User talk:Sideswipe9th/Archives/2024
 | Do not edit this page. This is the archive of User talk:Sideswipe9th/Archives for the year 2024. (Please direct any additional comments to the current talk page.) See the annual archives for . |
Lakewood Church Reversion
Hi @Sideswipe9th,
Just wanted to pop by because of your reversion regarding the addition of the gender content on the Lakewood Church Shooting page. I completely agree the content shouldn't be there, (and was about to post on the talk page about it) but notice you separately reverted an edit I made correcting the punctuation. I just want to make sure that was a mistake, or check if I did something wrong; always learning! Warmly, Arcendeight (talk) 00:11, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
- Hey Arcendeight,
- You've done nothing wrong. I was trying to use Twinkle's rollback to revert the dual additions by the IP editor on the suspect's gender identity. It screwed up and unfortunately your edit got caught in the middle sadly. Your edit to fix the punctuation was fine :) Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:13, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
- Oh great! Thanks for clarifying, and thank you for your edits. All the best, Arcendeight (talk) 00:14, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
- Feel free to reach out again if you've any questions! I've put in a request at WP:RFPP for page protection, which should slow things down a bit and help with only including reliably sourced information into the article if it gets granted. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:20, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
- Oh great! Thanks for clarifying, and thank you for your edits. All the best, Arcendeight (talk) 00:14, 13 February 2024 (UTC)
A Barnstar For You!
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The Anti-Flame Barnstar | |
| message Snokalok (talk) 20:18, 24 February 2024 (UTC) |
Because holy fucking shit, this may be the second most intense talk section I've seen to date (the first being that time on the Chloe Cole article when a certain group of conservative editors coordinated over twitter to get certain editors topic banned) Snokalok (talk) 20:18, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
- Anyway, you're keeping a remarkably level head throughout this so a barnstar for you Snokalok (talk) 20:19, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
- Oooh, I've not seen this barnstar before! Thanks so much Snokalok!
- Honestly, I find keeping a level head helps here, as it's a difficult enough content area to work in without starting flame wars in the talk pages. That's not to say I don't get frustrated or annoyed by certain actions or types of contributions, I'm only human after all. It's important to find a healthy outlet for frustrations :) Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:36, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
RE: Reliable Sources
Hi Sideswipe9th/Archives,
I didn't want to clog the talk page, but was curious about our discussion regarding the sources used in our previous back-and-forth.
Firstly, I didn't know there was a current list with vetted (and often challenged) sources so I thank you for making me aware (lots to read about Wiki guidelines). I did see that Pink News is currently a listed source in the link provided so I thank you for correcting my previous statement regarding it.
You also said, "The Advocate is considered a generally reliable source on Wikipedia" as well, but I can't find The Advocate listed in the same area. It's possible I am looking in the wrong place, though, so was hoping you could offer clarification on whether the statement above is correct or not.
I'm very new to contributing to Wikipedia so I apologize if this isn't the right way to contact you. In the event that it isn't, I'd appreciate any links explaining how I should go about a message like this in the future.
Cheers,
Randomdude87 (talk) 17:38, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- @Randomdude87: Hey! I'm always happy to answer questions, especially to new editors like yourself.
- So, there's two places to check if a source is reliable on Wikipedia: WP:RSP and WP:RSN. RSP is a listing of sources that have been discussed multiple times by the community. The entries in that list contain links to all of the major discussions on that source. The inclusion criteria for that list is that a source must have been discussed at least three times by the community. The inclusion or exclusion of a source from that list doesn't mean that it is or is not reliable, only that it hasn't been discussed three or more times.
- The Advocate not appearing in the list is because it's not been discussed three or more times. If you preform a search of the RSN archives, you'll see that the source was directly discussed once back in 2011, and has been referred to in roughly 20 other discussions about other sources. In those discussions, the community is treating the source as though it is reliable.
- If you think this is in error, then feel free to start a new discussion at WP:RSN. I'd recommend that you take a look at some of the other discussions currently ongoing on the noticeboard before posting however, just to get a feel for how to frame the question, and provide any relevant supporting evidence or commentary.
- Hope this helps. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:52, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
Killing of Sidra Hassouna
Hi there Sideswipe9th, I'm not sure if tagging for G5 is the right approach for that article since the page appears to have not been created while the user was banned or blocked, and the creator also does not appear to have a topic ban on the subject. Yes, it is an ECR violation but I think it would be more appropriate to reach out to an admin or post at a noticeboard since G5 doesn't seem to be an applicable CSD in that case. I don't get involved in arbitration matters, so if I am missing something about the scope of G5 and ECR please let me know. The Night Watch (talk) 01:54, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- @The Night Watch: I did reach out to an admin off-wiki about this, they said they usually deleted creations like this as G5 per WP:ARBECR. I believe the theory is the ECR restriction in ARBPIA4 is in effect a TBAN for this purpose. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:57, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- Alright, makes sense, just wished they could clarify this on-wiki. Either way the article will probably be deleted anyway. The Night Watch (talk) 01:59, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- @The Night Watch: Yeah, in some ways it'd be easier if there was a dedicated Gx for it, or the ability to add a comment in the template saying that it was ARPBIA4/ARBECR enforcement, but alas we don't seem to be there. Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:00, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- The Night Watch, Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#RfC: Status of G5 covers the current consensus. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 02:05, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- Alright, makes sense, just wished they could clarify this on-wiki. Either way the article will probably be deleted anyway. The Night Watch (talk) 01:59, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
Tagging pages for speedy deletion
Hello, Sideswipe9th,
Please review Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion#G5. Creations by banned or blocked users. The pages you tagged were not valid CSD G5s as there was no block evasion apparently involved. The criteria is not used to delete pags created by editors who have been blocked but to delete articles by sockpuppets of block-evading editors. But the CSD page describes what is required very succinctly. Liz Read! Talk! 03:25, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- @Liz: I posted a message about this on your own talk page when I saw you decline the CSD tag. Repeating what I said there, per Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#RfC: Status of G5 there seems to be a consensus that G5 applies to ARBECR violations, and that article (and the other drafts I nominated) were all created by a non-extended-confirmed editor on a topic covered by WP:ARBPIA4. Could I convince you to look at those nominations again please? Sideswipe9th (talk) 03:27, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- I just saw the message above this one. If these drafts/articles are a violation of general sanctions, then please tag them {{db-gs}} rather than a straight G5. Liz Read! Talk! 03:27, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- Could you retag them? I review G5s but not articles that violate arbitration standards. Thank you. Liz Read! Talk! 03:28, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- @Liz: I can indeed retag them if you want. {{db-gs}} wouldn't apply here as this is arbitration enforcement and not general sanctions enforcement. Sideswipe9th (talk) 03:30, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- Could you retag them? I review G5s but not articles that violate arbitration standards. Thank you. Liz Read! Talk! 03:28, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar |
| I appreciate all the work you do, not just with creating and improving articles but responding on the talk page too! Keep being awesome :D Vixtani (talk) 19:55, 28 February 2024 (UTC) |
Belgrade School Shooting revertions
Hello, I want to ask you why are you constantly reverting the contribution on "Belgrade School Shooting" page i've made? I have just tried to add the full name of the accused shooter & it's the latest on the news aswell. His name & last name have been released by the government so it's not anything rule breaking. WikiVeterans (talk) 15:48, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
- @WikiVeterans: Please see WP:BLPCRIME, which tells us that individuals who are not a public figure and who are not convicted of a crime, should not be named in a manner that suggests they have committed a crime. Please also see Talk:Belgrade school shooting#Naming the suspect where there is a clear consensus that BLPCRIME applies to the suspect, as under Serbian law there will be no trail for the suspect as he is too young to be tried, and that his name should not be included in the article. Sideswipe9th (talk) 15:52, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
- Oh alright, I won't interfere with the section anymore. WikiVeterans (talk) 15:56, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
On the topic of PoV pushing
I'll take your invitation to talk through some of this here. The issue I have with your assertion that a) observing that PoV pushers exist and will push PoVs, on multiple sides of the topic (and that policy should be crafted carefully to curtail this), equals b) assuming bad faith about other editors, is that "PoV push[ing|er]" obviously has multiple meanings, but your hypothesis depends entirely either on only one being possible/valid, or multiple possible interpretations but you (and whoever else) being able, as if by magical mind-reading, to know for a fact that a specific meaning was the one intended, when clearly it almost never will be.
In detail, "PoV-push[ing|er]" can mean at least three very different things:
- Everyone has viewpoints, and pretty much everyone (me included) is going to be guilty here and there of not checking our own biases, and thus at least momentarily pushing a PoV. Many references to "PoV-pushing" are about this, and are short-lived squabbles, usually resolvable with a simple WEIGHT analysis of the available RS. The "infobox warriors" Drmies brought up are also in this sector: a dispute about information architecture, encyclopedic purpose, usability, etc., with various people holding sometimes heated views on the subject, but not trying to change our content unduly.
- Second, there are editors who have a socio-political stance that they want to see prominent in our content (and even across our P&G material). Their position on or perception of something is felt to be the proper facts, the best-supported view, the real truth, and very important to promote (not just here, but in life). If WP isn't recognizing that version with the most due weight against conflicting views then WP isn't being encyclopedic, and shifting it toward that view must be making it better because that view being dominant must be a force of good in the world. We have lots and lots and lots of these editors; given the breadth of issues that people can take to heart, it's probably the majority of editors. Everyone in this sector is acting in good-faith too, though sometimes leading to NPOV and NOT#ADVOCACY policy issues. The essay Wikipedia:POV and OR from editors, sources, and fields is pretty good material in this regard; same with WP:Advocacy and WP:Activism (which should probably merge). WP:We shouldn't be able to figure out your opinions is also pertinent.
- Then there are the rare bad-faith and generally nutty types for whom their viewpoint is the only possible one, a Grand Truth; anyone disagreeing is a heretic/traitor/deceiver/etc., so ALL weight must be given to the PoV-pusher's side, or else! WP is simply a tool for promotion of their Truth, and their only interest in the project is to ensure it mirrors their version of reality exactly. If it doesn't, then they are convinced it is in grievous error and must be corrected at all costs. If they get banned, as they probably will, expect them to come back as socks and/or use other venues to campaign against WP as inimical and a bastion of lies/evil, or at best a farce (especially one controlled by a "them" that is the opposite of their doctrine). Spammers are effectively in this sector, the abuse section, too, just for monetary gain instead of ideology/obsession. Aside: This can sometimes lead to content problems due to what's outlined at User:Nikodemos/Asymmetric controversy.
So, we can't assume when someone says "PoV-pushing" or "PoV-pushers" that it implies the third, bad-faith, category. We rarely mean that, and generally use other terms for it like NOTHERE, FRINGE, SPA, LTA, etc. Yet your thesis that I am prohibited from ever observing that PoV-pushing exists in a particular subject (style matters) is entirely dependent on that phrase being assumptive of bad faith, which it demonstrably is not except in reference to category 3, who are essentially never at issue in style discussions. Given the nature of our past disputation, I'm quite certain that what you're concerned about category 2. But it literally is not possible for me to recognize that advocacy by its nature is good-faith (grounded entirely in conviction that advocacy of the viewpoint in question is going to make the world a better place) yet for me to be simultaneously assuming or claiming that it is category bad-faith activity. It isn't. I'm explicitly stating that, and have before many times in the past. "I think this is PoV" or "That's an activistic viewpoint not a proven fact", etc., are in no way, shape, or form assumptions of bad faith. Hell, I was a professional activist for much of my adult life, so I'd have to be some kind of self-loathing lunatic to believe that activistic intent is bad-faith in thought or deed. It's not. It's just often unhelpful on WP, in conflict with important policies.
Since it's very dubious to me that you do not fully understand all of that already, your pillorying me at AE for "assuming bad faith" has been difficult to interpret as other than an attempt to exploit process to silence someone you were semi-recently in an internal content dispute with (WP:POV railroad). I'll take you at face value if you explain why it's not and what the alternative rationale is, but I think you can understand why I've gotten that impression.
In particular, you have zero evidence of any kind that I've assumed (much less accused) anyone of bad faith in this area; you have no evidence of anything but me taking a testy tone with some people here and there (and an extraneous off-topic diff of me using a word, "delight", in a context that irritated you, because you assumed and continue to assume bad faith about its intended meaning). Being critical and raising concerns and getting in arguments is not assuming bad faith. You continuing to press your claim that I'm making bad-faith assumptions (no evidence, just your personal magic mind-reading powers) is itself more bad-faith assumption on your part about me and my meaning and intent, per WP:AOBF. That's leaning toward a WP:NPA problem, and must I ask that it stop. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 00:16, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
- @SMcCandlish: So on your point about POV pushers, you are correct that the term has multiple meanings, and to figure out which meaning best applies we need to look at the context of your original statement. In the original statement you said
We have two extremely entrenched camps demanding the deadnames either be entirely suppressed, or that they always be included if sourceable. Neither camp is going to shut up and go away, and will do everything in their power to wikilawyer their way to victory.
- So now, lets break that statement down.
We have two extremely entrenched camps
So we have two groups of editors.demanding the deadnames either be entirely suppressed, or that they always be included
With two diametrically opposed perspectives on content.Neither camp is going to shut up and go away
Both groups are going to continue to be vocal.and will do everything in their power to wikilawyer their way to victory
And both groups are engaging in wikilawyering and battleground thinking. Wikilawyering is typically considered a form of tendentious editing, and unsupported accusations of tendentious editing are generally considered an assumption of bad faith. - You have described two groups of editors, with diametrically and mutually exclusive viewpoints about the inclusion or exclusion of deadnames, and have said both will do all in their power to prevent the other outcome from happening. It seems to be as though you're describing your third definition here, as these are editors
for whom their viewpoint is the only possible one
. Now through this breakdown, can you see how this statement can be interpreted as assuming bad faith about two identifiable groups of editors? - P.S. Let me know if you don't want or need me to ping you on replies. I'm not sure if you have my talk page watchlisted, so wanted to be safe for this first reply. Sideswipe9th (talk) 00:35, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
- Pings are fine, though I would have come back around eventually. I really, really don't think it's a good idea to try to break down people's off-hand comments in a textual-analysis manner like this. If we routinely did this, we could almost always find some reason to find fault in something someone else wrote, because any given clause can be interpreted various ways. This actually leans, again, towards a bad-faith-assumptive direction: hunting for fault and insisting one has found it in material that can only possibly be interpreted subjectively, with zero means of tying that interpretation to the intent. What we should do and virtually always do is take what people are writing in the spirit it was most likely intended (and assume per AGF a more positive interpretation when available). It's why the community works, and why we're not always terrified that every other string of characters we type is going to be misused to try to ban us. We don't phrase-by-phrase nit-pick each other to death, for good reason.
