User:Polargeo 2/ACE2010/Shell

The following is copied from User talk:Shell Kinney Polargeo (talk) 11:44, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

You didn't answer the question

Shell, I asked you specifically about sanctioning an editor for civil comments made on the case pages, and you didn't really respond to it. JWB's finding contained six diffs which were from the PD talk page, out of 13 total. That is nearly half his evidence, so it is a very significant portion of the finding.

Furthermore, I am concerned about this statement: "At that time I was not involved in drafting the case and did not save diffs in my notes that might have been better than those eventually used in the finding." So are you saying that you saw more diffs but didn't save them, or you think you might have seen diffs? If you saw the diffs and they were substantial enough to warrant a finding, then isn't your responsibility to track them down and provide them? How are editors supposed to interpret a finding where the (purportedly) more serious offenses are not provided, and in their place is half a dozen mostly civil diffs which were argumentation on the case itself?

You also write "However, whether or not we were able to pick the best examples, the underlying principle still remains the same." On what do you base this assertion? In the two diffs specifically questioned by JWB ([1][2]), there was little or no evidence of incivility, particularly not to the level of a committee finding, and particularly not when those comments came on a case page where misconduct by other editors was being discussed. Your response is basically to acknowledge that they do not support the finding ("it's unfair to look at two diffs given as examples in an ArbCom finding and decide the finding is inappropriate.") Those two diffs represent 15% of the evidence, and a quick look at some of the others reveals that the number which don't support the finding might be even higher. In fact, several of them were JWB defending himself against baseless accusations that he had a vendetta.

The basic issue here is, if diffs do not represent the finding, they should not be included; and if there are "better" diffs out there that you remember reading, then you should take the time to provide them in the finding. At best, this seems to be very sloppy drafting; at worst, you sanctioned an editor unfairly based on vaguely recalled diffs which can't even be defended because you didn't present them. ATren (talk) 14:51, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

ATren, I understand your concerns here, but as we've found, we have a fundamental disagreement over areas of the Climate Change case. Where I see diffs that evidence a pattern of combative and personalized disputes, you see civil talk page comments - and that's okay; Wikipedia works because people of different viewpoints can all contribute their ideas.

My comment "At that time I was not involved in drafting the case and did not save diffs in my notes that might have been better than those eventually used in the finding." refers to me having taken rather detailed notes during my review of the evidence and editors involved, but not making a note of which diffs I looked at that caused me to make that particular note. I realize now that even if I'm not drafting a case, I ought to keep those diffs around as I find them just in case.

"However, whether or not we were able to pick the best examples, the underlying principle still remains the same." means that the Committee members voting in the case reviewed the editor (whether by using diffs provided in evidence, or the reams of talk page discussions or their own method of investigation) and all came to the conclusion that there was problematic behavior. We could say the same thing, with no diffs at all, and it would still be just as true. ArbCom (thankfully) isn't a court where we toss out things because XYZ procedure wasn't followed to the letter, so while I respect your concerns that the diffs provided weren't the best examples, I have to disagree with your assertion that it was either unfair or inappropriate. Shell ^babelfish 15:09, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Shell, you call them "talk page diffs", but in fact they were on the case talk pages, which is a completely different situation. On case pages, are we not expected to present and argue evidence, even as it pertains to other editors? And in this particular case, several diffs presented are JWB's response to others calling his participation a "vendetta" (a completely unsupported claim), so your selection of his responses is perplexing even as some of the participants on that thread were not sanctioned. You have not addressed these issues.

As for the other arbs voting for the finding, well, those arbs are not running, and if (when) they run again, I assure you they will be presented with a similar question, namely why they voted on a finding that was so poorly supported (even you seem to acknowledge that). This in fact reveals one of the weaknesses of arbcom, in that many arbs rely on the judgment of the drafting arb without deep investigation of their own, which means the arbitrator drafting the finding must be particularly careful in getting it right.

