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September 2016

"mass, anti-discussion smear" and other over-exaggerations

You may not like it, but don't delete it. Feel free to ask the original poster, EEng if he will remove it, or if he minds if you remove it, but don't unilaterally decide what you want on the talk page. – Gavin (talk) 13:49, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Pardon? E Eng 14:14, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

It appears Mr mcandlish doesn't like your post, which he keeps trying to remove. It's your call if you wish you remove it, not his. – Gavin (talk) 14:21, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Certainly not. It's a serious comment on attitudes toward what the reader's experience should be. I point out that the bit in quotes re "tedious to write" was added by someone else, though I absolutely endorse it as the perfect final touch. E Eng 14:51, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Quite right too. – Gavin (talk) 15:45, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

@SchroCat: See WP:REFACTOR, WP:OWN, and WP:TALK. Anyone is empowered to remove disruptive posts and other edits. Changing people's posts is discouraged. Removing patently uncivil ones is not. This isn't about EEng's smear-box in particular, really, but the entire WP:FACTION-looking mass invasion of WT:MOS with advocates of decorative quote boxes, not to participate in the RfC and address the issues raised in it, and discuss adjusting the default quote template, but rather to forum-shop, seemingly canvass (I see two canvassing notices posted already), and otherwise disrupt the RfC. Abusing the talk page as billboard to uncivilly straw-man the opposing side is just a small piece of this mess, though one you should not have edit-warred to restore. I think AN should be aware of this entire situation, which is clearly abnormal and unconstructive. You reverting to uphold a "principle" you and your buddy Cassianto ignore any time you feel like deleting posts you don't like, cannot be taken as any kind of serious position. (I'll be sure to remind you of your reverts and this conversation next time I see you do it, or backing up him doing it.) It's just part of your clumsily-revert-SMcCandlish-when-he-makes-me-mad pattern.

I've already written the AN request (not about you in particular; that would surely be over infobox battlegrounding, which hopefully ARCA will pour cold water on before that escalates any further). But I'm tired and should not invoke "process" in an off-the-cuff manner, and someone whose judgement I trust e-mailed me discouraging noticeboard action on this particular thing, so I'll sleep on it. I'm not so prideful I can't back down from a promise of AN/ANI/whatever action just because I stated one, if there are doubts it would deal with the matter effectively.
— SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 15:08, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

OWN??? PMSL! In my entire Wiki career I have left 29 comments on that page; you are getting up to 2,000 and taking the unilateral decision to delete other people's comments: who do you think is displaying signs of ownership here? – Gavin (talk) 15:45, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

We do not OWN our posts here, and others may change or remove them under particular circumstances, as you well know, since you do it as you please, then feign outrage if anyone does it with anything you agree with. I didn't touch your material, so how often you edit there is irrelevant. The fact that this is about appropriateness but you think this is about editcounts and page control – a very frequent and sorely mistaken "you aren't a regular editor of this page so you have no right to change it" theme of yours that you're now hypocritically trying to reverse (which seems to be your go-to tactic for everything) says a whole lot. So does the fact that you evidently feel proprietary about others' content and will editwar to retain it if it's on "your side", without any actual rationale for doing so, and regardless of the rationales for the changes (another recurrent SchroCat theme). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 20:46, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

@EEng: I thought I knew you better as an editor than that. How can you possibly think it is reasonable to mischaracterize in this way the views of everyone who has concerns about the excessive and undue promotional effect of these templates for whatever viewpoint is put in them? It's no different from referring to anyone who puts an infobox in an article as an "idiot" "non-reader" and "vandal". I really had faith you knew better than to pursue this "try to win by demonizing anyone who disagrees" angle. Oh well; the fact that you're totally unrepentant about it actually supports my view that this is disruptive, not accidental, and should be administrative;y shut down. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 15:08, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

For those playing along at home, we're talking about my insertion of an image here [1]. You do know me better than that, you're reading way too much into this, and I wasn't demonizing anybody. Of course I support concerns about excessive and undue promotional use of quotes, but I oppose those who think things like (as was stated two posts above my insertion) "Stylistically such isolated quotations are a train wreck. If there's no way to integrate such a quotation into the article text, it probably doesn't belong there" i.e. that there's no place for quotes which draw the reader in and spark interest, consistent with many people's belief that any time the reader says to himself, "Wow! This article is a pleasure to read!", then something's wrong. E Eng 21:34, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

The image has nothing to do with it. The straw man psychological projection of a crazy/stupid viewpoint onto everyone who doesn't agree with you about decorative quote boxes is the issue. But thanks for vividly highlighting exactly why these quote templates are PoV problems. "Draw[ing] the reader in and spark[ing] interest" in one particular party's viewpoint is a blatant policy violation. There are other ways to attract reader interest that do not favor particular viewpoints. But doing so at the sub-article content level is not a WP goal anyway, per WP:NOT#MAGAZINE. Grabbing reader eyeballs for as long as possible, much less precisely steering them, is not our job; providing information they actually want, arranging it logically, and backing it up with reliable sources, is our job. This is not an advertisng-funded site, and we have no incentive at all to keep people here longer than they need to be here to get what they came for (much of what WP:NOT is about, especially WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE is grounded in this fact). Life is short, and WP is not escapist entertainment in text form, it's a a particular kind of information source. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 22:12, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

There are plenty of situations in which an interesting quote illuminates, gives depth to, or brings to life the adjacent text -- even well into the article. There's a great example (though a bit long) at Oscar_Wilde#Imprisonment. Of course these should not be used in ways that promote a particular POV, just as article text should not promote a particular POV. But that's an orthogonal issue. E Eng 23:12, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

I don't think that imagery like "brings life to" is apt here, and it implies that (to steal SchroCat's own anti-infobox campaigning stump out from under him) all the hard work of other editors on the article is just "dead" material unless you, in your infinite wisdom, force a USA Today-style decorative sidebar on it. All of the "redundant eyesore marring a beautiful article" arguments that you guys bring against infoboxes (which actually serve a demonstrable utility function) actually apply, without reservation of any kind, to quote boxes, which are not utilitiarian in any way, and only exist to "steer" readers into accepting as "the take-away message" what you personally want to brow-beat them with. This is absolutely not encyclopedic writing, and it's why all the comments in the "anti-RfC" poll over there, aside from supports that are pure WP:AADD noise, are opposes. There's nothing even faintly tangential about the fact that quote boxes unduly draw attention to particular quoted material; that's the very crux of the matter. Taking material out of its context does not "give depth" to material, it robs the material of depth and makes it confusing and sound-bitey. It's a cheap-ass PR, marketing, and tabloid journalism trick, a form of tacky teaser.

