:Terrorism. Actions talk and B.S. walks, Commodore.
  • Does everyone want to hear my alleged "bizarre theory" about the word "unalienable" that is supposedly disrupting the Declaration of Independence? I assert that "unalienable" means "cannot be alienated." BIZARRE, isn't it!!
In recognition of the hard work you have done to railroad someone based on absolutely no factual information at all, I award you superbsbarnstar, Commodor. --Zephram Stark 01:31, 24 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I, Zephram Stark, do hereby nominate Smyth for The Most Hilarious Contradiction of Terms of the Day Award: "shows a total disregard for the consensus against him" ~Smyth


Is it possible to request comment from SlimVirgin? It doesn't feel like a normal lynching without the whole gang. --Zephram Stark 13:07, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by EKBK

Please limit your statement to 500 words

The things you say about Zephram Stark are simply untrue. You and your friends have been calling me a sockpuppet since I agreed with him on some points on the terrorism page, and what followed after I contacted a number of administrators was enough to make me sick. I was put in the position of "proving" I'm not a "sockpuppet", which I did to several administrators satisfaction, and I even emailed the founder of Wikipedia on this, because the principle of the thing was enough for me to do so. Just because I was formerly a "user" rather than an "editor" should not have made any difference in how I was treated, and I have since observed this fiasco with interest. I will re-iterate-I AM NOT A SOCKPUPPET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!--EKBK 18:10, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Commodore Sloat

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Zephram Stark's behavior on Talk:Terrorism has brought progress on that page to a complete standstill. He constantly engages in personal attacks and he keeps trying to commandeer the agenda to hilight his own original research. When his original research is shot down again and again, sockpuppets appear to defend him out of the blue. EKBK's very first contribution to wikipedia was to jump in the middle of the discussion Stark was disrupting and to claim that he uses the term "FISA-terrorism" (a neologism invented by Stark) all the time. (He claimed this after people asked Stark to quit adding original research to the article). It seems odd that a user's first edit to wikipedia would be to jump into such a controversial fight on a talk page, to make a highly unlikely claim. Stark has also made the "fucking Jews" comment another editor noted above -- whether he is Jewish or not, such attacks are entirely inappropriate for wikipedia. He keeps trying to hijack the discussion on the talk page to focus on his agenda - sometimes laying out "criteria for definition" with the goal of turning everything back to his original research (and ignoring the fact that there already are definitions of terrorism in wikipedia that are not original research and could be useful. I haven't been paying as close attention but I have noted that he is similarly disrupting the Declaration of Independence page with a bizarre theory about the word "unalienable." But it is not the content that people are objecting to here; it is his conduct, which has severely disrupted work on these pages. --csloat 19:31, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Smyth

I concur with everything Commodore Sloat says. Zephram Stark is such a difficult person to deal with because, at least on the surface, he does not appear to be a straightforward troublemaker. But as anyone who tries to engage with him quickly discovers, he is unreasonable, belligerent and utterly dishonest, frequently resorting to blatant lies, personal attacks, and consipracy theories about the cabal of administrators that prevent him and his sock drawer from turning articles into his personal playground.

I have not been involved with his argument about whether "inalienable" and "unalienable" mean the same thing, but a quick glance at the pages involved shows that the sequence of events is the same as with Terrorism. He makes low-quality opinionated edits, shows a total disregard for the consensus against him, repeatedly fails to provide even the smallest shred of evidence to support himself, and makes increasingly hollow pronouncements that a compromise is close. Then we have the sudden appearance of a sockpuppet army and his descent into lengthy paranoid political rants.

I don't know what a reasonable remedy against him would be. Banning him from editing only the articles he has disrupted so far is unlikely to help, as he has shown no inclination to give up during the months this has gone on, and there are hundreds of other pages he could quite easily give the same treatment to. – Smyth\talk 13:18, 24 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by jpgordon

I became aware of the issue of Zephram Stark when an editor requested that I look at Terrorism and consider protecting it. As an edit war was clearly in process, I did as requested, and explained it on the talk page. From that point on, it was clear that reasoning with Mr Stark was going to be, to put it mildly, exceedingly difficult and wearying. Mr Stark has shown no sign whatsoever of understanding the nature of cooperative editing on Wikipedia; rather, his insistance on the introduction of idiosyncratic, highly POV original research, his continual attempts to control and manipulate discussion, his assumption of conspiracy and accusations of "corruption", and his invocation of sockpuppets to imitate consensus make it clear that neutral third parties need to study the evidence (sorry about that -- it includes wading through months of Talk:Terrorism) and come up with a solution to this problem. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 21:06, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by BrandonYusufToropov

A cursory examination of Talk:Terrorism and its archives will reveal what we're dealing with here. Zeph is, I am afraid, a one-person filibuster out to prove that any deviation from his point of view is inherently subjective, outlandish, ridiculous, biased, part of a lynching party, etc. His perpetually chaos-inducing editorial philosophy may perhaps be powered by the Energizer Bunny; no amount of reasoning, or turning the other cheek, dims the surrealistically obesessive nature of his quest to remake this article according to his own eccentric standards. He is the single most consistently disruptive personality operating under a recognizable screen name I have yet to encounter on WP. I suspect he is one of those characters who is somehow entertained by inviting disciplinary action. which means we may be reinforcing bad behavior here, but folks, it has been months and, as he still refuses to put down the one-note megaphone he has hard-wired into this article.... BrandonYusufToropov 18:00, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (3/0/1/0)

Mike Garcia

Involved parties

  • Possibly also Guanaco and Danny, his mentors, as well as Jimbo Wales, the architect of his current mentorship arrangement.
Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

User talk:Mike Garcia User talk:Danny User talk:Guanaco User talk:Jimbo Wales

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried. If not, then explain why that would be fruitless.

This is a continuation of a previous issue that was hoped to have been handled but as it turns out the remedy either didn't work or has stopped working. I don't see how an RfC would help given the number of people who have already made clear that they disapprove of Mike's behaviour, and mediation isn't appropriate as this isn't about content but about behaviour, and the behaviour issues are clearly policy violations.

Statement by Fvw

Mike has a long history of problems on wikipedia, though for a while after Jimbo unbanned him things seemed to be under control. The last few months he has been getting progressively more troublesome however: He has made personal attacks, threatened people, repeatedly violated the 3RR, removed comments of people reporting him for 3RR violations from WP:AN/3RR and user talk pages, evaded blocks editing under different IPs (which also violates his agreement with Jimbo), and generally broken CIV in every way possible.

Though I must commend Danny and Guanaco for their effort in taking on such a mentorship in the first place, I feel that they currently aren't intervening enough to defray the damage done to wikipedia by Mike, nor am I sure that there's any level of mentor involvement that could do this. While I'm all for rehabilitating editors who've had troubles in the past, I'd rather have fifty unblockable vandals than one editor who continually creates ill will and ruins the general good spirit which wikipedia is built on. --fvw* 00:58, 22 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Mike Garcia

Please limit your statement to 500 words

Statement by Snowspinner

I remind the arbcom (And fvw) that they have previously declared that they do not have jurisdiction over Mike due to the special nature of his parole, which came directly from Jimbo, and thus is not something that it is within their power to overturn. Snowspinner 01:24, 22 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Oh? I must have missed that. I didn't see it in the RickK-Guanaco case, and that's the only ArbCom case relating to Michael I can find. Could you give a link? --fvw* 01:29, 22 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
While I'm not necessarily disagreeing with snowspinner, I honestly cannot remember us making such a declaration. Can you please refresh my memory. →Raul654 04:55, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not finding it. Possibly I'm delusional. Possibly it was something that was said off of the arbcom page. My recollection is David saying it - you might ask him. Snowspinner 22:27, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by third party Nandesuka

In this edit summary[9], User:Mike Garcia's edit summary was "PASBOUDIN, PLEASE STOP NOW OR I'LL KILL YOU". I don't know the detailed history of their dispute. I don't think it matters. I am not inclined to make excuses to allow this sort of behavior. Death threats are not funny, they are not excusable, they are not understandable, and they are absolutely not acceptable. I have seen literally thousands of content disputes on Wikipedia where the participants, although upset, somehow resisted the temptation to threaten bodily harm on others. It is my personal opinion that we need an absolutely zero-tolerance policy towards death threats. They have a chilling effect on bold editing (which was, of course, the editor's intent), and they shatter any pretense to an atmosphere of civility. I urge Arbcom to act on this matter (and any other matter where an editor issues a death threat, no matter what the justification) swiftly and firmly. Nandesuka 12:10, 22 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by third party the wub

I'd just like to add my opinion that whether it is by the Arbcom, or intervention by GodKing, something has to be done. As I see it death threats are totally unacceptable, and I imagine any other editor would recieve a very long or indefinite ban. Nor is this a first offence, Mike has repeatedly broken WP:CIV and WP:NPA. Yes he has made and continues to make many good edits, but when he gets into conflict everything breaks down. the wub "?!" 21:32, 22 September 2005 (UTC) Just to clarify, when I refer to Mike's behaviour I am talking about after Jimbo unbanned him, I don't think I was even around before then. the wub "?!" 21:36, 22 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by third party Ral315

I don't have any personal relationship to this case; I just want to note for the record that Mike Garcia is currently blocked for 72 hours for 3RR violation, and subsequent use of IP addresses to circumvent these blocks. Ral315 04:47, 23 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Just as an explaination, he was originally blocked for 48 hours for a 3RR on Hypnotize, however, I noticed that an anon IP continued to revert edits with summaries like this so I thought it was safe to assume it was Mike evading 3RR so I reblocked for another 24 hours. However, even after that, he continued with ANOTHER 3RR with even more threats like this one. This kind of hostility is not in any way helpful to the Wikicommunity and as such, I blocked him for an extra 24 hours ontop of the original 48 he had yet to serve and posted another warning on his talk page. Anyways, just saying something needs to be done as this kind of behaiviour should not be tolerated at Wikipedia without some sort of reprimand. Sasquatcht|c 21:00, 24 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by uninvolved third party Erwin Walsh

Arbitrators should probably seek comment from Jimbo Wales before accepting case; authority is not clear. Erwin

Statement by third party Flcelloguy

Just as clarification, I have blocked Mike Garcia twice. The first time was on September 5 for 24 hours ([10]); this was a clear-cut WP:3RR violation. In the hours after the block, I suspected that he was editing from an AOL IP because of some similar edits, but only warned him and did not extend the block ([11]). Then, on September 21, I blocked him for 48 hours following another 3RR violation ([12]). The reason I gave a 48 hour block, as explained on his talk page, was because of the multiple reverts, the harrasing edits and death threat (as noted above), and because I had warned him explicitly before about violating the WP:3RR rule, and his past history (he has eight WP:3RR blocks to date [13]). This 48 hour block has been extended by Sasquatch because of Mike Garcia circumventing the block using AOL IPS, continuing the harassing edit summaries and reverts. This is the current block in place. Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk | WS 21:26, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. I did make this statement; it just credited it to my IP in case anyone is wondering. Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk | WS 21:32, 26 September 2005 (UTC) [reply]

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (2/2/0/0)

Theathenae

Involved parties

Theathenae refuses to accept some proven facts that are found on credible sources if they conflict with his POV. He edit wars anyone who implements these facts without providing any sources to prove that his edits are true.