But this is about your candidacy. It seems that you have admitted to not being particularly thorough in providing the diffs which caused you to draft this finding, and rather than digging them up you filled in with case page diffs. This admission is good, because it's something which you notably refused to do when the case was ongoing, and in the weeks after. But now that you've acknowledged this, perhaps you can make it right and go back and find those diffs which you misplaced, and present them here, to demonstrate that your judgement was sound? I don't intend for this to be a rehashing of the case, but in light of your seeming admission here that there was more significant evidence which weighed in your decision but which was not presented, I think it would be worthwhile to see what that evidence was. If mistakes were made, they should be correctable; it is a Wiki, after all. :-) ATren (talk) 15:32, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Mother Mary an Jozef, man... at some point you have to stop going on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about this stuff. I'm also extremely pissed off at how the arbs handled (or more to the point, failed to handle) this case. But you have to know when enough is enough. You asked Shell a question, she answered. Let others decide on the suitability of her response. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 16:09, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Boris, these are highly relevant questions for an arb running for re-election. Shell's responses appear to be an admission that (at the very least) this finding could have been better documented. This is a significant admission, and perhaps if it had come during the case or shortly thereafter, I wouldn't be "going on and on" about it now. But in any case, Shell has an opportunity now to resolve it, and I hope she does. She may even earn my vote. ATren (talk) 16:44, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

I know there's been a lot of discussion about this topic, so some things may have gotten lost in the shuffle. No matter what my personal views on an issue, I'm actually not able to go back and make changes to a closed case, nor can I justify the entire Committee's decision on my own. I'm certainly not saying that I believe the diffs I provided were inappropriate, but I respect your opinion that they could have been better - not everyone looks at issues the same way and it's quite likely that different people would choose different diffs to represent the same idea. If you feel strongly that the finding was inappropriate, please open a request for amendment so that your concerns can be reviewed appropriately by the entire Committee. Shell ^babelfish 17:53, 21 November 2010 (UTC)

Shell, I'm not asking you to change a finding or retry the case. I am simply asking you to simply provide the diffs which demonstrate your finding but which you admittedly misplaced. It can be done here on this thread, or even on a subpage and linked. Providing those diffs would demonstrate that your judgement (if not your execution) was sound. It would also allow JWB to know exactly what diffs influenced you in your finding, in case he should decide to appeal.

It would have been nice if this had been dealt with during the case, but you didn't respond then, and now that you have revealed new details about your research (namely the missing diffs which influenced you), I think you should find those diffs and present them. I can even help you research if you like -- do you have a general sense of which articles or talk pages you examined, and when? ATren (talk) 01:22, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

(od) @ATren: When Shell and I worked up the Remedy 3 Findings of Fact, we included the minimum to demonstrate battlefield conduct. Their purpose is not to build a watertight case against someone, nor to convince the sanctioned editor of the errors of his/her ways, but to give other arbitrators a flavour of the problem. We could have gone into greater detail but our objective was not to diminish people but merely to exclude problematic editors with as little harm as possible to their reputations and to their will to contribute productively elsewhere. Not everyone however is capable of seeing the topic-bans positively, as an opportunity to move on from a toxic landscape and find more tranquil pastures.

During at least the period Jan-May 2010, you effectively became a single purpose account, focused almost entirely on debating/arguing on the Climate change sanctions noticeboard and on the talk pages of (usually) administrators with whom you disagreed. Many of the comments you made accused administrators of bias and demanded they remove themselves from the topic. You appear to have ignored their responses. Although the FoF only includes a handful of examples from January 2010, it is easy to find many more in a similar vein, made to other administrators and in other months.[3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12]

This seemingly relentless focus on the perceived biases/shortcomings of others is classic battlefield conduct. Repeatedly casting aspersions is not only profoundly uncivil but also a personal attack. Since the case closed, you have not shown the slightest insight into why your conduct may have been damaging to the encyclopedia and the collegial atmosphere it nurtures. Instead, you have pursued your "bias" agenda by: awarding yourself a "whistleblower's barnstar", characterising your actions as crusading; and taking up the cudgels on the talk pages of at least three arbitrators. You have even inserted yourself in the current election in an attempt to find a soapbox for your grievances.