That said, let's go over the details of your analysis anyway.
And both groups are engaging
: No, I made a prediction about what was likely to happen, not a statement about what is happening. It's important to remember the context: it's about changes you wanted to make mid-stream to a proposal, and my objections to that change because of predictable/likely effects it would have, both as to whether the community would accept that version, and if they/we did then what the consequences might be.in ... battleground thinking
: You're putting words in my mouth; I neither made that statement nor linked to that policy section with other words.Wikilawyering is typically considered a form of tendentious editing
: Nope; the word "tendentious" (or variant) does not appear at WP:WIKILAWYER at all; WP:TE (an essay) does mention that tendentious editing can take the form of wikilawyering, but that does not make all wikilawyering tendentious. "Tendentious editing is a pattern of editing that is partisan, biased, skewed, and does not maintain an editorially neutral point of view." A great deal of wikilawyering is not tendentious (nor part of a pattern of any other kind), and that term term also has a clear (but lengthy) definition. Neither LAWYER nor TE are defined, anywhere, as bad-faith activities, nor critical use of these terms as a bad-faith-assumptive activity.unsupported accusations of tendentious editing are generally considered an assumption of bad faith
: Nothing says that anywhere, and there's no evidence to support such an interpretation – not at WP:TE, WP:AGF, nor elsewhere like WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, WP:DR, etc., and not in community practice and history.It seems to be as though you're describing your third definition here, as these are editors for whom their viewpoint is the only possible one
: Nope. Who's assuming bad faith now? I don't think either extreme holds such a belief at all; they're just strongly resistant to compromising on it. Very clearly in the second group, acknowledging the position of the other (and ones in the middle) without namecalling, and are advocating (without abusing the system, which they treat as a encyclopedia project) for their version to dominate, to get the internal-policy equivalent of DUEWEIGHT. Probably not a single one of them has the NOTHERE purpose of abusing WP as a promotion mechanism for a zealotry/obsession stance.What's happened here is that you've come to very presumptive notions about what ABF and various other terms mean, which do not at all agree with their actual defintions, are equating all of them, and assuming basically that any time I am critical of anyone (specific, collective, or abstract) in any way for any reason that I'm assuming bad faith about them, but this is a demonstrably unsupportable conclusion, and is actually just assuming bad faith about me (at least in the general sense if not the WP precise sense; in the WP sense is more along incivility and aspersions lines). This is very, very similar to the habit of mostly new editors to go around claiming that every criticism or complaint about them is "a personal attack" without reading and absorbing the actual defintion at NPA. A forgivable misunderstanding, but one which quickly needs to cease.
Now through this breakdown, can you see ...
I can certainly see how the comments came across as a bit intemperate; sometimes that happens in protracted debates (and that definitely was one). ABF? Not at all. Here's the official definition:assuming that people are ... deliberately trying to hurt Wikipedia
. I've never suggested such a thing about anyone in any of these discussions, and I do not believe that it is true of any of them. It's unfortuate that this medium lacks facial expression, tone, body language, etc. I do not want you to get the impression that I'm angry with you or think of you as an enemy or anything like that. We largely agree on most of the things in the content area that was the genesis of this; but we're subculturally a bit separated, and clearly have a "how to effectively do WP policy proposals" split, where I urge practical compromise and you seem to want all-or-nothing. However, I keep getting the impression that you are (and long-term, grudge-bearingly) angry with me and treating me like an enemy. That TE page says some other important and directly pertinent stuff, including:The perception that "he who is not for me is against me" is contrary to Wikipedia's assume good faith guideline: always allow for the possibility that you are indeed wrong, and remember that attributing motives to fellow editors is inconsiderate.
Warning others to assume good faith is something which should be done with great care, if at all – to accuse them of failing to do so may be regarded as uncivil, and if you are perceived as failing to assume good faith yourself, then it could be seen as being a jerk.
Accusing others of malice: ... This is prima facie evidence of your failure to assume good faith. Never attribute to malice that which may be adequately explained by a simple difference of opinion.
- From my viewpoint, you keep doing all of that to me. You insist, and go to great and nit-picky but word-twisting and policy-unsound lengths to try to "prove" that I just must be assuming bad faith, no matter what. This is diametrically opposed to WP:CIVIL, WP:AGF, and everything related. This comes off as: I ticked you off once about something, and am now forever on your shit-list, and will be sanction-hunted by you indefinitely, especially if you can find some way to leverage a decade-old AGF restriction to miscast anything critical that I ever say, even entirely in the abstract, as "assuming bad faith", despite that actually having a very clear defintion which I am not transgressing. (The definition:
assuming that people are ... deliberately trying to hurt Wikipedia
). There's not a shred of evidence in your diffs or your attempt at analysis of my comments that even suggests such a thing. This behavior by you toward me definitely falls under WP:ASPERSIONS at least:On Wikipedia, casting aspersions refers to a situation where an editor accuses another of misbehavior without evidence, especially when the accusations are repeated or particularly severe. Because a persistent pattern of false or unsupported allegations can be highly damaging to a collaborative editing environment, such accusations will be collectively considered a personal attack.
Your accusations are both severe and repetitive, as well as without evidence. You might have a case at AE that I said something that crossed a CIVIL line, but I definitely did not cross an AGF line.I don't want to go to war with you. I want this antagonism to end. If there's something mutual about it, if you feel I've wronged you in some way, then say so, and where, and why it seems that way. We can work through it. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:01, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
- Pings are fine, though I would have come back around eventually. I really, really don't think it's a good idea to try to break down people's off-hand comments in a textual-analysis manner like this. If we routinely did this, we could almost always find some reason to find fault in something someone else wrote, because any given clause can be interpreted various ways. This actually leans, again, towards a bad-faith-assumptive direction: hunting for fault and insisting one has found it in material that can only possibly be interpreted subjectively, with zero means of tying that interpretation to the intent. What we should do and virtually always do is take what people are writing in the spirit it was most likely intended (and assume per AGF a more positive interpretation when available). It's why the community works, and why we're not always terrified that every other string of characters we type is going to be misused to try to ban us. We don't phrase-by-phrase nit-pick each other to death, for good reason.
Long thoughts that explain my meaning, but ultimately might be meaningless based on what I've said below. Keeping this here in case you're interested though in some of my more linear thoughts.
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It's unfortuate that this medium lacks facial expression, tone, body language, etc.
To be honest, and I think I say this already on my user page, I'm autistic. If we were having this conversation face to face, unless you are also autistic I'd probably be missing a lot of your facial expression, tone, and body language. Those are all things that in neurotypical people, I largely can't understand or follow. There is also a very real chance that, unless you're autistic yourself or have a great deal of training and experience in communicating with autistic people, you are likely to misread my own facial expressions, tone, and body language. In psychology this is commonly referred to as the double empathy problem.- I tend to prefer text communication because I'm not having to follow along with what you're saying, at the same time as I'm trying to formulate a response to it, while also trying to figure out whatever the non-spoken subtext you're also trying to convey is. By having only words on a screen, at any time while formulating a response I can scroll up and remind myself of exactly what you said.
I do not want you to get the impression that I'm angry with you or think of you as an enemy or anything like that.
I can safely say I don't get that impression from you. Even when we're strongly disagreeing over something I don't believe that we're expressing anger towards each other, nor that we consider each other enemies.- The problem seems to be how you're communicating, how others interpret your communications, and how you respond to others saying things like "Hey, maybe you should strike that comment because it's crossed the line towards incivility". In this discussion here, we're talking about how I interpreted something you said back in January, and how that differs from your intention and by extension I have misinterpreted your meaning. Have you ever noticed that this keeps happening to you? That people keep misinterpreting what you're saying, and because of these misinterpretations the comments read as assumptions of bad faith or accusations of impropriety? Because I certainly have noticed this.
- Take for example, this discussion from July last year. On 24 July you made a comment that two other editors described as derisive. Rather than apologise for unintentionally coming across as having made a derisive comment and strike the comment, you outright denied that it was derisive, and then made a comment that you don't need
censorious "you're not being left the way I insist the left should be" lecturing from other people under the same tent
. That really didn't help the situation. A few comments later one of the two editors then said they wereunimpressed by this full-throttle descent into assumptions of bad faith
. The simple question is, why didn't you say something like "Oh, I'm sorry. That wasn't my intent, let me strike that. Here's what I actually meant"? - For another example, let's take this unrelated discussion also from July last year. You start by saying that Colin made a
clearly politicized dogwhistle aspersion-casting [set of comments] at those who don't agree with [his] position
. Colin's reply was to say he wasHappy to address any concerns that my post implied you were right wing.
He was open to addressing your concerns and clarifying his point. You both then get into a back and forth about labelling editors as activists, with Colin eventually raising the point about how that can be seen as a personal attack. Rather than acknowledge his point, you deny its existence by saying it wasjust [him] inferring a meaning/intent/rationale/cause out of nowhere
. Once again, the simple question is, why didn't you say something like "Oh, I'm sorry. That wasn't my intent, let me strike that."? - In all three of these discussions, the only constants are that you are participating in them, and that other unconnected editors are interpreting your words to have negative meaning. Have you ever considered that perhaps, maybe all of these unconnected editors actually have a point, and that the way in which you are participating in these discussions is less than ideal? The question that I'd love for you to take a while and ponder is, why does this keep happening in conversations with you?
I don't want to go to war with you. I want this antagonism to end. If there's something mutual about it, if you feel I've wronged you in some way, then say so, and where, and why it seems that way. We can work through it.
My friend, I'm not at war with you. For me, Wikipedia is not a battleground, and if you think that it is, then I'm afraid that your own battleground thinking may be showing here. All I want from our interactions is for you to be better. I want you to take this opportunity to reflect upon why so many people keep interpreting your comments in a negative manner, and why when you're informed of this you double down, insisting that it was not your intention instead of simply apologising and reflecting on why the comment was misinterpreted.- It is only through you becoming better that maybe we can all work towards that joke on Hey man im josh's talk page about how some editors would rather participate in Israel-Palestine content (something that's currently one of the bloodiest ongoing conflicts in the world, subject to a lot of propaganda effort from both sides, and has decades of animosity between the two countries), or gender and sexuality content (something that is a current culture war item and political football in much of the English speaking world) becoming something of a historical footnote. As I said over on Josh's talk page, become the change that you want to see. Sideswipe9th (talk) 06:05, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
Re:
interested ... in some of my more linear thoughts: Sure, more info's better; makes for less assumption/wondering. Boxing the response to what's boxed above. |
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how I generally read all sentences: Understood, but there's a difference between internal syntax processing and breaking down someone's casual statement in a way to try to find fault with it. You can see by now that there are multiple ways to interpret the material, and you aren't a mind reader, so there is no basis on which to insist that the intepretation you originally came to is necessarily the correct one, much less to continue to seek AE action against me on that basis. Again, you should strike your claim that it is ABF. that is not the meaning you conveyed: One cannot pretend a future-tense hypothetical is a present-tense claim. Language just doesn't work that way. ... and I believe will try to do...: Sure, I could've said that, but it's understood someone making a prediction is stating a belief. No one's omnicient, and there's no mathematical proof of anything humans might do. So, you wanting to punish me for not having redundantly written something as an "I believe" statement is exactly what I was getting at with my "thought-policing" comment in the original version of my AE response. It's not your role to dictate other editors' syntax and verbosity. I'm informing you the base assumptions I made: I know, and I'm showing you detail-by-detail why that interpretation isn't objectively sound. You cannot be in a position to insist that your version is necessarily correct; doing it is really offensive honestly, and surprising. You're not the arbiter of what's going on in someone else's mind. A lot of misunderstandings come from the assumption that everyone has the same base assumptions: Exactly! Why not apply this to yourself here? why link to WP:WINNING?Because it succintly encapsulates the idea that WP should not be approached as a contest/struggle. The fact that it happens to link to a policy about battlegrounding does not mystically transmogrify any reference to WINNING into an accusation of a policy violation. We literally could not have such pages if this were the case.
Elephant: I don't see your rationale for going after me for making this observation, which was explicitly non-partisan and simply analytical of a polarization problem to work around in RfC/guideline crafting. It has come off as A) picking a fight for no reason at all other than "argument for sport"; B) a belief that you're in a position to tone- and wording-control what other editors are allowed to say and how, perhaps out of a belief in improving WP discourse/culture; and/or C) even an attempt to get rid of someone you see as an opponent because of a divergence of approach in the subject area. I can't magically know which it is (or if there's a fourth), but it has felt like C. Other things you said in material that followed the collapse box actually tend to dissuade this feeling, which is nice. |
I'm autistic
: Understood. Marginally on the spectrum myself (though with different effects, and it depends on the testing – the goalposts seem to move around a lot). I didn't mean to suggest something insensitive; rather, it's just that this medium can seem cold and even hostile sometimes when that's not the intent (especially during inter-personal arguments, and without SMS-style smilies being plastered everywhere).not having to follow along with what you're saying, at the same time as I'm trying to formulate a response to it
: Definitely a strength, and I feel the same even given the aforementioned limitation. Lots of time to formulate and reformulate responses.Even when we're strongly disagreeing over something I don't believe that we're expressing anger towards each other, nor that we consider each other enemies.
