Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/GoRight

NPOV, FRINGE, and UNDUE

I'm not entirely comfortable with user RFCs and submitting views quite yet, so I'm playing this from the sidelines for now. However, I want to take issue with GoRight's statement that: All the majority view editors need to do is play the WP:FRINGE and WP:UNDUE cards and refuse to agree to any compromise. Given their numerical superiority they have no particular incentive to engage in legitimate debate, preferring instead to silence their critics using procedural techniques such as we have here. This creates an article which fails to meet WP:NPOV over time. Keeping fringe science out of scientific articles is part of meeting the NPOV standard. WP:UNDUE is part of WP:NPOV after all. I propose that it is because most Wikipedia users strive to have the global warming articles meet the NPOV standard that you see a majority/"numerical superiority" pushing the mainstream scientific view and unwilling to give serious debate to inclusion of obviously fringe material (for example [1]) on the related articles. Jason Patton (talk) 08:48, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

We also have to take into account that for the wiki science articles GoRight's type of behavior is completely unacceptable while for the wiki politics articles this may be "business as usual". What may superficially look like a content dispute to someone editing politics articles is vandalism in science. In the real world it isn't that different. The way some politicians handle/manipulate facts would be considered scientific fraud in the scientific world. Count Iblis (talk) 01:02, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

The question isn't whether it's acceptable to science but whether it's acceptable to Wikipedia articles about science. If you're not contending that GR is violating wiki policy, but rather that what he's doing is just "unacceptable" from the point of view of scientific validity, that in and of itself can't be worthy of action so long as Wikipedia doesn't have specific policies regarding scientific articles. Oren0 (talk) 02:10, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

On most wiki science articles we stick to diferent guidelines that are perhaps not 100% official rules. This is an example of why the offial wiki rules are not suficient and sticking to the extra guidlines is absolutely necessary. Of course, special relativity is not a politically charged subject, so no editor will say: "There are hundreds of reliable sources that make this claim, you have no reliable source that shows that the statement is wrong."

We recognize that many so-called "reliable sources" are, in fact, not reliable at all. On the Global Warming page, most of the skeptical editors have accepted this fact, or are at least willing to stick to the rule that novel statements on the science of global warming must be cited from peer reviewed journals. E.g. editor Blue Tie has argued that this makes the wiki global warming page noncompliant with official wiki policy, but he has also said that he won't start edit wars over this.

The fact that GoRight continues to challenge this after many editors have taken the time to explain in detail why it is necessary to stick to this rule is very problematic. This cannot be dismissed as a mere "content dispute". It is damaging behavior as we can see from the situation a few years ago when many skeptical editors had not yet signed onto the guidlines for the article. There were many edit wars which fortunately did always end in favor of the scientifc point of view. However, the skeptical editors then made the argument that because of these edit wars, the article was not stable and should therefoe not be awarded FA status.

If we fail to say that what GoRight is doing is wrong and he can just go on editing the way he is, then there is nothing stopping the situation from going back to what it was a few years ago when a few more GoRight like editors appear. Count Iblis (talk) 14:10, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

So, you've created your own rules on the GW pages, then expect other editors to follow those rules without question? And when someone does question the custom rules, you want to expell them?

Look, if there is consensus to hold GW to a more stringent standard, that's fine. But that is inherently a consensus decision which is very different from official policy, and therefore will always be open to debate when new editors arrive. That comes with the territory when you institute a different standard for a subset of articles. Further, the fact that consensus is required for such a decision to be made is incompatible with a policy which expells those who disagree with the consensus - basically, by forbidding disagreement, you've created a consensus that can never be overturned. That's unacceptable.

In fact, if I were involved more deeply in the GW articles, I would vote to do away with the "peer reviewed" standard entirely. Why should these few articles reject sources that are valid everywhere else? Even if there are misconceptions in media (such as the special relativity example you cite) we should be documenting what reliable media sources are saying. To throw away all non-peer-reviewed sources for one topic, even a contentious topic, seems drastic (surely there's a baby somewhere in all that bathwater? ;-)) ATren (talk) 14:55, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

These are the standard rules used on almost all scientific wiki articles. They are necessary to ensure that the article contains reliable information. When GoRight questions the rules on their merit, that is ok. When he notes that the rules are not the official wiki rules and then argues that this gives him the right to ignore them, that0s not ok. He forgets that editing wikipedia is not supposed to be a game in which different sides attempt to edit in their POV while sticking to certain rules. In case of the politcs article it may well be the case doing so is buisiness as usual and does not really hurt the quality of the articles.

In case of scientific topics, this attitude is destructive. Note that the wiki rules have evolved over time via feedback processes. Rules that don't work well were modified, new rules were invented. But since science is a small part of wikipedia in which you rarely see problematic editors, the rules mainly deal with topics that attect a lot of editors and that are inherently prone to edit warring: The politics articles.

Nevertheless, according to independent assessments of wikipedia, the wiki science articles are regarded as the best wiki articles (often better than any other available sources), the wiki politics articles are regarded as the worst wiki articles (often they are the worst sources you can find on the internet). So, if you are afraid of "throwing a baby away with the bathwater", the last thing you should do is to ignore the rules for the wiki science articles :) Count Iblis (talk) 15:44, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

A few important questions:

1. Did I, or did I not, in relative short order agree to stop adding the material regarding earthquakes?
2. Have I abided by that ever since?
3. Did that decision not take place approximately 2 days prior to Raul having pointed to the ArbCom ruling in question?
4. Was I, or was I not, correct in my statement that neither WP:RS nor WP:V have incorporated the content of the ArbCom ruling cited by Raul?

--GoRight (talk) 22:14, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

GoRight, as soon as this issue was settled, the CO2 increase in the atmosphere was under discussion. Nothing wrong with discussing that and even your first edit in the article on this point, saying that it is both due to humans and due to natural factors. But then when it was explained to you that the anthropogenic component is actually 200% percent and that natural effects lead to removal of half of the CO2 emissions, you still insisted on your version which, given the facts, is extremely misleading.

I agree about WP:RS and WP:V, but we have discussed the rational of the policy agreed to by consensus for the Global Warming article (which is similar to most other science articles). Count Iblis (talk) 17:17, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Let us please not conflate two independent issues here. My questions above were obviously with respect to the earthquake related material. You seem to be answering in the affirmative on point 1, 2, and 4. Is this correct? If not, please clarify. Either way, please weigh in on point 3.

Regarding your second point, I have taken my response to the global warming talk page since that discussion is content, rather than behavioral, in nature.

--GoRight (talk) 20:49, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Let me add one additional question here:

1. Do either the notices at the top of the global warming talk page, Talk:Global_warming, or the discussion on the FAQ page, Talk:Global_warming/FAQ, mention the ArbCom ruling that Raul eventually pointed to or to the fact that there is a community consensus regarding sourcing?

--GoRight (talk) 21:02, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

What Count Iblis is talking about is an alleged local consensus developed among editors working on a specific range of articles. It is not as simple as "science" articles, because we have many science articles where loose sourcing standards are de facto practice. It is presumably for science articles on topics which are politically controversial. An article on Global warming is not purely a science article, though it seems that there has been an attempt to make it so by creating a "Controversies over" article. The problem is that for consensus to not simply be article ownership by a restricted group of editors, it must remain open to challenge and question. New editors will arrive, and, quite naturally, apply their own standards or, better of course, general Wikipedia guidelines to their editing of the articles, and they may easily see attempts to maintain the existing local consensus as "censorship." If we react to those new initiatives with cries of "disruption," and we attempt to prevent such, we will prevent consensus from being a living thing, and, in fact, that alleged consensus has died. And then we have a set of editors maintaining the "true consensus" against heretics. Not a good outcome, I'd say, for, as we know all too well, true believers, unwilling to consider new ideas (even if -- ore especially if -- they think they have heard these ideas a hundred times), will often consider that the ends justify the means, and so they become uncivil, edit war, and all the rest. I have only examined in detail two articles of the set of articles GR has been alleged to have edit warred in, and what I see there is, indeed edit warring, with GR not being the worst offender, individually, but the picture is even more troubling if we look at two things: first of all, the willingness of an allegedly disruptive editor (GR) to stand down, quickly in my assessment, to stop insisting, to terminate edit warring, and, secondly, the functional collusion (which may not be deliberate or literally coordinated) of multiple editors in maintaining the article through edit warring against edits apparently representing a divergent point of view. In Global warming, there was 4RR, collectively, in one day, on the GoRight "side." And 6RR on the side I'll represent by the name of one participant, Raul654. Please see my evidence page, User:Abd/GoRight for a list of the edits, where I define an edit war edit as one where an editor is repetitive, beyond an initial revert. (for xRR, there may be one additional edit counted, and the "repetition" does discriminate between repetition of the editor's prior edit or that of a cooperating editor). "Edit warring" in this sense, is not necessarily incorrect, beyond being a normally illegitimate method of maintaining articles. Obviously, 1RR is relatively routine, (and my standard does not consider it edit warring unless someone else has previously made the same reversion), but 2RR shouldn't be. A series of 1RR edits from individual editors can show a rough consensus (very rough, i.e., "majority"), immediately, and can be the default, pending discussion, but when individual editors repeat that, with the same content, we no longer have a process of finding default consensus quickly, we have edit warring, and if this is done without welcoming discussion, it can be fatal to the possibility of any rapid consensus. --Abd (talk) 17:49, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

The article global warming has, by long-standing consensus, been restricted to discuss primarily the science, with other issues delegated to further articles in agreement with WP:SUMMARY style. Similarly, we have for a long time tried to use only the most reliable sources, namely peer-reviewed articles and formal surveys and statements by respected scientific organizations. The popular press gets science wrong regularly, and for sensitive topics we therefore follow the "extraordinary claims" rule. Of course this consensus is debatable, however, in my opinion both of these decisions have very much helped in creating a good featured article, and keep the conflicts down to a manageable level. But back to User: GoRight. What do you think about him adding "alarmist" (and nonsensical) material even though he obviously was aware of the fact that this, regardless of who reported it, was plain wrong? And note that he did not add it as an attributed opinion, but as a factual statement. While he "only" added it twice, he kept arguing that the edit was right, wasting more of everyones time. His repeated addition of a misleading caption to the Keeling curve was unsupported by any source, reliable or unreliable (and, of course, in conflict with scientific fact). As you may know, in science two opinions do not have equal weight if one of them is wrong. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:09, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

It may be consensus, Stephen, but a per-article consensus is certainly weaker than global policy. The sourcing decision on GW is essentially an editorial decision, and should always be open to debate and discussion. It may be that the consensus is strong enough that a single random editor will not change it, but even then it cannot be expected that editors will not at least question that consensus. Such challenges should not be treated with contempt, but rather with patient discussion on the decisions that lead to the consensus (perhaps historical links to previous debates would help here). A little bit of patient discussion with a newcomer goes a long way, especially when dealing with local consensus issues that are not necessarily in complete alignment with official policy.

As for the earthquake claim, it may have been a little pointy, I don't know. And perhaps there were concerns about the graph edits and the Solomon/WMC thing. But none of these were outright abuses, and in each case, after a mild dispute, GoRight accepted consensus and moved on. Should he have acted better? Perhaps. Look on his talk page and you will see polite warnings from both me and Cool Hand Luke - warnings he has largely heeded. The point is, he's moved on. So what is this RFC about? You want to talk about wasting everyone's time, the so-called problems Raul cites are all in the past, all essentially resolved issues, yet here we are still discussing them because Raul won't let them die. GoRight had already moved on to other articles, e.g. the Fred Singer article where he made several good points about possible BLP violations, so why is Raul still wasting everyone's time trying to get him banned for a few minor conflicts which GoRight has long since conceded? ATren (talk) 04:16, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

"and in each case, after a mild dispute, GoRight accepted consensus and moved on" - he moved on to another article, or to another point in the same article, but he always pushed the same point of view, and he nearly always pushed in in a provocative and pointy manner. If these were isolated incidents, we would not be here. They are not. They are part of a consistent pattern. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:25, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

"always pushed the same POV" - yet, clearly some of his edits were good (see Abd's analysis), so GoRight's "POV" resulted in improvement to articles. Disagreement is not necessarily disruption, and editing from a stated POV is not necessarily abusive.