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

User talk:Theathenae, Revision as of 11:33, 6 September 2005

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

If not, then explain why that would be fruitless

I REX have on various occasions requested to try other steps in dispute resolution process. The Talk:Arvanites page is very long due to attempts of other people including me to reason with him. Also, I have tried to reason with him on his [Talk page]. In vain obviously. I have on at least one occasion asked if we can request Meditation: (quote from Talk:Arvanites) I suggest that we request for Meditation. This might help us resolve this dispute. REX 15:35, 27 July 2005 (UTC) They refused in favor of RfC. I later requested for comments (quote from Talk:Arvanites): I requested for comment. REX 10:18, 5 September 2005 (UTC) Check the request here. Nothing happened. So I believe that Arbitration is the only solution that can work because as I shall demonstrate below, Theathenae will not accept anything which contradicts his POV, however credible my sources may be (one of them is even an agency of the UN).

Statement by party 1 (REX)

On the Wikipedia article Arvanites there has been a dispute going on for quite some time over whether the Arvanitic language is a language in its own right or a dialect of the Albanian language.
I have provided the following references:

These are wholly credible sources, especially UNESCO which is an agency of the United Nations and they specifically refer to Arvanitic as a diaspora dialect of Albanian. User:Theathenae utterly rejects these sources and will edit war anyone who disagrees with him, however credible his opponent’s sources may be. He has written on the article Arvanites: Their language, Arvanitic has developed separately from Tosk Albanian and has been heavily influenced by Greek over the course of the past five centuries, to the extent that it is today considered a separate language by speakers and linguists alike. This statement is utterly his POV. He has provided no evidence to support such a statement and it contradicts with what UNESCO says. He also says on Talk:Arvanites that the article sould say: Their language, Arvanitic shares a common origin with the Tosk Albanian language this statement is also wholly inaccurate because it calls Arvanitic a language which shares a common origin with Tosk Albanian, rather like English and German are separate languages which share a common origin. This statement is also influenced by his POV and contradicts with UNESCO's statement. I have pleaded with him on his Talk Page and on Talk:Arvanites for him to consider his stance carefully, but he refuses only saying that (quote from Talk:Arvanites): I will continue to defend their right not to be labelled against their will. This statement that it is against their will is quite inaccurate. The Helsinki Report on Human Rights clearly says that some Arvanites use the term Shqiptar to describe themselves, that is the same term that Albanians use to describe themselves. Therefore, how can being called Albanians be against their will? Anyway, UNESCO, Encarta and Ethnologue wouldn't use that phrasing if it were against their will as he puts it. The UNESCO, Encarta and Ethnologue Reports were written by professionals, they knew what they were doing. I have proved all his sources to be false here but he has not indicated that he will observe Wikipedia policy. His behaviour is utterly unacceptable on Wikipedia I have told him on many occasions, but he refuses to listen. I have asked him to provide some references so that I could know that the scholarly community view Arvanitic as a separate language and not that he is not speaking off the top of his head (Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research). He can't, I have already demonstrated above that at least linguistically Arvanitic is a dialect of Albanian, and my sources above indicate that the scholarly establishment view it the same way (Both the UNESCO Report and the Ethnologue Report were compiled by professional linguists). If a certain phrasing is good enough for an agency of the UN (UNESCO), then it is certainly good enough for Wikipedia. We simply cannot accept User:Theathenae’s word over the word of institutions like UNESCO. This would be a violation of Wikipedia policies Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research. REX 11:26, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Theathenae (talk · contribs)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (1/0/0/0)


Rangerdude

Involved parties

Summary

Rangerdude is harassing editors who disagree with his POV.

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

User talk:Rangerdude#Requests for Arbitration 19:59, August 23, 2005

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

On June 10, I received a request from mediator user:MacGyverMagic to enter mediation on "Houston Chronicle".[14] I acknowledged my interest in mediation, and on June 14 I saw a mediation page had been set up so I tried to participate. Rangerdude refused. [15]

Rangerdude and I filed cross-complaints on June 15, including [16] and Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Rangerdude. We subsequently agreed to mediation and the RfC was withdrawn.[17]

We both agreed to a mediator, Andrevan.[18][19] Mediation never proceeded because we couldn't agree on how to proceed, despite the mediator's repeated inquiries (Rangerdude said that I might stalk him via email,[20] and I said that I did not want a public mediation). Rangerdude referred in some places to "mediation against" me, possibly indicating bad faith in the dispute resolution process.[21][22]

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Cberlet & Willmcw was posted by Rangerdude on July 25, 2005 and closed by him on July 30, 2005.

Statement by Willmcw

Harassment of editors Rangerdude is harassing and bullying editors who disagree with him or his edits. His goal seems to be either to end our involvement as editors or to punish us for disagreeing with him.

Cberlet Rangerdude brought an RfC against Cberlet and myself on account of our edit work on Ludwig von Mises Institute. The RfC charged us with "lack of civility, disruption, POV pushing, personal attacks on other editors, disregard of WP policies, disregard of talk page and consensus-building efforts, bad faith edits and assumptions". Only four editors (two of them LvMI associates) certified or endorsed Rangerdude's statement, while 14 endorsed Cberlet's statement and a total of ten editors posted separate views, most of which were against Rangerdude and some which received wide support. On the basis of that outcome, it appears that the community strongly rejected Rangerdude's view.

Rangerdude then heavily and contentiously edited Chip Berlet's biography and sought to have Berlet's published research deemed too extreme to use as a source for Wikipedia articles. At the same time he actively edited and created articles about one of Berlet's real-life adversaries, David Horowitz, with a positive POV.[23][24][25]

FuelWagon FuelWagon was one of the more vocal editors in the RfC, despite having had no prior involvement with either of us. He wrote a clearly-worded and boldy-formatted comment saying that the problem lay more with Rangerdude than with Cberlet or me.[26] Rangerdude first reformatted his comment then effectively tried to add FuelWagon to the RfC.[27][28] Shortly after the close of that RfC Rangerdude filed a separate RfC against FuelWagon. Wikipedia:Requests for comment/FuelWagon. The charges include having a "belligerent" tone in RfCs and filing a "false 3RR warning against another user". The RfC against FuelWagon received no endorsements or co-certifications. An opposing view received four endorsements within the initial 48-hour period.

SlimVirgin Rangerdude has also harassed SlimVirgin, who had had no editing interactions with him prior to commenting on the Cberlet/Willmcw RfC, and whose crime seems to have been speaking positively about us. In a number of edits he attacked her by name and he has made attacks on "wiki-cliques" that seem directed at SlimVirgin and other editors.[29][30][31][32][33][34] He apparently opposed Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/FeloniousMonk simply because SlimVirgin was the nominator.[35]

Willmcw Rangerdude has been attacking me as a "stalker" since June, 2005. He uses the de-listed RfC as an "attack file" with an ever-growing list of charges. I responded initially, but have not replied to every new addition. Rangerdude has copied and extended that file (minus my responses and other discussion) at User:Rangerdude/sandbox1/Evidence of willmcws wiki-stalking. He brandishes the charge as an attack in talk pages and edit summaries. [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] [43] [44] [45] [46] [47] [48] (Recent instances: [49] [50] [51] [52]) He seeks out other editors to warn them about my supposedly-abusive behavior, encourages them to bring dispute actions, and repeats the charges as a reason for editors to disregard my opinion. [53] [54] [55] [56] [57] [58] [59] [60] [61]

Katefan0 Rangerdude bullies Katefan0 in their editing disagreements, such as in Talk:Jim Robinson and Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Jim Robinson. [62] [63] [64]

Other issues From his earliest edits Rangerdude has been a POV warrior with a strongly pro/neo-confederate bias.[65][66] [67] [68] [69] [70] [71] He both shows bad faith and fails to assume good faith in others. He has followed my edits with an apparent intent to harass, in ways that mimic his own definition of wikistalking. [72] [73] [74] [75] [76] [77][78]


Statement by Katefan0

Rangerdude has made unfounded and potentially damaging personal attacks against me and has attacked other editors, has bullied and harassed editors who disagreed with him, disrupted Wikipedia to make a point, and aggressively inserted biased information throughout Wikipedia, while bludgeoning and smearing good faith editors who disagree with him. I have engaged Rangerdude in extensive dialogues on talk pages, largely to no effect. I opened an RfC over our main disputed article, Houston Chronicle, which received no replies. I then requested mediation, which formally opened on June 10. However, the mediator has been absent since that time and the dispute remains stalemated. Rangerdude continues to bully editors on Wikipedia:Stalking, through RfC’s and on other articles.

Personal attacks and harrassment

Rangerdude made a serious (and potentially libelous) attack against my personal and professional integrity [79]. When I protested, Rangerdude’s response was to escalate [80]. He has also targeted other editors who have disagreed with his conduct or biased edits: [81], [82], edit summary, [83], [84], among others.