Thanks for saying so; that is heartening. I want to also reiterate that even if I'm skeptical or critical of some of your interpretations/definitions, etc., I'm not upset with you. I am upset at the ABF claims at AE, but that's about what the claims are and their rationale, not who made them. A week from now, I may not even remember it was you who made them. That's one of my own spectrum effects; names, especially online usernames, just blur and fade for me, unless they are frequently reinforced by continued interaction. Funny post on FB today in a neuro-atypical group had a cartoon checklist titled "Lesser Known Personality Types", and one was "E. Asks someone's name & immediately forgets it", and half the responses including mine start with "E".The problem seems to be how you're communicating ... Have you ever noticed that this keeps happening to you?
Yes, and I've conceded as much at AN and AE. I've taken on-board a lot of advice in this regard over time, changed my approach. Will do so again. I know I've not gone far enough along that path yet. However, and I keep circling back to this because it really does matter, me having civility failures more often than I should does not equate to ABF. They are very different things.[An intemperate defensive response] really didn't help the situation
: True, but why on earth do you think trying to use it as a weapon against me at AE, in a totally unrelated matter, would help any situation? I'm not perfect, and no one needs to be castigated months after the fact for something they said that someone chose to interpret as negatively as possible (and is insistent on doing so; that is itself ABF by defintion). I also have what I would call a subcultural position on such matters, coming as I do from a background as a freedom-of-expression activist. There are different and subjective approaches to meaning, intent, interpretation, offense, and related concepts. An assumption toward the lines that anyone claiming offense is automatically in the right is not a proposition broadly accepted outside a certain socio-cultural range (nor reflected in our policies, or WP:NOTCENSORED, WP:OM, MOS:OMIMG and several others could not say what they say, and others already much discussed here like NPA, CIVIL, AGF, HARASS, and related, would read very, very differently). I'm not entirely within that range, though moving closer to it the further I get from my former free-speech activism career. The whole nature of offensiveness and offense-taking is subject to quite fractious literature in psychology, philosophy, linguistics, political science, cognitive science, anthropology, and other interrelated fields. Trying to force me by noticeboard to adopt a particular interpretation of such matters is wrongheaded and not what WP or any of its processes are for."Oh, I'm sorry. That wasn't my intent, let me strike that. Here's what I actually meant"
: Hindsight is 20/20. But I did in fact say it wasn't my intent, and what the intent was. What I didn't do was apologize and strike, and a lot of people will not when falsely accused of implications they are not making. Cf. you still not striking your incorrect ABF claims about me, which are far worse; it's not a matter of whether someone might subjectively misinterpret that you are making ABF claims about me; you're pointedly and repeatedly making them, despite the underlying polices not saying or meaning what you claim they do. That's not okay.On the Colin dispute: For a some time now I've had a sense that you have a problem with activism/advocacy being called what it is. I don't think we're going to have a meeting of minds on that, though we can try. I am an activist, on several things (formerly my job to be one). There's no ABF of any kind in those terms. They simply indicate strong, action-taking investment in a socio-political issue; that is, a PoV that is operative not just theoretical. I studiously avoid editing in topic areas in which I am an advocate in real life. Many editors don't, and it often raises NPoV and related issues. That does not mean they are acting in bad faith, and pointing out NPoV, BIAS, NOT#ADVOCACY concerns is not bad-faith assumption. As I've said many times, activism is not bad-faith, pretty much by definition: the activist has the good-faith belief that what they're advocating will better the world. (And is distinct from a bad-faith zealot in having examined the matter, weighed the evidence, and rationally made a decision, without demonizing oponents, insisting on a One True [Whatever] with any disagreement being characterized evil/lying/conspiracy/etc.). It's only a problem when policy isn't followed properly, and in various topics subject to activism (from two or often more than two directions) it too often isn't, in various ways. We're all human, and suppressing our own biases for the sake of neutrality is a challenge.
Have you ever considered that perhaps, maybe all of these unconnected editors actually have a point
: Yes, I've considered this carefully in various cases (and I do change my mind, publicly, from time to time). But they are not comparable cases from my perspective. (I can see how they could be to some people, particularly if they have an overriding concern about what could be called "impact of words"; the split here is largely that I care more about the intended meaning than the recipient feelings, and feel I have to, because in PoV and other policy matters, anyone is apt to have their feelings hurt if their noncompliance is called out, but we have to do it anyway.) When it comes to some of these matters, there's a subcultural conflict between free-expression advocacy and claims-of-offense-are-always-valid positioning. On others, that are very different matters, WP:Mandy Rice-Davies applies (someone engaging in inappropriate advocacy via WP is almost always going to deny they're doing it and is apt to claim they're being "attacked" when one points out that they're doing it; comes down to how to do it more gently).the way in which you are participating in these discussions is less than ideal?
: That I'm certain of, but the A and the B are not closely interrelated. Me adjusting to be more gracious doesn't equate to caving on opposing activistic PoV problems. (It may well require me to shift further away from a free-expression activistic position, however. Something I've been mulling over, since I notice myself shifting not that, and on several other related subjects, including some US constitutional-law doctrines.)Wikipedia is not a battleground, and if you think that it is
: I don't; that was my point. I even quit FB for several years during the Trump presidency (I hate even typing that phrase) because it was too battlegroundy; only rejoined because I was losing touch with friends during the pandemic; trying really, really hard to avoid socio-political arguments on there now, because my heart will be on my sleeve in that environment.the only constants are ...
: Sure, rather defnitionally. If you picked other diffs of another editor being misinterpreted, the same constants would apply (swap the username), those being the criteria by which the data were selected in the first place. An implication someone could leap to from what you said is that this "pattern" characterized diffs involving me in general, or disputes in which I'm involved in narrower general, but isn't correct. To the contrary, I write with a lot of conscious precision, and misinterpretation is actually uncommong. The real effect is that misinterpretation is frequently at the root of accusations made against me. That's not entirely my fault, though I have little choice but to treat it as an issue only I can do something about. Finally,reflect upon why so many people keep interpreting your comments in a negative manner
: Yes, I will definitely do that.insisting that it was not your intention instead of simply apologising and reflecting on why the comment was misinterpreted.
: Severable things, and a subcultural difference again. Apology is sometimes not likely because from my perspective in some cases it would be manipulative insincerity (from my ethical position, that matters quite a lot). But retraction/revision is something I should consider more often; as I said at AE, I don't actually have any interest in retaining something somone found hurtful/offensive, even if I defend against (bad-faith assumptive!) claims about why I wrote it. Reflecting on misinterpretation: definitely. Thanks again for taking time to read and reply. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 23:56, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
me having civility failures more often than I should does not equate to ABF.
Yes, but also no. While incivility and ABF are two separate things, from the perceptions of others there is a somewhat blurry distinction between the two. That your intention when making comments is not one of ABF doesn't prevent others from perceiving your comments as being made in bad faith. And that's the problem that keeps coming up I'm afraid. You are perceived as assuming bad faith about others, even if your intention is otherwise.but why on earth do you think trying to use it as a weapon against me at AE, in a totally unrelated matter, would help any situation?
Because it's part of the pattern where you say something, and other editors interpret your comments as assumptions of bad faith. Now it's true that you have no control over how others read and interpret your words, as a person we all ultimately only have control over our own actions (some exceptions apply). When we're told that we've said or done something that others perceive to be an issue, regardless of our intention, we have a choice to make on how to respond. We can continue as we were before, with or without explanation, or we can learn from that feedback and make the necessary changes in our behaviour so that the issue doesn't happen again.- As for it being unrelated, to my own immense frustration multiple editors have interpreted the AE report as being solely about the AN thread. And I've tried to clarify a couple of times now that this is about a long term behavioural problem, where you appear to be assuming bad faith about other editors or groups of editors. The AN thread was simply the point where I felt that this underlying behavioural issue had gone on long enough, and something had to be done about it. It was the straw that broke the camel's back. Now if you're reading my initial report as being about behaviour in the AN thread, then yeah those diffs would clearly be about an unrelated matter. But that's not what the report is about. Unfortunately I don't really know how to clarify that any more than I've already tried to.
no one needs to be castigated months after the fact for something they said that someone chose to interpret as negatively as possible
Sure, except that this issue of other editors reading your comments as an assumption of bad faith, or a personal attack, is something that keeps happening about comments you make. Now if it was only one or two editors, you could probably write that off as a them problem. But this is many editors saying this. At some point, there is a critical mass where it stops being a them problem and starts being a you problem.I also have what I would call a subcultural position on such matters, coming as I do from a background as a freedom-of-expression activist.
It's not about the position you're taking. To use the GENDERID RfC discussion from January, I don't hold any ill-will for you taking a different view to myself on whether the one word change I proposed is or is not a good idea. The issue is in how you're expressing your position, and how the words that you chose to express that position are perceived by other editors.An assumption toward the lines that anyone claiming offense is automatically in the right is not a proposition broadly accepted outside a certain socio-cultural range
Sure, and as I said in a previous paragraph, if it was only one or two editors who were to use your words "claiming offense" that would be true. But it's not one or two editors. It's many editors.Trying to force me by noticeboard to adopt a particular interpretation of such matters is wrongheaded and not what WP or any of its processes are for.
Yes, except for the circumstances that are specific to you. For the last 11 years you have been under a sanction where you are prohibited from making assumptions of bad faith about any individual editor or identifiable group of editors. What I and many other editors have perceived from your comments is a long term behavioural problem. I acknowledge that you have repeatedly stressed that it was not your intention to make an assumption of bad faith about others, but in the 11 years this sanction was passed, for this exact issue, your comments are still being perceived by others to be assumptions of bad faith.you still not striking your incorrect ABF claims about me, which are far worse; it's not a matter of whether someone might subjectively misinterpret that you are making ABF claims about me; you're pointedly and repeatedly making them, despite the underlying polices not saying or meaning what you claim they do. That's not okay.
Before I say anything further on this point, I would like to request one point of clarification. Which specific diffs are you suggesting I should strike? We've talked a lot here about the wikilawyer comment from 13 January 2024, so I'm guessing that's one. Are there any others?For a some time now I've had a sense that you have a problem with activism/advocacy being called what it is.
If we're talking about activism or advocacy off-wiki, I have no problem with that. Except maybe if someone calls me a "trans rights activist" or TRA, because that term has a specific negative connotation through its use to cast people (usually trans) who are advocating for trans and non-binary rights as being akin to the men's rights movement or MRAs. This research paper has some examples of how that term has a negative connotation.- However if we're talking about activism on enwiki, I do take issue with describing other editors as activists, and so it seems does Colin. Speaking for myself this is primarily because, enwiki has this annoying tendency to have idiosyncratic definitions for words that are often at odds with how the word is used elsewhere. A common example you'll see in the article space on CTOP articles, particularly from new, drive-by, or inexperienced editors, is neutrality. When we, as editors, are talking about neutrality, we're talking about WP:NPOV. As the rest of the policy states, this means we represent all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on any given topic. In some cases this can mean our coverage of a topic is pretty negative, when that negativity represents the overwhelming significant viewpoint. But when new editors talk about neutrality, they mean something different, in my experience this is typically either the exclusion of negative content, or the inclusion of positive in a manner that could lead to a false balance situation.
- Activist on enwiki is one of those words that has an ideosyncratic meaning. A lot of the time the meaning is not activist as it's defined in the article space, but activist as it's defined in the project space. The project space definition of the term is quite negative, as it discusses editors who aren't here to build an encyclopedia, but instead promoting their views. The project space essay definition is basically a guide on how to spot when activists are being problematic on an article or in a content area, and how to handle that.
- Now in December when you said
because activists will use it to editwar against inclusion of them anywhere
it's pretty clear that you're talking about activists in a negative sense. Edit warring is disruptive. Likewise in the discussion with Colin, you're talking about activism in a negative senseactivistic PoV pushing should be dismissed, frankly – because it is PoV pushing
andWe wouldn't have WP:ADVOCACY and WP:ACTIVISM ... if activism was okay in our content or as a prime mover of our P&G wording
. In both of these discussions, you were using the term activist to describe an identifiable set of editors; those who wish to remove all deadnames from all articles, and those who were seeking a change in the MOS in relation to linguistic changes within society. - In the context in which you said these things, I absolutely took it to have negative connotations. And it appears so did Colin. Colin said rather succinctly
Labelling someone an activist can be an attack, because there's an implication such people are not wanted at all on Wikipedia and should end up being blocked.
and I share that interpretation. If you read the WP:ACTIVIST essay, that is a clear implication from it. - One quick note, I'm going to assume that you have read the essay, as you were referring to it in the discussion with Colin and I can see that you edited it in the past. But have you read it recently? The essay has changed quite substantially from the last time you edited it, and it is now quite negative. If you haven't read it recently, I would strongly suggest that you do, as that might cause you to reconsider why both Colin and I consider the term negative in an enwiki sense.
I am an activist, on several things (formerly my job to be one). There's no ABF of any kind in those terms.