The really unfortunate thing about all of this is that the misguided attempt to sail the longship around the RfC and dodge the issues raised in it, with a "voting invasion" that is doomed before it starts, is that it's probably going to derail also the discussion of more subtly adjusting the default block quote style, which would obviate almost all of this dispute, site-wide. So, good job creating another gory style battlefield; you can now go make up heroic poems about yourselves. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 23:47, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

Chill. I'm not part of your RfC war. E Eng 23:56, 1 September 2016 (UTC)

I'm done. It's just severely frustrating to finally begin to get some maybe-traction on adjusting the default quote template enough to stop people abusing pull-quote templates because they don't think the default style is distinct enough, only to have the very people who don't think it's distinct enough derail everything. It seems more important to them to "make a stand" for "real FA editors" against "the rabble", and the principal point of it seems to be nothing but denigrating other editors and their work just because they don't think giant quotation marks or huge garish boxes are the right approach. It's even more ridiculous than the "infobox wars". It's like burning the stadium down rather than compromise in the slightest way on what code of football to play today. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 00:23, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Look, SM, you're obviously under stress right now and I feel bad for what you seem to be going through. All I said is that sometimes, in some articles, there's a place for boxed quotes, and that a complete ban on them is wrongheaded. I have nothing to do with any of these cosmic conflicts you refer to. For God's sake snap out of it, and let's have back the levelheaded Sandy McCandlish we know and love. E Eng 03:45, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

@EEng: I'm not "under stress", I just take NPoV policy seriously. What you just said there is a reasonably phrased statement, nothing like the straw-man hatchet job you pulled in your sidebar at WT:MOS. As to the meat of the question: What place is there for boxed quotes? Define it with precision, please. Now justify that in reference to ENC, NOT, NPOV, NOR, etc. Now, how you are going to actually limit applications of this style to only what that supposed definable and justifiable role is, especially when we all know for a fact that the majority of uses of these quoteboxes are PoV-laden highlighting of particular viewpoints? How would you stem that tide? After all that, riddle me this: Why do you give a damn when virtually no one else on WP wants these things?

I did an experiment about a year ago. I took the first 100 articles that came up using one of the decorate quote templates, and converted every single one of them to standard {{Quote}}, citing MOS:BQ, except two which were genuine pull quotes, and in both cases there was no need for a pull quote, so I simply removed them. A total of 0 (zero) out of 100 of these changes was reverted or even questioned. The bare fact of the matter is that approximately a dozen editors are hot, hot, hot for decorative quotes and no one else is. A number of other, mostly noob, editors insert them because they have not read MOS:BQ and are just copy-catting what they saw in some other article. The vast majority of articles follows MOS:BQ. This has been proven with incontrovertible numbers at the (original, not hijacked) RfC at WT:MOS. The only conclusion that can reasonably be reached is that use of décor quotes is a bloggish/tabloid style that a tiny handful of editors are promoting and who will fight to death to keep it, when no one else wants this garbage here. It's the tail wagging the dog. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 07:47, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

I agree that probably few editors understand how to use quote boxes properly, and that they have a place in relatively few articles -- perhaps no more than 99 1 out of 100 (or ~~100~~ 1 out of 101). Maybe that means they're not worth the trouble and should be banned, I don't know (though I doubt it). But all I said is that there is a place for them, and that many who object to them are those of the school that think that being dull and dry is a sign of article quality.

I'm actually sorry, at this point, to hear that you say you're not under stress, because at least it would explain all this: "I cannot say that Mailer was drunk the whole time he was on camera. I can only hope he was drunk." Can we stop now? E Eng 13:25, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure if you mean to imply that 1% of articles should have quote boxes, or are sarcastically saying 99% should. "Dry" and "dull" aren't even the same thing, in writing terms. Can you diff someone saying our articles should be dull? Can you also diff them saying quote boxes should be removed? If not, you are projecting stuff from your imagination onto other editors. It's difficult to get any clear picture of why you want quote boxes, other than a vague sense that anything that isn't "dry" or "dull" should be permitted. So, why don't we add reader opinion polls, links to gossip, embarrassing photos, and 1,000 other things that aren't dry and dull, if the need to decorate is so overwhelming? Why does it exactly have to be quote boxes, when we know that the typical use of them is WP:UNDUE? I'm sorry you seem to think I'm not approaching this rationally. I think my questions indicate I have the same concern about those in favor of quote boxes, and are the questions themselves not rational? What questions are the opposition asking? None, they're just engaging in character assassination. Ad hominem is the last refuge of someone who has no logical reason for their stance. The more I ask such questions the more the collective answer comes back that we should have quote boxes "just because". I actually said this almost word-for-word over a week ago, and the situation has worsened not improved, despite more people being asked such questions in clearer terms. That fact is very meaningful. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 20:04, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant 1/100 or 1/101 of course -- hadn't had my coffee yet. Here's someone saying articles should be "cold" (open the collapse box -- and don't fail to note the reactions from others in the thread that immediately follows). You may very well be right that typical uses of quote boxes are UNDUE (or tabloid- or blog-ish), and I repeat that "Maybe that means they're not worth the trouble and should be banned, I don't know (though I doubt it)." I'm sure we'll be collaborating happily again in the near future. E Eng 20:24, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