Rangerdude often bullies and intimidates people who disagree with his positions (particularly during RfCs and other instances in which a vote or poll is taken) by commenting on their votes or comments, sometimes extensively, with the intent of discrediting (and thereby discounting) their opinions. [85], [86], [87], [88], [89], [90], [91].

He has purposefully misrepresented my position in a debate to further his own position my original posting here. Misrepresentations: [92], [93], [94]. Despite my admonitions to the contrary, [95], he continued harass me about my own opinions [96], [97], [98].

He does not truly seek to resolve conflicts, seemingly preferring to argue his opponents into submission or deflect blame (here suggesting I alone am creating an impasse [99]), often reverting up to his limit under 3RR and haranguing dissenters on related talk pages. Reversions: [100], [101], [102], [103]. Talk: [104].

Dismissing or manipulating consensus

Rangerdude rarely accepts consensus unless it furthers his position or he is forced to yield. (Here he harangues Tony Sidaway, the VfD closer on Jim Robinson [105]). Or, he interprets consensus to suit his needs: Here, a consensus of two editors is enough when it furthers his position [106], but when it does not, a consensus of two (myself and Johntex) isn't enough; moreover, he harasses Johntex in an attempt to discredit his opinions: [107] [108] [109], [110].

He has manipulated policies to circumvent or defy consensus: (here he adds a {{disputed}} tag to the VfD vote on Jim Robinson [111]), and later on the redirect created as a result of the VfD vote [112]), [113].

He has violated WP:POINT when consensus has not gone his way. When Jim Robinson was properly VfD’d, and then failed to be undeleted through VfU, Rangerdude began voting keep on several other articles up for VfU at the same time. [114], [115], [116], [117]. He has not voted on VfU since.

Bias

Rangerdude seems primarily interested in editing articles into which he can insert conservative viewpoints both positive (Ludwig von Mises Institute) and negative (Sheila Jackson Lee). This would not be a problem, except that Rangerdude doesn’t seem to care about ensuring that articles he works on are balanced; he regularly inserts so much conservative criticism into articles that it makes them biased, then washes his hands of the article. After these additions [118], [119], [120], the article referenced contained three short paragraphs of bio information on a multi-term member of the U.S. Congress, and more than a page of cheap shots: [121]. Rangerdude left it up to others (primarily, me) to insert bio information that would serve as a balance to his additions. He later created what basically amounts to a hatchet page on her husband [122] and, similarly, on a liberal university professor [123]. When challenged on these edits and the directive on balance in WP:NPOV, Rangerdude’s response is to say, essentially, that he doesn’t have time to make it balanced (while continuing to work on other articles almost daily). [124], [125], [126], [127], [128], [129], [130], [131].

Additionally, he often justifies his biased edits with dubious sources which he deems reliable, including partisan blogs, partisan student-published tabloids, organizations with misleading mandates such as this one (which is criticized here) and unverifiable radio broadcasts [132], which he insists be retained when challenged. He has also been known to delete or oppose criticism of conservative figures (here scrubbing information critical of Tom DeLay (and edit warring in the process)): [133], [134], [135], [136], [137]). Other biased edits: [138], [139], [140].


Statement by Johntex

Rangerdude has harassed Wikipedia editors, including myself. He has violated Wikipedia policies, including WP:NPOV, WP:CIV, WP:DEL, and also Wikipedia guidelines, including WP:POINT.

Much of his harassing behavior is an attempt to inject his POV into article, such as in the example I illustrate below, where he harasses me by maliciously listing for VfD an article I created.

POV-pushing

User:Rangerdude has shown a history of POV-pushing on Houston Chronicle. His edits attempt to include as much negative information about the paper as possible. He even admits he does not feel responsible for making balanced edits, as in this exchange:

It is not enough to add information that unbalances an article and then wash your hands of it by saying "you can add other things if you wish…” User:Katefan0

In his attempts to create a biased article, he displays a willingness to cite any source that agrees with his POV, regardless of how un-noteworthy or biased the source. He also tries to create Wikipedia articles about these sources in an effort to bolster their apparent credibility in his arguments.

Introducing spurious sources

Rangerdude created an article on Texas_Media_Watch (TMW) because he wanted to quote TMW in POV arguments he wished to make on Houston Chronicle. I looked into TMW and found evidence that it was simply a one-person “organization” pushing the agenda of Sherry Sylvester and that the “organization” had not even been active since her departure. TMW did not qualify as a reputable source to be quoting at Houston Chronicle, and she/they certainly did not meet the notability standard for her/its own article. Thus at I listed TMW for VfD. The result of the VfD discussion was "Delete": [142]

Harassment of editor

After I listed TMW for deletion, Rangerdude took a sudden interest in an article I created on college football player Dusty Mangum and listed that page for VfD. I believe he did this in an attempt to intimidate me and anyone else who might dare consider listing one of his non-notable articles for VfD. Looking at Rangerdude’s last 3 months of edits: He has made no other edits to topics relating to college football, The University of Texas at Austin, or similar topics that would lead one to believe he was interested in Dusty Mangum for any other reason than to harass me. He has nominated no other article for VfD. He rarely even votes on VfD at all.

Among this discussion on the Dusty Mangum VfD was this statement:

To which Rangerdude made this unsigned reply:

Thus, Rangerdude ‘’’admitted’’’ that he violated WP:POINT by listing Dusty Mangum on VfD solely because I had created the article. [143] This is also a violation of WP:DEL which states that users should sign their posts of VfD pages. The VfD result on Dusty Mangum was "Keep" [144]

According to Rangerdude's own postings, he has shown himself to be harassing me. He is causing serious detriment to the project.

Statement by Rangerdude

Given the timing of this dispute and the editors involved in it, I can only respond by noting that it appears to be a frivolous retaliatory move by User:Willmcw against me for filing a request for arbitration against him and User:SlimVirgin following an extensive pattern of harassment and belligerency by both of these editors towards myself. It should also be noted that this is not the first time that Willmcw has made retaliatory complaints against other users who have reported him for violation of Wikipedia policies and guidelines. Willmcw filed a similar frivolous retaliatory RfC against me in June 2005 [145] only hours after I posted my initial complaint report against him on the incident noticeboard for wikistalking.[146] His purpose in both cases should accordingly be viewed as a disruptive and bad faith attempt to deflect investigation into his own repeated bad behavior and policy violations by way of initiating a competing complaint against his accusers.

As I detailed and documented at length in my arbitration case against Willmcw [147] and in a list of evidence assembled for that case and its related RfCs [148], Willmcw has engaged in a continuous pattern of harassment and wiki-stalking against myself since shortly after I arrived on wikipedia. In my experience with Willmcw I have found him to be an extremely vocal POV pusher who actively promotes a liberal/leftist viewpoint in his edits.

Typical example of POV pushing:

  • Willmcw adds/restores the scare-term "controversial" to the opening sentence of Hans-Hermann Hoppe, a libertarian philsopher who is of the opposite political viewpoint of his own.[149]
  • Willmcw removes the same scare-term "controversial" out of the opening sentence of Southern Poverty Law Center, a liberal organization that he agrees with.[150][151]

Willmcw has a bad habit of harassing other editors who differ with this viewpoint both on political and non-political articles alike. He has done this to me since we first encountered each other and I have seen him treat other editors who come from conservative or libertarian viewpoints similiarly. His stalking of me includes his following me to over 40 different articles on such diverse subject matters as United States trade law, astronomy, libertarian philosophy, the American Civil War, historians, think tanks, newspaper and radio outlets, and academic biographies. As I described in detail here, many of these cases of following were for the explicit purpose of disrupting and harassing my edits including staging challenges against settled and documented factual material and generally trolling for reasons to delete, disrupt, or even make minor unnecessary alterations to my contributions on wikipedia for no other reason than the fact that I am the one who made them. As Willmcw noted, this did indeed lead to me filing an RfC against him and another user over POV pushing and belligerency on the Ludwig von Mises Institute article (located here). What he fails to inform you of are the reasons behind this RfC, which included a blatantly inappropriate attempt by Willmcw to disrupt this article's content with quotations from David Duke, the notorious Ku Klux Klan activist.[152] Other inappropriate behavior by Willmcw on this article included attempts to disguise edits in which he removed content as "adding citations" [153] and censoring out sourced material that differed from his political POV[154]. It should also be noted that several other editors involved in that article concurred that this behavior was inappropriate and others who read the RfC subsequently helped with extensive work on the LVMI article to remove the biased and inappropriate material Willmcw was pushing there at the time.

I find it unusual that User:Katefan0 and User:Johntex would choose to join this arbitration request based almost entirely upon an ongoing editing dispute at the Houston Chronicle article. As the matters involving the Houston Chronicle article are currently the subject of a still-pending mediation case [155] on that article, I consider it inappropriate and premature that they would seek to join Willmcw's arbitration case as other dispute resolution mechanisms on that article have NOT yet been exhausted, and as far as I am aware all parties to that dispute had previously agreed to mediation including Katefan0, who described her position there at length.[156] The dispute on this particular article is political in nature and entails difference in content regarding opinion. While Katefan0 accuses of "POV pushing" on this article, she fails to disclose that she is guilty of the very same offense in her own right and perhaps even more so. Examples include deleting = sources that she deems to be critical of the Houston Chronicle [157]; Adding passages from far-left wing sources containing unrelated political attack information on sources used in the article [158] [159]; Making ad hominem attacks on conservative sources, such as the Houston Review and Texas Media Watch, to portray them as politicized or unreliable [160][161][162] while simultaneously adding and promoting politicized left wing sources like the Austin Chronicle.[163]; adding original research on indirectly related subject matter for the purpose of attacking U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay[164]. Katefan0 has also pushed a pro-Chronicle POV by multiple reversions and extreme stubbornness exhibited on the talk page in which she has sought to remove the word "criminal complaint" from a description of a legal motion the newspaper filed [165] (Katefan0 quote- "I will resist any attempts to use "criminal" as an adjective for the complaint") despite the fact that Texas law and even the newspaper itself described it as a criminal complaint.[166] When the statute itself was directly cited in the article text to show that the complaint was classified as criminal under state law Katefan0 also deleted the reference.[167] It should be noted on the Houston Chronicle article that Katefan0 has repeatedly volunteered that she is a former employee of the Houston Chronicle and cited that employment as a basis for her desired edits and in discussions about those edits [168] [169]. While she has been accusing everybody else who says anything critical about the Houston Chronicle of being "biased" or "POV" since the moment she arrived at this article, Katefan0 seems to exhibit a strong personal POV of her own toward this paper as a former employee and many of her edits have been aimed at removing, watering down, or spinning any criticism that's been made of the paper by another source or media outlet.