Off-wiki, and with the exception of TRA, I would agree. Hell, I consider myself to be a feminist, and there is no inherent negativity in that. However, as I've just explained, on enwiki the term does have negative connotations, and calling an editor an activist can easily be seen as an assumption of bad faith about their reasons for being here.the split here is largely that I care more about the intended meaning than the recipient feelings
That...makes a lot of sense. I think perhaps there's a better balance you could strike here however. Sometimes it is necessary to say things that others will find hurtful, but in my experience off-wiki (hello autistic bluntness) I've found that people don't really care about your intended meaning if they continually interpret your comment to have negative connotations. At some point they just start to consider you an asshole, rather than someone who means well but struggles with expressing it. If I'm being blunt, I think you perhaps care too much about intended meaning, rather than considering if there's an alternate way to convey the same meaning without it being interpreted negatively by the recipient.and feel I have to, because in PoV and other policy matters, anyone is apt to have their feelings hurt if their noncompliance is called out, but we have to do it anyway
It's not that straightforward. There's a difference between saying something like "that is not what the policy states" and "you should not be editing this material because you fundamentally don't understand the policy". You might intend the later to have the same meaning as the former, after all the editor is clearly wrong in their understanding of the policy, however the editor reading the latter will very likely read that as an ad hominem.- Take this diff from the AE filing between you and Andrew Lancaster. In the numbered list of points, #1 is fine. You're explaining why something is impossible. #2 is also fine, you're talking about an argument and not the editor making the argument. #3 however is where it starts to fall apart, now you're commenting on the editor, with the direct implication that they've not read up about the subject. Whether or not that is a true statement doesn't really matter, it's a comment on the contributor. Did that really need to be said in a discussion on WT:MOSBIO? #4 is OK, you're back to talking about the content of a contributor's argument. #5 is messy, in some places you're talking about the content, but in others you're talking about the contributor. #6 is bad. This is where the
you clearly should not be editing material
quote comes from. Again whether or not that is a true statement doesn't really matter, it's a comment on the contributor, and not appropriate for WT:MOSBIO. There are other examples of this in #6, for exampleNor are you paying attention in this discussion:
, orstrongly indicates again that this is not a subject area of competence for you, but that you have wandered in and started pontificating
(with a wikilink to Dunning-Kruger). Accusing the editor of not paying attention, or implying they're a walking/typing Dunning-Kruger example are not comments on content. - There's a lot in that discussion that you didn't need to say in that venue. There's a lot that's outright not appropriate for that venue. And there's a lot that your sanction currently prohibits you from saying in that venue. Don't cast me as unsympathetic here though, I understand what it's like to be interacting with an editor you perceive to be problematic (I say perceive because I'm not well versed enough in the underlying content to cast any judgement on Andrew, you may well be correct in your overall assessment). Sometimes it is necessary to make comments like this about an editor, but there's only a handful of venues where that actually is appropriate. WT:MOSBIO isn't one of those.
Me adjusting to be more gracious doesn't equate to caving on opposing activistic PoV problems.
No-one here is asking you to do this, and maybe that's what you're not appearing to be getting? To go back to our interaction at the GENDERID RfC in January, I don't take issue with you opposing my proposal because you think it's going to cause problems. I am more than happy to try and defend my proposal against your objections based on my day-to-day experience of editing the articles the guideline applies to. What I take issue with however is when you start making comments about identifiable groups of editors.I even quit FB for several years during the Trump presidency (I hate even typing that phrase)
Honestly? The scariest thing to me right now, as an outside observer of US politics, is that there's a real chance he'll be elected again this November. I fear for what will happen to the US if he gets into office, regardless of whether he has the support of both Houses of Congress.If you picked other diffs of another editor being misinterpreted, the same constants would apply
Yes, and with how many active editors enwiki has, I'm sure there will be other editors who manifest the same behaviour. But I'm not talking to them right now, I'm talking to you.The real effect is that misinterpretation is frequently at the root of accusations made against me. That's not entirely my fault, though I have little choice but to treat it as an issue only I can do something about.
It's not that simple my friend. While it is true you cannot control how others directly interpret your words, or react to those interpretations, you do have control over your own actions and words. At the end of the day, you ultimately have a choice between continuing as you are, in the knowledge that people are going to continue to misinterpret you and assign intent based on that misinterpretation, or you can adjust your communication style to minimise or hopefully eliminate that misinterpretation problem. A lot of people aren't willing to do the later, because it is hard. It requires a lot of introspection to identify where these issues are coming from, followed by a bunch of conscious effort to change your behaviour until those changes become habitual. By comparison doing nothing is easy, as you're not changing how you interact and engage with others.- I want to end this reply by referring back to something you said much earlier. You said many paragraphs ago that you're a former free-speech activist, and that your history has had a large effect in how you interact with other editors on enwiki. XKCD have a comic about free speech (seriously, how is there an XKCD for everything?) XKCD#1357. That comic has a rather simple message, freedom of speech is not freedom of consequence. Now we don't really have freedom of speech on enwiki, and as someone who comes from a country (the UK, Northern Ireland specifically) where we don't have freedom of speech as it is defined in the US, the acceptable limitations on what we can and cannot say are quite natural to me. Now I can understand in theory how that would be anathema to a former free-speech activist, even if I can't understand in practice what that actually feels like, but as the XKCD comic says, freedom of speech is not freedom of consequence. Other people don't have to listen to what you say, if they believe what you are saying is harmful to them in some way.
- You said above that there is a
subcultural conflict between free-expression advocacy and claims-of-offense-are-always-valid positioning
and I don't think there is. In a society with freedom of speech, a person is of course free to say things that other people find offensive. However, freedom of speech is not freedom of consequence. Just because a person is free to say something, it doesn't actually mean anyone else has to listen to it, or let it be said without consequence. If people consistently find that person offensive whether or not it was intentional, they are well within their own rights to boycott them, cancel them, or ban them from their community. Sideswipe9th (talk) 04:08, 26 February 2024 (UTC)- There's some progress here, but also some regression on previous steps toward agreement. The tough stuff out of the way first. This is really central to the entire matter:
you say something, and other editors interpret your comments as assumptions of bad faith. Now it's true that you have no control over how others read and interpret your words, as a person we all ultimately only have control over our own actions (some exceptions apply).
With regard to your noticeboard action this is of crucial import. The rest of your main theme (if I may stop quoting so much and just summarize) is that because I get misinterpreted this way that I have a responsibility to shift my approach, and I actually agree that is the case. However, it doesn't make me AE-punishable for assuming bad faith. That's a specific accusation of fact you've not proven, and have at least vaguely conceded several times in usertalk isn't actually demonstrated. That should really be the end of that AE matter. As for the general gist of, e.g.,a lot in that discussion that you didn't need to say in that venue
, etc.: I concede and agree.it's a comment on the contributor [Lancaster]
: It was, but also not ABF, which is the central problem with your AE. My non-ideal behavior cannot be misaccused of being something it's not. But, yes, it was definitely not ideal.Which specific diffs are you suggesting I should strike?
Strike, revise, even just comment that you've shifted your interpretation, whatever; I'm actually not one to insist on literal<s>...</s>striking (much less on apology, which is important to some but not me). The statements at AE I most have issue with are: "There's some pretty textbook violations of WP:AGF here", "this isn't the only recent examples of SMcCandlish assuming bad faith", "The repeated ... implications of bad faith about other editors", "emblematic of a much broader long term issue of ... accusations of bad faith", "making this sort of bad faith accusation", "All are assuming bad faith about their respective targets". You come to acknowledge now, multiple times in threads on two user-talk pages, the distinction between actual ABF and individual editors interpretating something at least initially as ABF. But not only have you not adjusted your accusations, you doubled down on it all in your 23:52, 24 February 2024 (UTC) AE comment (though this pre-dates a lot of our discussion here). Several of your summarative comments are rendered severely misleading as a consequence, e.g. "He has been under active sanction for this issue", and "problem, that SMcCandlish has been under active sanction for for the last decade", and "you have been under a sanction preventing you from" [in short, ever being critical in any way in MoS stuff]. Various things that are not actually ABF that you and some other editors are critical of are not what I am under sanction for; even if they may be legitmate issues to raise, they cannot be conflated with ABF. This is also a severe distortion: "Multiple editors asked him to strike the comments as derisive about fellow editors, he refused to do so." First "about fellow editors" is not correct at all, and of course there is no showing of any kind they were derisive. An accurate summary would be that I declined to strike something some editors assumed and accused was dersive, after I explained what I actually meant but they [including you] refused to accept it. Anyway, since you've not taken any revisional action, I've felt I had little choice but to quote, at AE, one of your acknowledgements of the distinction between someone misinterpreting me as assuming bad faith, versus me actually doing it. But the fair thing to do would be for you to modify your complaint there to rescind the ABF claims even if you want to press the civlity ones. Maybe I'll still be sanctioned anyway, and might even deserve it, but it should be for what I actually did (and I've already conceded some civility issues, and taken rectifying steps).To get back to our general discussion: You assert lots of other editors assume I am assuming bad faith (which if true would indicate something problematic in their own quarter per WP:AOBF, though this is not something you seem to want to acknowledge). Really, though, it's you claiming that all of these disputations involved [perceptions of] "assumption of bad faith". (You have an example of someone else saying "full-throttle descent into assumptions of bad faith", but that was someone joining you in insisting that their interpretation of what I said, an offense-taking interpretation, was necessarily the interpretation, so they were in fact the one engaging in ABF. Not a credible witness, but someone trying to win in a sociopoliticized tone/wording spat. How is this not trying to silence/punish/win in a content dispute?) Other people may have their umbrage about one thing or another, but they are generally are not ABF concerns being raised. They may be topic-specific objections to what someone thought I meant, something that could even qualify under WP:NPA had they been correct about it; others think something else was uncivil, or aspersion-casting, or battlegrounding, or bludgeoning, or pushing guideline compliance as if a policy requirement, or having some OWN+GAMING agenda, or editwarring, or bringing a complaint without sufficent evidence, or using the wrong venue, or whatever. (See? I do pay attention to complaints.) They're all definitionally very different. I'm actually very infrequently alleged to be assuming bad faith. I think this is because most editors seem to have a much clearer understanding of the definition of that (but maybe that's now a "historical" matter since we've been over definitional matters at length). In summary, multiple editors being upset with me for disparate reasons (even if they all ultimately relate to my tone/approach in dispute, and they do seem to, and I thus do have consideration to engage in and change to work on) is not multiple editors claiming I assume bad faith. I'm actually careful not to.
On a point of regression, I don't think it's constructive to outright deny, as if objectively definable fact, that there may be subcultural approach differences, when I'm telling you directly from my experience and perception that for me there are, and then go and stake out a pro-"cancelling" position that illustrates that subcultural difference at the scale of a billboard. To quote you from HMIJ's talk,
this sort of comment serves no purpose other than to bring heat to a discussion
. This comes back around to my previous note that no one has a role of being the arbiter of others' thoughts/perceptions (or how they're allowed to put them into words). Often deeply tied to identity and association, which I would expect you to understand more than average. It's okay to be offended by something, but not to demonize and dramaboard-hunt people as "assuming bad faith" just because one is subjectively offended by something they said or a position they hold (which is often enough imaginative projection about that editor, apt to fall into the first three [rather redundant] bullet points at WP:WIAPA in the NPA policy). There's just too much of this going around, especially in hot-topic subjects.Xkcd: I'm a huge fan, and its author/artist is generally wise. I have "Duty Calls" printed out and hung above my monitor, and it has much to do with my tone/approach becoming much better today (here and elsewhere) than in 2008. However, Munroe is incorrectly conflating freedom of speech/expression with US First Amendment legalities, a tiny subset of that broader issue, which is a societal and increasingly global one that has as much to do with sociopolitical censoriousness (versus often deliberate offensiveness and pejorative labeling), commercial propagandistic memetic suppression that serves the monetary and power interests of media-conduit owners (versus abuse of conduits for pushing hatespeech, fascism and lies, and whining of being "deplatformed" when conduit owners sensibly decide not to permit that), and several other factors. It's not all about governmental censorship and media control. (And most people are in the middle between these extremes – much of why passage of MOS:GENDERID reform RfCs has been stymied). "I don't have to listen to you" does not equate to "I get to muzzle or otherwise punish you". (A misunderstanding as common on the right as on the left.) Online communities do have the self-governance ability (if they're built properly, which many social networks, for example, are not) to eject people whose messaging is intolerable; we have WP:NONAZIS for a reason. But someone taking offense at one possible meaning, that they latched onto without cause, of a particular turn of phrase does not rise to that level. Part of the subcultural split here is apparent in
harmful to them in some way
; treatment of "offended me" and "harmed me" as equivalent has some popular currency within a certain sphere, but is not a broadly accepted idea, and one actively opposed by many. There's definitely not a consensus on WP that these terms are interchangeable. While I think that "reality leans left" is a truism that is actually true, and it's been analytically proven that WP's editorial base is strongly left-leaning in the aggregate, this isn't ProgressivismPedia and a number of ideas prominent in further-left discourse are not well accepted here and not likely to become so, that being one of them. This is intimately bound up with the DEADNAME matter, obviously, or the RfCs about it would have sailed through (and only needed to be singular).Trump: I'm alarmed about very little more than him and what he and his goons represent; the fact that he ever got into the White House is a deep shame that will persist for generations. The only thing that scares me more than him being re-elected is the brewing of what looks like it may turn into WWIII, which is not exactly disconnected from the Trump mess to begin with. Increasingly heated e-debate about this stuff is why FB became intolerable for a while, including severe strain on a lot of long-term friendships, and family relationships (not Trumpists, but those who blindly see him as a joke and nothing much to worry about, or simply "don't care about politics", and a few vaguely Republican relatives who don't like him but will always party-ticket vote Republican). My own activism on that subject was so forceful it became personally problematic (even to the point of blood-pressure issues).
I did expect that we would not agree about the terms "activism" and "advocacy". I don't see a way around the fact that both refer to advancing a particular actionably politicized viewpoint, and doing that on WP is by nature an NPoV and NOTADVOCACY concern (not necessarily problem or failure). There is no bad-faith assumption or aspersion in that observation, and I'm in the activist sphere myself, just not (that I'm consciously aware of) about any topic I edit on this website. Others may choose not to make that separatation (a conflict of interest in the sense broader than WP's definition of it), but they do so at considerable core policy risk. Not sure going round in circles about these terms will be productive. This may have to just be an "agree to disagree" matter. Especially on
calling an editor an activist can easily be seen as an assumption of bad faith
; that is itself ABF about the meaning and intent of anyone using an everyday term which has as many positive implications as potentially negative ones; regardless of any essay changes, it still means firm stance-taking on a societial viewpoint, and doing that overtly or covertly on WP is necessarily at odds with neutrality, despite being motivated by good faith virtually by defintion ("this is important for the world and will make it a better place"). If the WP:ACTIVISM essay has markedly changed in ways that are counter to policy or consensus, it'll need revision, and this may be further impetus to merge it with WP:ADVOCACY so they can't fork further. May take that on myself, but would have to pore over both pages in great detail, which I've not done in a while.Unless I missed something, I think I'm rough in agreement with you on all the rest in the above, including the material that boils down to "SMcCandlish needs to do better" and that it takes work. I'm not even unaccustomed to it, just haven't done it in a while, but clearly need to again. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 03:02, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- I'm not going to reply to everything now, as it's late and I want to try and get a (relatively) early night for me. I'll try and reply to the rest some time tomorrow. But there was one thing I wanted to briefly reply on.