"Cold", "dry", and "dull" aren't the same thing. Encyclopedic writing is "cold" in being neutral and fact-cite-fact-cite, compared to "fiery" investigation and "flaming" public relations and marking prose, which may be mostly nonse with no basis, but full of emotion. It's also "dry" in being focused on neutrally presented, significant facts in a logical order, versus "juicy" in using supposition, out-of-context inflammatory quotations, "weird" but irrelevant details designed to provoke a reaction, etc. It's only "dull" if the writers suck. But the typical justification for quote boxes (other than "to highlight this because it's important" – i.e., to push an editor's particular PoV) is "to break up blocks of text". This is why we have section headings, and an encyclopedia article is meant to mostly be blocks of text; someone who hates blocks of text should not be editing here, but making YouTube videos. Anyway, I agree this will blow over, and apologize if I was overreacting. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 11:43, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Apology accepted, though it really isn't necessary. We all have our moments. E Eng 14:54, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Quote boxes

Now that you're haranguing at least two Featured article writers about quote boxes I'm going to request that you disengage and find something else to do. Your use of derisive language like "people not involved in FA horse-trading", "decorative, cutesy quote framing or side-barring gimmicks", and "WOW! CHECK THIS OUT! tacky reader lure" indicate to me that you've left logic behind and are pushing an agenda. The next stop will be discretionary sanctions for you. --Laser brain (talk) 22:33, 2 September 2016 (UTC)

@Laser brain: I concede that the "horse-trading" comment was unnecessarily provocative, though hardly an attack and probably not even uncivil, just disgruntled and expressive of consternation at "wikipolitics". It is certainly not difficult to show particular FA-focused parties backing each other up inappropriately; other admins have pointed it out before themselves, about the specific parties now announcing at least temporary departures [2] (conveniently just as ARCA starts looking like it may authorize DS for the "infobox wars").

But where are your DS threats about flat-out attack comments made at WT:FAC today? "Machinations", "regularly targeted ... by editors ... pushing a[n] ... agenda", "have opened up a new line of attack", "very small groups ... are targeting the work of a very small number [of FA editors]", etc., are all uncivil aspersions, direct accusations of conspiratorial bad faith. It's a serious claim levied en masse, with no evidence at all, against everyone with a differing viewpoint. Oh, never mind; you just repeated the attack yourself and added another: "you've left logic behind and are pushing an agenda". I note also your post at the same talk page indicating you have a very firmly pre-determined view of the entire debate and are itching to crack the heads of one side of the issue [3], despite the personal-attack evidence all pointing in the other direction.

This is what WP:INVOLVED means, and you should step away. You seem to be at least as emotionally invested in this debate as the parties you're supposedly intervening between, and unmistakably taking one side. You quite explicitly side with all three of those individuals here, and say you plan to step in at FAC to fill their impending vacancy. But one even makes it clear that the dispute in question doesn't even have much to do with his departure, and the others say nothing about it.

What I've said, that you object to, is backed by very clear logic. There is no civility issue whatsoever is characterizing an unencyclopedic, PoV-pushing, and MoS-deprecated content framing technique as decorative, cutesy, gimmicky, tacky, or functionally a lure. It has zero to do with any editor, and casts aspersions at no one, but is strictly about whether the content presentation is properly encyclopedic. It's no different from saying "ain't" doesn't belong in our articles for several similar reasons, or that we don't use giant all-caps headlines at Wikipedia for more such reasons.

I hadn't bothered going this route yet, but I can certainly source external materials indicating what decorative quotation presentation is for and why it should not be used here. [Sourcing material moved to subsection for later reuse.]

I can do this all day (and it's not even wasted sourcing, since our articles on such matters actually need work). But I guess being able to actually back up what I'm saying means I've "left logic behind" to "push an agenda"? The only thing I'm "pushing" is what any editor should: that WP:ENC, the WP:CCPOL and WP:NOT aren't a bunch of optional nonsense. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 12:53, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

PS: I definitely do have other things to do. I haven't touched the related WT:MOS RfC since 1 September, I think, and like Brianboulton, I completely left the Thorpe affair article and talk page alone for a long time, both after dispute started, and after the original parties said their initial piece in response to Boulton's review (in which he reinstated many of my edits despite being angry with me). I trusted the matter to resolve itself with normal discussion if I just left. I returned to find a train wreck, with predictable parties (directly canvassed in the open by SchroCat) accusing everyone who disagreed with them of being in an anti-FA conspiracy. Surely it must be wicked collusion by an MoS cabal! People not summoned by SchroCat couldn't possibly be commenting there because the article was mentioned prominently in two recent RfCs, right? "Incontheivable!" [Should I have put that in a giant quote box? Heh.] It was patent assumption of bad faith, but I don't see you or anyone else leaving {{Ds/alert}}s about that. I'm a much more convenient target. If I left Ds/alerts, despite it being the approach ArbCom demands, I'm sure I'd get accused of "disruption" or something. I left one the other day and all it did was generate more drama. This strikes me as "non-optimal" process. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 14:00, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Surely you are familiar with the concepts of logos and pathos. When I say you've left logic behind, I'm referring to your derisive and provocative remarks which create an unneeded appeal to emotion rather than logic. And don't insult my intelligence by claiming you don't have an agenda. You're quite right that I'm taking sides—I take the side of anyone who's here to create content and has to drop what they're doing to read your walls of text and argue about things like infoboxes and quote boxes. That includes people who are labeled as pro-infobox. Your various arguments that amount to, "Well why aren't you talking to Jimmy about his behavior?" are needless diversions from the point, a problem I see people trying to bring to your attention frequently. I'm quite well aware that I'm emotionally invested in this issue and won't be applying any sanctions personally. I will seek them at the appropriate venue. I don't intend to pursue this discussion with you any further, because you've essentially indicated that you view others' behavior as problematic and not your own, and that you are fully justified in blowing up talk pages for days on end to push your interpretations of style. You saw to it that Darkfrog was banned for the same behavior—maybe you should take a second to realize you're now cooking yourself in your own stock. --Laser brain (talk) 14:25, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

@Laser brain: Fair point! Appeal to emotion is actually central to the very reason that pull-quote styling doesn't belong in an encyclopedia, so it would be hypocritical for me to engage in it while opposing it. I concede that using florid language like I did can have that effect, and I shouldn't get worked up that way. And, yes, I'm clearly also wordier than you and several others prefer. Aside from that, what would you advise, though, about how to participate in these discussions? (Other than "just run away from every so-called style dispute and let the chaos of random whims reign" of course; I obviously care about stability, consistency, and not using style arguments to dodge policies – this matters.) I redacted a bunch of diffs and gripes about SchroCat and Cassianto at WT:FAC, in the interests of peace, and also quoted Schro positively.