I also suspect that this move by Katefan0 may be in part retaliatory dating back to an unrelated disagreement we had many months ago on the Jim Robinson article. From that time until the present Katefan0 has been occassionally following my edits to such articles as the Houston Chronicle, Sheila Jackson Lee, various VfD's and RfA's, RfC's I have initiated on other unrelated matters (including the earlier stages of the dispute with Willmcw) and most recently Wikipedia:Stalking - typically for the purpose of opposing whatever position I am advocating or voting against whatever way I vote, seemingly for no other reason than for my involvement. This particular editor also has very strong political opinions on many articles and frequently confuses differences of opinion with "personal attacks" on herself. Thus, opposing her opinion on article content, article subject matter, a wikipedia administrative matter, or even a vote is, in her mind, "personal attacks" or "bullying." This description has been applied by her to dozens of links to our past disputes in her case above, yet virtually every one of them is a content dispute where she has mistaken differences on wording or opinion for a personal affront to herself.

Katefan0 also seems unaware of or unwilling to abide by Wikipedia:NPOV_tutorial#Space_and_balance, which states of articles that have viewpoint imbalance on sourced material that they "should be considered an NPOV work in progress, not an irredeemable piece of propaganda." This provision also specifically says that "The remedy is to add to the article—not to subtract from it." Yet as her complaint above evidences, Katefan0 has both used a temporary imbalance in articles such as the Houston Chronicle as a reason to justify her subtraction of critical material, no matter how sourced it is, and as a basis to attack me personally with allegations of pushing propaganda. When I suggested many times that she should add to the article instead of subtracting from it as this guideline instructs Katefan0 responded in hostility toward me personally, shunned this suggestion, and now even cites the fact that I made it in her RfAr complaint against me! If adding to the article is not the remedy for balancing it then why does the guideline say that it is and why should I be held at fault for simply informing her of the same thing that the guideline says to do?

I am at loss for an explanation of what could have induced JohnTex to seek this case beyond the fact that he was on Katefan0's side of the Houston Chronicle dispute (and was personally recruited by her to participate there). Beyond that, I have not even had substantial interaction with JohnTex on wikipedia since early June! As I have no current disputes with JohnTex and rarely if ever even encounter him on wikipedia, and as his case her pertains entirely to subjects involving an article that is currently still in mediation, I see little purpose that his arbitration request could accomplish and consider it little more than a bad faith attempt to assist Willmcw and/or Katefan0 in pressing what ultimately comes down to a frivolous complaint that was intiated without any doubt for retaliatory reasons. I do find it curious that he would choose to make WP:POINT allegations against me for a VfD at the time of the Houston Chronicle dispute given that he himself was simultaneously VfD'ing new pages I created for WP:POINT reasons[170] and consider it outright bizarre that he would try to make a case upon the fact that I forgot to sign a single message post out of dozens in my exchanges with him. Such behavior on his part could rightly be described as a nitpicking personal vendetta and appears to offer very little if anything of relevance wikipedia's quality, content, or even genuine editing disputes. It should be noted that Johntex seems to be similarly unaware of Wikipedia:NPOV_tutorial#Space_and_balance, hence his support for Katefan0's attempts to subtract legitimate sourced information from articles.

As a concluding note - should this case proceed involving the allegations made here, I will similarly be asking the arbitrators to examine evidence of severe POV pushing on the part of Willmcw and Katefan0 as well as the disruptive retaliatory behavior entailed in filing this case, which constitute WP:POINT abuses, in the case of all three editors. Rangerdude 03:52, 30 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by third party (Willmcw RFA v Rangerdude): FuelWagon

I already posted my comment about Rangerdude's RFC against Cberlet and Willmcw in this diff. It is my statement as a third party in the Rangerdude RFA against Wilmcw and SlimVirgin bookmarked here. That comment applies to this RFA as well. FuelWagon 20:36, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by MacGyverMagic

My apologies for allowing this dispute to end in arbitration. Obligations outside of Wikipedia have prevented me from doing anything as time-consuming as mediation for a while now, and this particular case turned out more difficult than I initially thought. I've taken steps to ensure active people are tending to the mediation requests now. - Mgm|(talk) 07:28, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (3/0/0/0)


UninvitedCompany

Involved parties

Summary
  • Abuse of adminship
  • Blocking, permanently, without support from the arbitration comittee, a user who opposes the admin's POV being pushed
Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried
    • AHEM! Haven't you forgotten the Mediation Committee? (Me and Brandon Yusuf had an outstandingly successful mediation.) Uncle Ed 02:40, August 23, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by party 1 (-Ril-)

Getting inappropriately involved in Edit Wars
Taking revenge for preventing POV pushing
Taking further revenge
Summary

UninvitedCompany is clearly an involved user, who clearly has an opinion of -Ril-, and is clearly, and self-admittedly, extremely anti-Islamic, in contrast to -Ril-. Therefore, UninvitedCompany should not be blocking -Ril- unilaterally, or indefinitely.

Requested Temporary injuctions

I, -Ril-, would like, solely for the duration of this RFAR, the following temporary injunctions

  • UninvitedCompany to be de-sysopped ("adminship is no big deal, so why should de-adminship be" - paraphrase of Ed Poor)
  • -Ril- to be unblocked
  • -Ril-'s talk page to be unprotected
  • UninvitedCompany to be prohibited from editing -Ril-'s user page

--~~~~ ( ! | ? | * ) 15:19, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by party 2 (UninvitedCompany)

My position, and that of the Wikipedia community, with regard to -Ril- is already summarized at these locations:

I would be happy to provide a further statement if any of the arbiters request it.

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 13:17, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statements by other parties

Michael Snow

Please note that -Ril- is still subject to the indefinite block imposed by UninvitedCompany. -Ril- has resorted to a number of sockpuppets and IP addresses to evade the block. There has been a notable lack of enthusiasm for lifting this block (this is what -Ril- characterizes as a "lynch mob"). Given the concerns expressed by two arbitrators and alluded to by -Ril-, I offered to lift it if the Arbitration Committee devised an appropriate temporary injunction against -Ril-, but no such injunction has been forthcoming.

Additionally, a number of users suspect -Ril- to be a reincarnation of banned user Lir. Actually, I personally do not believe this, but have instead come to the conclusion that -Ril- is a different banned user. Based on language and IP evidence, -Ril- is clearly British, whereas Lir as I recall was in the US. Additionally, -Ril- has a couple notable characteristics, a tendency to latch onto particular biblical topics, and a habit of naming sockpuppet accounts along a particular theme. This combination leads me to believe that -Ril- is another notoriously disruptive user of sockpuppets, specifically CheeseDreams. --Michael Snow 16:13, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Phroziac

This has gone a little too far, in my opinion. It is gaming the system to make a fourth revert 24:20 after the first, and say it is not 3rr. There is never an excuse to violate 3rr. I have never violated 1rr personally. The block was an obvious example of a perfect IAR use. WikiProject Wikipedians for Decency did not need pictures of "indecency". This is no different then putting a picture of a penis on the main page. UninvitedCompany should probably not use admin features on a page he has a very strong POV in, except for obvious vandalism, 3rr, etc. An indefinite block is not the same as permanent, and UninvitedCompany was well within IAR to do that. The "vandalism" on -Ril-'s userpage was useful information, but perhaps it should not have been blanked. There is nothing wrong with those images, but they are there to illustrate articles in the encyclopedia. They are not there to put on wikiprojects, the main page, or anywhere else that they obviously do not belong. That was not a lynch mob. -Ril- should not excessively use loaded words to push his argument. This RFAr is very silly. --Phroziac (talk) 23:40, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by User:Ed Poor

It's not true that UninvitedCompany is pushing any POV, least of all an anit-Islamic one. Ril has misconstrued UC's reply to a comment Ril made (see diff).

Furthermore, it is a complete waste of everyone's time to allow an RFArb for this sort of thing. Ril is not helping this project, and is abusing this page to thwart UC's enforcement of policy.

This entire RFArb amounts to a personal attack on UC and is in itelf ample grounds for a ban. I would have done it myself, if UC hadn't beat me to it.

Wikipedia accounts are only for those who are trying to help organize and present the world's knowledge. Those who interfere with, or thwart, this goal should be shown to the door. Uncle Ed 16:43, August 24, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by smoddy

I urge the Arbitration Committee to take on the views of the community. -Ril- made the point himself that no-one had unblocked him. If anyone seriously thought he should be unblocked, he would have been. No admin has seen fit to unblock him. Many have supported the block on the relevant page. The Wikipedia community does not want -Ril- around. It would be foolish to unban -Ril- simply because there was no reason in policy for the block. Sometimes what is needed goes beyond policy, hence we have Wikipedia:Ignore all rules. If any editor is really unhappy that -Ril- has gone, I urge them to come and say their piece. But, in my opinion, UC has done a great service. [[smoddy]] 18:05, 29 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Bmicomp

The mere fact that nobody has unblocked -Ril-, but instead congratulated TUC on the block speaks volumes. From Wikipedia:Banning policy:

"The decision to ban a user can arise from four places. Bans from all places are equally legitimate.
1. The Wikipedia community, taking decisions according to appropriate community-designed policies with consensus support, or (more rarely) following consensus on the case itself. The quickpolls policy was one example of this. Some editors are so odious that not one of the 500+ admins will unblock them."
Statement by Klonimus

Ril is a disruptive user, if there is any controversy about TUC's actions they should she be merged into the Ril Case, and delt with in that context. Given the general issue with slowness of ArbCom, TUC was being predictive of what that outcome would be. Klonimus 23:35, 2 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Erwin Walsh

Locking Ril's talk page seems poor form, as this prevents Ril from legitimately querying the block. Erwin

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (3/2/0/0)

Anonymous Editor 24.147.97.230 and other addresses

Involved parties

Statement by party 1

Either a single anonymous editor, using multiple IP addresses but primarily 24.147.97.230 , or multiple anonymous editors, have been engaged in an extended edit war on the Ted Kennedy page, and now also the Rosemary Kennedy page.

