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

Tue Mar 8 16:16:18 UTC 2005

> From: David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com>
>>Temporary injunctions are for the specific purpose of keeping the
>>peace.
>
> On Tue, 08 Mar 2005 13:50:10 +0000, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> An editor in good standing feeling mistreated is the sort of thing
>> that makes volunteers fade away, so all this is a matter of concern.
>> Temp injunctions need to be applied with care.
>
> David, one arbitrator has strongly implied that the policy of
> tempbanning has been adopted in order to discourage editors from
> seeking arbitration, and not simply to keep the peace. S/he has
> written of tempbanning: "I strongly encourage you to complain about
> that practice widely and to discourage others from seeking
> arbitration.  If you can build a consensus against us, we will either
> change or be replaced," and "[P]lease remember that arbitration is not
> something that people should want or feel good about doing. It is a
> serious step that can result in a Wikipedia Death Sentence; if these
> temporary injunctions make disputants decide to try a little harder to
> avoid bringing their squabbles before the ArbComm, so much the
> better."
>
> It's a good thing to discourage squabbles from being brought to the
> arbcom; but not all disputes are simply squabbles, and you may be
> discouraging genuine disputants too, in cases where the dispute
> resolution would be for the benefit of Wikipedia.

That doesn't make sense to me.  I do understand the argument that tempbans
where seen as unjust could drive away good editors, but so can seriously
bad behavior.  If a week's rest from editing a few articles is *worse*
than editing those articles in the presence of the behavior about which
one wants to make a complaint, I just don't see that the complaint can be
that serious.  Suppose somebody says "Tony Sidaway, no editing articles
about politics or sex."  Well I'd just get on editing articles about the
hundred-and-one other major subjects an encyclopedia covers.
A sense of proportion: is that something so lacking in Wikipedia editors?