[WikiEN-l] Re: ArbCom - too attached to 'equal treatment'?

Thu Mar 3 01:52:15 UTC 2005

zero 0000 said:
> I think the issue that Jay raised is a serious one.
>
> The scenario is that A brings an arbitration case
> against B, the committee looks at both sides of
> the dispute, then both A and B get penalties.
>
> This is a clear violation of A's right to due process.

Well it isn't a trial, and nobody said A or B had a right to any process!

But think of the arbitration committee as, perhaps, an examining
magistrate, not a judge.  They are investigator, prosecutor and judge all
rolled into one.
I think the mistake being made is to assume that there is supposed to be
some kind of adversarial system with a clear winner and a clear loser as
in the case of a criminal trial under the system of common law.  This
isn't the only way of getting at the truth and deciding how to remedy any
problems that exist, and for our purposes it certainly wouldn't be a very
efficient one.
It also must be borne in mind that we are all accountable, at all times,
for   all of our actions on Wikipedia.  We're not here to gossip, make a
living, entertain ourselves, argue or save the world.  Common principles
of justice and the individual have no place here.  This is a community,
one with a purpose, and the arbitration committee is here to ensure that
it functions smoothly.  Someone who is scared to take a complaint to the
arbitration committee because he may then be held accountable for his own
actions is, it seems to me, missing the point.