A complete list of addresses in use is found at Wikipedia: Requests for comment/24.147.97.230.

There are two issues, content issues and conduct issues. I am not asking the ArbCom to resolve the content issues. However, the conduct issues make it impossible to resolve the content issues. The page has been under page protection twice in the past two months to stop the edit wars and revert wars.

The content issues are whether particular sections that are negative to Ted Kennedy and to Joseph Kennedy Sr. should be included. The majority of signed-in editors think that these sections are non-encyclopedic and should not be included. The anonymous editors have insisted on continuing to add (revert) the same sections. They have accused the other editors of failing to negotiate in good faith.

The first content issue was the inclusion of an external link to an attack web site from the Ted Kennedy page. Multiple anonymous IP addresses added the link, no more than three addresses in a 24-hour period, which appears to be gaming the system. The page was then protected by an admin. After some search for a mediator, Kelly Martin agreed to try to mediate. This resulted in her conclusion that there was a consensus against inclusion of the link.

The anonymous editors have now tried to add the link to the web site for Rosemary Kennedy, who was only a victim and should not be the subject of having her family ridiculed. Claims that there was a consensus against the inclusion of the link are being rejected.

There were two more revert wars over the inclusion of material of little encyclopedic value. Editors who think that these paragraphs should not be included have been willing to have quickpolls on their relevance. However, the anonymous editors have altered the polls, and have accused their opponents (incorrectly) of POV pushing and disregard for consensus.

Since discussion is not working, and requests for other methods of discussion are not working, I request arbitration as a last resort.

ArbCom actions requested by party 1

I am requesting, as an interim measure, that the ArbCom issue a temporary injunction against anonymous edits to the Ted Kennedy and Rosemary Kennedy articles until this matter is arbitrated.

When the ArbCom accepts this case, I request that the principles cited include a statement that disputes should be resolved by consensus, but that consensus does not mean unanimous consent. (These anonymous editors are arguing, based on competing dictionary definitions, that consensus does mean unanimity, and so are demanding a liberum veto.) I also request that a statement be made that, in an encyclopedia, which is a compendium of knowledge, editorial judgment is required as to what is appropriate for inclusion in an encyclopedia.

Statement by party 2

Please limit your statement to 500 words


Hello, I'm not sure exactly what User:Robert McClenon is really looking for here. This user has filed FOUR RFCs to have users blocked in 30 days, the same 30 days of his new membership. I am the target of one of these RFCs. This is an average of one per week. As to my conduct, my conduct is proper. The issues I have involve a group of editors who delete and revert material on pages related to Kennedys. They are extreme POV pushers and refuse to negociate. As to User:Robert McClenon, If he can give a specific and exact description of what his is looking to come to an agreement on I would be willing to participate. It is a bit of a surprise as this user wrote this today, "I have no interest in mediation with any anonymous editor. Robert McClenon 22:32, 21 August 2005 (UTC)" 24.147.97.230 02:47, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Interested third parties

I urge ArbCom to deal with this matter. This editor's conduct has not been proper in any way, shape, or form. This IP address initially started editing here by inserting a promotional link for the fatboy.cc anti-Kennedy website and now is intent on inserting large chunks of material derived from that website. S/he has unleashed an army of sockpuppets to start a revert war to insert two large, POV sections of dubious encyclopedic value. A large consensus of editors of numerous political persuasions opposes the insertion of the material in its current form. Instead of seeking a compromise or an alternative way to insert some of the same facts in the article (as many of those editors have repeatedly stated they were open to) this editor insists that everyone who disagrees with the insertion of those two sections is a pro-Kennedy partisan, a vandal, a POV warrior, etc., etc. This editor is essentially a one issue POV war and this sort of anti-wiki behavior should be stopped now. Gamaliel 04:49, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

If taken to ArbCom, Gamaliel needs to be a party to this. He/She is one of the most POV editors at the Kennedy Site and has co-written an RFC against me. 24.147.97.230 15:50, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, I did not write the RFC, though I did sign it, as did four other editors to date, and I agree with what Robert McClenon wrote. Also, if I am drafted into this proceeding, so should the rest of the ten or so editors who have participated in forming the consensus against 24.147's POV edits in that article. Gamaliel 16:12, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

comment from third party (Robert McClenon RFA v 24.147.97.230): FuelWagon

My involvment in this article was to post a reply to an article RFC some time ago regarding whether or not the article should include the "fatboy.cc" link. My comment at the time was something to the effect that the website seemed one step above juvenile bathroom humor, its only claim to fame is several pictures of Kennedy's naked stomach and a picture with a roadmap superimposed over his nose. This site is equivalent to finding a comment about someone scribbled on a bathroom wall with anatomically correct sketches included. I consider the site to be an embarrassment to be listed on wikipedia. And to use policy-language: it is unencyclopedic and non-notable. a number of editors agreed [173] and the consensus seemed to be drop it. several anon IP editors voted to keep the link, but user jpgordon pointed out that most of these anon votes are from IP addresses that made only 1 edit[174], which would indicate ballot stuffing by one of the editors engaged in the dispute or the strangest voting dynamic I've seen on wikipedia. Despite consensus to drop it, 24.147.97.230 continues to push to have the fatboy.cc website listed. The ballot stuffing incident and the insistence to include a grout-writing URL despite consensus to drop it (at least among the registered users) is enough of a red-flag that good faith can no longer be assumed and that processes for dispute resolution that require good-faith (RFC's and mediation) will not work. FuelWagon 00:15, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

RE: ballot stuffing. In any wikipedia poll, I could find a website or mailing list or blog that supports my position and spam them saying "hey people, wikipedia is trying to suppress your point of view. Your vote is needed now!" or some equally partisan bit of propaganda, give them a URL to a wikipedia talk page with the poll in question, and then sit back and watch the votes tally up. I could do that, but I wouldn't. To me, polls are among editors who are actually doing the work, making the contributions, and investing the time to make the article better. i.e. polls are a way for editors to resolve disputes amongst themselves. The idea of getting outside, non-contributers to vote in a poll simply to force the result a certain way is not what I would call a good-faith attempt to resolve a dispute between editors who are actually working and contributing to an article. FuelWagon 14:53, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Previous Dispute Resolution

There have been three previous article Requests for Comments to try to resolve these content and conduct issues.

There was one previous attempt at mediation (via a non-MedCom procedure), by Kelly Martin. She concluded that there was a consensus against adding the "fatboy.cc" link to the Ted Kennedy site. However, the advocates of adding the link dispute the claim of consensus.

Please understand that I, the "anon" initiated this previous attempt at mediation and contacted Kelly Martin24.147.97.230 02:51, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Since a previous RFM has not resulted in a truce, I have no reason to believe that mediation will have any effect again.

A Request for Comments was posted about the conduct of the anonymous editors. Their response was to post a Request for Comments about my conduct. This does not seem to provide any evidence that they are willing to try to change their conduct.

Again, please understand the user Robert McClenon has posted the above mentioned RFC...as he has done to 3 other users in 30 days, his first 30 days at Wikipedia24.147.97.230 02:51, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This arbitration request is premature. The last step of dispute resolution should be a request for arbitration. User:Robert_McClenon has, to date, refused to engage in mediation with User:24.147.97.230,[175]. An attempt at mediation should always be made before it reaches this stage.--Agiantman 21:33, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Response to claim of premature arbitration request:
  1. Mediation, as noted above and below, has been attempted. I see no reason to delay arbitration simply to permit another round of mediation, which I expect will not result in a compromise, to delay arbitration.
  2. The above statement that the RfAr is premature is being filed by someone who is not a first, second, or third party to this proceeding at this time. I have stated that I am willing to go to mediation with Agiantman, but not with 24.147.97.230. Robert McClenon 22:44, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Confirmation of Parties' Awareness

  1. Party 1 Robert McClenon 01:43, 22 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Party 2 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:24.147.97.230&diff=21539886&oldid=21536212

Statement by involved third party

I was invited to mediate a dispute on this article related to the inclusion of a specific external link. However, I concluded that the dispute was not mediatable as there was no middle ground that the parties would consider acceptable. The parties were (understandably) unwilling to submit to third-party arbitration of the acceptability of the link. At that point, I listed the issue on RFC and a reasonably civil discussion ensued, in which a number of editors (all save one posting from anonymous addresses) argued in support of the link, and a number of established Wikipedians argued against inclusion of the link. At the point where it appeared to me that the discussion had terminated, I offered my opinion as to the apparent consensus of the Wikipedia community regarding the issue. At the time the lead anon advocating for this link (the only one with any significant edit history) appeared to accept that conclusion. I have not, however, continued to monitor the article after the point at which the dispute seemed to be resolved, nor have I monitored the editing of any of the parties on other related or unrelated articles.

It is my impression that the flock of anons are not sockpuppets of the lead anon, but instead distinct likeminded individuals acting at his direction or urging: this appears to be a "grassroots" effort to influence Wikipedia consensus rather than a single individual trying to appear to be more than one person. Kelly Martin 18:58, August 22, 2005 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (2/0/1/1)


User:Willmcw and User:SlimVirgin

Summary

Willmcw is stalking and harassing other editors who disagree with his political POV for disruptive purposes. SlimVirgin has engaged in extreme personal belligerency toward other editors, has made repeated personal attacks, and has engaged in coordinated disruptive actions with Willmcw.

