User talk:Briangotts

For discussion prior to 9/1/05, see User talk:Briangotts/archive I will generally respond to comments on the commentor's talk page.

Scimitar's RfA

Thanks for supporting my request for administrator powers, which has been successful. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact me on my talk page. Thanks again! Scimitar ^parley 17:11, 1 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Huns

Hun (燻)], the barbarians living to the north of China at the time of Xia (夏), was referred to as Xiongnu at the time of Han." -- Sino-Korean Dictionary Sinzahay, Minzungserim, 1967 Please don't delete.

I have no clue how that's relevant to my edits. --Briangotts (talk) 19:53, 1 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your support!

Dear Briangotts, thanks for your vote of confidance at my RfA. I'll try hard to make the soggy mop proud! — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 22:37, 2 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Jewish History stubs

Thanx for your comment re: Bar Kapparah. I'm already working on Hiyya bar Abba, and I'll add the others to my list. Thanx for pointing them out! Sputnikcccp 21:05, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Sigurd Syr

As promised, I've made an edit to Sigurd Syr. I'm not at all used to writing about Viking Sagas, nor working with only a single source. I hope I've summarized Sigurd Syr appropriately, and I hope you like the edit. Thanks for accepting my apology, and thanks for helping me learn a more about Norse history. Un focused 17:34, 12 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Edom

Excellent work! I've done some minor copyedits and dabs. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:54, 13 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Kazan

Hi! Could you start a stub Hebrew edition of Kazan and Tatars articles. Some my friends are studing Hebrew, but thel level of knowlege isn't advanced as well... Please, note, that Semitic 'q' should be used in word 'Qazan'! Thank you, --Untifler 13:08, 17 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You might want to try User:El C or User:Doron they'd probably be better for this. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:47, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Brian, thanks for believing in me, but I am afraid my Hebrew is not that good, unfortunately. Let's try to contact someone else about קזן. ←Humus sapiens ←ну? 20:57, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

User:El C and User:IZAK come to mind... If it's just simple translation, even User:Ramallite could probably lend a hand, although this stuff is pretty far outside his interest area I'm guessing... Tomer ^TALK 01:10, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Although my Hebrew knowledge is only conversational, I know of a couple of Hebrew programs that could help out. [1] This site should have a Hebrew converter. My suggestion is to get a qwerty hebrew program, and your best choice for a knowledgeble Hebrew speaker would probably be User:Tomer. I am getting up there too :). Guy Montag 02:10, 21 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

My RfA!

My dear Brian, I simply wanted to drop by now that my RfA is closed to give you a big THANK YOU! for your kind support. Your trust in me, when the matter of my increasing involvement was being put against me by a few people, gave me strength and cheered me up a lot; I felt I was being understood at last. You'll always have in me a friend. Hugs! Shauri Yes babe? 20:52, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Khazars

I consider it one of the best articles around, it is in my watchlist. ←Humus sapiens ←ну? 03:24, 7 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Mahatma Gandhi

Hi, hv seen ur rv of the article. If you don't find consensus on talk page, u shd probably try to achieve it. Else, u may find that someone else may rv ur edits. Given that the article was a FA, I believe that lot of iterations hv already occurred. You may want to check out the archive of the talk page as well. --Gurubrahma 18:36, 10 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

E-mail

E-mail for you, Brian. Cheers, SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:49, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

ArbReq against Jguk

Please consider supporting Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration#Jguk and date notation. ←Humus sapiens ←ну? 23:33, 17 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your support, Brian. I took the lberty to adjust the indent & "forge" :) your sig. Please fix as you see fit. ←Humus sapiens ←ну? 04:03, 18 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Norse in Gardariki

I wish I did. Unfortunately, it is not exactly a favoured subject, and the written sources are virtually non-existent. The information is consequently provided by archaeology, but in Russia the methodology is to consider a Norse grave to be non-norse if there is a Slavic pin in the grave (something I know from personal acquaintances tempts archaeologists to add Slavic objects to Norse graves during excavations).--Wiglaf 19:56, 24 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Template/Workshop