And remember, POV goes both ways. We all have a POV. If you want to ban GoRight for a few ill-advised edits and a mild overexuberance in support of his POV, surely we should also ban Raul for edit warring on a WP:BLP violation and threatening to block another editor in a content dispute? Is Raul's POV any less evident in these edits than GoRight's? To ban GoRight while Raul continues to edit freely would be a double standard. ATren (talk) 03:20, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I disagree with quite a bit of Abd's analysis, especially in the WMC case. As for "resulted in improvement", as far as I'm aware these cases are extremely rare, and it's even rarer that GR's edits were a direct improvement. And your concept of a "double standard" is a bit weird. Where are GR's thousands of useful contributions? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:17, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

(e.c.) If you disagree with Abd's analysis, then perhaps you should enumerate which bits you disagree with and/or present counter-evidence. It seems like this RFC is filled allegations unsupported by diffs; Abd has at least documented (in detail) his rationale, so it should be easy for you to point out where he went wrong. As for the idea that "thousands of useful contributions" entitles an editor to break the rules, I've always found that to be an absurd notion. How many good edits excuses a BLP violation? 100? 1000? How about brazen WP:BLOCK violations - how many good admin actions are required to entitle an admin to block an opponent in a content dispute? Wikipedia is not a MMORPG. Good edits should never be looked upon as "experience points" to be used as ammunition in battle. ATren (talk) 16:49, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

If you miss any diffs from my section on the main page, please let me know. My time is somewhat limited, hence I restricted myself to very few episodes. And while not all of the views on the main page are heavily supported by direct diffs, quite a number of them are. I point in particular to those of Kim and R. Baley. Note that a generic claim that some "allegations are unsupported by diffs" may be an efficient tactic for a lawyer, but it does nothing to devalue those that are supported by diffs. As for Abd's analyis, at User:Abd/GoRight#Alleged_harassment_of_User:William_M._Connolley, it suffers from a number of problems. In particular, he confuses legitimate criticism of a user (as e.g. this here on the RfC, and which should stop before WP:NPA) with a blatant violation of WP:BLP with regard to WMC as the subject of an encyclopedic article. In particular, this edit violates WP:BLP by adding material that, contrary to Abd's and GR's claim, is not supported by the source. See WP:OR: "Take care, however, not to go beyond what is expressed in the sources or to use them in ways inconsistent with the intent of the source, such as using material out of context." The section in the New Yorker was not presented as a criticism of WMC, but rather of an example of a breakdown of Wikipedia's system. Moreover, the selective quoting completely misrepresents the case - this was one of the few occasions where ArbCom has recognized a sanction as wrong and has withdrawn it. It is also blindingly obvious from Talk:William_Connolley#Added_some_criticism that GR's reason for adding criticism is not a legitimate interest to improve the coverage, but rather motivated by by a desire to get back at William for "Mr. Connolley's propensity for placing criticism in the bios of those with whom he disagrees". This is another mix-up of WMC as an editor and WMC as an encyclopedic subject protected by WP:BLP. And of course there is the minor pseudo-polite snipe of "Mr. Connolley" when even cursory reading of the article makes it clear that he is entitled to "Dr. Connolley" and normal Wikipedia style would not use any form of address on talk pages.

Abd also claims that he material from the New Yorker article was, in the end, " substantially accepted". This is completely wrong. The current version is not framed as as criticism, but gives a neutral and complete summary of the event as described in the New Yorker. Compare "In March, 2005 it was charged that Mr. Connolley 'strongly pushes his POV with systematic removal of any POV which does not match his own,' his accuser charged in a written deposition. 'His views on climate science are singular and narrow.' A decision from the arbitration committee was three months in coming, after which Connolley was placed on a humiliating one-revert-a-day parole" with "A July 2006 New Yorker explains that Connolley briefly became 'a victim of an edit war over the entry on global warming,' in which a skeptic repeatedly watered down the article's explanation of the greenhouse effect. The skeptic later brought the case before Wikipedia's arbitration committee, insisting that Connolley was pushing his own point of view into the article by removing points of view with which he disagreed. The arbitration committee eventually placed Connolley on parole, although this was later revoked and Connolley went on to become an administrator. Jimbo Wales cited the sanctions against Connolley as a failure of the system". and tell me that those are "substantially" the same.

To avoid misconceptions: Failure to analyze more claims denotes lack of time, not acceptance. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:41, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

You fail to realize that neither Abd nor I condone the edits made by GoRight on Connolley's page - not at all. All we are saying is that such mistakes, even made by someone with an admitted POV, are forgivable if the editor realizes his error and adheres to consensus. You seem to want to bury GoRight for weeks old errors that were not entirely destructive in the first place and which he's already conceded. But then, when faced with similar transgressions by Raul - transgressions which he's still not admitted nor abandoned (see his continued arguments above on the Singer/NewsMax claim - a BLP violation at least as egregious as anything GoRight did) - you cite Raul's "thousands of edits". So essentially, you want to ban GoRight for the same mistakes Raul made, while Raul gets a pass, apparently because his "thousands of edits" give him enough experience points to break some rules in battle. I object strongly to that philosophy. In fact, it should be reversed: the experienced editors should be held to a higher standard and should lead by example. ATren (talk) 20:32, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

(partial unindent)If there are errors in my "analysis," I would appreciate it if Stephan Schulz would point them out specifically. There are two analyses, actually, one which should be NPOV, at User:Abd/GoRight, and the other on the project page here. The latter is conclusions, the former, strictly evidence, hopefully impartial (though possibly with selection bias, which can be fixed by anyone -- I have no objection to other editors fixing errors on that page or adding missing material, provided it isn't done disruptively, in which case I'd revert it in a flash -- and so can anyone else.) "Thousands of useful contributions" can be a balancing factor when considering response to editor misbehavior, particularly if the editor recognizes the error and turns from it. There is, however, properly, no bias against an editor who has made no prior contributions. If Raul is doing something worthy of a ban, then he should (1) stop it, (2) explain that he understands the error sufficiently that we won't fear he will do it again, or (3) be banned. Same is true for GoRight. Past history of positive contributions means we might ask, persistently, for the apology, for maybe a week. However, no allegation has been made here that Raul should be banned. I'd say he should be warned, for some of what I've seen. GoRight was properly warned for some of what he did. And he did, in fact, modify his behavior, though, someimes grudgingly. The remedy for other aspects of what I've seen re Raul would, possibly, be a request that he resign or face RfC or ArbComm, but I'm not to the point of thinking that proper. There have, quite simply, been insufficient efforts to resolve the issue at lower levels. Just as was the case with GoRight. Raul could defuse this whole situation quickly if he could recognize what he did that wasn't proper, including the whole manner in which this RfC was filed and the charges made, which are certainly exaggerated and polemic. Without that, the fuse is burning. I don't know how long it is. For WMC, it might be short. --Abd (talk) 16:41, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

(undent)

1. Just because something hasn't been peer reviewed (yet) is not a de facto argument that it is "wrong".
2. Making a judgment that something is "wrong" on our part if WP:OR, which we are not supposed to do here. We are supposed to use material found in WP:RS and WP:V sources which I did. There is no requirement that all such WP:RS and WP:V sources be in agreement.
3. My caption was not misleading. There are both human and natural sources adding CO2 to the atmosphere over time. That graph does not distinguish between the two sources but merely represents the net measured concentration found in the atmosphere over time. So, the net value observed is, in fact, a combination of those two sources. I was merely making that implicit fact explicit.

--GoRight (talk) 22:03, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

I do not agree with GoRight's third point; the first two are valid. One of the disturbing aspects of some of the charges against GoRight is that he was allegedly "wrong." Being "wrong" is a right we have on Wikipedia, we cannot, at least not properly, be blocked for being wrong. We can be blocked for behavior that violates community standards, and correctness of opinion is not one of those standards, fortunately. But just to make it clear that I see part of the problem here is that GoRight did make mistakes and did do things which, if repeated tendentiously, would have violated community standards, I'll expand a little on that caption problem. It isn't that the text he inserted was "wrong." It is that text has implications in how people will read it and what subtle impressions they will draw from it, and these are not beyond our consideration. NPOV isn't simply a matter of presenting all sourced information, we must choose, often, from among what can be sourced and verified. Political activists who get involved with Wikipedia will pick and choose what is presented in an article, in order to create a desired impression. The caption as it existed before GoRight's attempt to modify it was neutral, but a minor problem is that it could easily be interpreted as showing anthropogenic increase. Purely from a theoretical point of view, the level of CO2 would obviously be a result of both anthropogenic and other effects, the question is balance. To state, simply, as GoRight did, without source, if I'm correct, that the level of CO2 is a result of both anthropogenic and natural effects implies that part of the increase is anthropogenc and part is natural, when, it appears, that may not be true. The technical argument is true (and I mentioned this myself earlier). The change is obviously the sum of anthropogenic and natural causes, *but* this will easily be read with an assumption that the anthropogenic effect is less than the net effect, when what I see other editors asserting is that this isn't the case, that natural effects *reduce* the CO2 levels from what, otherwise, anthropogenic effects would cause. (Quite simply, I don't have enough of the science under my belt to have a firm opinion about this, but my point is that the existing caption wasn't controversial: the chart shows the CO2 levels; the changed caption incorporated a controversial statement *in implication* -- not in technical meaning. My sense is that a settled consensus on this would remain that the caption does not mention cause, nor need it. The chart is not about cause, it is about an effect, and doesn't establish the cause. Nor should the caption raise a controversy unless it illustrates one, and it does not.

My problem isn't that editors resisted some of GoRight's efforts. It is how they did it. It is behavioral. R. Baley reverted GoRight's first edit to William Connolley because he saw it as a personal attack, even though the material was actually quoted almost exactly from reliable source. I have not claimed that the revert was improper, because with a BLP we may shoot first and ask questions later. But "shooting" does not extend to attacking and disparaging an editor who makes an edit that would be quite normal in a non-BLP article. And the edit summary was exactly such, utterly unnecessary and inflammatory. Even if true. I.e, were it true that GoRight's intention was thoroughly disruptive, WP:AGF still requires us to assume good faith and allow an editor every opportunity to participate in our community consensus, only leaving this behind when the continuation of that assumption becomes impossible. We may, before that, begin to question good faith, to notice how behavior is suspicious, etc., but to state what is essentially an assumption of bad faith, without proof, is utterly improper and uncivil. And that is exactly what R. Baley did with that edit, and he simultaneously threatened GoRight with blocking for what was, at the worst, an incomplete edit. Ultimately, the article came to incorporate the material GoRight had added, but with additional material that balanced some possible incorrect assumptions a read might make, such as the editing restrictions remaining in force. It might be noted that R. Baley's edit wasn't counted as an "edit warring" edit in my summary of what happened with William Connolley. Even though it could be said to have triggered one, even more than GoRight's original edit, quite possibly because of its incivility.

It is certainly easy to find edits where GoRight responded with incivility. But to quote an old song, "You would cry too if it happened to you." If a user is treated with incivility by an administrator, especially, and even more so if so treated by a group of editors acting in concert to prevent the user from changing an article as the user thinks -- rightly or wrongly -- is more accurate and more in conformance with policy, the user will come to easily assume that there is a repressive cabal, and, if inclined to "speak truth to power," will talk about that cabal; much of GoRight's alleged incivility is about this. I agree that it is uncivil, but it also must be seen in context, and the level of incivility involved is the natural confusion of a relatively new editor, I must assume. If GoRight is, in fact, a more sophisticated POV-pusher, I must congratulate him on the subtle manner in which he drew experienced administrators into shooting themselves in their feet. However, I think that he was merely a catalyst, exposing an unhealthy condition which had arisen in the global warming articles, not from some cabal, but from editors, with good faith, acting in concert and only occasionally in coordination to maintain those articles from damage from POV editors, a noble goal in itself were it not for the damage to true consensus, which must continually adapt to the presence of new editors, including rather than excluding them. GoRight's edits attracted some support, other editors continued to restore them when he didn't, and the article settled, not because consensus was found, but because the other side threw up their hands in despair. After all, if, those might think, the status quo is going to be maintained against policy, with uncivil discussion and edit summaries, and with threats of blocks, by multiple administrators, there is no hope. And I'm simply doing my best to show, and make it so, that this is not the case. This is a community, we make decisions together, and everyone is welcome, if they are willing to follow certain rules of civility and respect, to heed warnings properly and civilly given, and all the rest. --Abd (talk) 01:20, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Not listed on Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/User_conduct?

For some reason, I don't see this listed anywhere on Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/User_conduct. Not under "Candidate Pages" and not under "Approved Pages." Yilloslime (t) 00:56, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't see it listed either. This really should be done if this RFC is to carry any sort of validity.--Cube lurker (talk) 17:34, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Thats weird. I've listed it. Note that for some reason Raul hasn't signed up to it, though he created it, so technically it only has one signatory. Now we can have good fun arguing when the 2 day period should begin from: when I listed it? When Raul created it? William M. Connolley (talk) 21:47, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I just removed the speedy tag, because I think that substantially two users certified this, and that the signature was missing was a probable oversight by this user, who didn't notice it before going on a (short?) break. I would not start the two-day clock until the creator returns and has a chance to sign it, but I would also consider this incompletely filed, with, thus, no obligation to respond on the part of the subject user. Consider it an RfC page in the process of being created. Had this been created by a user who signed it, which is the situation the instructions contemplate, then the requirement for signature within two days would clearly apply.