Involved parties

An administrator incident complaint was filed by User:Rangerdude against Willmcw for wiki-stalking and general harassment on June 15th. [176] Willmcw filed a retaliatory RfC against Rangerdude later the same evening, alleging that Rangerdude's wiki-stalking allegation against him was a personal attack.[177] Mediation was suggested in response to Rangerdude's complaint, both parties agreed to mediation with User:Andrevan, notice was posted to the incident board and the RfC, which was then withdrawn. Attempts to proceed with mediation from then until the present have been unproductive due to mediation backlogs and disagreement over the format for conducting mediation. In the meantime the conflict has intensified. Allegations of Willmcw's harassing behavior and wiki-stalking of Rangerdude continue to the present. User:SlimVirgin has also become involved in the controversy, supporting Willmcw. Additional incident complaints were filed yesterday by Rangerdude against Willmcw[178] for disruption of Rangerdude's edits and against SlimVirgin for harassment, promotion of Willmcw's disruptive activities, and abuse of her administrator powers in page protecting Rangerdude's user page at a time she was a party to the disputes.[179] Page protection was removed by SlimVirgin after Rangerdude complained, but additional disputes remain. Rangerdude subsequently posted an additional request for mediation disputing Willmcw's recent activities as harassment and requesting mediation with SlimVirgin for the same.[180] SlimVirgin refused this mediation [181] and Willmcw denied that Rangerdude's original complaint, located here had ever been filed against him.[182]

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request
  • [183] Post by Rangerdude informing SlimVirgin of RfAr after SlimVirgin refused mediation.
  • [184] SlimVirgin acknowledges Rangerdude's intent to file RfAr
  • [185] Notice posted to Willmcw of Rangerdude's intent to file RfAr
  • [186] Willmcw acknowledges RfAr has been filed
Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

If not, then explain why that would be fruitless

  • [187] - Incident complaint by Rangerdude against Willmcw for wikistalking and harassment, June 15th.
  • [188] - Incident complaint against Willmcw for continued harassment, August 18th
  • [189] - Incident complaint against SlimVirgin for harassment and abuse of page protection policy, August 18th
  • [190] - Request for Mediation by Rangerdude with SlimVirgin & Willmcw.
  • [191] - SlimVirgin refuses mediation request.
  • [192] - Willmcw denies original complaint was ever made against him.

Statement by Rangerdude

Rangerdude complaint against Willmcw
  • Willmcw has engaged in a pattern of harassment, disruption, and wiki-stalking towards Rangerdude from February 2005 to the present and involving over 40 different articles (evidence). This stalking has been disruptive including dismantling of Rangerdude's additions without justification, removal of source material for political and POV reasons, and general harassment aimed at pestering Rangerdude's day-to-day edits on unrelated articles. This violates Wikipedia's policies on civility, disruption, assuming good faith, and existing Arbcom precedent and Jimbo Wales' Recycling Troll case ruling about pestering other users with stalking [193][194].
  • Willmcw's stalking of me has included disruption of the Houston Chronicle mediation including the unilateral addition of himself to a closed mediation between Rangerdude and another editor[195] and revert warring to retain his self-addition after it was removed.[196]
  • Willmcw has repeatedly attempted to disrupt Rangerdude's efforts in the current guideline proposal of Wikipedia:Stalking. This includes multiple bad faith edits aimed at dismantling, weakening, and deleting the proposal's text [197], revert warring to add an unfriendly and undesired change to the proposal [198], [199], [200] [201] and removing material authored by Rangerdude from the proposal while it was being drafted on account of its authorship. [202]
  • Willmcw has made WP:POINT disruptions aimed at harming the Wikipedia:Stalking proposal. Willmcw announced his intent to file a counter-complaint of wiki-stalking against Rangerdude for the purpose of disruption after objections were made to his dismantling edits to the proposal that are described above.[203] He was warned of WP:POINT in response [204], but subsequently followed through with the complaint posted to Rangerdude's talk page.[205]
  • Willmcw has repeatedly attempted to alter and remove a question posed to him by Rangerdude regarding his purposes and disruptive edits on the Stalking article from that article's talk page. Edits were for the purposes of removing the fact that the question was addressed at his edits specifically. [206] [207][208]
  • Willmcw has engaged in and promoted revert warring against Rangerdude's edits and in disregard of talk page discussions that are pending. [209] [210] Note: this particular case of revert warring was on an article that Willmcw has repeatedly stalked me to dating back to February 2005 and has edited in a disruptive manner previously.
  • Willmcw has a history of filing retaliatory motions against Rangerdude in response to reports of his policy violations and bad behavior by Rangerdude. Examples include [211] filed 4 hours after Rangerdude reported Willmcw for wikistalking on the administrator incident board [212]; Threats to post [213] and followthrough on posting a retaliatory wikistalking counter-complaint[214] against Rangerdude after Rangerdude voiced concerns about Willmcw's intent in editing the wiki-stalking proposal despite having a long history of having been accused of that same practice in the past; and filing a retaliatory RfAr against Rangerdude 4 days after this RfAr was posted regarding him[215]. These examples are violations of WP:POINT and are attempts at gaming the system in response to complaints that call his editing behavior into question.
  • Willmcw has engaged in heavy POV pushing to promote a liberal/leftist political agenda and to disparage conservative/libertarian viewpoints that disagree with his own. Example: Willmcw added the scare term "controversial" to the opening sentence of Hans-Hermann Hoppe, a libertarian philsopher,[216] yet removed it from the opening sentence of Southern Poverty Law Center, a liberal organization that he agrees with.[217]
Rangerdude complaint against SlimVirgin
  • SlimVirgin assisted Willmcw in the WP:POINT disruption described above by posting a coordinated note publicizing it to the Village Pump announcement where community input was solicited for the Wikipedia:Stalking guideline proposal.[218] This was done for the apparent purpose of disrupting or discrediting the Village Pump request for community input on forming the guideline, as indicated by her edit summary description and accompanying comments.
  • Moments later SlimVirgin abused her administrative powers to page protect my user page[219], apparently aimed at preserving and promoting Willmcw's WP:POINT complaint that she had just linked to. Wikipedia:Page protection prohibits administrators from protecting pages in disputes where they are involved. The protection was removed after Rangerdude complained on both the Admin noticeboard and the Page Protection board. SlimVirgin also made an accompanying second post at this time to the Village Pump aimed at promoting Willmcw's note after another editor removed it apparently for WP:POINT reasons. This post demonstrates that her purpose in protecting the userpage and pursuing the other editor was motivated primarily by her coordinated promotion of Willmcw's note for purposes of disrupting the guideline proposal Rangerdude was working on, rather than a simple case of vandalism as she has claimed.[220]
  • SlimVirgin has made repeated personal attacks and bad faith allegations against Rangerdude. SlimVirgin rudely accused Rangerdude of deleting another unrelated user's comments from a noticeboard when the culprit was an apparent scripting bug that has been causing problems to that particular board.[221] SlimVirgin made a similar bad-faith accusation of deletion agaisnt Rangerdude for merging a simultaneous and duplicate request for input on the Wikipedia:Stalking proposal into one notice post.[222] SlimVirgin responded with extreme belligerency and personal attacks when Rangerdude responded to this allegation by stating it was a simple attempt to merge two redundant posts. SlimVirgin also removed Rangerdude's comments explaining this merge.[223]
  • SlimVirgin has engaged in multiple personal attacks including demeaning personal comments in response to the incidents mentioned above. Examples: "What is wrong with you" [224] and "You're a disruptive editor" [225].
  • SlimVirgin has made similar personal attacks towards Rangerdude previously, has exhibited extreme personal belligerency toward Rangerdude as an editor ("What's wrong with it Rangerdude, is in part that it's you who's suggesting it. My position is that you should not be editing this page") and has made attacks against Rangerdude that could be construed as a legal threat. [226]Note: SlimVirgin has been cautioned by the Arbcom previously for making personal attacks.[227]

Statement by 216.112.42.61; complaint against Willmcw

May I say something here? I just noticed this complaint by chance when looking at this page. Rangerdude is not the only one that has been stalked by Willmcw. I too have been stalked by said user, though it was a while ago so I don't remember it well. I just gave up rather than reporting it, but since others are now reporting on Willmcw, I am also. If I remember correctly, Willmcw was trying to push his own biased POV in the article 'terrorism', and I reverted his edits for a while, then gave up. Willmcw then stalked my IP to the article 'ballotechnics', which I had done substantial work on, in which Willmcw falsely portrayed it by classifying it as a pseudoscience, to discredit my contributions in anger over my attempt to prevent his pushing his biased POV. Being as others have also been stalked by Willmcw, it is clear that he has got to go.

Statement by Herschelkrustofsky; complaint against Willmcw

I wish to second the remarks of 216.112.42.61; I too have been stalked by said user. Willmcw has anticipated my contribution to this discussion in his response below, but I would like to make it official. --HK 14:33, 24 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

...And, Willmcw has resumed stalking me. I have begun compiling a log of frivolous edits, which I will submit as evidence if the Arbcom decides to accept this case. --HK 00:15, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I too have been stalked by WillmcwJonah Ayers

Recusals

As this RfAr involves two fairly well known administrators on Wikipedia, I am also requesting in compliance with Wikipedia:Arbitration policy on conflict of interest for any arbitration participant who has a strong historical editing relationship with or other personal allegiance to SlimVirgin, Willmcw, or both to disclose this information and, if applicable, recuse him or herself in accordance with this policy. Thank you. Rangerdude 00:34, 19 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Willmcw

Rangerdude raises five points in his complaint against me. I consider two of them (#1 & #4) serious enough for the ArBCom to arbitrate. I believe that the other three complaints are minor and/or are based on mistaken interpretations of events. Here are my specific responses:

1. I previously responded to Rangerdude's "wiki-stalking" allegation here: Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Rangerdude#Description. Rangerdude also made this accusation during my Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Willmcw. At that time three editors, each barely or not known to me, wrote to say that they'd checked the "wiki-stalking" evidence and found no wrongdoing.[228][229][230]. However Rangerdude has continued to attack me with this charge for months. I request that the ArbCom decide whether my own behavior towards Rangerdude has been wikistalking harassment, or whether his repetition of the charges has been harassment. I am eager to reply in detail to any of Rangerdude's specific charges that the ArbCom wishes.