Now it may well be that the greater clarity which this comment provides will enable you to reflect on what went wrong during the Spring and help you to move on. I hope so because, whether you like the description or not, continually beating the drum is tendentious and a further example of not listening to what others are saying.  Roger ^talk 09:05, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Roger, why is "Repeatedly casting aspersions is not only profoundly uncivil but also a personal attack. " ? That would depend on what extent the allegation were true, would it not? --cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 09:28, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Well, yes and no, as truth, like beauty, is essentially in the eye of the beholder. Apart from the difficulty of objectively determining the truth of an essentially subjective statement, this kind of issue can only be dealt with by consensus. This is not achieved by a single editor repeatedly making the same allegation but by finding out what other editors think, and whether the complaint gets traction, either via an RFC/U or at WP:AN. It has also enables the editor against whom the allegations have been made to present their side of the story and has the added advantage of bringing closure to the issue. Repeatedly casting aspersions is simply the wrong approach.  Roger ^talk 09:59, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

It may or may not be the right approach - but that does not make the allegations uncivil. Redefining terms to bash editors does not generate an impression of impartiality. --cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 10:43, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Both civility and incivility are broad churches and clearly your mileage may vary on the what constitutes one or the other but my personal view (which I'm sure will be widely shared) is that, on balance, serially casting aspersions about the integrity of others over months is uncivil. No redefining of terms took place.  Roger ^talk 11:04, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

WP:CIVIL does not agree with your usage. If allegations are ignored (and I think most, if not all, of Atren's points were simply ignored), all you can do is repeat them. For instance, my complaints about arbcom misuse of WP:CIVIL were ignored or given ludicrous non-substantive responses for months. It was only by repetition that folks such as yourself have finally started to respond substantively. I don't agree with the responses, but at least I'm hearing answers at last. --cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 11:25, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Simply saying that WP:CIVIL (and WP:NPA, which forms part of the same policy) don't apply isn't enough. There were numerous allegations of bias and bad faith, based on speculation and surmise, made about numerous administrators over five months: this is squarely covered by policy.  Roger ^talk 12:06, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

ATren can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think at least part of the reason he may be so upset here is because of how he perceives the sanction paints him. He appears to share the same POV on climate change as most of the editors he found himself in dispute with, but found himself in an adversarial position because he could not abide what they were doing to the BLPs of what looked to be their idealogical opponents. Speaking from experience, I can tell you that when you start trying to counter what you perceive to be an orchestrated effort by POV-pushers to control the content of a topic (like Intelligent Design, for example, to name one of the articles that is most notorious, deserved or not, for such activity), it is very easy to allow it to suck you into an all-consuming time sink of point and counter-point. I know that happened to me, because when I entered the CC arena around a year ago I really intended on taking at least one CC article to FA-status. I'm really disappointed in myself that all that resulted, article-wise, after nine months of activity was a single good article. I've accepted responsibility for my topic ban, however, because I recognize that I could have done a better job at maintaining a moral high ground and staying above the fray.

ATren is in a similar situation. He tried and tried to defend these BLPs. In fact, it pretty much consumed his entire Wikipedia activities. Of course, after awhile he started to take it a little personally. He probably doesn't see, however, much difference in the conduct of some of the editors who fought with him, yet weren't topic banned or had findings found on any matter. So, the moral equivalency question here raises its head to him, IMO. I understand that motivation doesn't excuse the behavior that you believe occurred, and I don't know if that changes anything about the answers you're giving him, but I hope it helps you understand where he might be coming from. Cla68 (talk) 12:17, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

As you say, the problem with toxic topics is that decent people get involved, and invested, and then behave in all sorts of ways that aren't at all typical of them. Unfortunately, disengagement is really the only answer.  Roger ^talk 10:46, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Roger, what you are saying is that anyone who repeatedly alleges admin misuse - no matter how well founded - can be sanctioned for breach of WP:CIVIL (or WP:NPA). Do I misunderstand? Because I don't think most non-admins would see that as at all reasonable. (And, I repeat, that is not what WP:CIVIL says.) --cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 13:30, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