That it was not logged could indicate that the creator expected the other signer to log it when complete, or perhaps something unexpected has happened to him, let's hope he is okay.

In the meantime, if some other user attempts to resolve the problem, or has so attempted, and fails or failed, that other user could sign and off we'd go. As the matter stands, this should be considered a page in the process of being created, the RfC has not begun, but there is no need to prevent editors from assisting in putting it together, but I would discourage !votes before completion. I particularly dislike !voting before evidence has been agreed upon or at least the dimensions of the controversy have been laid out clearly from all points of view. It's here, it is not to be deleted, but it also isn't complete and ready to start, until the technical condition has been met. What if the creator returns and announces that, with a bit of a wikibreak, he changed his mind? --Abd (talk) 00:42, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

As a side note, there is nothing wrong with a very small number of editors discussing the RfC to determine if they should sign it. This would not be Canvassing unless it becomes a broadcast matter, soliciting editors who are not already involved. The matter would shift a little once this is open. In particular, there is also nothing wrong with soliciting editors to attempt to resolve the dispute. Indeed, that should precede RfC if possible. --Abd (talk) 00:42, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Had another thought. William, you probably should not have listed it. If it's been reverted out of the list, fine. Question is, what happened to Raul? Until the ducks were in a row, you probably should not have signed it, if his participation was important. Your signing it and especially your listing it, may have caused the clock to start ticking! I would recommend, at this point, copying the wikitext to your user space or off-wiki, because it could disappear. If it does, it could be refiled when you have your ducks in a row. My opinion is that the clock starts ticking when the RfC has one signature and is listed. But if the listing is reverted, it is not ticking. It isn't filed. The claim that the period had expired and therefore it couldn't be listed was not correct. The period starts when it is listed, there is no other time on which to base it, since files can be created over a substantial period of time. So I see here what I often see: various parties thrashing about, making moves contrary to their own interests, etc. Take a deep breath, relax, and do it right (though I see no signs that you are not calm). I suggested to GoRight that he sign it. Let's see if he takes the advice! After all, if he tried to work it out with you, perhaps he should sign it, he certainly could. There is nothing there saying that the subject can't sign. --Abd (talk) 01:22, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I knew I was going to have a few days of intermittent access - that's why I queued up those FAs in advance. But due to an error of mine, I thought it was going to start the evening of the 3rd when it actually started the evening of the 1st - so essentially I went offline 48 hours earlier than expected. Raul654 (talk) 05:04, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Right. There were a series of errors or missteps here, including the idea that the 48-hour period would start with the page creation, which I don't think is a position that could be sustained. It starts with listing, so there was no rush. It may have, in fact, been better to wait before listing, because the RfC "complaint" was poorly written and documented, probably because it was written in a hurry, mostly off the top of Raul654's head, and it really should have been considered a draft. I think it was actually a mistake for WMC to go ahead and list it, it wasn't ready and there was no rush. (And the complaints that it wasn't listed were inappropriate; the reality would have been that nobody should have endorsed it or written an opposition until it was listed and "seconded" by those certifying it as required.) I addressed, at first, only this issue, the attempted speedy deletion of the RfC because of the missing signature, which was an error I fixed by removing the deletion tag. However, I had no intention of participating, as serious participation in an RfC, without taking the substantial time it can take to actually investigate, is, in my view, foolish and dangerous. Unfortunately (for my own time) I took a look.... and once I'd seen certain things, I couldn't, in conscience, turn away.--Abd (talk) 18:10, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Abd, I just want to take slight issue with your parenthetical statement (And the complaints that it wasn't listed were inappropriate). If this had been a dead draft in userspace, i'd agree. But when I came upon it there were already opinions, endorsements, an active talkpage, and user talk messages requesting comment. Maybe the correct suggestion wasn't to list but rather to blank till ready. However I stand by the concept that if you allow momentum to gather in an improper way, you can skew the process as a whole.--Cube lurker (talk) 14:45, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

That is a reasonable argument, but, I believe, incorrect. There is nothing to prevent one user, two users, ten users, a thousand users, from working on a draft. Further, if the RfC isn't listed yet, it *is* a draft, and comment may be solicited (within spam limitations, not Canvassing limitations). While it may seem that momentum is gathered, and that is true to some extent, any user can point out that all this bulk of comment was gathered prior to listing, not through listing, and that it may thus be biased and not based on neutral solicitation. When I look at the "support" for this RfC, and for supportive comments within it, I see mostly users who were previously involved in edit wars with GoRight (and the judgement of "edit warring" may apply as much or more to them than to GoRight); that they were gathered prior to listing is, to some extent, evidence of participation bias, and those comments might properly be discounted, if we are trying to understand what the consensus is. It would have been more proper to develop the draft in user space, but there were, and are, lots of things that were improper not only about this whole RfC, but also about what preceded it. Reading the guideline, and reflecting on the intentions and what had happened, I came to the conclusion that the creation of the page is not the effective date for beginning the two day period, because there is no fixed time limit for the process of creation. It's not a true RfC until it is listed as proposed, and not, still, an effective RfC until approved. Really, others should refrain from commenting in it before it's listed, except in Talk, which is fine. Endorsements of a proposed complaint really should be careful about proposing it before it has some official effect, because they might be signing on to something they ultimately wouldn't agree with. Some of this stuff could be made more explicit in the guidelines.

I would highly recommend refraining from comment in an RfC until it's been approved (i.e., has the two signatures). That's a suggestion for efficiency. RfCs are not a speedy process, and there would normally be plenty of time to reflect, investigate, get it right. Investigation takes a lot of time, astonishing amounts of time, for me. Days, even, if I'm not to just make a snap judgment. And I don't like to make snap judgments, when I do, I prefer to explicitly refer to them as such. After I'd done a few hours of looking, I did call this RfC a "steaming pile," and then retracted that, because I'd only looked at some aspects of the evidence, and what if the problem was merely clumsy presentation? But underneath this RfC, it turns out, is a whole can of squirming worms and, frankly, the best thing to do for all would be to bury it, quickly. That could only happen with some agreement between the nominators and the object, GoRight, and I fear this isn't going to happen. (It would still be difficult, perhaps, but possible. I'd argue that if, for example, one of the nominators were to withdraw the attempt-to-resolve certification (which was a serious mistake in itself), the RfC could be speedy closed without prejudice, as now being fundamentally defective, and then we would see if anyone had sufficient ... motivation ... to reopen it and add the certification, which, after what has been discussed, if not true, would be wiki-suicide. I have personally attempted to resolve the dispute, and seem to have found some success, so far, so I, as well, couldn't certify it, for the attempt to resolve must not only be civil and patient, but must also fail.) (Process opinion: if a certifier withdrew, the two-day period would re-open, anew. I would, at that point, if I had the tools, freeze the project page -- were I not involved, which I now am because of my comment here. So I'd ask for that. And then someone who wants to add a certification would do so in Talk, which would not be frozen, and when that was seen, an admin would remove the protection.) --Abd (talk) 16:20, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

What are we trying to get here?

I guess I don't understand what result this discussion will have given the previous ANI discussion on the matter. I just don't see what could possibly be resolved here. Is this just a stepping stone to ArbCom so that you can show more steps of dispute resolution? To me, the basic conclusion of the whole dispute is rather simple: GoRight hasn't acted great but he hasn't done anything that's at all beyond reproach or worthy of topic bans/blocks either. Raul, I also echo the sentiment of multiple respondents at ANI that threatening to block GoRight over a content dispute was counterproductive. But in the end this RFC seems like a lot of typing for no good reason: even if we were to all agree on sanctions here, that decision wouldn't be binding anyway (as I understand only ArbCom can institute 0RR or topic bans as people have proposed). So what's the point? Oren0 (talk) 02:07, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

To me, the basic conclusion of the whole dispute is rather simple: GoRight hasn't acted great but he hasn't done anything that's at all beyond reproach or worthy of topic bans/blocks either. - He hasn't made a single productive edit since he came back, but he has wasted much time and caused consteration among the more productive GW editors. (Note: the 9 edit wars he started in 11 days do not count as productive, however much the global warming deniers might wish to claim they are) As to your first question, the goal is that GoRight's disruption stops, either because enlightened self-interest helps him realize that if he continues acting this way, sanctions will be forthcoming, or (more likely) sanctions are actually imposed on him. If the RFC doesn't produce this result, the arbitration committee is the next step. And your understanding is wrong - community bans and community topic bans have been done before in the cases of tendentious problem users. Raul654 (talk) 03:01, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Not a single productive edit? There are at least 2 BLP issues that GoRight raised that I believe had merit, and others agreed. Furthermore, if we are judging unproductive edits, I would classify your edit warring over the NewsMax claim quite aggressive, given that there was no source for the claim, there was a month-old fact tag, and you still reverted twice with a warning "do not remove the newsmax mention". To me, that's a clear-cut BLP violation. Is that productive? I would also classify your threat to block an opposing user in a content dispute very unproductive - or do you believe you are immune to the blocking policy? So if we're going to ban GoRight for disagreement (exactly which policy was violated here? And I'm not talking about pseudo-policies concocted by editors who wish to squelch opposing viewpoints), shouldn't we also ban the user who brazenly violates both WP:BLP and WP:BLOCK? ATren (talk) 04:22, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

The Newsmax sentence *was* largely accurate - Singer has written for Newsmax, and one of the articles Singer wrote for them was cited and discussed extensively on the talk page. The only questionable part of that sentence was the part calling him a "regular" contributor. Even if wrong and he was an irregular or one-time contributor (and that's a big if) this is not libelous - it's just mildly inaccurate. The proper thing to do would have been to remove the offending word ("regular"), thus rendering the sentence entirely accurate instead of removing the entire sentence. Removing the entire sentence when removing a single word would have been sufficient is unproductive, yes. Raul654 (talk) 04:59, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Raul, there was one single guest editorial by Singer on NewsMax, and no other indication of any affiliation with them other than the fact that other authors quoted him. You not only edit-warred on the phrase "... is a regular contributor and adviser to... Newsmax", you did so despite there being a month old {{Fact|date=May 2008}} tag, and with an edit comment warning others "do not remove the newsmax mention". Did you not see the {fact} tag? Did you even bother to check Newsmax to see if he was listed there? You should know that BLP claims require sourcing, no exceptions, and here you were edit warring a BLP claim with a stale {fact} tag. I see no policy justification for such behavior on a BLP. ATren (talk) 05:35, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

As for your specious claims about blocking GoRight for disagremeent - it's not the fact that he disagrees with me that I have a problem with - it's the fact that he's consistently wrong on everything (including but not limited to: claiming that global warming causes earthquakes; citing a source which said point blank that the theory ran counter to all known evidence; citing an arbitration case as fact in WMC's biography - an actual libelous BLP violation; claiming that the NIPCC is a reliable source, contrary to the arbitration committee pseudoscience decision; claiming that his edits to insert such sources did not violate that arbitration committee decision after being provided a link to it; claiming that Fred Singer's letter was not published in a reliable source; claiming that Fred Singer's letter had to be published online in order to be verifiable; and the list goes on and on) and constantly edit wars based on these misconceptions of his. Raul654 (talk) 04:59, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

If we could please just keep the record straight here:

• claiming that global warming causes earthquakes: I didn't claim anything, I reported what a third party reliable source (MSNBC) claimed.
• citing a source which said point blank that the theory ran counter to all known evidence: Please point me to the portion of [2] that claims the "theory ran counter to all known evidence."
• citing an arbitration case as fact in WMC's biography - an actual libelous BLP violation: I was reporting a verbatim quote from a third party reliable source (The New Yorker).
• claiming that the NIPCC is a reliable source, contrary to the arbitration committee pseudoscience decision: No, I argued that the Heartland Institute was a reliable source.
• claiming that his edits to insert such sources did not violate that arbitration committee decision after being provided a link to it: (1) as already explained I didn't notice that "reality disagrees" was even a link, (2) my position was and still remains that the ArbCom ruling has not been incorporated into the policies and it is the policies that people are expected to work from.
• claiming that Fred Singer's letter was not published in a reliable source: I don't believe that I ever said that. I merely questioned whether it was WP:V which I later accepted.
• claiming that Fred Singer's letter had to be published online in order to be verifiable: I never claimed this.
• constantly edit wars based on these misconceptions of his:I never broke the WP:3RR rule since my return, nor did I repeatedly push the same exact text on multiple days (except possibly the misleading graph one, once). In all the cases you cite there are other editors with as many reverts as mine and the same editors can be seen in various of these "wars" which consist of no more than 2 or 3 reverts on my part (generally) so I should not be singled out. You know full well that this is frequently the case whether I am involved or not. --GoRight (talk) 05:57, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

First, it's not a violation to be wrong (see Abd's comments on the RFC page). Second, he wasn't wrong on everything - others agreed with many of his edits, even the Solomon text on WMC's article space page (which I disagreed with) was well sourced and was added back by at least two other editors. I agreed with several of his other points, and others did as well.