FYI, since Rangerdude began calling me a wikistalker I also have been accused of it by these editors:

2. The mediator invited me to join the Houston Chronicle mediation on June 10th and I promptly accepted.[231]. After hearing no reply I posted a note asking if anything was happening then, having seen a notice of mediation, I just dove in on June 14th. Rangerdude made repeated efforts to remove me from the mediation.[232][233] Rangerdude had previously demanded that I not be included and the mediator had agreed, but no one had informed me of this agreement. When the mediator asked me to leave the mediation I did so promptly.[234] Prior to my participation, Rangerdude promised to limit his edits "to existing texts to a minimum during mediation excepting extraordinary unforseen circumstances".[235] That restriction did not cover the large new, POV section [236] and other POV material that he added to the article over the next two days. [237][238] After June 15, Rangerdude never made another contribution to the mediation or to the article.

3. Rangerdude has reverted as much or more than I have. In fact, he recently amended this charge against me after having just violated the 3RR himself.[239][240][241]

4. My charge of "wikistalking" against Rangerdude is based on his following me with the apparent intent of harassment. [242] I will address his harassment of myself and other editors in a separate request for arbitration.

5. Rangerdude's question on Wikipedia talk:Stalking asked about the personal motivation of my edits and had my username in the heading, both of which I consider to be violations of talk page wikiquette. I first responded by simply removing my name from the header, but Rangerdude wouldn't settle for that. Then I tried to move it to my talk page, but that not would do either. Rangerdude reverted three times, demanding that it be on the proposal's talk page with my name in the header. I finally gave in. [243][244][245][246]

Submitted by -Willmcw 08:24, August 23, 2005 (UTC)


Statement by SlimVirgin

It's hard to know how to respond to this, because I don't feel I have a dispute with Rangerdude. My interest in him is only as an admin. I see him as a disruptive editor and a vexatious litigant, who seems to spend most of his time on Wikipedia complaining about people.

Rangerdude takes a tiny factoid about an editor, twists it out of all recognition, then inserts it into multiple complaints in long-winded, quasi-legalistic posts to anyone he thinks might listen. Within the last month, he's filed two RfCs — Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Cberlet & Willmcw and Wikipedia:Requests for comment/FuelWagon, the latter deleted as uncertified and apparently filed because FuelWagon supported Will and Chip during the first RfC, making it WP:POINT — at least one RfM, and now this RfAr. It's practically impossible to defend yourself against his complaints, because he twists any response you make and uses it against you.

I first became aware of him, and began to think he was a disruptive editor, on June 15 when someone set up SlimVirgin's Left Boob (talk · contribs) and used it to post encouragement to Rangerdude on WP:AN/I [247] regarding one of his complaints about Willmcw allegedly "stalking" him. This was the first I'd heard of the allegation against Will. My next encounter with him also saw him on the same side as sockpuppets. On June 18, he defended a malicious vandalism listing [248] made against Will by Poetatoe (talk · contribs), a new account believed to be a sockpuppet of Thodin (talk · contribs), another disruptive editor who thinks everyone's stalking him.

Because of his support of abusive sockpuppets and their support of him, and because he was making (as I saw it, absurd) complaints against a good editor, I formed a view of Rangerdude as disruptive. I therefore left a note on his talk page asking him to reconsider his complaints against Will, and to consider taking a break from interacting with him. [249] He replied complaining about Will's editing of Eric Foner but when I checked the page, it was clear that Rangerdude was reverting to unsourced material, and all Will was doing was politely asking for a source. I therefore told Rangerdude that Will was following policy, as he always does in my experience. [250]

It seems this was enough to turn me into one of Rangerdude's targets. Since then, he was posted a lot of criticism of me (which I see as personal attacks), for example this [251]. I won't give detailed responses to his specific charges unless the case is accepted, except to say that they're nonsense, and in particular I haven't abused any admin powers in relation to him. I once protected his talk page for 10 minutes when a new account Bigelow (talk · contribs) (another abusive sockpuppet who strongly supported Rangerdude) kept deleting a message that Will had posted, [252] so I briefly protected the page from being reverted until I could work out what to do about Bigelow (who responded to the page protection with a personal attack [253] and was therefore blocked). Rangerdude writes above that I unprotected the page only after he complained about the protection, but that isn't correct. The protection log shows:

  • 08:48, August 18, 2005 SlimVirgin protected User talk:Rangerdude (vandalism);
  • 08:57, August 18, 2005 SlimVirgin protected User talk:Bigelow (abusive account; blocked indefinitely)
  • 08:58, August 18, 2005 SlimVirgin unprotected User talk:Rangerdude (vandal has been blocked). [254]
  • It was at 09:05 August 18 that Rangerdude made his first complaint. [255] SlimVirgin (talk) 12:20, August 24, 2005 (UTC)

Statement by third party (Rangerdude RFA v Willmcw and SlimVirgin): FuelWagon

My involvment in this situation stems from an RFC that Rangerdude filed against Willmcw. I was not involved in the original dispute and saw the RFC and made a comment as an outside, uninvolved, and neutral party. Rangerdude was complaining about Cberlet and Willmcw's edits on the Ludwig Von Mises Institute (LVMI) article. I looked at the evidence given and the responses made, then looked at the article and talk page histories, and made my comment that the three people who certified the RFC (DickClarkMises, an LVMI employee, Nskinsell, an "adjunct scholar" for LVMI, and Rangerdude) were far more the root of any POV problem around the LVMI article than Cberlet and Willmcw. [256]

Rangerdude related to this RFC as if he "owned" it. He reacted to my comment by going in and reformatting my comment [257] [258] and then he replied to my comment, calling it "extremely one-sided", "troubling", and "revolting". He claimed my "insinuation ... plainly violates Wikipedia:assume good faith" He claimed I "misrepresented" his edits. And he concluded "Given these clear cases of misrepresentation, bad faith personal insinuations, and inconsistenly-applied 'conflict of interest' allegations, I am disinclined to give further credence to the neutrality or accurracty of FuelWagon's take on this matter." [259]

I got the feeling that Rangerdude was using the RFC as an attempt to punish editors who disagreed with him. I told Rangerdude that "an RFC is a mechanism intended to resolve a dispute. It is not a place to "build a case" against an editor to bring punitive measures againt them"[260]

Rangerdude's reply indicated that he believes an RFC is needed prior to arbitration. "Were I to seek arbitration at this point before conducting an RfC into user conduct as this one is plainly categorized and designated, the request would likely be denied"[261]

This only reinforced my opinion that Rangerdude was not using the RFC as a way to resolve his dispute with Cberlet/Willmcw, but as a way to build a case so he could eventually take it to arbitration and punish them. "You're attempting to convict someone of being rude when you broke nearly every traffic law in the book before coming before the judge. ... Take a break. give yourself a day to breathe." [262]

Rangerdude's reply indicated his refusal to change course. "this RfC can and will proceed in a proper and responsible fashion be it with or without your assistance"[263]

Rangerdude continued relating to the RFC as if he "owns" it, and opened an RFC-in-a-RFC, commenting on my comments and asked other editors to endorse his comments. [264]

Throughout that RFC, Rangerdude related to the entire RFC page as if he owned it. He responded to many editors who commented against his position, he resisted attempts to move his replies to that talk page, and he even took it upon himself to put his own comments in the "response" section normally reserved for the individuals being accused of violating policy.[265] He even declared the "requirement" to close the RFC was that "the new revisions (to the LVMI page) are allowed to remain" [266]

Soon thereafter, and in a further demonstration of using RFC's for punitive means, Rangerdude filed an RFC against me for some comment I made on another RFC, accusing me of personal attacks. No one else certified it, so it was removed.

I went back to editing articles and didn't bump into Rangerdude again until I happened upon the proposed policy against "stalking". Rangerdude seemed intent on making it against policy to "stalk" another editor. The overall consensus was largely against the proposed policy, and it was eventually merged in with "harassment". I believe Rangerdude became heavily involved in the policy proposal for wikipedia:stalking with the specific intention of accusing Willmcw of "stalking" him. "stalking" is an accusation that is easy to make and is extremely difficult even for an innocent editor to disprove.

While I haven't been involved in the current dispute that Rangerdude is requestion arbitration for around Willmcw and SlimVirgin, it is my opinion that Rangerdude's edits qualify as POV-pushing and he wikilawyers against anyone who opposes his POV edits. In my opinion, this request for arbitration was his intention from the start when he filed the RFC against Willmcw and Cberlet. Rangerdude's edits were consistently POV. And he consistently reacted to anyone who opposed his POV edits by RFC'ing them, building a case against them, and accusing them of countless policy violations. His reaction to my comment read more like a prosecuting attorney than someone attempting to resolve anything: "Given these clear cases of misrepresentation, bad faith personal insinuations, and inconsistenly-applied 'conflict of interest' allegations, I am disinclined to give further credence to the neutrality or accurracty of FuelWagon's take on this matter." [267])

It's my opinion that Rangerdude's approach to dealing with editors who have a different point of view than him is to wikilawyer them, find a way to punish them, file RFC's and negotiate a change to the article in exchange for closing the RFC, attempt to change policy to make it easier to accuse them of policy violations, and accumulate enough empty charges to bring it to arbitration. FuelWagon 16:10, 23 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]


I don't have direct experience of SlimVirgin's behaviour around this specific incident. However, my experience of SlimVirgin saw three good editors leave wikipedia in disgust after a run-in with her. While not directly related, it may reflect a pattern of behaviour on SlimVirgin's part that may have contributed to the above situation.

On 11 July, 2005, the Terri Schiavo article looked like this. The talk page marked the article as "controversial topic" and "in mediation". Ed Poor was mediator. SlimVirgin came into the article, performed 9 edits [268][269][270][271][272][273][274][275][276] over the course of 3 hours. During that time SlimVirgin inserted the "in use" tag [277], which displays "This article is actively undergoing a major edit."

Several long term editors on the article protested that SlimVirgin's edit qualified as reckless for an article listed as "controversial" and in "mediation" and that her edit contained numerous factual errors.

SlimVirgin never once acknowledge a single factual error in her edit, although she continued to ask us to point out any error. "If I made a factual error, point to it" [278], "You also mention errors of fact, but again, don't cite any. Please do." [279], "Show me one factual or grammatical error that I edited into the article" [280], "Show me one error I made in the article" [281], "neither of you has said what your objection is" [282], "If you feel I've introduced errors, please list them on talk" [283], "please discuss your objections on talk" [284], "Please say what your specific objections are" [285].