- You said
no one has a role of being the arbiter of others' thoughts/perceptions (or how they're allowed to put them into words)
. On thoughts and perceptions I would completely agree. People are allowed to think, believe, and perceive however and whatever they want. Freedom of belief is something that's enshrined in UK law. On expressions and manifestations of thoughts and beliefs however, I disagree. If someone says something that others perceive negatively (specifics don't really matter here), others are allowed to call them out on that. This is particularly the case for private groups, membership organisations, discussion forums, or web communities. When someone join a group, they are signing up to the group's rules and regulations, and expected norms when it comes to conduct. And if they breach those norms, then the group is well within their rights to kick that person out. - Bringing this back to speech, if someone repeatedly says something that others perceive negatively, and the group decides they are better off without that person, they are allowed to say "You're not welcome here any more". In taking that action, that is not a restriction on that person's ability to speak freely. They can continue to say whatever they want to say, just not in the place where the people who don't want to hear it can hear it. If they want to continue to speak in that manner, then they can form their own group of like minded individuals or join another existing one.
- I'm glad you like XKCD, and Duty Calls is a hilarious one. My personal favourites are Exploits of a Mom (curse you Little Bobby Tables!) and The Race (it's basically the cast of Firefly Adam Westing). I don't think Randall is incorrect though in Free Speech. Freedom of speech does not give you carte blanche to be an asshole. Nor does it compel others to have to put up with what they believe to be inappropriate conduct. That is what Randall is talking about in that comic. And that's why on enwiki at least, we have policies and guidelines like WP:CIV and WP:NPA, and targeted sanctions like IBANs. Enforcing behavioural PAGs is not "muzzling" someone, though it might feel that way to someone being sanctioned for it. That person is still free to say or do whatever it is they're saying or doing that goes against our PAGs, they're just not free to say it here. If that were not the case, then NPA in particular would be almost unenforceable.
- And this is where I'm going to leave it for tonight. There is an example related to what I've just said, that I think might give you some more direct insight into my point of view on this point of sanctioning someone for unacceptable speech, but because it's an open dispute I'm not going to mention it until it's resolved in some manner. WP:INAPPNOTE and whatnot. Plus there's a chance you might stumble upon it anyway and I don't want to potentially colour your viewpoint of that particular dispute or prevent you from feeling able to contribute to it. Sideswipe9th (talk) 03:44, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- Thanks for response, and no hurry. Also don't want to be "picking an argument for its own sake" or whatever. I do get where you're coming from on most of this, even if not agreeing with all of it.
If someone says something that others perceive negatively (specifics don't really matter here), others are allowed to call them out on that.
is certainly correct (though you seem to want to deny me this ability, at least if it intersects with topics or editors that interest you).they are signing up to the group's rules and regulations
: Yep, and resistant refusal to accept this principle is the source of the majority of MoS conflict ("it shouldn't apply to my pet topic!"), though that's orthogonal. Not orthogonal is that WP has no rule or regulation that one must never offend anyone else . But accusing others of ABF because they subjectively offended someone is itself against the rules and regs (ASPERSIONS, CIVIL, NPA, AOBF), and offensive, less subjectively so, because of said actual rules.allowed to say "You're not welcome here any more"
: Yes, but no one in any of these discussions seems to have wandered into that territory (happens all the time in GENSEX, though, almost invariably from a far-right quarter.) The Firefly series at xkcd: Thanks, I hadn't seen that somehow, despite being a Browncoat. Carte blanche: Of course; I wouldn't suggest otherwise. There's just a middle ground between "everything must be permitted no matter how offensive" and "Anything anyone claims could offend must be suppressed". We're surely both in the middle, but lean opposite each other. I won't wonder too hard about your mystery example, since I don't have the extreme position you seemed to think I do. (There's a straw-man element here; just because some free-expression extremist somewhere might make a nutty argument that they are entitled to say whatever they want, no matter what, in every venue on earth doesn't mean I'm making that argument. The one I am making is quite clear: there are different approaches to offensivness, what that even means, and what should be done in regard to it under what particular circumstances. And that where I land on that spectrum clearly differs from where you do, with neither of us having an objective Truth on the matter. My background makes me more resistant to claims of offensiveness than yours does, but also appears to make me more likely to assume good faith behind someone's statement, which is a bit ironic given the nature of this dispute and followup discussion.) — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 05:07, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- Thanks for response, and no hurry. Also don't want to be "picking an argument for its own sake" or whatever. I do get where you're coming from on most of this, even if not agreeing with all of it.
- There's some progress here, but also some regression on previous steps toward agreement. The tough stuff out of the way first. This is really central to the entire matter:
- Under separate cover, since not exactly flowing with the rest of the discussion: I'd like to highlight a new development. (INAPPNOTE doesn't seem applicable here, as you're not involved and the AN thread is apt to run longer than the block it's about anyway). In a recent dispute (which – imagine that! – also involves MoS and civility/offense-taking), a responding admin very hyperbolically referred to some comment as "beyhond the pale" (there's hardly any agreement it was even uncivil). Various people do not know the origin of that phrase and why it's offensive to a lot of people. I and another editor pointed out why, in both relevant venues [1][2][3]. We both simply noted and explained the offense potential without making an assumption or accusation of bad faith (intent to offend, etc.) behind that comment. For my part, I did it without demanding retraction, striking, or apology; the other editor did suggest a strike, but did not pursue it further. Neither made any dramatic issue out of it anywhere, just made note of it and got back to business. The admin (keep in mind admins are held to higher standards, especially in admin actions) has not responded to any of this much less struck it, and has gone to AN to seek approval of their action in which that phrase was used (though that wording's not central to the matter). Yet still no one is making a big deal out of it. We trust in good faith that the message that the phrase is apt to offend will be noticed and absorbed (by that person and by others) without trying to turn it into a public and performative apology-demand spectacle. Note how similar the underlying situation is to the one you've highlighted at AE, yet how very, very different the behavior has been by those observing the potential offensiveness, both in how they are approaching the editor who wrote it and how they are approaching community involvement. Both are even subjects about which people can be die-hard advocates/activists (doubly so with regard to "beyond the Pale", involving both Russian treatment of Jews and British treatment of the Irish, for centuries of bloody history). This should really be food for thought. Why did you (and someone else) take such an insistent position that I must have meant the meaning that offends you? What do you hope to gain by long-term refusal to let it go? What are your own motivations, biases or tendencies that impell this response when it is not impelled in others? Which of these two approaches is better for collegiality and for the community? — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 05:20, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- (aside) I'm struggling to find any corroborating source for the idea that this expression (which I suspect I've never used but know of) is offensive to anyone. The best analysis of it I can find is here. And wikt:beyond the pale agrees that association with either of these two historical "pale"s is dubious. Garners merely notes that some people spell it wrongly. I can't find any dictionary that tags the phrase as possibly offensive. It would seem far more reasonable to assume the term meant a boundary or area (or conceptual "field" as the first source suggests) and that while those two historical examples are of boundaries linked to oppression, there's no actual evidence that such a boundary of acceptable behaviour, as the term suggests, is in any way linked to either of these historical examples. -- Colin°Talk 11:09, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- Related, I think the reason nobody "made any dramatic issue out of it" was the obscurity of your complaint about it being offensive, where you admitted that nobody has ever heard of it being offensive. So either they took your word for it but were sympathetic to the person making the mistake (I didn't know it was offensive, so why would they?) or concluded maybe SMcCandlish is doing some OR etymological fallacy silliness that is entirely beside the point of the forum so I'm not going to argue with them about it here. Arguing about whether labelling people activists is bad faith is important to Wikipedia. Arguing about whether "beyond the pale" is offensive is a matter for Wiktionary.
- My problem with the activist label is it gets used to criticise only the other guys. Both sides of these debates, whether about "commit suicide" or "she for ships" or deadnaming, are here to push and argue for their POV. But the side that could be considered "conservative" generally doesn't view its behaviour as activism. For example, the rants by right wing journalists about gender neutral terminology being used by the NHS are protesting about a society change that happened that they didn't like. It isn't necessarily a fully adopted societal change (few changes are: we are still very sexist and racist) but it was a change they didn't like. Much of the racist activism in the UK is about people noticing and being upset that there are more brown people than before. I think the people pushing back are just as much an issue for Wikipedia as the people pushing forward. And grouping people into those camps and dismissing them because they are in a camp is getting into personal attack territory. Instead I think we should judge these issues on their merits, not because of who proposed them or is against them. -- Colin°Talk 13:11, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- I find myself agreeing with Colin here, beyond the pale isn't really an offensive term. Like I'm Irish, I was born and live in an area that's beyond the historical boundaries of the Pale, and we use that term all the time. Hell, there's even a music, art, and food festival called Beyond the Pale held annually in Wicklow. Maybe it's something the descendents of the diaspora have a different context on, I dunno. But as a contemporary native of the island, it's not offensive here in the slightest.
- I'd also note that, according to our article on the Pale, the notion that the phrase comes from the historical region in Ireland is dubious at best.
- I would agree however that it's hyperbolic in the context in which it was used. As I said in my comment on the AN review of the block, in isolation the comment made was pretty weak as personal attacks go. A beyond the pale personal attack would ordinarily have to be something pretty egregious, perhaps something on the historical level of "your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of elderberries", where you're deeply insulting the person (and optionally their parentage) in some manner. In ordinary circumstances, the underlying comment would be worthy of a warning or some other mild form of rebuke. But contextually, the comment was made a month after this editor was already blocked for making a somewhat more egregious personal attack against the same editor.
- When judging this as someone uninvolved to the underlying dispute, I have to consider the underlying context. I have to ask myself, what were the circumstances in which this block was made? And in those circumstances, I think the block is justifiable, even if the language used by the admin while making it is hyperbolic. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:25, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
- (aside) I'm struggling to find any corroborating source for the idea that this expression (which I suspect I've never used but know of) is offensive to anyone. The best analysis of it I can find is here. And wikt:beyond the pale agrees that association with either of these two historical "pale"s is dubious. Garners merely notes that some people spell it wrongly. I can't find any dictionary that tags the phrase as possibly offensive. It would seem far more reasonable to assume the term meant a boundary or area (or conceptual "field" as the first source suggests) and that while those two historical examples are of boundaries linked to oppression, there's no actual evidence that such a boundary of acceptable behaviour, as the term suggests, is in any way linked to either of these historical examples. -- Colin°Talk 11:09, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
As a meta comment, I think it is interesting that away from the drama boards, it is possible to have a civil conversation about what one wrote, what one thinks, what one hopes for, etc. Any one of the above replies would be tagged with some TLDR or "wall of text" or bludgeoning comment elsewhere. I've met one or two people on Wiki so toxic that they twist every word you write and the conversation has a exponential Brandolini's law problem. Fortunately nobody here is like that. (Hey Dustfreeworld thanks for fixing my "unsigned" and in case your ears are burning, no, you aren't remotely in the ballpark of users I'm talking about. My most recent experience was someone who left the project with their tail between their legs several years ago.) -- Colin°Talk 10:31, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
- No. My ears seldom burn, no mater the comments are toxic or not
;-)(Why do you think they are?) and I seldom describe people as “toxic”. Btw, who’s that? As a side note, I’ve met someone who creates so much misinformation that takes much efforts to debunk and the other user simply refutes by twisting every word they wrote. --Dustfreeworld (talk) 11:00, 28 February 2024 (UTC)- To catch up (been taking a break from this stuff): Whether "beyond the Pale" actually can be proven to have a particular origin is immaterial to the point I was making. In case A), there were two (I think) editors convinced that someone said something potentially offensive; they refused to accept that no offense was meant, and one of them has pursued the matter for months now, despite their finding offense being completely and totally subjective. In case B), two editors were convinced that an admin said something potentially offensive, for reasons which were at least defensible if not (we now see) entirely linguistically proven (and that proof is potentially irrelevant; if there's sufficient general belief that in the historical origins, then actual offense may be real). Neither editor made a big deal about it; just made their point and moved on, without making assumptive accusations about the intentions of the speaker, much less seeking sanctions over it. So, why the difference? The questions I posed for Sideswipe9th about this were rhetorical, for self-analysis, and not intended to generate a bunch of answers here, but they shouldn't be dodged because of Colin's etymological claims (and WP isn't a reliable source for such anyway, meanswhile offsite sources disagree). Aside: my prediction "the AN thread is apt to run longer than the block it's about anyway" proved true; as for the block being allegedly justified, only about 50% of respondents at AN agree with this, and the majority are partisans in the underlying dispute.Colin: Yes, all of this is a WP:MWOT by normal standards, but has been a mutually productive discussion we've engaged in voluntarily and cautiously. "Brandolini editors": Yes, I encounter them, too. I've had some DR attempts fail with amazing fireworks before. In one, I wrote up a summary of the dispute and sides in it with such neutrality that it was described as "this is how it should be done" by the responding admin; the other party, though, just used it as an excuse to attack me in about two dozen ways. I'm glad that nothing like that has happened here; even when each of us has raised concerns or criticisms, it's been civil and constructive.