People can be, and are, frequently sanctioned for incivility, personal attacks and so forth. It doesn't much matter whether the egregious conduct is directed at an admin or not.  Roger ^talk 10:51, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Only an admin can misuse admin tools, which was one of the complaints. BTW you completely failed to answer my question. And that's why questions and often repeated. So, let me ask again, Roger, what you are saying is that anyone who repeatedly alleges admin misuse - no matter how well founded - can be sanctioned for breach of WP:CIVIL (or WP:NPA). Do I misunderstand? --cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 13:31, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

• The findings were terrible. Arbs such as Shell groping around the case talkpages to dig up every marginal minor incivility in an extremely long and poorly conducted case. Darn right they were able to find "evidence of a battleground" when editors are trying to defend themselves over the course of a very long arbcase they are going to have a few diffs that are close to the line. I think the grubbiness of this tactic lowers the arbs to the level of the very worst battleground editors they are arbitrating against. Its very easy for editors who are not trying to defend their wikipedia reputation and right to edit the articles they are enthusiastic about to sit back and be all calm but when you get up every day for 4 months wondering what sanction may or may not be made against you wikipedia is no fun whatsoever. Maybe the arbs could take this into account when they are grubbing about for minor incivilities and things that even Mother Teresa would not perceive as being a PA on the arbcase talkpages, but it looks like they wanted a kill, to be seen to be tough. Instead of being tough they came up with a fairly harsh sanction and stuck everyone into it, including editors who only deserved a soft warning to editors who should have been banned from wikipedia. That's not fair it is just lazy and extremely poor. Polargeo (talk) 10:15, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
  • This is both unfair and misplaced. The findings of fact all derived directly from proposals made by the community and were either acepted or rejected on their individual merits by the committee en banc. Editors were treated leniently, with disengagement via topic-bans being the sanction. In your own case, your finding of fact was not amended to include details of your calamitious period even though such conduct would normally attract a hefty block, both at ArbCom and at AN/I. It's time, I think, to stop flogging this particular dead horse.  Roger ^talk 10:59, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Polargeo's criticisms are on the ball, IMO as an uninvolved editor. To their discredit the arbs generally do not seem very receptive to any critical feedback on the subject. --cheers, Michael C. Price ^talk 11:10, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Michael: Part of the problem, I think, is that Wikipedia's policies encourage honest attempts at reaching compromise and consensus if civil and in good faith. But with the CC case, the mere fact that an editor remained engaged in the discussions appears to have been used against them. Even civil conduct was punished. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 11:25, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

I agree with essentially all of the above including the comments of various editors normally on the other "side" of the dispute. The handling of this case was phenomenally inept. And nothing was done about the excesses of admins (be it Lar's self-declared bias on one side or the actions of certain admins on the other); indeed, as has been shown above, daring to criticize an admin was considered self-incrimination. But worst of all there was no attempt to address the underlying systematic problems -- just topic bans on specific individuals. See you all at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate Change 2. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:23, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

"Phenomenally inept handling of arbcom cases" makes strange bedfellows indeed. :-)

Early on in the case, a recused arb (SirFozzie) suggested a blanket topic ban based on a mostly objective and impersonal criterion: anyone who participated in 2 edit wars in the last 6 months would be banned. I endorsed that idea because I thought it would be the most pragmatic way forward, essentially a cease fire imposed by removing anyone remotely involved without specifically judging the merits of their involvement. This last point was crucial, because this case was so large and long-running that any attempt to directly criticize and sanction a large number of individual editors was bound to be error prone and unfair.

Shell and Roger basically ignored this proposal, deciding to do their own research and post a series of individual findings, many of which were marginal findings at best, based mostly on cherry-picked out-of-context diffs. And, perhaps even more damming of these two arbs, when we requested they review context on the diffs they provided, they simply ignored us or evaded our direct questions. It was clear that they were completely uninterested in admitting their own mistakes. This is evident even now, as Shell has refused to retract clear misstatements on my finding which are now on display on her candidacy questions page (see this - the statement that I "continued to bring up an action from several years ago that was widely upheld by the community and demand that because (I) disagreed the admin should undo it." appears to be a complete fabrication by Shell and she has not yet retracted it)

In the context of the mess created by these weak findings, SirFozzie's pragmatic and impersonal proposal doesn't look so bad, does it? ATren (talk) 15:47, 26 November 2010 (UTC)

Response to Roger

Roger, in response to the good faith inoffensive diffs Shell put in my finding, you now (above) produce more good faith inoffensive diffs to support your case. I think my point is proven, that even on close examination, even though I was involved in this highly contentious topic area for almost three years, you and Shell can't find anything remotely uncivil despite the fact that you're now clearly digging for diffs to support your weak finding.