You, or any Wikipedia user, can contribute your suggestions and comments to the /Workshop page of any active arbitration case. Comments on evidence or proposals can help in understanding the import of evidence and in refining proposals. Proposed principles, findings of fact, or remedies may be listed on /Proposed decision and form part of the final decision. Fred Bauder 18:40, 26 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Anonymous Editor RfA

Hi Brian. My comment on the RfA page was brief, so it's not surprising it was confusing as well. As I clarified to Bababjou, while I did express concerns about his POV editing, I find Anonymous Editor generally reasonable in discussion, and don't see any reason to think he would abuse his admin privileges. In addition, I think that Wikipedia would benefit from multiple POVs. Also, I think the Muslim related articles get a lot of vandalism, and it would be helpful to have an admin patrolling them more regularly. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:39, 27 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

My RfA

Thank you for your support! If you should ever have any concerns about my actions as an administrator, please be sure to tell me! Kirill Lokshin 13:34, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Naming conventions for articles on Jews

As there is a great deal of inconsistency in the naming of articles about Jews, I have proposed that they be made consistent. I'd appreciate it if you could commment on this here: Template_talk:Jew#Name_of_articles_on_Jews. Thanks. Jayjg ^(talk) 07:54, 30 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Your vote change, from support to neutral to oppose

I'm a great admirer of your work and I hope to work with you on Norse-related articles in the future, but I had to change my vote to oppose over the Stormfront incident. I would be happy to discuss the issue with you if you wish. --Briangotts (talk) 03:05, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I have to change my vote again to weak oppose. From the developing discussion it seems clear that Haukurth still doesn't understand the danger of Amalekite's actions, and I find this very disturbing for reasons I've stated above. Briangotts (talk) 02:58, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know if I can express this any more clearly now than before but I'll try.

Amalekite's post, when taken in context of the VNN where he posted it, his moderation of that forum and his previous postings to it, arguably constitute an incitement to violence against certain Wikipedians.
Accepting the previous, the post puts people in danger.
This justifies the block of User:Amalekite under our rules.
If this had been the reasoning given for the block from the beginning I doubt I would ever have objected strongly for it and probably I would not have expressed myself at all.
Nevertheless, I don't think the aforementioned danger was large.
I don't think that blocking User:Amalekite did anything to ameliorate that danger.
I think that blocking in general is not a very effective remedy since people can so easily get new accounts - and indeed User:Amalekite returned under the name User:Etikelama and no doubt has other accounts as well.
I think that other action than blocking, or in addition to blocking, would probably have been more effective. Writing to the moderator of the Stormfront forums, asking him to remove the post in question, was something that seemed like more productive action to me so I did.
I think that arguing about the blocking of a Wikipedia username trivializes any real threat or danger that exists. If there is a real threat, danger and incitement to violence the matter should be taken through the appropriate legal channels - arguing technicalities of Wikipedia banning policy makes the matter seem like some trivial game.

If you feel my opinions on this single issue, out of all the things I've done and said for the duration of my career on Wikipedia, weigh so heavily against me as to counter anything positive I might bring to the janitor position then you are indeed right to vote oppose. It greatly surprises me that people will apply this kind of litmus test for a single opinion. Based on this alone people have expressed the opinion that I'm an unethical person. Others have said that since my judgment is so flawed here I will clearly have poor judgment in other things - but no-one has pointed out to me any other previous failing of my judgment from my record.

I never expected this, I never thought this would be such a big deal, I never thought so many people considered me a bad person. I don't really care tuppence whether I get a rollback button or not - but I care about this. And frankly, I'm feeling absolutely horrible at the moment. I just woke up after a few hours of fitful sleep to find more oppose votes, your being one of them. I don't know what I'll do now. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 05:42, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