No one is more aware than me how many people want to pillory me and all other MoS regulars. (Actually, I think I can specifically enumerate those who do, and why.) I'm not complaining that particular other parties aren't being punished (I think the whole ArbCom punishment regime is detrimental when not applied strictly to reader-facing content PoV-war behavior like "my ethnicity versus yours" and "crystal healing is real science" crap). The complaint is that "down with MoS" rants full of gross incivility almost never receive any "please don't do that" response from admins, but any slight line-crossing from an MoS regular will, like we're being held to higher standards than anyone else. The administrative response to style disputes is to side against anyone seeking guideline compliance about 80 to 90% of the time. The regular editors of no other guidelines on the system have to live with a whole array of Damoclean swords over their heads like that. No one gives a damn if we feel stressed out and attacked. We're those "twattish MoS nutters", remember. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 18:36, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

Aside from that, what would you advise, though, about how to participate in these discussions?: Don't think for a minute I don't care about the MoS. I spent years working as a technical writer, teaching college English comp, and helping doctoral students edit their theses. I've used and even written manuals of style. To me it was something to have in mind as I authored content or graded student papers. I've also brought MoS compliance issues to writers' attention thousands of times. Usually there is no fuss, but sometimes there is. I suppose I've learned to pick my battles over time and I've also learned that the world is more "shades of grey" than it is black and white. I don't have to be right all the time and I don't lose sleep if something is contrary to a MoS entry—especially when the author has a thought-out response to why they diverted. My job as an FAC coordinator here is to assess consensus for promotion, but I also personally look at each candidate before I consider promoting it. If it's not in compliance with the MoS, I'm going to look to see if a reviewer caught it. If not, I'll make a comment myself and see if it was an oversight or if the author has a rationale. It's somewhere between there and creating pages of discussion and frustration that you and I have a disconnect. Maybe you can help me out there, maybe not. --Laser brain (talk) 17:30, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

@Laser brain: Thanks, that helps a lot. I'm not sure yet how to address the matter you highlight since it arises from everyone frustratedly/frustratingly discussing. This would continue indefinitely even if I keeled over dead this very hour. I am trying to come up with ways to approach the matter differently, e.g. turning to external style guide sources to "back up" what MoS says, as long as the sourcing can be used more productively and isn't wasted research time. It doesn't seem to help moods, though it does tend to resolve a dispute in a particular direction (and has even led to MoS changes, e.g. MOS:JR). I just have to figure out a way to approach this more effectively (in the "how to make friends and influence people" sense); I come from two professional backgrounds – civil liberties activism and standards-compliant coding – which color my approach too much. Or maybe I'm just an asshole (people who think so seem unaware how much my approach has changed since ca. 2012, or how deeply troubled I was about the "bird caps" fiasco, and how hard I've worked to prevent a repeat of it over other matters). I could try obsequious wording, but this is actually one of the things that infuriated people about the indeffed MoS editor you mentioned (along with the 7 years of "source the MoS itself" campaigning); it comes across as patronizing and insincere if one is too polite in making a point.

Anyone is going to be "frustrated" if, as a native or at least fluent speaker, they deeply feel they know the one true way to use the language, even if they know intellectually this isn't really true (variant: as a professional in X, they have conviction there is only one proper way to write something about X, even if no one does it that way except in topical journals). If they feel really strongly about it, they'll demonize, and drum up support from other people irritated about some different and unrelated style peccadillo, using "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" reasoning, when there should be no enemy-think at all [cf. injection of the "MoS people chased away productive bird editors over capitalisation" myth into the FAC discussion]. It's rooted in topical territory control, not reader needs.

I don't have an easy answer for the overall "MoS turmoil" problem other than to keep angling for consistency [disputes mostly arise where we lack it], discouraging "because I wanna" exceptions that don't have a legit IAR basis [breeds more demands for exceptions], pointing out when people are using their personal frustration/desire as an excuse to attack people and foment anti-MoS cabals [like the anti-diacritics "wikiproject" that got MfDed as a NOTHERE / GREATWRONGS canvassing farm]. I try to remind people that we have MoS and other guidelines not as documentation for what the world should do or most commonly does [most printed, edited material, by orders of magnitude, is daily news writing in a much less formal style]. It's simply a set of internal, reader-oriented game rules so we're all playing the same game instead of standing on the field fighting about what game to play. The particular rules often don't matter much; just agreeing to something so we can get on with it is the point.

The MoS regulars have loved that the FAC regulars include MoS compliance in the FA criteria; we just wished this was adhered to more firmly because of the "this FA doesn't comply so none of my articles have to, either" pattern, which is growing. (CITEVAR is another issue, too; it was created to reduce fights over cite formatting, but has PoV-forked from the rationale of ENGVAR and DATEVAR to instead enable OWN-ish claims down to the one-character level. I see that FAC gets plenty of "don't you dare touch my cites" debate, stemming from the same territorial instincts as "give me this style variance or else".) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 01:00, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

Sourcing on pull-quote styling

This can be re-used to improve articles like Pull quote.

As just one example, here's several statements from a magazine's [see WP:NOT#MAGAZINE] house style guide [4]:

"Quotes are used to emphasize excerpts of text." ["Emphasis" is anti-NPoV, especially with a quotation, i.e. with presentation of one person/organization's own viewpoint.]
"we need to provide [our readers] with some focus anchors to fix their attention to the most important parts of our articles." ["Steering" readers and trying to make them accept the editor's view of what is important is directly against NOR policy.]
"They are used to pull a text passage out of the reader’s flow and give it a more dominant position in the post or the article." [Do I even need to comment? This is anti-encyclopedic on both counts.]
But this contrasts very sharply with what they say about block quotes (the kind MOS:BQ calls for): "Just like a pull quote ... block quotations ... are also set off from the main text as a distinct paragraph or block. ...[but] are usually placed within the reader’s flow." [This is exactly what MoS says to do.]