The problem here is, Roger and Shell seem to be sanctioning mere disagreement with and questioning of admins. They also seem to be oblivious to the difference between assuming bad faith and criticizing the actions of admins. Even my direct statements about bias were usually couched in terms that did not assume bad faith -- we all have inherent biases and occasionally misread situations as a result, and I was usually careful to indicate that I don't consider bias or questionable decision-making to be signs of bad faith. Simply challenging admin actions in such a fashion as I did is not grounds for an incivility finding. Or at least, it shouldn't be.

Michael Price's question above seems to cut to the heart of the matter: "Roger, what you are saying is that anyone who repeatedly alleges admin misuse - no matter how well founded - can be sanctioned for breach of WP:CIVIL (or WP:NPA). Do I misunderstand?" Neither Roger nor Shell seem to want to answer this question, because I think it cuts to the core of their flawed mindset: they never accounted for the possibility that all these admins' actions were inappropriate, even if executed in good faith, and that my challenges were both civilly presented and wholly justified.

There were perhaps half a dozen admins involved in the diffs Roger and Shell present here and in the finding. I acknowledge that it is much easier to simply assume that the lone editor challenging these admins was at fault. But that assumption is flawed on multiple levels:

1. In many cases I was not the lone editor to challenge these admins. In one case, my polite request to an admin to step back was presented by Shell in isolation, even though there was an AN/I thread in which several other editors expressed concern about that same action. In another case, my concerns were echoed by at least 3 or 4 others (and not the combatants themselves) on the enforcement page. Shell and Roger presented these diffs with no context and grouped them together make them appear to be indicative of a pattern, even though they were different situations and different times, and the issues I was raising were echoed by others.
2. Even assuming that my diffs constituted a pattern of challenging admins, Shell and Roger made no attempt to address whether the challenges were justified. I asked them to examine context on a handful of them, they ignored my arguments. For example, I told an admin to "back off" after he compared an editor's intelligence to that of a ten year old in the context of a block threat: Shell took my "back off" comment out of context and said nothing about the admin berating an editor's intelligence which prompted it. It appears that neither Shell nor Roger examined any of this context in their finding against me, even when I assembled the evidence and pointed them to it.
3. There appears to be an implicit assumption on Shell's and Roger's part, something akin to "all those admins couldn't have been wrong". So rather than examining individual cases, they presented a numeric argument: "here are 10 diffs that show ATren criticizing a bunch of admins". But as any Wikipedian knows (and arbs certainly should know), admins often act in support of one another, and frequently in support of vested contributors, without doing due diligence to examine the true nature of a conflict.

   So how do we resolve whether I was right to challenge those admins? Well, let's see: almost all of the issues I raised (and for which I was sanctioned) dealt with the handling of one vested contributor whom admins refused to sanction no matter what he did. If my actions were so incorrect as to be subject to an arbcom finding, that would seem to exonerate that editor, right? Not quite. In a spectacular contradiction, the committee agreed with me and issued findings against that very editor, in some cases citing diffs which were directly related to the questions I'd raised earlier! Think about it: even as Shell and Roger sanctioned me for merely questioning admins who refused to take action against this editor, they themselves voted on findings against that editor which basically agreed with my position.

I have raised many of these issues repeatedly with Shell and Roger, and their responses have been either non-existent or evasive. They clearly do not have answers, but rather than re-examine their own position, they dig deeper -- digging up more inoffensive diffs from my history that actually demonstrate my point further. This is precisely NOT the kind of thing we expect from arbs. ATren (talk) 16:28, 26 November 2010 (UTC)