Since HMIJ has been too busy (or just disinclined by now) to engage in our thread on his own page, I'll summarize my response to what Sideswipe9th last posted there, which I left dangling: I think you may have in fact actually identified a (single, only-ever) case of someone being unilaterally ARBATC-sanctioned while not being an MoS/AT regular. The other two potential examples don't count; one was an MoS regular being "simul-sanctioned" along with someone else in a short-term i-ban, and the other was MoS's longest-term disruptor (a regular and then some) finally getting T-banned after years of issues. On making diff lists of others' problematic edits: I'm still loath to do that, and since my own behavior would get draggeed into it (for a decade back or further, as we know, since it's happened in the present AE thread), there's no much point in me myself making that effort even if it temperamentally suited me. Some other MoS regular who irritates fewer people, like Cinderella157, could perhaps do something like that, but I'm skeptical they're into pre-emptive diff compiling, either.
I could easily construct a list of a few dozen editors I know of who ...
: My "provide a list" was sarcastic, not an actual suggestion; but that you chose to single out a particluar PoV in that topic area, when my original comment was about PoV issues on both sides equally, is "interesting".these are comments on the contributor, and not content.
...That the person adding the content was in error is almost always going to be implied when you make this comparison, but it does not need to be explicitly stated in the terms that you did.
... + various further making of this point in other language: Yes, that's "a fair cop", if I can quote Monty Python and the Holy Grail too (though I didn't turn anyone into a newt). I think I do need to moderate better when it comes to that sort of thing, though again there was no assumption of bad faith in those comments (rather, an assessment of lack of topical competence, running through the entire long thread). — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 00:39, 1 March 2024 (UTC)I'm still loath to do that, and since my own behavior would get draggeed into it
Yeah I totally get that. It's not a fun thing to have to do when there's a long term disruptor, but it can be a necessary thing. As for your own behaviour, yeah the boomerang is always a worry, and its even something I worry about myself when making a report. Did I say or do the wrong thing? Am I being the disruptive editor and not realising it? Those are some of the questions I ask myself whenever I consider making a report.there's no much point in me myself making that effort even if it temperamentally suited me
Never say never. If you were to compare my contributions to discussions today, versus my contributions two years ago, I think I interact with talk pages quite a bit differently than before. Some of that is environmental, as the editing environment around you changes, often you find yourself changing with it. I'm sure that if you put in the effort, and are successful in changing the way you're perceived by others, if someone did try to pull up a diff from a decade ago you could say and demonstrate with more recent diffs and behaviour how you've changed since that time. Decade old diffs are only truly helpful if you're trying to establish a decade long, unchanging pattern of problematic behaviour.but that you chose to single out a particluar PoV in that topic area, when my original comment was about PoV issues on both sides equally, is "interesting"
The sarcasm I clearly missed, alas that is the problem with a textual medium without tone indicators. But, on a more serious point maybe that's because as a regular in that topic area, I don't recognise this other group actually existing. Most of us who edit articles relating to trans and non-binary people know that there are circumstances where inclusion of a name is not warranted, and there are circumstances where it is. Some of us may disagree on where the inclusion line is drawn in edge cases, the Isla Bryson case would be the most recent example I can remember, where I came drew the line as exclusion but other regulars came down as inclusion. As far as I can recall though, all of the POV pushing I've seen on this issue are from editors seeking to include the former names in all circumstances. If there are examples of this that you're aware of, I would be more than happy to re-evaluate my position here.though I didn't turn anyone into a newt
That's the problem with turning people into newts, they always seem to get better!I think I do need to moderate better when it comes to that sort of thing
I'm glad you recognise this. And if it's something you think I can help with, drop me a line and I'll see what I can do. It's a long, and non-linear process, but one I think you're more than capable of. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:13, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
- To catch up (been taking a break from this stuff): Whether "beyond the Pale" actually can be proven to have a particular origin is immaterial to the point I was making. In case A), there were two (I think) editors convinced that someone said something potentially offensive; they refused to accept that no offense was meant, and one of them has pursued the matter for months now, despite their finding offense being completely and totally subjective. In case B), two editors were convinced that an admin said something potentially offensive, for reasons which were at least defensible if not (we now see) entirely linguistically proven (and that proof is potentially irrelevant; if there's sufficient general belief that in the historical origins, then actual offense may be real). Neither editor made a big deal about it; just made their point and moved on, without making assumptive accusations about the intentions of the speaker, much less seeking sanctions over it. So, why the difference? The questions I posed for Sideswipe9th about this were rhetorical, for self-analysis, and not intended to generate a bunch of answers here, but they shouldn't be dodged because of Colin's etymological claims (and WP isn't a reliable source for such anyway, meanswhile offsite sources disagree). Aside: my prediction "the AN thread is apt to run longer than the block it's about anyway" proved true; as for the block being allegedly justified, only about 50% of respondents at AN agree with this, and the majority are partisans in the underlying dispute.Colin: Yes, all of this is a WP:MWOT by normal standards, but has been a mutually productive discussion we've engaged in voluntarily and cautiously. "Brandolini editors": Yes, I encounter them, too. I've had some DR attempts fail with amazing fireworks before. In one, I wrote up a summary of the dispute and sides in it with such neutrality that it was described as "this is how it should be done" by the responding admin; the other party, though, just used it as an excuse to attack me in about two dozen ways. I'm glad that nothing like that has happened here; even when each of us has raised concerns or criticisms, it's been civil and constructive.
Tiffany Scott link
Just a heads up, I'm planning to write an article on this topic, hence the link, but it was getting a bit late to start something new. I think there's enough information there for the topic to be notable. This is Paul (talk) 11:26, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- @This is Paul: So I have two concerns here. One is the article title, I'm not sure (criminal) is an appropriate disambiguator for a biographical article. The other is WP:BIO1E. From reviewing the sources, Scott only really appears to be notable for being part of the reason for the 2024 Scottish prisoner placement reforms. Her conviction doesn't seem to be that notable in isolation from those reforms. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:33, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- I think her notoriety and the Order for Lifelong Restriction probably add weight to the case, along with the reports of her death, as few prisoners' deaths are given widespread media coverage. I suppose the case's role in the reforms is a reason for that, and her transfer just happened to have been approved as the Isla Bryson case kicked off. As for the name feel free to suggest a different disambiguation title. I chose criminal as we have other such pages, and it seems appropriate to disambiguate by notability, but on reflection we could go with prisoner instead. This is Paul (talk) 18:09, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- @This is Paul: yeah, prisoner seems a better disambiguator. That still leaves the BIO1E concerns, I'm busy at the moment trying to salvage a recently created draft, but I'd suggest checking to see if there's any sources that contain substantive content about her in isolation from the Scottish reforms and Isla Bryson. When I did a quick search earlier, I couldn't find anything that didn't link her to those reforms. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:39, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- There's a few articles from her appearance at Falkirk Sheriff Court in 2017, but not much. It appears she was regarded as dangerous by the authorities to the point that security had to be tightened during her appearance in court, but the reforms and the post-Bryson furore appear to be the thing that brought her to wider attention. I didn't know much about Orders for Lifelong Restriction until today, but Scott's OLR on top of a relatively short prison sentence would seem unusual. I'll search for stuff under her previous name. If the case for an article on this topic isn't strong enough then perhaps it may need to be merged into something about the reforms. This is Paul (talk) 19:31, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- @This is Paul: Mmm yeah. Violent prisoners aren't inherently noteworthy, we have hundreds of them throughout the UK, and needing to have increased security at court appearances is sadly common. Usually it's their conviction, in the broader context of their crime (eg they murdered someone) that is what's notable about them. That's why we tend to have more Murder of articles than articles on murderers.
- I believe the Order for Lifelong Restriction is the rough Scottish law equivalent to the now defunct whole life order under English and Welsh law. The primary difference is that unlike the former English life order, the Scottish equivalent allows for periodic review by a parole board.
- I think the reforms might be a more notable topic overall than Scott, though I've not looked into the sourcing, and there's no reason why a paragraph on her case couldn't appear in the context of that article, alongside a paragraph on Bryson as those two cases seemed to be the impetus for the changes. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:46, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- Sounds like a Scottish equivalent of this article could be worth a a go too. This is Paul (talk) 19:59, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- There's a few articles from her appearance at Falkirk Sheriff Court in 2017, but not much. It appears she was regarded as dangerous by the authorities to the point that security had to be tightened during her appearance in court, but the reforms and the post-Bryson furore appear to be the thing that brought her to wider attention. I didn't know much about Orders for Lifelong Restriction until today, but Scott's OLR on top of a relatively short prison sentence would seem unusual. I'll search for stuff under her previous name. If the case for an article on this topic isn't strong enough then perhaps it may need to be merged into something about the reforms. This is Paul (talk) 19:31, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- @This is Paul: yeah, prisoner seems a better disambiguator. That still leaves the BIO1E concerns, I'm busy at the moment trying to salvage a recently created draft, but I'd suggest checking to see if there's any sources that contain substantive content about her in isolation from the Scottish reforms and Isla Bryson. When I did a quick search earlier, I couldn't find anything that didn't link her to those reforms. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:39, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
- I think her notoriety and the Order for Lifelong Restriction probably add weight to the case, along with the reports of her death, as few prisoners' deaths are given widespread media coverage. I suppose the case's role in the reforms is a reason for that, and her transfer just happened to have been approved as the Isla Bryson case kicked off. As for the name feel free to suggest a different disambiguation title. I chose criminal as we have other such pages, and it seems appropriate to disambiguate by notability, but on reflection we could go with prisoner instead. This is Paul (talk) 18:09, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
After you reverted two separate good-faith edits of mine on J. K. Rowling within a few minutes of me making them, I decided to read through your previous edit history on the article.
A comparison of your many reverts to WP:OWNBEHAVIOR is illuminating:
| Edit date | WP:OWNBEHAVIOR | Your edit summary |
|---|---|---|
| 19:17, 11 March 2024 | An editor reverts a change simply because the editor finds it "unnecessary" | we don't need to document every single Twitter spat Rowling gets into |
| 05:13, 11 March 2024 | An editor reverts justified article changes by different editors repeatedly over an extended period to protect a certain version, stable or not | Per extensive workshopping [...] please discuss any substantive changes on the talk page |
| 04:40, 11 March 2024 | An editor disputes minor edits concerning layout | this change broke text verification integrity by moving a footnote away from the text it was supporting (the change moved the footnote over by a whopping nine words) |
| 03:09, 14 August 2023 | An editor reverts justified article changes by different editors repeatedly over an extended period to protect a certain version, stable or not | This text was extensively discussed during the last featured article review and has a broad consensus. Please engage on the talk page why you think this content needs to change |
| 03:51, 29 January 2023 | An editor reverts justified article changes by different editors repeatedly over an extended period to protect a certain version, stable or not | this particular bit of text has been workshopped several times now |
| 01:55, 26 June 2022 | An editor reverts a good-faith change without providing an edit summary that refers to relevant Wikipedia policies and guidelines | restoration of content |
| 01:32, 26 June 2022 | An editor reverts a good-faith change without providing an edit summary that refers to relevant Wikipedia policies and guidelines | restoration of revision |
| 01:19, 26 June 2022 | An editor reverts a good-faith change without providing an edit summary that refers to relevant Wikipedia policies and guidelines | Restoration of edits |
As the kids say these days, I suggest that you touch grass.
Stephen Hui (talk) 02:12, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Stephen Hui: Hey, welcome to my talk page! So Rowling's article is a WP:FA, the content in it was extensively discussed during a featured article review almost two years ago now. I am one of several editors who participated in that review and keep the article on my watchlist as it sees a large amount of disruption. While featured articles are open for editing like any other, they are also typically subject to a strong consensus.
- Some of those edits, like the one on 14 August and 29 January was my responding to editors engaged in an edit war. If you check the sequence of edits on 14 August, you'll see that the content Chaosdruid added was reverted by two other editors, one before and one after me. Likewise if you check the sequence on 16 January, you'll see that Decodingw's edits had been reverted 6 times by multiple editors including myself. Simply considering the changes to be made in good faith is not an exemption from WP:EW. As the edit warring policy states being right are not a valid defence against edit warring. BRD is typically considered good practice, and in that circumstance after the first revert both Chaosdruid and Decodingw should have started a talk page discussion, where those changes would have been discussed and potentially refined.
- The edits on 26 June 2022 are a special case, as on that day the article was featured on the main page. While the article was on the front page, we saw a flurry of edits, some good, and a lot bad. On that date, almost all of us who participated in the FAR were patrolling the article, and extensive use of reverting was applied. Every editor who was reverted was then invited to the article talk page to discuss their proposed changes. You can see this in Talk:J. K. Rowling/Archive 13, which contains every discussion started on or just after that day. Following discussion and refinement of the proposed changes, a consensus was found for some changes to that article and those were installed on or after that date. Some editors however did not take up the invitation, and proceeded to edit war against consensus, and as a result quite a few editors were blocked on that day.
- The edit at 19:17, 11 March 2024, was because we just had a discussion on adding and removing content to that section. That particular piece of content was sufficiently close to that discussion that removing it seemed warranted. Now that editor is of course free to propose adding it on the article talk page, but given the comments made about WP:NOTNEWS and these being individually minor manifestations of Rowling's views about transgender issues I suspect there will not be a consensus to add it.