Here's a source for the fact the the style is an explicit "lure", in an definition of the pull quote style, from one of the most reputable publishers in the entire field of online copy and content presentation, SitePoint [5]:

"It’s a device designed to isolate and visually highlight a particularly interesting sentence within the body copy. It’s a 'lure' intended to draw skimmers into the content." [Hard to get any clearer than that this is a PoV and NOR problem.]

National Geographic Style Guide, on not misusing pull-quote style for block quotations or sidebars:

"pull quotes [should] be just that, material pulled [i.e., repeated] from the text and not stand-alone information." [6]

Just a few examples from a couple of minutes on Google. I haven't even delved into things like The Chicago Manual of Style on this question yet.

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For the Arbitration Committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:04, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

IB question

Hi -- I have a question about the current and past infobox debates that I hope you can answer for me. Since this is such a divisive topic, perhaps I should preface this with a couple of quick points. As far as I know you and I have never interacted much, and certainly not with any rancour that I can recall, and not over infoboxes. I've removed infoboxes from some but not all articles I've worked on and have had a few discussions about those cases, but it's never become unpleasant. I've not read the Arbcom infobox case and was only vaguely aware of it; I've looked at barely any of the many links to the debates that have been provided in the most recent discussions. You can consider me mostly ignorant of the history, but aware it exists.

My question is about a particular point that I see made that I'd like to hear your side of. A couple of times, people have said that certain FA writers, and FA articles in general, are being treated differently by editors who feel infoboxes are high value. (I'm trying to avoid using "pro-infobox" and "anti-infobox" as I don't think either is a fair characterization.) I feel sure you would not agree that they are being targeted in any way, but I'm curious to know how that relationship looks from your side. Are they wrong when they say that editors try to add infoboxes to their articles more often than random chance would appear to suggest? I have written dozens of FAs to which an infobox might be added, but I've only rarely seen that discussion on those talk pages. What is it that leads to these discussions happening, and why do you feel it appears to some editors that they are being singled out? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library)

@Mike Christie: I'm just going to do a brain-dump that goes beyond your question, because I need to write it out to help sort it all in my own head. It's been a long day.

I have't seen FAs singled out prorammatically. At an MfD against a page written by Gerda Arendt (claimed to be the most "pro-infobox" person, or something to that effect), it's actually being alleged that she adds about an infobox per day to random articles, which is "un-targeting". Then someone else claims they're all about him and "his" articles (but that's not actually borne out by the data on the page in question).

I think the most obvious explanation of the I-box/FA connection is that everyone who is focused on "the best" articles, which includes many people who have a tendency to favor infoboxes are part of a "complete article package", if you will, is very protective of them, and very certain that there's one way, or a sharply limited number of ways, to do them well. An infobox-favoring person really into FAs is naturally going to want to make sure FAs have them, and that might be an overriding concern for them. Someone opposed to infoboxes (in reality, more often opposed to infoboxes only either wikiproject WP:LOCALCONSENSUS party lines like "no I-boxes for classical music", or against them in certain general types of articles, e.g. biographies) feels the same way about FA, just that an i-box is an "eyesore" or whatever on them, and may consider them a detriment to to act against. Either group may act without discussion, knowing full well it's apt to produce dispute. This is what people are getting at about both sides being disruptive. (There are really many sides – mine is that good ones are generally helpful, especially for mobile users, but are best in long articles, and rarely useful in stubs except when the add some special feature like the original infobox, {{Taxobox}} does.) Regardless of alleged targeting, when really it's mostly just half a dozen or so people who care enough about I-boxes to argue and argue and argue about them every day, the same people show up in ever other discussion, whether they've edited the article or not. They'll make nonsensical arguments like "you haven't even editing this article!" when they haven't either. It's all about WP:WINNING. And WP:FAC, WP:GAN, etc. provide forums for them all to get together and fight regularly, giving an illusion of "targeting" (probably to everyone).

Anyway, I think "targeted" is just battlegrounding and demonizing conspiracy theory language designed to further polarize the debate. And I would not be surprised if there's someone somewhere saying that FA editors who don't like infoboxes (at all, or in particular cases) are "targeting" various FAs for infobox deletion. Most of the claims made by one side against the other are made vice versa, though it is very clear that the bulk of the civility problems are coming from opposers of the addition of i-boxes to FAs and GAs and PRed articles in which the feel they have a stake. And I know that this deletion is happening, without consensus, since I've witnessed it myself. I've also seen lots of squabbling to add one.

A serious complication, that no one ever seems to address, is that because of WP:EDITING policy, we're expected to be adding information and consensus-permissible features to articles, not removing material from them unless there's a policy rationale or an obvious common sense reason to do so. This combines with WP:CONSENSUS, which defaults to the presumption that content long present and stable has tacit consensus, but cannot possibly presume that content not present has consensus to be absent (otherwise WP would have one article, with only the first edit ever made to it). It's a necessary but non obvious fact (cf. the "discovery" of gravity) that policy presumes that an infobox can be added without a prior consensus discussion (though someone might controvert its addition leading to discussion), while one should not be removed without prior consensus, unless there's a policy based reason to do it (e.g. BLP - criminal infobox used some singer's page as vandalism) or some other obviously actionable reason (e.g. totally incorrect, like a dog beed i-box on a cat article, but often, as in that example, replacement is better than removal). I tend to feel this is never going to be aired, that ArbCom or whatever is just going to "kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out" without any sensitivity to the how-WP-works nuances.

There's a tense discussion happening at WT:FAC about the personalities and "camps", but I'm not sure how constructive it will ever be. It feels like being a peasant in the hall of the king, the attitude is so thick in there. (FAC people are "content writers" you see, and everyone else is not, especially not those "inexperienced" "MoS obsessives", etc., etc. Ridiculous levels of false dichotomy and territorializing, but probably cannot be helped much due to the nature of that beast; FA is actually hard work, and no one wants to chase away FA editors, even if some are being WP:JERKs about something, frequently.)