As to your other claims, I've examined those disputes and GoRight accepted consensus in all cases. Where's the warring? Where's the abuse? Are you claiming that an editor has to be infallible, or simply agree with you 100%? Because those are the only standards GoRight seems to have violated here. ATren (talk) 05:46, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

The point is that some users would prefer to just kick out opposing viewpoints like Conservapedia does. In the end, debate-squelching accusations like "civil POV pushing" are much more harmful to Wikipedia than people like GoRight, who hold an opposing viewpoint and civilly engage in debate. I've already seen at least two cases where GoRight's concerns were valid, and I agreed with his edits. In that time, I've seen Raul revert GoRight with a warning "do not remove this" even though he was re-inserting an unsourced claim to a BLP (I've since reverted it back). To me, that's much worse than "civil POV pushing" - that's "aggressive POV pushing by a power user who will block you for opposing him". Maybe the latter deserves an essay along the lines of "civil POV pushing" - perhaps "Power User POV Pushing", WP:PUPP? :-) ATren (talk) 17:09, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I think the Conservapedia comment is unfair. I have seen many cases where reasonable claims were made and discussed by all with good endings for all. Concerning civil pov pushing, I think you may also call it persistent pov pushing. Discussing the same things absurdly many times, even if done in a civil manner, is disruptive. The problem is that in wikipedia POV pushing is not taken seriously unless it is accompanied by big words and legal threats. The way it works is that they let it go on until someone snaps, consuming valuable resources in the process. A recent block (race related article) comes to mind. Brusegadi (talk) 04:14, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

GoRight has raised at least two issues on a BLP which I believe had merit, and the article in question is now better for it. I don't agree with his POV and I don't agree with all his arguments, but if we are going to block him for simply engaging in debate - which is exactly what this RFC appears to be arguing - then yes, we are no different than Conservapedia. As a scientist, I find it depressingly ironic that so many editors who consider themselves progressive pro-science editors are the ones who act with the most religious vigor in suppressing debate. ATren (talk) 04:32, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I did not mention GoRight in my comment. It was not about him. I was making general statements, since your statement about conservapedia seemed to apply generally to "some editors" and you argument against "Civil POV pushing" can also be interpreted generally against that label. My remarks above about POV pushing (in general) in itself being disruptive (even if civil) and the comparison to conservapedia being unfair still stand. I am reserving comments about GoRight until I have better time to review his edits. Sorry for the confusion. Brusegadi (talk) 05:07, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

OK, understood. My general problem with "civil POV pushing" is that the "civil" part is irrelevant. If someone is truly, abusively POV pushing, the civil part shouldn't matter. He could be completely civil and he would still be violating policy by edit warring on his POV. So a simple charge of "POV pushing" covers the abuse nicely.

But the basic problem is that there are many cases where the so-called "POV pushing" is minimal at best, and evidence of outright abuse is lacking - it is in these cases that this new "civil POV pushing" term is being used. "Civil POV pushing" assigns a label to those pesky editors who are neither true POV pushers nor uncivil, and actually implies a policy violation for those who engage in civil talk page debate. This creates a POV "tautology" where any opposition can be squelched:

• Is the editor uncivil? If yes, then block per WP:CIV.
• Otherwise, is the editor engaging in personal attacks? If yes, then block per WP:NPA.
• Otherwise, is the editor edit warring on his POV? If yes, block per WP:NPOV and/or WP:3RR.
• Otherwise, accuse the editor of "civil POV pushing" and institute a topic ban.

In effect, "civil POV pushing" is the catchall case that permits good-faith editors to be banned just for disagreeing about editorial decisions espressed on talk pages. This is fundamentally wrong and I object strongly to the way it is being used.

(Perhaps there are cases where "civil POV pusher" is a valid label, but I've yet to see one, and certainly not in this particular case.) ATren (talk) 05:27, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Understood and pretty much agree with you that the 'civil' part should not matter, but from my experience it does since pathological POV pushers tend to only be sanctioned until they become uncivil. I doubt that those working on the page "Civil POV pusher" mean to create the tautology you describe above. I have seen at least one case of what they describe (in race related topics.) Brusegadi (talk) 06:04, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I think we're on the same page; there may be cases where "pathological POV pushing" would be problematic. But banning is not the solution in these cases - that just creates drama. In my history I've dealt with someone you might consider a "pathological POV pusher" for nearly 3 years now, and he still edits freely. I've learned that the best way to deal with such editors is be unswervingly civil, revert POV as needed (citing policy or consensus for support), and ignore idle talk page chatter. The way not to deal with them is to apply nonsensical labels and try to get them banned for talking. That's a recipe for drama - and even if you do get them banned, they're so angry at the perceived injustice that they run to Wikipedia Review and stir up more trouble than they ever caused on-Wiki (see the Moulton case, which continues to inspire high drama months after his controversial ban - there is a compelling argument to be made that not banning him would have been less disruptive in the long run).

Having said all of this, I don't even see how "pathological POV pushing" applies to this particular case. There is no indication that GoRight refuses to accept consensus when other editors reasonably explain the issues (note: reasonably explain - as opposed to calling him a POV pusher and threatening to block him. See, for example, how I resolved GoRight's Fred Singer concerns with rational, respectful debate, and he fully accepts the compromise version of the "Martian" text). ATren (talk) 15:39, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) I hesitate to say much before I've examined the record more closely, but, as you can see from my beginning of a comment on the project page, this RfC is problematic. As to what is said about "pathological POV pushing," the recent edit record is far too short to be able to show that. He's definitely an assertive editor, but that isn't necessarily bad. In the first article I looked at, there are two aspects: edit warring and resulting text. As to edit warring, yes, he did what I'd call edit warring, though far below 3RR standards, and not long sustained, i.e., two edits may be considered edit warring edits (by my standards), in two days. And so did three other editors, including the nominator and an endorser. And what ended up sticking was, with respect to the major issue, his edit, and with respect to the minor issue, the edit of an endorser (and he didn't edit war over that.) Was his position in the first edit war (the only one he warred in) correct? Tentatively, I'd have to assume so, since it has stuck. On the other hand, did he simply wear out the other editors? That can happen with POV pushers, but it's damaging on a scale of months or years, not days. If two edit warring reverts in two days establishes "pathological POV pushing," a lot of editors are in trouble, including a certifier and an endorser.

This RfC is properly over editor behavior, and, in fact, content issues are largely inappropriate here, in the face of the major alleged problem, edit warring. So I'm not going to be distracted by arguments that he was "wrong." There are other fora better for dealing with content problems, for finding wider consensus on content issues, and then, for showing that edit warring, continued in the face of that, is against consensus. RfCs should not be used to remove editors who disagree with a consensus that has not been clearly established and is not clearly maintained. And I gotta go, kids and their mother need some help. --Abd (talk) 17:30, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Canvassing?

Is this considered canvassing? [3][4][5][6] ATren (talk) 17:54, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I hope not, because you want to hear the involved parties and the witnesses in GoRights trial. Count Iblis (talk) 18:26, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I would be much less concerned if this had been properly listed for impartial observers to take note of it. Combine the fact that it's hidden from view, with the notices ... well I'll just say the appearance is sub-optimal.--Cube lurker (talk) 18:42, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I am unfamiliar with the underlying dispute and have not investigated it at all. Let me ask User:GoRight a question: Is there a dispute? If so, did you attempt to resolve it and fail? If so, then why don't you sign it? I can tell you that I would. At this point, the lack of a signature is a technical requirement only, and I would refuse to wikilawyer my way out of an RfC even though, I'm sure, they are a pain in the ... donkey. That's just me, and you have every right to think differently, but at this point, the RfC is simply in the process of being created, and hasn't been listed because it is not complete. We don't know why, but any involved editor could fix that, or Raul might return and fix it. Piece of advice: if you sign it, GoRight, it will look really, really good. If you don't, someone else probably will, given the Endorsements, so what you'd gain is a little time. Your choice. Think about it. --Abd (talk) 00:50, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I am confused by this comment. I am the subject of this dispute. Wouldn't signing it be essentially saying that I had a dispute with myself and I was unable to resolve it? I am not trying to wikilaywer anything. I merely wanted this thing out of limbo. If it moves to "Approved" immmediately, as noted below, that is perfectly fine. The criteria have now been met to justify it so there is no point in delay. --GoRight (talk) 01:46, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

By this time, it had already been signed. Signing it would have been a bold act, an opportunity that seems to have been open for a short time and then closed. No, the certification wouldn't have said that. This is what you would have signed: Users who tried and failed to resolve the dispute The certification is not a statement that the complaint part is valid. Did you try and fail to resolve the dispute? It's moot now, but this is the point: by acknowledging that there was a dispute, and by acting to place it before the community, you would have indicated your openness to community advice, your willingness to work with other editors, in a way that would have created an impression very difficult to erase. This would not have turned bad behavior into good, it merely would have set up a bit of a predisposition. It was, shall we say, political advice, but it was also practical and honest (if you did indeed try and fail to resolve it): it would have set a collegial tone, setting up a token of cooperation. Instead, the balance, as it is, is the other way a little, because of your AN/I report which looks like a complaint about the technicalities of this RfC. Not badly so, and you certainly appear to be functioning civilly, which will help you. I have not read your lengthy response yet, and I'm not sure I will, because I'm not sure I want to put the time into it (i.e, into not only reading it, relatively minor, but also verifiying what you say and reading all the responses and checking their evidence as well. If requested, I'd probably do it, I tend to respond to requests. Otherwise OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, so much of it and so little time, and it calls. --Abd (talk) 02:44, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I removed speedy tag for this RfC. Here's why.

I think we can safely assume -- unless there is evidence to the contrary, that the user who created this page, which was a lot of work, intended to sign it, and may not even realize that he didn't. He hasn't edited since July 2. Thus the substance here is that there are two editors who attempted resolution and who have substantially certified so, if, in fact, we can tell from the record that it was attempted. The purpose of the two-editor rule has thus been satisfied, and the error a small procedural one. I have not investigated, so if it is credibly asserted that no effort to resolve was made by either of both users certifying, I would investigate and probably would consent to replacement of the speedy tag.

I have no opinion whatever on the underlying dispute.--Abd (talk) 00:29, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Okay, definitive: clock starts at 21:46, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

If no additional certification appears within 48 hours of the listing time, the RfC is subject to delisting and might be deleted, but I don't see a requirement that it be deleted, and, in fact, find that somewhat offensive. If not listed, certified, and active for the appropriate period or until consensus is clear, it's moot, but would still exist for the historical record. (Filing an abusive RfC, for example, is itself abusive, and for this reason, shouldn't be deleted any more than similar filings on AN/I are not deleted.) --Abd (talk)

If this is the case then there is no point in delay. I hereby remove any objections. Let us simply move this thing to the "Approved" list to move things along. --GoRight (talk) 01:37, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

For the record, Raul appeared and signed it at 01:07, 4 July 2008. Good luck, all of you. Be nice. Don't fight.--Abd (talk) 02:30, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

OK, and for the record then, the criteria have been met so please move this to "Accepted." There is no reason to delay at this point given that it has been certified, or am I missing something here? --GoRight (talk) 02:54, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Re: Wurble by William M. Connolley (from RfC project page)

"Wurble" Nice. I will intersperse.

... thanks to Abd for taking the time to read through this. *But* I think he has demonstrated how hard it is for an outsider to make sense of this.

You are welcome. Indeed, I am keeping that difficulty in mind, and, you will note, that I have carefully refrained from making, so far, a final judgment on GoRight's behavior (beyond noting certain problems with it, some of which he has already, himself, acknowledged and, possibly, changed). However, it is also possible to be so close to a situation that you don't see the forest for the trees. It is quite easy to mix content and behavioral issues, and quite dangerous. Yes, sometimes it is necessary to understand the underlying content issues, but, for example, "edit warring" doesn't depend on content issues, though they may certainly cause it and explain it. That is, it is edit warring to repetitively assert an edit that is contrary to guidelines, but, setting BLP aside, it is also edit warring to do the same with an edit that conforms to guidelines (other than behavioral guidelines). (More accurately, it's still edit warring with BLP, but justified because of the special BLP guidelines and legal necessities.)