- The important thing here is discussion. When an edit is challenged by another in good faith, the important thing is always to start a discussion on the article talk page. Now your edits I reverted for two reasons. The first edit did indeed break text verification integrity, because that footnote only supports the text
beginning in 2017
. That particular piece of prose was subject to intense workshopping during the FAR and after, and the placement of those footnotes was subject to that discussion. The other issue with that edit was that partially changed the dash style used in the article. MOS:EMDASH only mandates changes in a dash style when the style in an article is inconsistent. However, as a result of the FAR, the style in that article is consistent, and that article uses ENDASH. Rather than fixing an issue, your edit introduced a new one by making the dash style used in the article inconsistent. - Now your second edit I'm afraid came across as rather WP:POINTy, in that you removed two citations that directly supported the article text. Those citations were used to support the
continual
word that you removed from earlier in the sentence. You may also wish to note that I did not revert the removal of that word. You also in that edit said that it wasthe first part of a multi-part edit I was making before I was done
. Now I and other editors who have the article on our watchlists will be more than happy to hear your proposals on the article talk page. They will be discussed, and if a consensus exists either made, refined, or rejected. This is a necessary process to ensure that the article continues to meet the FA criteria on an ongoing basis, so that any future featured article review does not need to be as involved as the 2022 review. - Please go ahead and suggest the changes you're thinking of on the article talk page, I know I would love to hear them and I'm sure that other editors on the article will too. But please also do not be aggrieved if I or other editors watching that page continue to revert substantial changes that depart from the existing consensus, given the highly contentious nature of that article. Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:50, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
Any progress on that GENSEX ARBECR ARCA we talked about?
Wow ... that's a mouthful of acronyms!
I ask because just recently the need struck me when, yesterday, Music of Minecraft was subjected to a misgendering attack due to Lena Raine's role; maybe someone badly wanted to do it to her article but didn't want to put up with the indefinite PC there. Instead of protecting the page I found it easier to block the /64 that had done it from the article for a year. I also RevDel'ed all the offending edits and in one case an edit summary.
Then, tonight, I wound up having to put India Willoughby on indef semi, and in addition decided to go back through over a year's worth of edits and RevDel all the misgendering and deadnaming there.
Since at the very least I now think that use of RevDel is something we ought to do on a standard basis in that situation (under RD1), I am thinking more certainly about what we want to say in requesting this amendment to at least save admins a lot of work. You suggested you were going to start something in your own userspace ... have you? Daniel Case (talk) 06:56, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hey Daniel Case,
- Mmmm, acronym stew. I've been slowly compiling the info off-wiki for the moment. Progress is slow though as it's difficult to compile a list of how many articles that have been indef ECPed, as not every admin is diligent in logging the action at WP:AELOG, and there's no consistent formatting to how individual admins are summarising the protection reasons in the protection log. I've been thinking of writing a quarry to search through the protection long for the last couple of years to grab any explicit GENSEX protections, I'm just having a difficult time parsing all of the different acronyms that are used.
- I'll try and post something here again in the next day or two. Kinda busy at the moment between getting an article ready for GA, rescuing a draft from NPOV hell, and my off-wiki day job. I think the information that'd be most useful when making this request is the overall volume of how many page protections are necessary (which I've been trying to compile), and a few key examples where protection has had to escalate through multiple requests because prior levels were insufficient, or disruption started the instant protection ended.
- What I have found I think suggests that perhaps we should be asking ArbCom to add ARBECR as an option to the WP:CT/GG standard set of restrictions. I'll know more for certain once I've gathered more of the evidence, but I think it'd be more useful as an option for selective use on highly controversial pages (eg Libs of TikTok), instead of the blanket topic wide version of it that exists in WP:CT/A-I, WP:GS/RUSUKR, and WP:GS/AA.
- So on RevDelling, that's actually something I request somewhat frequently for pages on my watchlist. The most recent discussion on this was in August 2023, which ultimately leaves it up to a judgement call. In most cases where RevDel is necessary, RD2 is the most relevant criteria, as misgendering and deadnaming are BLP violations. Sometimes it's also necessary to request Oversight under WP:OSPOL#1, particularly when the deadnames are only verifiable to a doxxing website or forum. Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:34, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
- Agreed. Just let me know when you're ready so I can look over what you've drafted. Daniel Case (talk) 22:57, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Not been feeling great the last couple of days I'm afraid, pretty exhausted. I have pulled together a listing of all currently indef ECPed articles, broken it down by year, and by protection reason. There's actually fewer indeffed ECPs than I thought, though there are 8 articles that went straight to ECP as the first protection logged action, and interestingly there's one indef fully protected. Not sure if that helps or hinders a potential ARCA yet though, and I haven't figured out yet how to frame this beyond "we handle some very contentious articles in this topic area that have the potential for significant disruption" followed by some key examples. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:19, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: And then, once in a blue moon the stars align. Talk:Sweet Baby Inc. is looking like it might be a prime case study for why ARBECR should be extended on a per-article basis to GENSEX. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:09, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: first draft of my opening statement is ready at User:Sideswipe9th/ARBECR sandbox. The bolded "As of 7 March" text is a wikilink to that sandbox page, which when we post the case request will have the content in the "Indef ECP articles in GENSEX" section. Argument could probably be stronger, but lemme know what you think :) Sideswipe9th (talk) 18:45, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- Yeah, that page has been coming up at the noticeboards lately. I think I took the occasion to RevDel an edit to it. No ... wait, that was on transgender history (another good argument for ECR ultimately, I think). Daniel Case (talk) 19:51, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: I'm not sure we see enough disruption on transgender history to warrant ARBECR. I think the key differentiator between ARBECR and indef-ECP is that ARBECR also restricts the talk page contributions of non-EC editors to making only non-controversial edit requests. That article's talk page is pretty quiet. An argument could be made however for indef-semi however, if the pending changes protection winds up being useless. I think the argument for this is strongest when we can demonstrate the necessity for the additional talk page restrictions provided by ARBECR. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:10, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- Oh, that's what I mean ... eventually. Too many of these things in other topic areas covered by ECR have eventually reached the level where that's necessary. Daniel Case (talk) 20:12, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Aaah, OK. Not sure how to craft an argument on that though. Maybe that's something you could do in your statement? Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:14, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- The understanding with ECR has to me always been that it's not mandatory, just strongly (especially in PIA articles about present or past military clashes or terror attacks, or in present circumstances closely related to the current conflict and/or newly created as a result) recommended. Ditto with GS/CASTE (articles about castes or tribes or otherwise closely related to that subject), GS/AA (articles most directly related to the conflict, although lately we're ECRing almost everything ... maybe that's a portent of something in that corner of the world?) and GS/RUSUKR (just about anything related). ECR doesn't have to be imposed from the outset except with new PIA articles, but making it available as an option means admins need not slowly escalate to it as some of us prefer to do in its absence.
- Likewise, within GENSEX I would want ECR as an option to apply to biographies of trans- or otherwise gender-nonconforming people who use pronouns different from what they once did and were not notable before transitioning. These are the articles most frequently targeted by purposely disruptive editors for misgendering and deadnaming, which in addition raise BLP concerns. In fact I defy anyone to find an article about someone in that category of appreciable length that we've had for some time that we haven't had to put on long-term protection for that exact reason. Daniel Case (talk) 21:15, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Can't tell if this is a draft of your statement or not, but I'll reply as if it's not.
- Huh. As written ARBECR is mandatory across the WP:CT/A-I content area, though there is a bit of wiggle room for where articles contain content related to the conflict but it's not the primary topic of the article. Eg The Game Awards 2023 has content on the Gaza because the humanitarian crisis there was brought up by industry members ahead of the event, but that article itself isn't subject to ARBECR even though it occasionally gets some disruption.
- On deadnaming and pronouns, I should probably add a paragraph into my statement about that, as that's one area where it would definitely be useful. I wonder how many bios of non-cis people are indefinitely ECPed per the BLP CTOP, and of that number how many would also be covered under GENSEX. Time to go bash together another quarry I think. Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:27, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hmmm, 210 indef ECP protections. Filtering that is going to be a PITA. Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:41, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Ok, I've added a paragraph on GENSEX bios to the draft. I just did a word count, and it's coming out at 598 words. I don't really want to add any more to my statement as I'd like to save some for back-and-forth with the committee. Could you give it a once over and let me know what you think? Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:09, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- It's not a draft, but it does incorporate some things I'll be including. Daniel Case (talk) 03:47, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Cool! Unless you've noticed any glaring issues with what I've said in the ARCA drafting section of my sandbox, I'm ready to launch the request when you are :) Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:21, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
- It's not a draft, but it does incorporate some things I'll be including. Daniel Case (talk) 03:47, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Ok, I've added a paragraph on GENSEX bios to the draft. I just did a word count, and it's coming out at 598 words. I don't really want to add any more to my statement as I'd like to save some for back-and-forth with the committee. Could you give it a once over and let me know what you think? Sideswipe9th (talk) 22:09, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hmmm, 210 indef ECP protections. Filtering that is going to be a PITA. Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:41, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Aaah, OK. Not sure how to craft an argument on that though. Maybe that's something you could do in your statement? Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:14, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- Oh, that's what I mean ... eventually. Too many of these things in other topic areas covered by ECR have eventually reached the level where that's necessary. Daniel Case (talk) 20:12, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: I'm not sure we see enough disruption on transgender history to warrant ARBECR. I think the key differentiator between ARBECR and indef-ECP is that ARBECR also restricts the talk page contributions of non-EC editors to making only non-controversial edit requests. That article's talk page is pretty quiet. An argument could be made however for indef-semi however, if the pending changes protection winds up being useless. I think the argument for this is strongest when we can demonstrate the necessity for the additional talk page restrictions provided by ARBECR. Sideswipe9th (talk) 20:10, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: And then, once in a blue moon the stars align. Talk:Sweet Baby Inc. is looking like it might be a prime case study for why ARBECR should be extended on a per-article basis to GENSEX. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:09, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
- @Daniel Case: Not been feeling great the last couple of days I'm afraid, pretty exhausted. I have pulled together a listing of all currently indef ECPed articles, broken it down by year, and by protection reason. There's actually fewer indeffed ECPs than I thought, though there are 8 articles that went straight to ECP as the first protection logged action, and interestingly there's one indef fully protected. Not sure if that helps or hinders a potential ARCA yet though, and I haven't figured out yet how to frame this beyond "we handle some very contentious articles in this topic area that have the potential for significant disruption" followed by some key examples. Sideswipe9th (talk) 19:19, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
- Agreed. Just let me know when you're ready so I can look over what you've drafted. Daniel Case (talk) 22:57, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
RFA2024 update: no longer accepting new proposals in phase I
Hey there! This is to let you know that phase I of the 2024 requests for adminship (RfA) review is now no longer accepting new proposals. Lots of proposals remain open for discussion, and the current round of review looks to be on a good track towards making significant progress towards improving RfA's structure and environment. I'd like to give my heartfelt thanks to everyone who has given us their idea for change to make RfA better, and the same to everyone who has given the necessary feedback to improve those ideas. The following proposals remain open for discussion:
- Proposal 2, initiated by HouseBlaster, provides for the addition of a text box at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship reminding all editors of our policies and enforcement mechanisms around decorum.
- Proposals 3 and 3b, initiated by Barkeep49 and Usedtobecool, respectively, provide for trials of discussion-only periods at RfA. The first would add three extra discussion-only days to the beginning, while the second would convert the first two days to discussion-only.
- Proposal 5, initiated by SilkTork, provides for a trial of RfAs without threaded discussion in the voting sections.
- Proposals 6c and 6d, initiated by BilledMammal, provide for allowing users to be selected as provisional admins for a limited time through various concrete selection criteria and smaller-scale vetting.
- Proposal 7, initiated by Lee Vilenski, provides for the "General discussion" section being broken up with section headings.
- Proposal 9b, initiated by Reaper Eternal, provides for the requirement that allegations of policy violation be substantiated with appropriate links to where the alleged misconduct occured.
- Proposals 12c, 21, and 21b, initiated by City of Silver, Ritchie333, and HouseBlaster, respectively, provide for reducing the discretionary zone, which currently extends from 65% to 75%. The first would reduce it 65%–70%, the second would reduce it to 50%–66%, and the third would reduce it to 60%–70%.
- Proposal 13, initiated by Novem Lingaue, provides for periodic, privately balloted admin elections.
- Proposal 14, initiated by Kusma, provides for the creation of some minimum suffrage requirements to cast a vote.
- Proposals 16 and 16c, initiated by Thebiguglyalien and Soni, respectively, provide for community-based admin desysop procedures. 16 would desysop where consensus is established in favor at the administrators' noticeboard; 16c would allow a petition to force reconfirmation.
- Proposal 16e, initiated by BilledMammal, would extend the recall procedures of 16 to bureaucrats.
- Proposal 17, initiated by SchroCat, provides for "on-call" admins and 'crats to monitor RfAs for decorum.
- Proposal 18, initiated by theleekycauldron, provides for lowering the RfB target from 85% to 75%.
- Proposal 24, initiated by SportingFlyer, provides for a more robust alternate version of the optional candidate poll.
- Proposal 25, initiated by Femke, provides for the requirement that nominees be extended-confirmed in addition to their nominators.
- Proposal 27, initiated by WereSpielChequers, provides for the creation of a training course for admin hopefuls, as well as periodic retraining to keep admins from drifting out of sync with community norms.
- Proposal 28, initiated by HouseBlaster, tightens restrictions on multi-part questions.