Several editors pointed out factual errors in her edit, including user:Neuroscientist who posted a 5,000 word explanation here [286]. Rather than acknowledge a single error, SlimVirgin replies " I don't appreciate the personal comments you've lobbed at me." [287] SlimVirgin accused several editors of various policy violations including "POV pushing" [288], "taking ownership of the page" [289], "violating NPOV and No original research" [290], and "arguing for the sake of arguing" [291]. When asked to support her accusations, she neither provided evidence nor withdrew her accusations. Demands for evidence to support these accusations were met with silence. I filed an RFC against SlimVirgin and it was supported by 5 editors. I eventually withdraw my certification to allow the RFC to be deleted.

When the RFC fails to resolve anything, a long time contributer to the Terri Schiavo article, User:Duckecho quit wikipedia, citing SlimVirgin's "arrogance" as one reason for leaving [292]. User:Neuroscientist quits wikipedia soon after [293].

SlimVirgin withdraws from Terri Schiavo mediation, saying it was "silly". [294]. One editor who had been working on the article "A ghost" called it "self-centered, naked arrogance" [295]. Ten days later, "A ghost" stops contributing to wikipedia [296].

These three editors (Duckecho, Neuroscientist, A ghost) had been working on the Terri Schiavo and other articles on wikipedia for several months and had 2,000 edits combined. And all of them leave wikipedia immediately after this incident with SlimVirgin. Despite SlimVirgin's accusations of rampant policy violations by these editors on the Terri Shiavo article, none of these three editors had any RFC's or admin blocks against them.

The end result of SlimVirgin's behaviour was that three valuable editors left wikipedia in disgust, two specifically blaming her of arrogance. FuelWagon 19:02, 30 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

update: Having filed the above comment, SlimVirgin informed me she can no longer assume any good faith of me [297]. Later that same day, she questioned the validity of an RFC that I filed against another editor (Bensaccount) about a week and a half prior. SlimVirgin said it looks like "another example of an inappropriate RfC filed by" me [298]. She questioned several aspects of the legitimacy of the RFC on the RFC talk page. I told her that given her declared bias against me, and given that she hadn't said one word about this RFC up until this point, that she shouldn't be involved with this RFC at all. We went back and forth on the talk page. SlimVirgin eventually deleted two posts of mine that comment about her behaviour, she attempted to justify the first delete as a personal attack and saying "reverting" for the second one. [299][300]. I tell her she's trying to suppress criticism of her behaviour as an admin and as an editor. Some time later, SlimVirgin says that she asked another admin to look at the RFC, and based on what they said, she wasn't going to delete it. [301], which means the RFC was fine in the first place.

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (3/0/0/0)



Requests for Clarification

If you need to clarify the precise meaning of a previous decision of the Arbitration Committee, your request should go here.

Jarlaxle Artemis

Is Jarlaxle Artemis blocked indefinitely by an admin, or banned by the ArbCom (the ArbCom doesn't usually ban indefinitely)? I ask because he is strongly suspected of still creating articles: if he is banned, they are speedies, if he is merely blocked, they are not. The text of the final decision signed by Raul654 uses the word banned, but the case was closed. -Splashtalk 01:39, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

As I understand it, Jarlaxle Artemis has been banned by the community. Such bans are rare but not unknown.
James F. (talk) 14:06, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

User:Gavin the Chosen

Gavin the Chosen was blocked for a month as part of a recent arbitration decision, but I'm concerned that this hasn't stopped him from continuing his harassment against me. One of the findings in that case was that he followed me around, posting insulting comments, and doing things to try to interfere with my normal editing here (such as jumping onto articles he had never touched before specifically to undo whatever I had done or to egg fights on).

Even though he is blocked I am still getting harassing emails from him through the WIikipedia email link, which I hesitate to disable as it is a way for people to contact me directly about issues related to the encyclopedia. Furthermore I have run across a number of editors recently who after a single disagreement have escalated into very mean-spirited attacks, claiming that they had been privately emailed and "warned" about my behavior by an editor who wished to give them all the details of my supposed campaigns to destroy articles, etc. which is all the same nonsense Gabriel/Gavin would try to tell people. These editors then pick up the campaign of insults on various talk pages.

The month block was intended to be a way for Gabriel to take a break and think about his actions here, but instead his harassment still continues. He apparently still watches all the articles he was involved in emotional disputes with earlier, as he mentions what has happened recently on them in his emails.

I would request that his account be disabled outright so he cannopt access emails (and since the RfA finding said he should come back under a different name after his block expired, there's no reason for his current one to be active) or that his month long block be reset so that his activities here are completely stopped for the agreed upon month. DreamGuy 21:16, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It only says he may choose another username, but this is very disturbing and I agree that the block should be reset in addition to disabling his account or something of that sort. I haven't received any emails yet; want to send me one now, Gavin? ~~ N (t/c) 14:32, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

He has sent me the following three messages. ~~ N (t/c) 22:22, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

the requested response

Unfortunatly, it would seem to me that dreamGuy's accusation revenge for the arbitration process that he is undergoing. I have kept my word , as for the end of the baqrgain that is my arbitration. I have sent him nothing, larghely becaseu i wish him to have no contact with me ( frankly hes aggravating) It is my beleif that this unfounded accusaton prooves the accusation i have placed against him in the matter of his methods and bad faitrh in his operating style here on wikipedia. I ame accross this message to s end ytou a message becase u my watchlist contains the RFAr page, (along with many others)

and as for the detaqils about mean spirited attacks, it se ems that the attacks were perpatrated by dfreamGuy, just look at the edit history of his talk page...

Also it would stand to reason if I have been gone for a month and others, some of whoim ive had zero contact with are saying what i was saying about how dreamguy opwerates on wikipedia, then it cant be a coincidance. perhaps this is farther proof of his defamitory adgenda on some articles such as Otherklin and Therianthropy, and his general, totally incurable lack of civillity towards other users in general.


This is the reason why i grew tired of him, and his wayhs of acusations and atte mpting to play the system and fiegn victim status.

in the light that i have done nothing that he accuses me of, i would ask you to disregard his lies, and possibly add attampting to file a false RFAr against me as a revenbge tactic to the eviance page of his RFAr IN that mnatter, my hands are tied, but i w ould appreciate it greatly if you and the other arbitreators would be so kind as to disregard his accusations against me, because they are fabrications.

(i find it intersting how hes trying to have my account destoryed... interesting way of going about it, making false accusations and suich, isnt it?) sorry if i got a little long woinded or a little repetative, but this is being written as the first trhing after i got here from work.

thanks, and feel free to send this message to other arbitrators, or to contact me for conversation at gagb@gabrielsimon.com on MSN or filmbuff42 on YIM.

thanks for listening.

For some little reason, I'm inclined to believe DreamGuy here. Do the developers have any way of logging/checking use of Special:Emailuser? I have asked him what a false RfAr is - does he mean this request for clarification? ~~ N (t/c) 22:22, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Reply: "sorry, i thought it was an RFAr. in any case, the reast of it apllies, i think,. his accusations are totoaly false. i beleive this attempt at deception on his part to be typical of his rather childish behaviour and overall lack of maturity and civillity on this site."

addendum

hew also said that the find9ing of the case was that i followed him around. this is blatently false. its the complete op[posite in fact. but im not trying to be vindictive, only accurate.

thanks for listening again

Um, no, Gabe. I just checked the RfAr, and I didn't see the arbitrators say anything about anyone following anyone around. ~~ N (t/c) 22:22, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

afterthoughts

i do not see the harm in looking at pages and ar ticles while im gone... i already he some changes i plan to make when im back...

i cant see the harm...

No, there's no harm, just don't email people harassing things! ~~ N (t/c) 22:22, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

...

(after I had posted the above)

i still maintain the truith of the matter. i have not and shall not email iuser dreamguym simply because hes not worth my time. his antics have gone on a long, long time, and ecasue he hides behind police, and then goes and beats other people with them, as would a cave dweller bludgeon prey.

it does puzzell me w hy you posted my response though.

Because it's your word against DreamGuy's, and while you both have had civility problems in the past I consider him to be far more trustworthy. DreamGuy, it might help if you posted some evidence, like links to the attacks from users you think Gabriel had been emailing. ~~ N (t/c) 22:38, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, was mostly gone for the weekend. I no longer have he emails in question, as I deleted them in disgust (and now that I think of it, I thought I had blocked his email address because of other harassing emails previously, so I don't know if something about the forward process doesn't work with my filter or if it came from another similar account/email that happened to use Gabriel's language style and so forth, which is pretty distinct). Talk:Urban legend is full of the tirades of an editor claiming that an editor emailed him to "warn" him about me. I believe User:Khaosinfire was the other main one talking about "email warnings" on his/my talk page. There was someone else too, but there are a variety of editors who like to play the same style game of troll accusations so that they hope to prevail (User:Lightbringer maybe? I know he's gone off the deep end lately) but keeping track of which ones claim they got email warnings and which ones are just bad editors in general without that claim can be rough.
I think I'll just not worry about it anymore at this point, as if he does it again (or there are similar accusations from others) there should be plenty enough evidence to hang him, and if he doesn't do it again he's learned that he'll be caught doing this too. like he was caught with all his other nonsense (sockpuppets, anon IP to try to get around 3RR, etc.). And of course his responses above show absolutely no improvement, so I suspect that when he comes back he'll just continue on with his nonsense and get blocked for multiple months, and knowing his history will cntinue to do so until it becomes effectively permanent. DreamGuy 23:47, 25 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

DreamGuy you need not even bring up my name about this for one I do not send people email on Wikipedia. I may have had multiple disputes with you, but like I said before I am not going to debate you anymore because it's not even worth my time, I am rarely even here anymore because I found Wikinfo. Furthermore if your going to even try to accuse me of being involved, you better have some evidence..........So put your evidence were your mouth is........that is all Khaosinfire 01:10, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

He didn't say you emailed anybody, he said Gabrielsimon emailed you. In fact... did he? ~~ N (t/c) 14:41, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

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