On the evidence page I've been creating, I define "edit warring" in a fairly easy-to-judge way, and, since Rule Number One is Ignore All Rules, we cannot say that all edit warring is incorrect. However, it is clearly to be avoided and only used when overwhelmingly justified. I set the standard low, i.e., I defined an "edit war edit" as one which repetitively asserts an edit. An editor makes a change to an article, not repeating any other recent edit (loosely defined; if I could, I'd include any prior edit that was the same, but that's not practical, and the editor involved might not know about that edit, so I'd only include it if the editor was involved in the previous edit sequence). Then someone else reverts it. That first reversion is not an edit war edit. We have a system that avoids useless discussion by following a rule: anyone may "propose" an edit, and it stands unless someone else removes it. (More standard deliberative process would have, anyone proposes a motion, and nothing happens unless someone else seconds it.) What should happen if the edit is opposed, once, then, is that it is discussed so that consensus becomes manifest. But if the first editor reverts that first revert, that is edit warring, and so are other edits that revert again. I've included in this, first and subsequent reverts from other editors over the same content. So this cannot be a "bright line." The bright line, under tight conditions, may be set at exceeding 1RR. Some of what I consider edit warring is 1RR, where it repeats a revert of another editor; it is merely the first level of edit warring, below the bright line where sanctions would necessarily apply.

With this standard, we can then see if "edit warring" was taking place, and who was involved.

I'm going to look at the ~22/6/2008 edit warring on GW as my example.

Good example, particularly since it is one I have already studied. Let's do it!

And [7] in particular: which is to say, my removing of from both natural and man-made sources. The addition is contentious: the rise in GHG is well known to be anthropogenic; asserting otherwise is (a) POV pushing and (b) doomed, hence tendentious.

That's quite a lot to infer from a single incident where he backed down. There are two issues here, the content issue and the behavioral issue. Let's assume that WMC is correct, that there is a consensus on the impropriety of the language inserted by GoRight. Does it follow that it was a "contentious" edit, that it was "POV pushing," and that it was "tendentious"? It is reasonable to assume, for the moment, that WMC is correct, for the moment, as to the consensus, and thus it was "doomed." But making a single edit contrary to consensus does not begin to establish tendentiousness, reverting it once might, depending on context, reverting it twice more so, depending on context (what discussion was going on, etc.), but I wouldn't start to consider an editor "tendentious" until they continue to repetitively assert a rejected argument at least for days. I'd suggest that we should assume good faith, particularly since the opinion being expressed by GoRight is a common one as political polemic, so he may believe it (and, in fact, the statement he was inserting is technically correct, and the comment merely a problem because it has an implied spin. Is there zero non-anthropogenic contribution (positive or negative) to rising GHG? It's a semantic problem; I agree that the consensus language is probably scientifically sound, but the point is that GoRight may have believed otherwise.) GoRight made the edit, which would, I must assume, look to him like an NPOV statement (he may be wrong, but that's another issue). He was reverted without comment, with an edit marked "minor," by Raul654. GoRight reverted with summary, (There is no reason to object to this clarification. If you object please take it to the talk page.). Given that no reason was alleged for the revert, his reversion seems relatively reasonable. He was reverted without explanatory summary by WMC, likewise marked "minor." (What is this marking of possibly controversial edits with "minor"? I've not noticed this before from responsible editors. GoRight does it himself once with this article, later. Comments, anyone?)

What happened in Talk here? Well, it was mentioned, but the exchange was uncivil (on all sides, mildly compared to how hot it can sometimes get). WMC did explain the graph, but not in a way that might be reasonably expected to convince GoRight, who backed down, not because he was convinced, but because he was faced with what seemed to him like too many opposing editors. GoRight posed an unfortunate sock puppet question (one I've seen before from relatively unsophisticated editors.) WMC removed it as stupid; probably he shouldn't have been the one to remove it, but he was right, it was unhelpful, but "stupid" was a tad uncivil. I disagree that GoRight, in turn, has been uniformly "civil." However, he hasn't pushed incivility beyond limits, such that he could be blocked for incivility. If we had tougher standards, and more even enforcement, there'd have been a number of editors warned and/or blocked, not just him.

But GR, as the talk in Misleading graph demonstrates, clearly didn't have any good sources for the idea that it might be natural. Its clear from the talk there that he simply didn't have a clue, had never looked at the evidence or even followed the obvious wiki links. Yet he previously used the edit comment Let's at least be clear about where the increases are coming from. Sm8900 repeated the same invalid edit, with no reason why, in edit comment or on the talk page (where you'll find us patiently explaining, yet again, why this is wrong). This wasn't a one-sided edit war, of course, but the side that prevailed was *correct*, and justified their position; whereas the side that lost was incorrect and made no attempt to justify their postiion (which is unsurprising, because its indefensible).

Minor point: increase from CO2 is due to a combination of anthropogenic and natural causes, that's what GoRight was saying. Making the statement, however, in context, implies that the natural causes are positive, or, at least, significant in proportion. The statement as it is, without the additional language was accurate, saying nothing about cause; but, in the context of the article, there is an implication that the rise is anthropogenic. There is natural variation in CO2, but it appears, from what I've seen, that the natural variation is masked by the anthropogenic variation, making it difficult to assert how much variation is natural, but, from records, I'd assume that limits could be set. And, as you can tell, an expert I am not. I'm convinced that global warming is a very serious problem and even if it isn't the risk is so high, the possible damage so great, that we'd better pay very serious attention to it. And that's not relevant to our task today.

In this sequence, as WMC acknowledges, there was edit warring on both sides, and being "correct" doesn't justify edit warring, in general. Now, suppose that WMC is correct, GoRight "didn't have a clue." If that's true, what he needs is education, not being called a vandal and targeted with an RfC. Does he listen and learn (best), or at least back down when he sees it's hopeless (acceptable). What happened here? I describe this in my comment on the project page, but I'll describe it a little differently here.

On the narrow point, the insertion of (italics) "Recent increases, from both natural and man-made sources, in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO₂)." GoRight was reverted by Raul654 (twice), William M. Connolley, and Jason Patton. GoRight reverted his content back in twice, and was supported in this by Sm8900 (once).

From Talk, GoRight wasn't convinced, he was simply outnumbered, and gave up. It's my belief that, with negotiation, consensus could be found on this that would either not harm the article or would improve it. GoRight's position is not, I suspect, an unusual one, and it would be better to more clearly address it, thus avoiding conflict in the future. I'm not going to debate this, but GoRight had a point. And his edit was also improper, by itself, it swung the balance in the other direction. This is an example of subtle POV, it can be quite tricky to work out.

It is very important to understand the appearance here, from the perspective (probably) of GoRight and of those who think there is this big conspiracy to hype global warming. There was an edit war on June 22. There were two disputes involved, the one we've examined and another. If we look at individuals, at 2RR were GoRight, Sm8900, Jason Patton, Raul654, and at 1RR were William M. Connolley and Oren0. If we look at possible "cabals," we have one "side" at 6RR and one "side" at 4RR. (Sm8900 made two sequential reverts, one in each "dispute," properly considered one for revert counting purposes). In fact, it would be a serious mistake to presume some kind of cabal in a formal sense, but not at all preposterous to look at editors who routinely back each other up, watching the same articles, and effectively maintaining some kind of status quo there. From this perspective, perhaps we can understand what WMC next mentions, referring to a comment by GoRight:

And I simply lack the incentive to actually waste time fighting the Connolley gang over it was hardly helpful.

Sure. Not helpful. But entirely understandable. I've been working with another editor to help revise GoRight's view about this. What I'm pointing out here was that, reviewing the record, it is not difficult to see how GoRight could think that, sincerely. What has begun to concern me, as I've investigated the evidence here, is that misbehavior by a relatively new user is one thing, but misbehavior by highly experienced users, administrators, is another. Appearance is important. An appearance of conflict of interest must be avoided, almost as much as actual conflict. I continue to assume, fully, good faith on the part of WMC, and can easily attribute what I see as his errors to oversight or loss of perspective, with both of these being quite understandable under the circumstances. (Here, the biggest "error" is the filing of this RfC.) I'm asking WMC to return to an assumption of good faith; that used to be policy, and was only demoted to a guideline because it can't easily be "enforced." I should go back and fix that. It is enforced, by natural law. Stop assuming good faith, and, if you are active and you care about the project, you will ultimately be sucked into some serious mistakes, mistakes that can get you blocked or desysopped. It will come out in uncivil edit summaries or block summaries, unnecessary uncivil comments in Talk, improper blocking, and the like. It is very, very dangerous to lose our assumptions of good faith.

By the way, GoRight, when I removed the speedy deletion tag from this RfC, assumed that I was likewise part of the cabal. He's revised his opinion and has apologized. Maybe we can turn him into a cooperative Wikipedian yet; in any case, I consider the participation of people like him, even if they are SPA, even if they are pushing a POV, to be crucial to the balance of the project. And, yes, it can be frustrating and difficult to deal with. But it's necessary. --Abd (talk)

You could not have expressed my opinion better if you reached into my brain and photocopied my thoughts. This is spot on; I agree with every syllable of this analysis. I hope others will read this and take your excellent advice. ATren (talk) 08:26, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I left out one line of Connolley's "Wurble." Oh, and as for 0RR, its not necessary. Experience shows that 1RR is enough. I didn't realize what he was referring to, but I think I have recognized it. He's referring to a suggested sanction by Count Iblis. I agree with Connolley in general; many editors who show up on my evidence page (User:Abd/GoRight) would profit from a self-limitation to 1RR on a topic, 0RR if the editor was the source of new text. Going beyond that is a sign that something is wrong. When one editor goes beyond that, others with differing views may go beyond that, it escalates. 1RR, at least, establishes a minimum kind of default consensus: If there are more editors on one side willing to revert than on the other, we have a majority, which is about as minimal as consensus can get. It's obviously not enough. But the very necessity of pulling in other editors identifies a community and it brings in others who might have cooler heads. I've suggested, now, that RfC would have been appropriate, and remains appropriate, for possible inclusion of the material from the Solomon editorial in the article on William Connolley. Preposterous arguments were asserted, to be sure, to keep it out, such as Lawrence Solomon not being notable, as if this were so clear that to challenge it was to be contentious. But this is also a BLP, and so extra caution is in order. We need to include, in the discussion, critics of Connolley, and firmly base whatever conclusion is found in community consensus, as broad a consensus as possible. Being inclusive in these decisions is absolutely necessary if we are to avoid the same edit wars, over and over. Consider the alternative: perhaps, armed with, say, an ArbComm decision, admins watch the article and immediately warn users like GoRight, and promptly block them if they violate the ArbComm rules. How will this look to, in this case, people who believe that there is a conspiracy to promote a hoax of global warming? Some of these people will welcome the opportunity to "stand up for the truth," sacrificing accounts for that. And there is a vast well of such people. No, the solution is to find a deeper consensus, which requires being inclusive in the process. --Abd (talk) 23:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

RE: View by Kim D. Petersen

KDP asserts, "Inviting L. Solomon to use blogs to circumvent Wikipedia rules. [45], apparently so he can get more meat for his POV."

• Lawrence Solomon is well within his rights to us a WP:SPS to defend himself on his BLP. Doing so is well within the rules set forth by WP:RS, WP:V, and WP:BLP, and my offer of assistance does not violate any policy of Wikipedia that I am aware of.
• Your assumptions regarding my motives, however, are a violation of both WP:AGF and WP:CIV. --GoRight (talk) 19:56, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

KDP asserts, "Really setting the mood [46], by baiting."

• It should be obvious that my reference to WP:OWN in this case was merely a backwards reference to the topic of the previous section, wherein an editor other than myself makes the assertion that this page has WP:OWN issues.
• Nor is KDP innocent of the charge of "baiting" himself, see [8] and [9]. My response, however, was to use an approved template to indicate that I considered him to have abused the use of the vandalism template [10] and to offer to find a resolution to our mounting tensions [11]. An offer that he has thus far not even responded to. --GoRight (talk) 19:56, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

KDP asserts, "of course noone considers the man controversial, and the text didn't say so".