On the up side, I see increased support in all these venues for:

The idea that MOS:INFOBOX needs to spell out why/when to have an infobox and what kinds of things should be in it, instead of just throwing up its hands and saying "argue about it at each article".
Recognition that WP:ARBINFOBOX actually made matters much worse, by demanding it be argued at each article, and being punitive toward site-wide discussion of the matter if the issue at hand is particular article. (This is yet another case of ArbCom being a separation of powers failure, the wikicourt dictating what the wikilegislature/parliament is allowed to enact.)
DS: The ongoing WP:ARCA requests to enable WP:AC/DS in this area might, finally, actually happen, so that vicious incivility and disruptive editwarring can be dealt with swiftly (they haven't been to date because, while WP:ARBATC enables DS for MoS/AT matters generally, the perpetual argument is that infoboxes are content not style, and that MoS having a section on style relating to them doesn't make them a style matter per se, so on one's been willing to apply DS to "infobox wars" to date, that I know of).

On the down side, see thread above this; some admins seem already to want to use (or have others use) the forthcoming DS to go after only those in favor of adding infoboxes, as a general class, instead of using it to address actual disruption problems regardless of "side", and I can easily see some big drama coming out of that if it's pursued that way. I'm sure if you ask someone else you'll get a radically different answer. :-) Personally, I think this isn't really about infoboxes at all, but actually about territorial control; it exactly mirrors the "our wikiproject says you can't put an infobox on our articles" nonsense that led to ARBINFOBOX in the first place; it's not about FAs, but about whether "outsiders" have a "vote" in content development after someone stakes a claim. It's localconsensuses against the whole rest of the project. This is clear as day to me, but no one wants to address that either. I firmly predict that in a few years, the community will finally say "enough! we've told you before there are no WP:VESTED editors", a bunch of FA people and wikiproject people will quit, hands will be wrung, and other editors will fill the gaps over time. That's what's always happened in similar matters. People have quit over date formatting, citation style, capital letters, commas, you name it. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 19:45, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

I appreciate the extra detail; it helps me understand your position. There's just one thing I'd like to respond to -- you say 'FAC people are "content writers" you see, and everyone else is not, especially not those "inexperienced" "MoS obsessives", etc.'. I understand that you wrote that as a parody, but I think it's inaccurate. I consider myself a "FAC person", and I don't recognize that attitude in myself or in any of the other editors I deal with regularly. I'm sure there is polarization as well as discourtesy, and no doubt some people have expressed unreasonable opinions, but personally I'd appreciate it if at a minimum you would qualify sentences like that with "some FAC people", rather than giving the group a monolithic character. I wouldn't consider myself a "MoS person", though I like the MoS, but I'd object to anyone saying "MoS people are X". Thanks -- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:38, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

@Mike Christie: Certainly agreed. I was parodying, but using direct quotations of things people at WT:FAC posted only yesterday. What I posted over there myself repeatedly impresses upon the participants that the dichotomies and polarizations editors are bandying about are illusory and silly; sorry that my point in this regard wasn't clearer here. I certainly don't mean to imply that most FAC participants really hold this viewpoint. It's just that the tenor of the discussion has turned in this direction (and often far worse, e.g. "twatty MoS nutter", etc.).

A side essay that relates to all this in a background manner: I would say I expect it to just blow over, but it's been my experience otherwise. E.g., in the same forum, someone is repeating the "evil MoS people chased away birds editors" myth, and I'm sure will repeat it again in a year and in five years. What really happened is about half a dozen people ran that wikiproject aground by picking fights all over WP for a very long time, then quit in a huff when they did not get what they wanted. One of them had been loudly "quitting Wikipedia" since 2005, and two of them were constantly agitating about how worthless WP is and how they should go start their own more reliable online ornithology encyclopedia, etc. Just a whole pile of WP:NOTHERE, including what they were fighting over to begin with. (They were trying to force onto WP a specific organization's draft bird names standard, with very little real-world adoption, then apply rules from it to all other biological categories, and even updating that third-party organization's website, as they went along, on the status of WP's use of their "standard". Raised serious WP:COI, WP:SOAPBOX and other concerns.) But it's just so very much easier to say "damn those MoS nuts! they drove away some editors!" What MoS people really did is bring to a close years of trouble caused by one project with many others, compounded by attempts to PoV-fork guidelines, etc. The one productive editor out of the three who did quit during this mess explicitly stated he was retiring for a number of reasons, and had already left almost a year before the big RfC finally settled this stuff, but in the mythology, the MoS RfC drove him away.

People like to mythologize things like this in anti-MoS/AT ways because everyone has at least one thing they disagree with in MoS; if you're just really adamant about that one thing, it's easy to manufacture allies who don't care about it but have their own nit to pick, and all feel they could get their heart's desire if only MoS would just die. It's like blaming "the damned government". Very easy to do, because if you're not unhappy with the road maintenance, you're probably irritated about the tax rate, or some international policy matter, without any of these things being related in any way. People do this about MoS especially, versus other guidelines, because of the innate sense that native (and even fluent non-native) speakers have that they are masters of the language, thus any divergence from what they're used to or prefer must be an error, something substandard. It doesn't matter how much proof you have that this is not the case, the feeling is hard for some people to shake. The MOS:JR hair-pulling is a great example. Various editors were utterly convinced that it must, always, be written "X. Y. Zounds, Jr." in American English, because they were American and old enough (like me) to have learned this in grammar school. After being shown proof that the convention is increasingly abandoned in American publications and now a minority usage, and never existed elsewhere, thus something WP can dispense with, several (four, I think) continued to insist it was a hard-and-fast rule in AmEng no matter what and fought page by page to stop MOS:JR's implementation for about three months, failing to carry the day at a single RM discussion, but never giving up until the last article. We see this sort of thing all the time, and MoS people get backwards-blamed for it. There's a reason most MoS regulars quit after a few years. It's very stressful to be ganged up on over personal and unrelated peccadilloes, especially when you know that if it were not for MOS, editors would be at each other's throats all day long, page after page, fighting over every imaginable style quirk, just as society would collapse if "the damned government" disappeared. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 15:39, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

