User talk:Georgewilliamherbert/Archives/2016/May

This is an archive of past discussions about User:Georgewilliamherbert. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

ANI - Steel1943

Hi, Georgewilliamherbert! I wanted to thank you for stepping in and for closing that ANI thread before it had a chance to continue to escalate, become much worse, and cause SergeWoodzing (who was clearly very angry) to become more angry. I was disappointed with some of the responses that I saw in the ANI thread from other editors. I tried my best to calmly respond to his complaint and help him understand where he went wrong (while also acknowledging that Steel1943's responses were not the best as well). I was about to explain to him how I understood his frustration, how we WP:AGF and try to offer assistance and level-headed decision-making at ANI, as well as help him to step away and cool down. But before I was able to do so, other responses were posted, and worded in a manner that, I feel, escalated his anger to an extremely high level and almost intentionally so.

I completely agree with your closing observation, in that a significant part of ANI is to diffuse the situation. Those who participate should be expected to engage and discuss issues with diffusing the situation as a top priority. Causing intentional provocation and making the reporter more upset is absolutely not constructive and against what ANI is intended to do, and I feel that this is what happened today. Anyways, I wanted to leave you a message and offer my appreciation for stepping in and preventing the discussion from getting (more) out of control. It's too bad; I feel like I could have helped him, we missed an opportunity and failed at doing so. ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 02:42, 23 April 2016 (UTC)

I left SergeWoodzing this message; hopefully I can try and make the situation a little bit better than the way it was when the ANI closed. I really hope that I did the right thing (both in the ANI, and afterwards on his talk page)... ~Oshwah~^{(talk) (contribs)} 03:11, 23 April 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 April 2016

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Basis please

What is the basis of your administrative action? What is your hurry? Can you distinguish between disruptive editing and accusations of disruption? What specific behavior justifies this? Please provide diffs. Thank you. Hugh (talk) 19:12, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

The AE discussion and complaint had the specifics; but more generally, you were clearly nibbling around the edges of the previous explicit ban. While I can AGF enough about your understanding of the limit of the topic ban previously to not issue a block myself, it's clear that you're not getting that we'd like you to stay away from that topic for a while as it just causes everyone pain and suffering. The reasons for the older topic bans and blocks for violations should be clear to you. It's not helpful for you to poke and prod at fuzzy edges until you get pushback; "broadly construed" is meant to discourage that.

Please stay away from the topic area. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:16, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

Respectfully, I know there is a AE filing, thanks. I am asking you as an administrator of our project regarding your administrator action, asking for one or more specific diffs that in your mind stood out during your due diligence in evaluating this filing. Thank you in advance. Hugh (talk) 19:26, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

All three there in the AE filing, and others showed similar boundary testing. This one [1]

Which changed "stated" to "said IER was among the most prominent organizations" shows the problem rather clearly.

Seriously - The prior warnings and prior topic ban were clear community and admin messages "Don't do that", Hugh. They were clear and used "broadly construed", and you're not a newbie around here. You know how things work. I understand why you want to know the edges of the restriction. I don't get why you think that poking and testing like this was better than asking on AE or the like for clarification.

There's consensus you're not safe for editing in or around this topic area, with the rest of the community. Is that clear? The restriction expanded due to you poking at edges in ways we found unconstructive. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:35, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

15 April 2016

In 2009, an article in Mother Jones magazine said IER was among the most prominent organizations promulgating climate disinformation.

Edit summary "WP:SAY, more accurate, neutral paraphrase of source."

Please I need to understand your thinking on this. How was the edit a violation of a topic ban on "conservative American politics"? Hugh (talk) 19:42, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

I made substantial expansions of my statement at AE today. What is your deadline? Hugh (talk) 20:10, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

Please provide a diff of an unconstructive edit. Hugh (talk) 20:10, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

It would be more difficult to find a constructive edit. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 06:52, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Georgewilliamherbert: You acted while I was editing my statement at AE. What is your rush? You were on something of an administrative tear Wednesday afternoon, banning three colleagues and extending a topic ban within an hour, thank you for your contributions to our project; you have demonstrated an impressive ability to quickly sort through cases and a admirable bias toward action. Is there an admin cup of some kind open? May I ask, in the course of your investigation phase in your due diligence of the AE case, might you have encountered any other editor behavior that might be considered actionable? Again, please provide one diff of an edit you consider nonconstructive. If you are too busy to explain your administrative actions, perhaps you should leave them to others. Thank you. Hugh (talk) 15:41, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Two points:

One, a number of diffs of specific problematic edits were cited on the AE page. One of them I quoted here.

Two, there's unanimous uninvolved administrator agreement that your behavior was a problem and the extension of the restriction was needed.

I was responding slowly yesterday but did address your concerns several times. There's a consensus your behavior is a problem. It's now evident you don't understand why or agree. I'm sorry that there's no meeting of the minds here, but it reinforces the importance (to me) of having expanded the restriction.

Regarding the "banning three colleagues" - I enacted a community ban which was !voted on at ANI, per community ban process, on one person's two best known accounts out of 50+ total identified sockpuppets (named and IP addresses). This was an easy and obvious administrative action using admin powers, enacting a unanimous community consensus that this editor was a problem and needed the additional "ban" beyond indef blocks. Any administrator with time could have done it.

Regarding your case - There is an appeal process for AE actions. Please feel free to do so if you disagree with it. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:49, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply. The comments of involved administrators you cite were all from before I had completed my statement. What is the deadline? I would like to understand your investigation and your due diligence you performed prior to your administrative action. Do I understand from your reply that your due diligence consisted of skimming the comments of uninvolved administrators? May I ask again, in the course of your due diligence on this case, did your investigation of the history uncover any unusual behavior of editors other than the subject of the complaint? Thank you again. Hugh (talk) 19:03, 23 April 2016 (UTC)

Kindly self-revert your recent administrative action and please leave it to other admins who have more time to thoroughly investigate cases and explain their administrative actions. Thank you. Hugh (talk) 15:00, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

It appears to me that HughD is again trying to push boundaries. Here the editor is trying to add an article that talks about climate change denial (basically the same subject as the Mother Jones article that was part of the ARE)[2]. This new RfC again seeks to add material that appears to be done for political rather than encyclopedic value. The added article includes this quote, "As Witherspoon researched the options starting around 1993, Exxon had embarked on a public campaign casting doubt on climate science as a basis for strong policy actions. Internally, the attitude was different." I would request that HughD please step back from the controversial aspects of the article. Springee (talk) 17:35, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

Notice of appeal WP:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Arbitration_enforcement_action_appeal_by_HughD