• The text KDP restored read, in part, "He [the man] is a controversial figure ...". See [12]. This does not say that his views on GW are controversial, it says the man is controversial because of his views on GW. --GoRight (talk) 19:21, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Alleged harassment of User:William M. Connolley by GoRight

Please see the section in my evidence file on this. The "harassment" consisted of criticism of Connolley's editorial behavior, and was no more severe, at its worst, than what GoRight faced immediately, routinely, and continues to face with this RfC. Which is more harassing, for an editor, talking with another, to claim that another editor has inserted "unsavory" material into articles of individuals with whom the editor disagrees, one of GoRight's offenses, or to drag an editor before AN/I as a "civil POV pusher," threaten the editor with blocking for attempting to insert RS material into articles, actually block the editor (improperly), and then file an RfC that uses the block as evidence?

GoRight was involved in a content dispute with User:R. Baley. Baley presented it as a warning for personal attack, but the edit which Baley had reverted wasn't a personal attack, it was reliably sourced material on the subject of the article, and the substance of it, being Wikipedia history, was actually verifiable by anyone, in detail; but it was usable because it had been reported in a New Yorker magazine article. If there was any fault in the edit by GoRight, it was that it wasn't balanced, there was additional material to be quoted which made it more balanced, which is what eventually happened. Yes, I see a POV in that. But I see more of a POV in the immediate and uncivil reversion of it. That material ended up being substantially accepted, but the incident continued to be used by Baley as an example of GoRight's "harassment" of Connolley. If George W. Bush, upon his retirement, becomes a Wikipedia user, will this mean that anyone attempting to insert critical material into the article on him would be "harassing" him? No, Baley got two issues confused. Connolley the editor and Connolley the notable person, the subject of a biography. However, even then, the "harassment" consisted of criticism of editor behavior, not gratuitously insulting, whether accurate or not. I get this kind of criticism almost every day.

And then, being in a content dispute with GoRight, Baley blocked him. In his favor, he rescinded the block early, but never apologized or acknowledged that it was an improper block. That oversight should be rectified. If not, Baley should lose his bit. I have not examined in detail the behavior of Raul654, but what little I've seen, in regard to GoRight, is utterly inappropriate for a Wikipedia administrator. As to Connolley, he has generally been civil and the worst thing he's done, in what I've seen, was to certify this RfC when, in fact, little or no attempt had been made to resolve the matter through discussion. There is, however, the appearance of a cabal maintaining the Global warning articles through edit warring; I have no reason to pin this on Connolley, he is merely one of a number of editors who have participated in this. This was one of GoRight's errors, to consider Connolley as some kind of mastermind behind a conspiracy to repress the truth on global warming. There is, instead, a constellation of users cooperating with each other with, in fact, some discussion of strategy among some of them. While some of the actions of these users are improper, I have no reason to suspect anything other than good faith. --Abd (talk) 05:15, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

It was not an improper block, and I'll thank you not to mischaracterize my actions. The only dispute, extended or otherwise, that I was in with GR, was with respect to his campaign at the time to disparage WMC. My actions were scrutinized at ANI by several editors and, afaik, admins. Enforcing NPA and BLP is entirely proper, and having a biographical article is not just another endrun around those concepts. R. Baley (talk) 07:46, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I think it is important to note the misrepresentation of a source Baley points out in the main page of this RfC. Going back to Abd's example; if Bush was an editor here whom I collided with, it would be awkward if I added negative information to his article. It would be bad if I add the negative information while failing to note that said information is refuted in the same piece I am using to source! Brusegadi (talk) 08:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Baley's response assumes that he was correct. I find that the evidence shows otherwise. "Mischaracterize" refers to my conclusions, and what he has stated, now, in response, doesn't make reference to the evidence but to a vague claim that his action was sustained at AN/I. I did not find a review of the block at AN/I, which is not, however, a substantive review board, it is more like 911 with the police and, unfortunately, it often becomes distracted by content issues.

Brusegadi's comment is more to the point. When an editor has a POV, or for other reasons, it is common for the editor to consider fact A to be more important than fact B, and, when a source demonstrates fact A and fact B, to only show fact A. The source did not refute fact A, rather it also showed fact B. Does fact B refute fact A? No. Fact A remains true. There is a possible implication from fact A which is countered by fact B, or not, that's actually debatable. This was a balance issue, not a matter of misrepresentation of source, and the remedy was not to remove fact A from the article, but to add fact B, and that is what actually happened. Now, this can be debated, and my conclusions aren't binding on anyone. However, what is clear is that Baley was involved in an editorial dispute with GoRight, never allowed GoRight the required assumption of good faith, dealt with contempt with what appear to be serious attempts to negotiate compromises and to understand and apply policy, and then blocked him. That is administrative misconduct, and I've seen it happen far too often for such misconduct to pass unnoticed until, later, the admin makes the same mistake with someone who is prominent, as happened with User:Physchim62 and User:Tango and they are then desysopped. That Baley continues to defend his action is a bad sign. That's the error that Baley might be making here, and, as it happens, independently, as far as I've seen today, WMC may also be making in an independent case alleging improper block that is before ArbComm. Bad timing. The friends of WMC will, understandably, try to defend his action, which is probably about the worst thing they could do for the welfare of both WMC and Wikipedia, for it may encourage WMC to continue his defense. ArbComm isn't inclined to punish admins, but is very concerned about abuse that hasn't been recognized by the admin and continues to be defended. Coffee! Smell! I'm not involved in this dispute, other than now in examining it, I have no agenda being pursued beyond honesty, and, in fact, as to POV, I'd be on the other side from GoRight. --Abd (talk) 11:47, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

One more point: I have not argued that R. Baley was incorrect in reverting GoRight. This is, after all, a BLP with special requirements, and, properly, GoRight would have attempted to negotiate consensus in Talk, and Baley's revert could be seen as insisting on this. If GoRight had edit warred over the insertion of that first piece of information, it would have been problematic. The incivility of Baley's revert, however, was gratuitous, inflammatory, and disruptive, far more than GoRight's edit. This is why I say that the content issue is a distraction. Baley's edit could have been dead wrong, even vandalism, and the revert should not have included a personal attack on the editor being reverted. The edit warring that did occur, however, wasn't by GoRight, and that the information was eventually included, with the kind of modification that happens when somebody acts to bring it within consensus, shows that it was not the insertion and alleged misrepresentation by GoRight that was the problem, it was the incompleteness of it. In a BLP, we want to avoid imbalance; with an ordinary article there would have been no question: removing the sourced material, as done by R. Baley would have been improper. With a BLP, it was justifiable, because balance should be negotiated before the material is inserted.

GoRight later edit warred over another similar issue in William Connolley, hitting 3RR (and apparently believing that this was the limit), an issue that, to my mind, has not been resolved except by editor exhaustion: there were multiple editors willing to run 2RR, on both sides, instead of negotiating consensus. I'm not attempting to clearly apportion blame for that, but when an article is being maintained in some state merely by a small margin in numbers of editors willing to edit war, there is a serious problem, and it is incorrect and positively dangerous to try to pin this on a single editor, the apparent catalyst. The problem is the potential energy of unresolved dispute, and the catalyst merely a trigger; another one would arrive sooner or later. --Abd (talk) 13:35, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Commentary on Wikipedia:Requests for comment/GoRight#View by R. Baley

I'd rather avoid going deeply into the content issues, because content issues can require vast amounts of time to resolve, and a user RfC is not the best method of addressing content issues. There is a boundary problem here as well: is an administrator removing sourced material from an article, allegedly enforcing BLP, then in a content dispute? If so, then for that admin to block is improper. My immediate impression on this question is that, if there is other editor support for the edit removed, then, yes, the admin is involved in a content dispute (with multiple users), and, absent emergency, the admin should refrain from blocking. In the subject article, edit warring started as the result of insertion of controversial content by GoRight, removed with uncivil comment by R. Baley. GoRight did not continue to assert that edit, it was asserted again by others, with edit warring, and the matter settled with most of the content inserted by GoRight remaining, and GoRight turned to another source and did become involved in edit warring over the placement of that in the article. The original revert made by R. Baley, however, set the tone, and the incivility, I suspect, confirmed for this user that criticism of global warming and of the subject of the biography, in spite of meeting sourcing standards (as he would think), was not welcome, as a matter of bias and not of policy. The uncivil edit summary of R. Baley set the tone for this, and, in itself, showed that he wasn't a proper judge of this user's conduct, and for this reason I conclude that his subsequent block action was improper, and not merely marginally so. It was not necessary to block the user in order to maintain BLP policy. I will continue later. --Abd (talk) 21:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to note what happened below. Schulz picks up on what he may see as a weak point in my comments, the sock suspicion raised by GoRight. There is no serious contention that Schulz and Connolley are socks, but there is a serious contention that GoRight was blocked contrary to block policy, which is a matter of high importance. The "sock charge" is of minor import, it's an arguably uncivil comment by one minor editor. The charge I've made, now, of block policy violation, is a serious charge against an administrator, and it shouldn't be distracted by irrelevancies, such as whether or not the charge is "totally absurd" (Schulz's claim), which I agree is true as to a charge, or ("reasonable for an ignorant editor, but without sufficient foundation to even warrant investigation"), which is what I claim is the case given what GoRight faced.

This is what happens to Wikipedia discussions, often, they turn into debates over minutia of no importance, and sometimes, I've seen signs that this is deliberately done. I'm not charging that here, rather I think that what's happening is that some editors are convinced that GoRight is "wrong," and that every comment that doesn't focus on that is therefore "wrong," and that it must therefore be defective, so let's find what is wrong about it. The cart draws the horse, the conclusions the investigation and commentary, and so the editor only sees evidence that fits the theory. It's a well-known problem in science, and it is the same problem here.

Remember, I came in here totally neutral, not as to content -- I think global warming is real and we are causing it -- but as to process and editor behavior. I had no prior run-ins or negative ideas about any of the parties here. My intervention was initially seen as hostile by GoRight. If I were one of the editors who (1) was uncivil to GoRight, (2) edit warred with him and others, and (3) endorsed this RfC, I'd be worried. Not worried that I would "lose," but that I might have made a mistake, or a series of mistakes. I would highly recommend taking a different look. Start with my evidence page at User:Abd/GoRight. I've only included material from three articles, so far, plus the matter of alleged harassment. Try to imagine how this would look to ArbComm. If there is anything important missing from that page, please suggest it or put it there yourself, but that file should be NPOV; if it isn't, please specifically point out the problems in Talk for that page. If there are errors, fix them. And wonder, how is it that an independent editor, without an axe to grind, comes up with the conclusions I've presented in this RfC -- which are still incomplete and not final. If I've overlooked something important, fill me in! If I've misinterpreted something, specifically address it. Otherwise, that page is going to stand and objections to it as, quite simply, denial of what can be proven from the record.

Then, the extended comment page at User:Abd/GoRightRFC, which is founded on the evidence page. If my interpretations there are incorrect, please challenge them! But specifically, pointing to the evidence. If I've said something there not supported by the sources, put a citation needed tag on it! (But the comments page relies upon the evidence page and does not necessarily cite each source there, redundantly. But that can be easily done.)

Lots of work? Yes. Which is why we avoid RfC over problems as minor as this was on the GoRight side. This RfC was way premature. --Abd (talk) 17:26, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Abd on R. Baley

prior unretracted uncivil comments by Schulz and Connolley, whose "continued incivility" had been asserted by Fred Bauder - diffs, please, both for "protracted uncivil comments" by me, and for a comment on me by Fred (assuming "whose" references both William and me, otherwise clarify). And the claim that William and I are socks is absurd and can not seriously be made in good faith. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:48, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that the claim is "absurd," but there is no basis for it that I have seen, other than some resemblance in views and cooperation, and that is weak, for sure. It was a serious blunder on GoRight's part, but it was, in fact, harmless, because nobody took it seriously, apparently not even GoRight; it's just another evidence that he was seeing or imagining an edit cabal, and that, while almost certainly mistaken if we think of some conscious conspiracy, was nevertheless an appearance that GoRight could be expected to perceive. After all, we even see publication of the allegation in reliable source (reliable in the sense of edited and legally responsible, not necessarily reliable for fact).

As to diffs, they are on the evidence page or in the extended comment. I don't think I've asserted anything that isn't backed by diffs or actual quotation of edits, or both. Evidence is at User:Abd/GoRight and the extended commentary was moved to User:Abd/GoRightRFC by another editor whose suggestion and bold edit are appreciated.