If I may, one of the reasons things might get mythologised is because that can be easier than reading what people are saying, especially if people (like you) are saying a lot and in a rather forceful manner. I've been following this on and off for a few days, and I am wondering if you realise the impression you give with some of your posts? You clearly know the history very well, and feel strongly about this, and you often make excellent points, but sometimes people are left with their impressions rather than the detail of what you have said. My view tends to be that you need people to make decisions on MoS, but they need to be the people that are knowledgeable about the issues, but aren't the ones that get attracted to MoS in the first place. And good writers both know when to deviate from a MoS and when to let a style issue go (if they were submitting for professional publication, they would mostly just let the copyeditor do their job and various mechanisms smooth any friction - Wikipedia lets the two roles rub up against each other, with predictable consequences). i.e. you need writers, copyeditors and an overall editorial board/management, not a crowd-sourced overlapping mixture. And now I am risking saying too much... :-) Carcharoth (talk) 05:18, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

@Carcharoth: No doubt, on all counts. That's why I've mostly just walked away from this all for the last two days other than a couple of minor responses. As for the latter matter, yeah, I've been saying for years that the only reason we have all this drama over "style issues" (which are very often not style matters at all, but CCPOL matters filtered through a style lens) is that WP's "everyone can edit" nature gives people the false impression that "everyone can edit the MoS to get what they demand", or (more mildly) "everyone can edit the MoS well", and both are mistakes. It's a specialized niche that requires an tremendous amount of research into transcontinental linguistic norms and trends, the differences between numerous types and registers of writing, careful balancing between conflicting expectations, and even more careful balancing of all of them against what WP needs stability-wise and what readers need consistency-wise. MoS is infrastructure, not content, and self-proclaimed "content editors" are often very poor information and communications architects, even if skilled at working within the structure that's built a little for them and mostly for the audience. It's like the difference between actors and stagecraft people. Some have great skill at both, but not very often. My own shortcomings (in either role) stem from an activist background, mostly making me more argumentative than necessary. I work on it, but canvassing factions tend to push me pretty hard. I just hope whoever closes the RfC looks at the policy arguments and doesn't just count ILIKEIT votes, but my hopes are not high due to the anti-MoS bias among the admin pool. <shrug> I've bot bigger fish (interesting Linux stuff, for pay) on the line right now keeping my mind mostly off of this stuff. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 05:49, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:List of European countries by average wage

Done

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Nomination for deletion of Template:Lino

Done

– Commented over there.

Template:Lino has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Codename Lisa (talk) 09:32, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Linum

Template:Linum has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Codename Lisa (talk) 09:36, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

@Codename Lisa: One's enough, and please do them as a group nom, so we don't have to comment over and over. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 09:37, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for September 5

Fixed

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Quote template RfC research

Hi, SMcCandlish. I want to thank you for researching third-party stylebooks and presenting your findings to the RfC participants. Your work simplifies things for the rest of us. Kudos. Fdssdf (talk) 04:06, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

@Fdssdf: No prob; I do that regularly to bring interminable style disputes to a close. Unfortunately, due to construction at my place, most of my books are packed up, so I don't have access to the bulk of the works I usually turn to (I own almost every major style guide published in living memory). — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 05:36, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

New article improvement drives

Check out the following new article improvement drives and contests. North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 11:41, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:The 10,000 Challenge – aims to reach 10,000 article improvements for UK- and Ireland-related articles
Wikipedia:WikiProject Africa/The 10,000 Challenge – aims to reach 10,000 article improvements for Africa-related articles

Editing other people's posts

Do not edit other people's posts. It isn't up to you to shut down or merge someone else's RfC.

I don't know whether you've been alerted to the MoS discretionary sanctions within the last year, but in case not (and, as I understand it, the repetition is necessary for reasons I've never fathomed), here it is again. Someone is likely to take this situation with you to AE, AN/I or ArbCom. You should pull back before that happens. SarahSV ^(talk) 23:35, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

This message contains important information about an administrative situation on Wikipedia. It does not imply any misconduct regarding your own contributions to date.

Please carefully read this information:

The Arbitration Committee has authorised discretionary sanctions to be used for pages regarding the English Wikipedia Manual of Style and article titles policy, a topic which you have edited. The Committee's decision is here.

Discretionary sanctions is a system of conduct regulation designed to minimize disruption to controversial topics. This means uninvolved administrators can impose sanctions for edits relating to the topic that do not adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, our standards of behavior, or relevant policies. Administrators may impose sanctions such as editing restrictions, bans, or blocks. This message is to notify you sanctions are authorised for the topic you are editing. Before continuing to edit this topic, please familiarise yourself with the discretionary sanctions system. Don't hesitate to contact me or another editor if you have any questions.

See WP:REFACTOR and WP:KETTLE. You know full well it's perfectly acceptable and appropriate to refactor, and did so in the very discussion we're both seeking closure of. You also know that duplicate requests should be combined. This particular bit of revert-warring, which seems to be your go-to tactic, just helps demonstrate the validity of my concerns about your camp believing WP's rules (and exceptions thereto) only apply when you want them to, and are bent to serve page content over-control interests. See also the instructions at {{ds/alert}}; one is not to be left if one has already been received in the last year for the same case. Your leaving this one also constitutes self-notice; you'd do well to keep that in mind and not join in on the dismissive verbal vitriol your friends are spewing against all MoS editors, all editors who want FAs to follow guidelines, and all editors who are aren't FAC people (depending on how wide a holier-than-thou net of aspersion and denigration they're casting).

Now that I think of it: please stay off my talk page entirely unless you are leaving a procedural notice, or are here to post something constructive, collaborative, and collegial. I can't for the life of me remember when was the last time that happened, if ever. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 20:37, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Washo language

Disregard

– RfC was too vague to answer.

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Any further thoughts?