To read proposals that were closed as unsuccessful, please see Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/2024 review/Phase I/Closed proposals. You are cordially invited once again to participate in the open discussions; when phase I ends, phase II will review the outcomes of trial proposals and refine the implementation details of other proposals. Another notification will be sent out when this phase begins, likely with the first successful close of a major proposal. Happy editing! theleekycauldron (talk • she/her), via:
MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:53, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
March 2024
Hello. I wanted to let you know that in your recent contributions to Sweet Baby Inc., you seemed to act as if you were the owner of the page. Everyone is welcome to contribute constructively to Wikipedia. This means that editors do not own articles, including ones they create, and should respect the work of their fellow contributors. If you create or edit an article, remember that others are free to change its content. Take a look at the welcome page to learn more about contributing to this encyclopedia. Thank you. FMSky (talk) 01:37, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hi FMSky. As you are aware, being a participant in the discussion, there is a rather lengthy on Talk:Sweet Baby Inc. over this particular piece of content. Multiple editors, including myself, have voiced objections to it including that this content is WP:UNDUE. There is quite clearly no consensus for this content, at this time, and you have yet to convince any editor that the content is due. I would strongly urge that you self-revert this edit and re-engage on the article talk page. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:41, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
- I dont think anyone other than you have argued that it is undue, the only concern had been the reliability of sources, which shouldnt be a problem anymore --FMSky (talk) 01:43, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
- @FMSky: both myself and Aquillion have said that this is undue in any form. Additionally, as I've just noted on your own talk page, you are currently in violation of the 3RR brightline, having made 4 reverts in the last 10/11 hours. Please self-revert your most recent edit to the article. Thanks. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:45, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
- Thank you for self-reverting. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:45, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
- @FMSky: both myself and Aquillion have said that this is undue in any form. Additionally, as I've just noted on your own talk page, you are currently in violation of the 3RR brightline, having made 4 reverts in the last 10/11 hours. Please self-revert your most recent edit to the article. Thanks. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:45, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
- I dont think anyone other than you have argued that it is undue, the only concern had been the reliability of sources, which shouldnt be a problem anymore --FMSky (talk) 01:43, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
NICE
If anything this article confirms that NICE is expected to be and generally considered to be independent of government interference. Your comment "and as far as I can tell, no reforms to prevent future political interference took place" is somewhat overselling this as though it was a scandal that one might expect to lead to reform. The NICE statement that the change was made "to align with the revised remit given to NICE in 2014 that no recommendations addressing national public policy issues or legislation should be made in NICE guidance, unless specifically indicated within a topic referral."
can be taken at face value if you want to. The guideline states its remit is to "Commissioners, managers and practitioners with public health as part of their remit, working in the public, private and third sector" and "the public". None of them are "the government". So I can see the point that minimum-price legislation for alcohol could be regarded as outside of their remit. And I can see why campaigners would be disappointed if they had false hopes it would be. Can you imagine if NICE recommended that tax on alcohol be directly hypothecated for the NHS. You and I might agree it had overstepped its remit there. So a line needs to be drawn somewhere and perhaps that line should have been made clearer to those drafting that guideline, so they weren't disappointed later. It isn't really convincing as evidence of a systemic problem of political interference.
The other example you gave, on guidance on adult depression, isn't political at all AFAICS, so not sure how it is relevant. But reading the article suggests that there were problems with a draft that will be addressed. They say "NICE listened to our serious methodological concerns and engaged with us appropriately with regard to these. I am very pleased with that and now hope that they’ll indeed address them all in this third revision"
. Not really seeing what's news here. Second draft revision gets revised, after consultation and feedback, for third draft revision. Hmm. -- Colin°Talk 11:28, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hey Colin. So on the political interference article, there is a world of difference between expected to be free and actually being free of government interference. In this instance, NICE removed part of their guidance because ministers at the Department of Health wrote to them telling them to remove it. The issue isn't whether or not NICE overstepped their remit, it's that the government wrote to them in secret to remove part of the guidance and NICE did it. To quote the chair of the committee for this guideline, the change was "imposed after the committee had signed off a final version of the guidance".
- Now, I'm sure we can both agree that issues relating to trans and non-binary people are a political hot topic within the UK right now, especially when it comes to youth. A few months ago we saw some pretty awful non-statutory draft school's guidance from the Department for Education that government lawyers assert has a high risk of being found unlawful, yet the government pressed ahead with publishing. Almost two years ago we saw guidance from the EHRC allowing for the exclusion of trans people from single gender services aligned with their gender identity. Because of that guidance, the EHRC itself is currently under investigation by Ganhri because there are serious concerns over its political independence following the appointment] of Baroness Falkner in December 2020. In this set of circumstances, it is not out of the realm of possibility that the NICE guidance on puberty blockers has been subject to political interference from the government.
- As for the other example I gave, you are correct that it wasn't about political pressure. If you re-read my comment on YFNS talk page, I was also making the point that the guidance NICE issue can be incorrect. The 2017 incident was because they issued incorrect draft guidance, and a large coalition of health organisations called them to task over this. Per the original stakeholder position statement from the coalition, they raised the concerns about fundamental methodological flaws during the first draft of this guidance, and those concerns were not addressed in the second draft. According to an archived copy of the Society for Psychotherapy Research website from November 2021, even the third draft of the guidance did not address all of their concerns. That guideline was eventually released in June 2022, and according to an archived copy the Society for Psychotherapy Research website from that same date, even the final version of the guideline had the same methodological issues that the large stakeholder group raised with the committee during draft 1. According to the final stakeholder position statement summary, the stakeholders still "remain concerned about the trustworthiness of the guideline" based on its final draft.
- The overall point I'm making is that, while we may consider NICE guidelines to be high quality per MEDRS, they are not perfect. They are not immune to political pressure, nor are they immune to methodological flaws that compromise the trustworthiness and reliability of the guidance they provide. They are not above rebuke by other high quality reliable sources, and treating them as though they are is doing ourselves and our readers a disservice when that information is contextually relevant to an article and has due weight. Sideswipe9th (talk) 17:54, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
- The BMJ article doesn't state it as strongly as you, only that "The edit appears to have been made as a result..". Comparing the draft with the final, the scope of "Who should take action" was revised from "They could be working in government departments, Public Health England, local government, the NHS and other organisations in the public, private, voluntary and community sectors." to "They could be working in local government, Public Health England the NHS and other organisations in the public, private, voluntary and community sectors." Quite clearly "government departments" was removed. The recommendations still "Making alcohol less accessible, affordable and acceptable". How one makes alcohol less affordable I would argue really is the sort of policy a government should make. They could by all means ask a body, perhaps NICE, to recommend among options, but I can also see that this could quite reasonably be viewed as a political decision.
- NICE have thousands of guidelines and reports. You only have a few examples. Yes I'm sure they get some things wrong, that they don't revise guidelines as frequently as one might like, that some bodies are unhappy with some decisions (but you don't hear so much from the ones who are happy), and so on. You'd really need a compelling source that it is institutionally incapable of making wise evidence based decisions, and I don't think you'll find it. The whole NHS is a tale of people disagreeing on how to do it, often very vocally. It doesn't mean those involved aren't in good faith trying their best. -- Colin°Talk 19:16, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
- Colin
You'd really need a compelling source that it is institutionally incapable of making wise evidence based decisions, and I don't think you'll find it.
In any of the now four discussions on this (Talk:Puberty blocker, YFNS' talk page, my talk page, and WT:MED) has anyone actually said that we should not include the findings of the NICE review into puberty blockers? Because if they have, I must have missed it. If they have could you link me to the comment(s) where they did so? What I have seen across those discussions is some editors wishing to contrast the NICE review against some other high quality sources (ie WPATH, the paper by Horton) that have criticised its findings and methodology, in a contextually appropriate manner. That's why I've stressed the point to you that NICE are not infallible. They can make mistakes, and they can be called out for those mistakes by other high quality sources. - There is also a discussion on whether to include SBM's criticism over NICE rejecting a freedom of information request for the names and qualifications of those involved in the review. While SBM clearly isn't MEDRS, and it would be inappropriate to discuss that in the Puberty blocker#Gender-affirming care section, due to the way that article is currently structured a good faith argument could be made for including it in the Puberty blocker#United Kingdom section, just as there are good faith arguments to oppose it. Most NICE guidelines that I'm aware of include names, job titles, and summary qualifications of the guideline committee members. For example, here's the list of members for the committee behind the 2022 depression in adults guideline we've been discussing here. Here's the member list for the guideline on the diagnosis and management of ADHD. Here's the list of members for the guideline on the diagnosis and management of autistic adults. And here's the member list for the guideline on epilepsy in children, young people and adults.
- From reading the original FOI requests, for their part NICE seem to be considering this specific list of names and qualifications to be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act 2000, on the grounds of data protection. This seems to be at odds and seemingly out of step with how they handle the names and qualifications for other guidelines they publish. Accordingly this does seem like fair criticism to make against the organisation and the circumstances that lead to the development of this guideline. Now it's possible they've withheld this because the development of this guideline was a part of the Cass review, and the review itself has been withholding the names and qualifications of all of its members. As a former academic in a different field (computer science), the level of secrecy behind both the NICE guidance and the Cass review is concerning to me. Outside of the blinded peer-review process, the authors behind a piece of good science should be known, and I have to wonder why they are being withheld in this circumstance. There's a rumour that Cass will be publishing the final report sometime later this month or early next month, and perhaps when she does so we'll find out who was involved. Sideswipe9th (talk) 21:38, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
- See my latest comment at YFNS page. I've never complained the report was being removed or suggested to be removed, it was the "not give a lot of weight to" a review from "a country the CoE say is ...". That's just plain offensive. And foolish.
- I'm not particularly focused in this particularly NICE review or whether it itself has problems. I'm much more interested that editors review RS with decent arguments. Neither YFNS argument, nor your "I found a few cases of complaints about NICE over the years" arguments are good imo, if one's point is to "not give a lot of weight" or regard a source as being less reliable. If your point was only to say NICE isn't infallible then you wouldn't have me disagreeing with that and needn't have done all that research. But if your point is that because they made this mistake here or nearly made that mistake there, then we should also "not give a lot of weight to" this other review/report/guideline there, then that doesn't add up. Because, as I said, NICE produce thousands of such reviews/reports/guidelines. We'd need evidence of a systemic problem.
- I wonder if the anonymity is due to threats, though. I mean, it's pretty likely those involved will get death threats. Whereas you don't tend to get that for prioritising the "wrong" epilepsy drug.
- I'm reading Fighting for Life: The Twelve Battles that Made Our NHS, and the Struggle for Its Future. It's pretty good if you like that sort of political history. Anyway, they mention NICE and Herceptin. That's a good example of political interference, but the opposite way around, where they were pressured into agreeing an expensive treatment that would normally have failed their algorithm. Turns out there's a magic money tree for cancer.
- NICE have a hard job to do and they are in a battle with the best funded companies in the world. So I can imagine that a lot of the criticism they get is directly or indirectly (though funding charities) from drug companies disappointed with their opinion of their hoped-for-megabucks-blockbuster. I imagine also their reviews are used as bargaining tools to argue the price down. So I suspect there's a lot of pressure on them. -- Colin°Talk 08:49, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
- Colin
Hi Sideswipe9th,
I think it would be kind of you (and in-line with Wikipedia policy) to restore the IP's comment and explain why we use they/them pronouns to refer to Nex Benedict, as opposed to the he/him we see in most sources now, and the she/her we saw in very early reports, and how this is because Wikipedia operates under a system of gaining consensus for policies, and all articles, per current consensus, must comply with MOS:GENDERID...all of this is obvious to you and I is not so obvious to a first-time editor.
Imagine you were brand new to Wikipedia, were confused about the Wikipedia style guide, and asked a question on an article talk page to this effect. Then your comment disappeared. Because you're not familiar with Wikipedia, it's not immediately obvious what happened or where it went. Your original question went unanswered, and now you're only left with more questions.
WP:NOTFORUM which you cite, states that talk pages should not be used as a general forum for discussing the topic of an article, but rather on how to improve it. IP's comment, while ill-informed, is relevant to improving the article (by changing pronouns), and is not general commentary on the subject. Thus, it seems as though this is an inappropriate rationale for removing the comment when we can politely end the user's confusion.
Thanks, Peter L Griffin (talk) 01:17, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hi Peter L Griffin.
- The IP editor's comment was a forum style comment about pronouns, it was not a suggestion on how to improve the article. On articles in this content area we see dozens of this type of comment every day, and they are typically removed per WP:NOTFORUM. So I will not be restoring it at this time. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:21, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
- It would seem the IP's (implied) suggestion was to modify the pronouns in the article to reflect Nex's sex assigned at birth. Peter L Griffin (talk) 01:25, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
- You are welcome to hold that opinion of the comment, however that seems unlikely given that the comment ended with
Those are the only pronouns. The facts do not care about your feelings.
There are a great many editors, including myself and EvergreenFir who would remove this type of comment per the reasoning you've been given. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:28, 30 March 2024 (UTC)- Eh, hanlon's razor may apply here. I'm not going to start an editwar with you over this, but IP clearly does have an (ill-informed) opinion about how the article ought to read and has some logic of sorts to back it up. I do think a reply would be courteous. Peter L Griffin (talk) 01:36, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
- Hanlon's is often tempered by Occam's, and the simpler explanation is that this was just a forum style comment about pronouns. You are of course welcome to post a message about why the comment was removed on the IP editor's talk page if you so wish. However that type of comment has no place on an article talk page. Sideswipe9th (talk) 01:39, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
- Eh, hanlon's razor may apply here. I'm not going to start an editwar with you over this, but IP clearly does have an (ill-informed) opinion about how the article ought to read and has some logic of sorts to back it up. I do think a reply would be courteous. Peter L Griffin (talk) 01:36, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
- You are welcome to hold that opinion of the comment, however that seems unlikely given that the comment ended with
- It would seem the IP's (implied) suggestion was to modify the pronouns in the article to reflect Nex's sex assigned at birth. Peter L Griffin (talk) 01:25, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
Nomination of Where is Kate? for deletion
The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Where is Kate? (3rd nomination) until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.
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New Pages Patrol newsletter April 2024
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ARCA closure
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Mail (not from me)
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
Bishonen | tålk 12:23, 8 April 2024 (UTC).
- @Bishonen: Hey, sorry been away on holiday for the last week, haven't touched my computer and still not fully back yet. Saw the email I think you're talking about and I'll give a quick response in a sec. Sideswipe9th (talk) 14:59, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
- OK, thanks very much. I was worried you might be having the same health troubles as before; delighted it was just a holiday. Bishonen | tålk 16:41, 8 April 2024 (UTC).
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- @Tryptofish: It's been a tough couple of days. Can't go into more details for now I'm afraid, but thanks for the thoughts. Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:03, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
- Sorry to hear it. I understand. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:46, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
- @Tryptofish: It's been a tough couple of days. Can't go into more details for now I'm afraid, but thanks for the thoughts. Sideswipe9th (talk) 02:03, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
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