But to be helpful, as to the two items mentioned, Bauder's edit, which is with regard to Connolley, is at [13]. As to Schulz, the comment was a general impression, based on seeing many examples in reviewing the situation with GoRight. This is not an RfC on Schulz's behavior, as such, and I mention things like this to show the environment that GoRight faced, which explains (though it does not justify) GoRight's incivility. Incivility breeds incivility. If Schulz, or anyone, feels that my comment is unjustified and harmful, they can request that I investigate and report on it in detail, or, essentially, force me or someone else to investigate by taking action such as they think justified. I do everything I do imagining that ArbComm is looking over my shoulder, though, certainly, I make mistakes, and I consider those who point them out to be my friends, at least in that respect. Did I make a mistake with this? I don't think so yet. Schulz, in the interchange with Bauder, laced his reply with gratuitious incivility, quite like the incivility that he has lambasted in GoRight. I refer to [14]. This interchange is also currently copied into User:Abd/GoRight#Alleged harassment of User:William M. Connolley, where both Connolley and Schulz make unnecessary remarks about another Wikipedian and public figure, Solomon. Further relevant comment below.--Abd (talk) 12:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Absurd: Yes, the claim of sockery is outright absurd. We both are easily recognizable as different real persons with a long online presence both on and off Wikipedia. Compare User:William M. Connolley, User: Stephan Schulz, and for good measure [15] and [16]. Maybe the Mossad could fake this, but it would be hard to imagine why... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:20, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

By the way, the evidence shown by Schulz that they are separate persons is conclusive unless governmental-level resources were involved, which does seem absurd to me. But that's not the point here. GoRight did not file an SSP report, nor did he make any credible assertion of sock puppetry; I take his comment as that of a user flailing about in despair, seeing that he's up against a brick wall, and inferring that there is mortar involved, it's not just going to come apart if he pushes on it, the bricks are stuck together. My suggestion to him has been to step back, look at the wall, admire it, and if he wants to get to the other side, walk around it. --Abd (talk) 14:07, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Schulz has lost context. There are two questions: (1) Is it absurd to make a claim of sock puppetry? Perhaps. I have not investigated it. There have been long-term socks. But I don't see enough evidence to investigate it, and, frankly, it doesn't matter and it is irrelevant. I don't care if WMC or Schulz are the same person or two different persons, so why debate it? On the other hand, if someone asserted that they had credible evidence that these were socks, I wouldn't consider it absurd enough to not, at least, look at it. Given the history, it better be good!

But that is not the point. The question is, rather, was it "absurd" for GoRight to raise the issue? He would have limited knowledge, and what is absurd when our knowledge extends is not necessarily absurd before that. I'm saying that it wasn't necessarily absurd in that context. Further sock puppet is a term of art that can include meat puppetry, and there is no clear dividing line between meat puppetry and simple editorial cooperation. The real question here would be whether or not there was improper cooperation, editors bolstering each other allowing the avoidance of 3RR violation, tempting and leading dissenting editors into crossing that bright line with stonewalling. I'm not contending here that this can be proven, nor advocating further process to determine this. What I am contending, though, is that it appeared so to GoRight, and that this appearance wasn't "absurd." If Schulz really wants to confront this, if he thinks it is worth the wikidrama and distraction and risks, he's welcome to follow up. This RfC is highly unlikely to conclude that GoRight's behavior justifies sanctions, for a number of reasons, starting with the fact that, at this time, sanctions would be punitive, not preventative. There is vigorous argument here that GoRight violated guidelines and policy, though the RfC is short on clear, specific evidence of this that is not contaminated by context. (I.e., if you have a group of people in a room shouting at each other, to alleged "improper shouting" for one, and not for the others, and to only show evidence that the one person shouted, without looking at context, is "contaminated" by selection bias. The mine has been salted.) My effort here was to step back and look at the context. I looked at all edit warring in an article instead of just at the reverts made by GoRight, and I detailed this in a document intended to be NPOV, User:Abd/GoRight. That document is not complete, so if any user thinks that there has been selection bias involved, or accidental exclusion of relevant and necessary evidence, please, either fix it or point out the deficiency, specifically, so that it can be fixed. Instead, what I'm seeing is general denials, and attempts to impeach me as a witness, even though the evidence page is totally sourced and doesn't make conclusions beyond the unavoidable possibility of bias involved in selecting what is important. My conclusions are transient, but participants here should realize that the evidence is not transient. It remains for future generations. An RfC is, among other things, a preparation for ArbComm. I suggest to anyone, before diving contentiously into an RfC, think, how will ArbComm view the history? Is it going to focus only on an alleged "perpetrator," or does it open its eyes to the whole context and who might have caused the disruption and how? In my considered view, incivility was the core of this; the other problems could have been resolved much more quickly and much less disruptively if the participants had been civil. (There are certainly civil participants, but they didn't make the problem worse.) Connolley's continued incivility is worrisome for an administrator, and likewise is that of Baley and Raul654. Shulz, as well, has allied himself with Connolley, supporting and, in my view, encouraging his incivility, instead of, as a friend, helping Connolley to restrain it. This RfC, so badly constructed and presented, designed to preach to the choir, was written and certified by Raul654. There is a list of RfC participants at the end of User:Abd/GoRight, which shows which participants had prior history with GoRight, with particular attention on edit warring (bold italic), other opposing connection (bold), or previous cooperation and encouragement (italic). This prior connection proves nothing, in itself, but it's pretty easy to see possible participation bias. Endorsers who pile in even before listing, and who had prior difficulties with GoRight, may simply show that there is a faction, a group of cooperating editors, which isn't, in itself, a bad thing, but which can easily become abusive, especially when mixed with the poison of incivility. --Abd (talk) 13:59, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

"And the claim that William and I are socks is absurd and can not seriously be made in good faith." Nor was it seriously made, as clearly explained here [17]: "... although I am certainly not accusing you of actually being such (in case there was any doubt)." —Preceding unsigned comment added by GoRight (talk • contribs)

Whether you are serious or not is, of course, something we can only guess. This edit certainly seems to indicate that you suggest it, and the one you referenced [18] is a classical case of a non-denial denial. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:15, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Then let me remove any doubt. I never seriously thought that you were a sock puppet WMC. Meat puppet is harder to decide. This is evidenced by the fact that I never actually pursued any official action on this point. Had I seriously thought you were I would have certainly pursued it no matter how futile it might seem. --GoRight (talk) 20:27, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

We are required to take GoRight at his word, and I see no reason to doubt it. As to non-denial denial, there is a classical example of it in the material referenced above (about Solomon), and GoRight was blocked for pointing it out. Not good. Schulz is walking on thin ice and appears to imagine that everything is just fine, feeling, apparently, secure enough to join in this RfC and point fingers at others for behavior that he himself displays. I'd say that we (Wikipedians in general) should recognize incivility for the serious problem that it is, and stop it, both in ourselves and collectively. --Abd (talk) 12:48, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Stephan, is that the only diff where GoRight brings up the sock puppet allegation? Because if that's all there was, even if he was serious, he asked you politely and explained his rationale for believing it. I don't see the problem. In fact, I once did the exact same thing when I had a suspicion about an established user - I was in a dispute with two editors who seemed to have similar styles, and user A responded in place of user B in a way that raised suspicions. So I asked directly to user A "are you a sock of user B?" The user (with whom I had an ongoing dispute) answered a sincere "no" and explained the diff that raised my suspicion, and I dropped it. In fact, after having that sincere exchange, we got along better and opened a wider discussion on our differences.

So, I certainly see no harm in asking another editor directly, as long as it's done civilly (it was). Further, I've seen no evidence he dwelled on it beyond the initial mention of it. This is not abusive in the least. ATren (talk) 14:03, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Atren is making my point. There had arisen a poisonous context in the global warming articles, where interlopers were treated uncivilly. It's not just global warming, this sometimes happens with other established articles which have groups of defending editors. My question is this: if there is a genuine consensus reflected in the article, then there will be editors on all sides (including "fringe") who accept the consensus, and if a new fringe editor appears, it should be a sympathetic editor who warns an offending interloper, unless other participants can bring themselves to set aside their own POVs, and be unoffended when someone challenges the "consensus," and warn in a civil and truly welcoming way. If this isn't done, if the defense of the article becomes purely a war against "fringe editors" and "vandals," increasingly, what we will see is "fringe edit warriors," with increasing sophistication, and increased vandalism. The very effort to stop it will increase it, until, what a surprise!, an article must be protected, as Raul654 attempted to do, what, about a month ago? If a view is truly fringe, there will be few who advocate it; but the editors with the GW articles have confused "fringe science" with "fringe opinion." Global warming skepticism isn't fringe opinion, though society seems to be moving in that direction. It isn't there yet, so by clamping down on "fringe science" in the article, the editors, in all good faith, are pushing a POV, for NPOV isn't about "science," it is about all human knowledge, which, while it may be "science" in the original meaning, isn't what we think of as science, as in "junk science" or "scientific fact." It refers to a particular kind of knowledge, a particular method, and a cultural phenomenon. POV pushing engenders POV pushing; to me, the trick is to involve editors from all POVs in the project of discovering NPOV, in building articles that are clear and which explain and show the nature of any significant controversies, as well as what is solidly known. Sometimes the division into Primary Subject and Controversy over Primary Subject is useful, because then Primary Subject can focus, for example, on the science of it, but, very important, the Controversy article can't be used to shove notable RS opinion under the carpet, it must come back into the Primary Subject article in summary style. --Abd (talk) 14:57, 9 July 2008

Yes. Look at Oren0's request for adminship. He is a skeptic, but he did mention that there is plenty of evidence for the other side. Asking editors to follow other editors around may be too much. Also, you have to understand that "skepticism" in global warming is somehow fragmented. Some think its a conspiracy, others think its natural causes (within this category there are subcategories), etc. Brusegadi (talk) 03:32, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Since we are discussing harassment here

Do people consider the following pattern of personal attacks to be harassment of User:Lawrence Solomon, User:GoRight/Notes#Harassment_of_User:Lawrence_Solomon? These seem at least as offensive as anything I did, no? If not, what is the distinction you are making? --GoRight (talk) 20:33, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Baffled. [19] is an apology. Are you offended by such? William M. Connolley (talk) 20:37, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

If you are truly baffled by why this particular comment was included in this list, then that fact only serves to illustrate how blinded you are by your own biases. The "apology" portion of that comment was perfectly fine, however the newly formed PA portion of that comment, "As a journalist, he's obviously of very poor quality.", was not. --GoRight (talk) 12:15, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Not that this has anything to do with the RfC, but both William and I have made it very clear that we comment on the public figure and objectively bad journalist, not on the Wikipedia user. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:41, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

"objectively bad journalist" is a violation of no personal attacks, and, if I didn't have to get up early tomorrow, and since it is fresh, I'd warn Schulz. Same attack has been made before, by Schulz and Connolley.--Abd (talk) 03:15, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Rest assured that I'm aware of your opinion. I just don't share it. Calling Bill Clinton an "objectively bad president" is an opinion, not a personal attack. The same holds for other public figures. We could debate if my opinion is valid (and I have plenty of evidence, starting with the Nigel Weiss affair), but in no way can this be seen as a personal attack on a Wikipedian. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:51, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Yet that same "objectivity" and careful discrimination between the "Wikipedian" and "the public figure" is lost when the subject of the article is William Connolley. I see it as an attack on a Wikipedian because of context. It was irrelevant here. Actually presenting objective evidence impeaching a journalist might relevant when using the journalist as a source is the actual issue, though, in fact, WP:V is set up to avoid exactly this kind of debate. If the New York Times, or CBS News, publishes opinion, our usage of that would not and should not depend on whether or not, in our judgment, the writer is "bad," but on the reliability of the publication. Schulz and others have failed to see the forest for the trees, have become lost in the details of this or that writer or critic, apparently because of POV. And that is precisely what is so dangerous.--Abd (talk) 12:04, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry - but this is really a very big misinterpretation of WP:V and WP:SPS. Op-Ed's are opinions by individuals, which is printed in some media. They follow most of the SPS guidelines because they are personal opinions. They do rank somewhat above WP:SPS in reliability, because there is a superficial editorial process (mainly to ensure that the media its printed in, won't get libel suits), and because the media guarantees us that the person really is the person that he claims to be. The media doesn't make the Op-Ed reliable, the individual does, it hinges on the expertise and general reliability of the individual. The media its printed in, may raise the notability of the opinion though.

Now for the public person/wikipedia person discussion, there is a clear distinction here. If the wikipedia persona or the actions of that wikipedia persona is the basis for the discussion, then the Wikipedia rules must be upheld. But if there is a clear distinction between the WP persona and the public persona - then it doesn't. And we discuss that public person just as any other public persons - with the same rules and guidelines that normally are there (primarily BLP).