No one thinks you're a bad person, Haukur. The issue for me is that you didn't at the time, and I feel still don't, understand how strongly people felt about Alex Linder posting that list. If a white supremacist had posted a list of names to a Ku Klux Klan website of editors he believed were black, are you seriously saying you'd want to see him continue to edit? You were asking your fellow editors back then to continue to work on a project alongside someone who wished them dead, and who had taken steps to publicize their existence to other people who wished them dead. You sent (as I recall) around 20 e-mails to the list about it, and posted numerous times to the talk page, so you clearly felt strongly that he should be unblocked. Yet you knew nothing about him. You stated, for example, that he didn't wish anyone dead, when all you had to do is read his posts on VNN and elsewhere to see that he has explicitly called for death to the Jews, and has advocated the genocide of black people. You also posted of his list: "This is not a threat. Nor is it, I believe, an action exposing any Wikipedian to danger. For one thing no information is made public that isn't already public." But many of the users whose names he posted don't make public that they're Jews, and in fact some of them aren't. You were expressing strong views on issues you'd done no research into. You also seemed not to know that the block was covered by the blocking policy. Again, a lack of research.

Finally, the argument you and Matt had with El C today on his talk page, which is what drew attention to your nomination, was worrying for its timing, its vehemence, and because it showed your views hadn't changed. You were still arguing that: "From User:Amalekite's contribution log and his posts to Stormfront and VNN I see no evidence that he was acting in bad faith on Wikipedia. And we assume good faith unless we have overwhelming evidence to the contrary." I'm sorry but I find that very naive. When a group of editors is being attacked like that, we have an obligation to support them, and I want to see editors who understand that become admins.

But please don't mistake this criticism of your actions as an opinion that you're in any way a bad person. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 06:45, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Many people have said that my judgment is so deeply wrong that I can't be trusted. Others have said that I don't have ethical integrity. El C has recently repeated that he feels revolted by me and he has never retracted his comment that I acted as far from goodfaith as is imaginable. Indeed there are people who not only feel but have told me that I am not a good person. I'm glad that you don't feel that way, Sarah.

Why do you continually use the word vehemence to describe my extensive participation in the Amalekite discussion? You yourself have participated very extensively and entirely on one side in my RFA and the associated discussions - even to the point of commenting on a third party talk page here. Would you describe your own behavior as vehement? Can we agree that an alternative word is more apt?

I did as much research as most people at the time and I carefully watched every contribution to the discussion. I realize now that I should have read through all relevant policy pages earlier, in particular to find the very rarely used provision that was invoked. I regret not having done that. If you yourself had stated your reasons for the block clearly and with reference to the relevant policy at the outset you might have been able to save us all some trouble. But hindsight is 20/20, of course, and I had thought - until this week - that we would let bygones be bygones.

I still think that Amalekite's contribution log suggests that he acted in good faith. Most of his contributions were naive, some were clearly not helpful and most were reverted with good reason. Some of his anonymous contributions were worse and I only became aware of them late in the debate. People can act in good faith for a bad cause. That someone acts in good faith does not mean that she is right or that she is necessarily a good person.

As I have stated many times before I essentially stopped objecting to the block when all the facts of the matter had become clear to me. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 09:15, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Haukurth, you stopped objecting but you believe that Amalekite acted in good faith which is shocking to me. You also believe that it is more effective to contact a website known for advocating the death of certain groups of people and then ask them to take down a list of names because it might lead to harm to members of those groups. This, to me, is just naivete. You are right that blocking the party in question is no way to ensure he will not continue his listing on Stormfront but it is the only remedy available to Wikipedia as a community to at least protect its members from harassment here.

Like Sarah, I don't attribute any bad faith, malice, or prejudice to you, only, as I said, what I believe is poor judgment in one specific area where admin powers are important. Whether other people have accused you of being a bad person, I can't control what they think, just as I can't judge you based on the fact that your support comes in part from people whose views are abhorrent to me and who have made similar baseless accusations against others. I would of course vehemently deny any such charges that were made against you, as I have done here and on the vote page.

In pointing to your numerous (and from my perspective excellent) contributions to WP articles, you are conflating two issues. One is whether a person's article edits are valuable to WP as a whole, and I don't think even your detractors can reasonably deny that they are in this case. The other is whether they can be relied upon to exercise the judgment necessary to be an admin (as determined by each voter), and I simply can't be sure of that in this case. I think the issues are separate, though they are difficult to distinguish (indeed, this is why it has been so difficult for me to vote against you in this instance). --Briangotts (talk) 14:57, 1 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]