Done

See Talk:Universum Film AG#Requested move 22 August 2016. I nudged Wbm1058 to respond to your proposal, so you ought to have the same chance. I was about to close this as No Consensus but was hoping for a final flurry of opinions. The sticking point for any logically-minded closer is that the current title, Universum Film AG, is not actually the name of the company but of a predecessor company. So if it the RM closes as 'No Consensus' the article is stuck at an obsolete name. Thanks, EdJohnston (talk) 16:19, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

@EdJohnston: I commented again, but would suggest relisting. No one's really done a proper WP:COMMONNAME analysis, and I'm actually taking a while off, for the most part, due to too much anti-MoS drama lately making this place unpleasant and a source of stress rather than interest for me. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 09:30, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

Don't be a Coward

Add your defense of RFCs at Coward to your list of eloquent writings so I can quote it again in the future. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 20:33, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

Heh. If you mean the one about FRC and "lemmings" it's a bit specific to that discussion. But it's the sort of general point I make frequently. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 01:17, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Han Chinese

Done

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What I just thanked you for

On ARCA you basically said everything I was trying to say in fewer words, and even got in something I forgot, about feeling sympathy for one who feels they have been wrongly accused and who wants to leave the project as a result. That kind of situation certainly does suck. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 12:32, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

@Hijiri88: Thanks. It's a rare day I say something in fewer words than someone else! Ha ha. Anyway, I'm honestly feeling that way again. There's a bit of a mutiny/coup in the air, with a handful of editors in a certain faction, many with admin bits, trying to exempt themselves from site-wide guidelines (or just eliminate the guidelines), and there's a good chance they'll actually succeed, to the detriment of the entire project. (See the proposals and venting at WT:FAC, and related canvassing party at WT:MOS.) Meanwhile, myself and others are being personally attacked by this crowd multiple times per day and no admin will lift a finger because of the topic of the debate and the friends this group have cultivated. This is starting to feel like a shitty, thankless job instead of an enjoyable hobby. I've certainly been more productive in other areas of my life just by taking a "max of about an hour per day" semi-wikibreak, and ignoring the project completely on some days. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 07:07, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

End of days

The apocalypse is upon us, Mac! I just discovered that my favorite evolutionary biologist, global domestication expert, and current dog/wolf research leader Larson has 2 cats at home: http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/11/genes-turned-wildcats-kitty-cats Regards, William Harris |talk 11:09, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

@William Harris: They conveniently poop in a box, and don't demand walks! Ha ha. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 15:30, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

No, I have never experienced a cat seizing me by the right arm and dragging me out of my chair towards the door at walk time. However, if I had owned a cheetah........ Regards, William Harris |talk 20:54, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

@William Harris: If you get into Landrace and related articles (Breed, Cultivar, Breed standard, Hybrid (biology), Crossbreed, Purebred, "List of whatever breeds" articles, etc.), please keep me in the loop. I have a long-term WP:STEWARDSHIP interest in our coverage of the topic, but haven't had much time to devote to it lately due to work deadlines. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 03:31, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

I shall, Mac, and that would tie in with your earlier interest - and our joint redevelopment - of the Domestication article. The Landrace article would benefit from a review and the addition of citations from quality secondary sources, rather than from the odd few agricultural journals. Regards, William Harris |talk 07:55, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, 2016

Done

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Please comment on Wikipedia:New pages patrol/RfC for patroller right

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Re: my topic ban

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Kindly stop slandering and making false accusations against me. I reside regularly in a country where Wikipedia is blocked, and I do not have the time and energy to jump through VPN and get into edit wars. Yes I did take a long break to recollect myself after having bad experiences with article editing, not to mention full time employment commitments, which means I only read WP articles these days. The user which I filed a complaint against in fact was being disruptive in the main China articles, which led back to FLG. So if someone was misbehaving, am I not allowed to document their behavior?

If there was a way of getting someone's attention to this user's behavior without appealing, I would have. I spoke with the WP IRC and they recommended me to file an appeal, which got me here. You are frankly insulting me by suggesting that I am "bidding my time", when I fact don't even want to have anything to do with FLG in real life anymore, let alone online. I was only dragged back to FLG because of one user's disruptive editing, and as it demonstrated, WP admins are fare more concerned with procedure than actual content.--PCPP (talk) 15:04, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

@PCPP: This appears to be in reference to Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Falun Gong#Amendment request: Falun Gong. (September 2016). I didn't make any accusation, false or otherwise, and you seem unclear on what slander actually means (and should read WP:NOLEGALTHREATS very carefully if you think you do know what it means).

I simply observed the clear and indisputable fact that you were disavowing an interest in Falun Gong matters while simultaneously pursuing further Falun Gong-related disputes (which ArbCom itself also noted - the first Arb comment is that your pursuit of that dispute was a violation of the topic ban you are asking them to lift). Expressing an opinion/assessment of what this pattern looked like, I also reasoned that your request to have your Falun Gong t-ban rescinded – on pretty much no basis but a clearly counterfactual assertion that you had no interest in Falun Gong on Wikipedia any longer – should obviously not be granted. I stand by that reasoning, and the commenting Arbs unanimously agreed with it. The fact that you're on my talk page arguing with me about your Falun Gong t-ban is in fact another violation of that t-ban (yes, even if you abbreviate it "FLG"), for which you could be blocked. I strongly suggest you WP:DROPTHESTICK and find something else to occupy your time, and toward that end am marking this discussion closed so you don't violate your t-ban even further.

As a summary of average propensity, I think that "WP admins are far[...] more concerned with procedure than actual content" is accurate, though there are of course individual exceptions; similarly most cops don't care why I might be stealing food, they're still going to arrest me if they catch me doing it. Given that the admin pool in the aggregate leans toward bureaucratic enforcement regardless of the merits of the points under discussion, this is simply further reason for you to avoid bringing up Falun Gong discussions, in any form for any reason, on this site. If you're already certain your treatment will be unjust, then complaining to me about the injustice is rather like shaking your fist at your neighbor because it's cold and wet outside. Just accept the conditions you observe, "dress appropriately", and move on without making a pointless scene, please. — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 09:17, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Please comment on Talk:Elvis Presley

Done

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Cogent argument

I just read another cogent, well thought out argument at Talk:Slut-shaming, and not surprisingly it was you again. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 20:17, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. I do what I can. :-) — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼ 08:57, 27 September 2016 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Mel Brooks

Done

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