In this particular instance the distinction is clear, when speaking about the reliability and quality of the articles that Solomon has written, its the public persona and the public persona's output that is discussed. And you are correct in the assertion that context is the major thing to look at. Fortunately we have in the past had several instances where Solomon's denier series has been discussed, with regards to reliability and quality. (for instance here or here). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:01, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Are we really doing all this Wikilawyering to defend calling someone an idiot? It's all seems pretty Eddie Haskellish to me. ATren (talk) 20:17, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't fan the flames by posting this kind of stuff, and the first few links aren't particularly bad. The edit summary on the last one, though, is exactly the reason I think there's blame all around. An edit summary like that just isn't necessary, especially on a revert. JeremyMcCracken (talk) (contribs) 20:43, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, its hard to condone poor spelling William M. Connolley (talk) 20:47, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I think that the whole "attaching the journalist, not the Wikipedian" business is nonsense. If GoRight called you an "objectively bad scientist" and defended it by claiming that he was attacking you "as a climatologist" rather than "as a Wikipedian" you'd ask to have him blocked. We shouldn't be attacking anyone here and I believe all editors who have exercised poor judgment. Oren0 (talk) 04:40, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Oren, may I suggest that you do not make unfounded claims about my propensity to call for blocks? And if GR claimed he was "attacking me as a climatologist", he'd display exactly the level of research and fact checking that identifies a journalist as an objectively bad journalist. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:51, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I apologize for the misunderstanding. The "you" in that sentence was William Connolley, who does have a background in climate modeling and has called for GoRight to be blocked based on personal attacks. Oren0 (talk) 16:45, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree, and I'll take it a step further: why don't we quit the sophomoric name-calling entirely and start behaving like professionals? ATren (talk) 05:58, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I'll second that. The first step to negotiating is being able to sit down together at the negotiating table. JeremyMcCracken (talk) (contribs) 08:41, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I certainly agree with both of you on this point, but I am not the one that has opened this RFC nor am I the one seeking to have people excluded from the debate. My purpose for raising this point is discussed further below. --GoRight (talk) 12:15, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't know exactly who is agreeing to what, but I agree that this whole thread is off-topic and a waste of time. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 09:51, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

(written earlier than below, but edit conflict) I don't like that GoRight started this section, but there is, unfortunately, a relevance. Pot calls Kettle black. In this section, the Kettle says, "Here is a photo of you. Is this 'black'?" What is relevant about it is (1) the definition of 'black." (2) Possible sanctions for blackness. And we could mention geese and ganders, stone-throwing by people who live in glass houses, and McCracken got it right. But if Schulz really wants to address this issue "objectively," it could be arranged. It might be anyway, if some consensus appears that discussions between the editors aren't going to resolve this dispute, which is larger than Raul654 et all vs. GoRight. To me, the dispute isn't about global warming. It is about how editors behave in seeking -- or not seeking -- consensus on the articles. And that is very relevant. What I've seen here is increasing awareness and comment from neutral editors as to my identification of the problem, expressed agreement from one adverse party and supporters, and dissent and even contempt from the other adverse parties. That does not bode well for the latter group. I would greatly welcome friends of editors on the latter side, but capable of seeing the point, beginning to intervene to help in mediating this, because I don't see that the "caucus," for lack of a better word, is hearing it. Connolley is presently before ArbComm, facing possible sanctions for another action, and he doesn't need additional weight from this history and the publicity over it. Baley could face an RfC from what he's done, and desysopping is not impossible as an ultimate outcome, given that he hasn't acknowledged the error. Schulz could possibly face a topic ban, as could, possibly, Petersen. These are not, to me, by any means, a desirable outcome except in comparison to the status quo. --Abd (talk) 15:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Stephan Schulz asserts that this thread is off-topic. Given that it casts him in a poor light based objectively on his own actions I can understand why he would seek to paint it as such. Such an assertion would be incorrect. This RFC was written to illustrate how my behavior was so poor as to warrant my being topic banned. One of the rationale's used was the fact that I had been blocked for harassment by User:R. Baley, a charge that I wish to examine in more detail.

User:Abd has done a most excellent job of illustrating that on the charge of edit warring I was no more culpable than several other editors here, yet I am being singled out in that instance. The edits I provide above likewise illustrate that on the charge of "harassing others" I am again no more culpable than my peers, yet again I am being singled out for special treatment ... and unfairly so.

If the entire purpose of this RFC is to help me understand how my behavior needs to change then it seems to make sense that we compare and contrast my behavior with that of those bringing the charges against me so that I might better understand why I am being singled out. In this way I can better understand those aspects of my behavior that are being considered offensive. Please help me to understand how my behavior differed from that of those leveling the charges against me so that I might bring my behavior in line with the expected community norms. I assume that those leveling the charges against me would assert that their own behavior is acceptable, or is this not the case? --GoRight (talk) 12:15, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I have no problem with how this thread displays the various participants. However, in this RfC, the topic is indeed irrelevant. Open an RfC on me if you want to discuss my behavior. Granting your view for the sake of argument (and only for that sake), the sentiment in WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS still applies. We don't want to go to the lowest common standard. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 12:41, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Stephan, I would never suggest that your own behavior of represents "the lowest common standard". Both you and WMC are held up as being representative of the community norms of behavior. Are you suggesting that I should be held to a different standard of behavior than those who frequent the GW pages such as yourself and WMC? --GoRight (talk) 13:02, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I suggest that we cut this debate short. GoRight: yes, it's clear that some of the others who have signed views against you are guilty of many of the same behaviors, but just as I believe you should not be sanctioned, they shouldn't either. I understand your rationale in pointing out the apparent double standard, but that's not going to help your case one bit. Everyone knows there's a double standard, and the community accepts it, so no point in rehashing it. If you want fairness, civility and NPOV, go elsewhere; Wikipedia is none of these things.

So I suggest you stop pointing out the obvious incivility in others and let the RFC take its course. ATren (talk) 14:51, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, GoRight, stop "defending" yourself by making the WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS argument. That standard does not "exactly" apply, as Schulz claims, but I'd suggest that you pretend it does. I don't agree with ATren, however, that the community has accepted a double standard. Rather, from my point of view, the "community" is like a sleeping giant, and only occasionally wakes up sufficiently to "accept" or "reject" something; until then what we have is low-level processing, the kind that happens in sleep and dreams, and it can be quirky, depending on what Saṅkhāras are involved. Patience, GoRight, it will work itself out, and, if it doesn't, you won't cause it to work itself out by expressing your own POV exclusively, you will just make the natives restless. If you carefully and without attachment learn the policies and guidelines, and how community process works, and you can avoid incivility and gratuitous conflict (even if civil, it can be disruptive), you will be able to accomplish much. And to the other "side," I say, if you do not take a similar attitude, and trust the broader community (which includes IP editors and "POV pushers" and, indeed, every interested party), you will be forced to defend the articles with ever-increasing use of reverts and vandalism tools, article protection, complaints to AN/I, and the rest, and that's a war, and people get hurt when they war. I would truly consider it a shame if the major part of the defense (of the global warming articles and an insistence on peer-reviewed sourcing for them) were taken out of the picture, by a topic ban. But it's essential that these parties start to cooperate. On the other hand, a topic ban (from editing articles in the field) would still leave the parties able to work together if they try, in Talk, if they can remain civil. I'm hoping a topic ban is not necessary, both for GoRight and the others. I do not see it as necessary yet, because WP:DR has not only not been exhausted, it has barely begun. That's why I've said that this RfC was improperly filed, the certifications were blatantly defective. Again, I've suggested that those two editors withdraw the certification, but this has been rejected (Connolley) or ignored (Raul654, though I haven't tried communicating with him on his Talk page as I did with Connolley).--Abd (talk) 16:11, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

My last bit on this thread:

I fear that there may be some confusion regarding my purpose here. I am not seeking to justify my actions based on the actions of others (i.e. making a WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS argument). I wish to turn this RFC into a positive opportunity for self-improvement by ascertaining the rules under which I am expected to operate relative to others. This seems a fair question to ask.

If the wikipedia-wide standards of WP:V, WP:RS, WP:NPOV, WP:NPA, and WP:HARASS are insufficient to describe the expected behavior of all editors within the GW pages then we should document the variance of expectation from those established norms. For example, if it is viewed as being acceptable (by "the community") for GW proponents to ignore WP:NPA and WP:HARASS while GW skeptics are expected to scrupulously adhere to them then let us make that distinction clear and explicit for all to see. Doing so will save a lot of arguing moving forward, which is of course one of the main goals behind this RFC in the first place.

Having such a clearly delineated set of expectations will assist not only myself but other GW skeptics as well, and in so doing will undoubtedly reduce the annoyance factor amongst the GW proponents since we skeptics will be less likely to violate the unwritten rules by mistakenly emulating the behaviors of our opponents.

I apologize to those who are seeking to assist me here but who may feel that I am working against their efforts with this thread. Depending on the outcome of this exercise I will have to decide whether to pursue things at the next level and I merely want all of the pertinent aspects to have already been discussed here as an expedient later, should it come to that.

Note that it is not my desire to escalate, but if this effort results in a topic ban what other recourse will I have. Likewise with the suggestion of a 1RR self-imposed restriction. I am perfectly willing to live within 1RR as long as the expectation is that everyone will live within 1RR. I see no legitimate reason that I should voluntarily agree to accept a handicap relative to my ideological counter-parts when my actions are essentially on par with their own. --GoRight (talk) 16:36, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Understand that 1RR is a common self-imposed restriction; beyond that will often be entering edit warring territory. I normally follow 1RR myself. If others edit war, let them, and, if I think it's a problem, I'll decide which is less disruptive: reverting back (within 3RR almost always) or taking it to AN/I -- rarely do I do this, it pisses people off and pulls trolls out of the woodwork --, or continuing to negotiate (most common) and perhaps involve other users with an RfC (often a good idea, and often successful, when it is a content RfC), or simply letting it go if it isn't important or I don't have time. There is no clear boundary for edit warring; I used a rather artificial but relatively clear definition in my analysis: any edit that was a repetitive revert beyond the first with a particular topic, regardless of elapsed days or identity of author,I called an edit war edit. This could be honed. It doesn't imply that the edit warring, so defined, was contrary to policy. Sometimes we forget -- and newcomers should be educated -- that Rule Number One is Ignore All Rules. However, Ignore All Rules, without being scrupulous clean, and careful, and, indeed, knowledgeable, you could get blocked. And then, if you could show that you were actually following the full meaning of IAR, in good faith, you'd probably be unblocked, unless the community feared you were a loose cannon likely to do damage, or there is a deeper problem, such as violation of Abd/Rule 0. I agree that clearer rules would make it easier to expect what will be okay. But there is substantial sentiment against instruction creep, which makes for inflexibility. You might say that Wikipedia is a Common law jurisdiction, with Public policy being the strongest principle.

The real restriction, if voluntary, would be not to edit war as a means of "forcing" some state for the article, unless it's truly necessary and so important as to be worth risking damage to the consensus process. Political reality suggests that you avoid edit warring; if the other side uses it regularly, once the community becomes aware of it, at a wide enough level, that's practically political suicide for those. By not edit warring yourself, you are far more likely to sidestep the avalanche when it comes.--Abd (talk) 17:33, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

--Abd (talk) 17:33, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I would suggest that while WP:IAR is important, WP:DICK is much more fundamental. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 19:11, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

My, how WP:CIV of you. But given my recently reformed behavior here, I will refrain from taking your WP:BAIT. --GoRight (talk) 19:33, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Stephan, but probably not in the way he intended it. :-) ATren (talk) 19:51, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Done?

I think we're all done here; everyone has said all they need to. All those who agree signify their assent by not bothering to sign below William M. Connolley (talk) 22:27, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

1. No. Not yet. Ncmvocalist just added an excellent comment and there should be adequate time to review and endorse it, or not. My own comment is incomplete, though it may indeed be time to call it as complete as it's going to get. --Abd (talk) 04:52, 4 August 2008 (UTC) my comment done, but three new edits today --Abd (talk) 03:31, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

• We're done here - a sanction has been imposed and the discussion on it has closed. Ncmvocalist (talk) 07:11, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

• Clarification, a sanction has been imposed but not as a result of this RfC. It was instead via a WPFORUMSHOP to WP:ANI. --GoRight (talk) 00:48, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

• RFCs do not directly result in sanctions - it's just a venue to raise concerns. If further action is needed, it goes through an admin noticeboard or ArbCom. In other words, it is ancillary which venue the sanction was imposed through. If it was merely forumshopping for something that was meritless, the community would not have come to a consensus to impose the sanction to address, in part, some of those concerns raised here on your conduct. Ncmvocalist (talk) 02:48, 17 August 2008 (UTC)