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

slimvirgin at gmail.com slimvirgin at gmail.com
Mon Mar 7 16:23:00 UTC 2005


> >> It wouldn't artificially discourage people from making legitimate
> >> complaints for fear that they too would be penalised <snip>
Theresa Knott said:
> > Is there any evidence that this has actually happened in the past? . . .
> >I am not aware of a legit complaint not having been made out of fear.

I was reluctant to bring the case against the LaRouche editor
Herschelkrustofsky because of uncertainty about arbcom attitudes.
Herschel was operating a couple of sockpuppets and for months the
three user accounts engaged in absurd POV editing and original
research, as well as trying to goad editors into making personal
attacks. I couldn't prove they were sockpuppets, and twice asked a
developer for help but got no response, so I couldn't bring a case.
They started attacking me in November, and I managed to last several
weeks of daily snide remarks and POV editing, when I finally broke
down and called one of them a "toxic troll" twice within half an hour,
the only time I had said anything that could be called a personal
attack. The context was that, after days of negotiation with Herschel
to have an NPOV tag taken down, we finally reached an agreement, took
down the tag, and then one of his sockpuppets put it straight back up
again. Hence my troll comment. Herschel was pleased as punch that I'd
finally weakened and he went straight to the arbcom page and asked for
a penalty against me. Fred Bauder responded by saying that if I ever
showed up at the arbcom, I'd be banned for a day or two at least.
This, without having seen any evidence or asking for my side of the
story. That definitely made me reluctant to bring a case, though I did
in the end.

In January, I asked David Gerard for help regarding my sockpuppet
suspicion. He was able to get a developer to check the accounts, and
it was confirmed that they appeared to be sockpuppets, so I took the
case to the new, recently elected arbcom. In the course of it,
Herschel complained about my toxic-troll comment on an arbcom talk
page. He submitted no evidence on the evidence page, and provided no
diffs, but the arbcom took his comment as evidence and found the diffs
for him. I didn't know they would do this, and hadn't prepared a
defense. I wasn't penalized but I was formally warned.

When the proposed decision against Herschel was being written up, Fred
also made a couple of remarks about the need to deal with "the POV
warriors on the other side," and named one editor, but he said
warriors plural, so I assume he also meant me and/or one of the other
editors. This meant we had to spend more time submitting defenses for
ourselves. Fred provided no evidence of POV-pushing on our part, no
examples, diffs, nothing, so we didn't even know what we were
defending ourselves against.

These were minor things, but they were annoying, because several
editors had spent a lot of time dealing with Herschel for eight
months, and we were doing it for Wikipedia, not for our own benefit.
None of us had personal POVs that we were pushing, except a desire for
accuracy. Keeping him and the two other accounts at bay was hard work,
as was putting up with his constant snide remarks, and then putting
the arbcom case together; yet it felt as though we were on trial too.

If we'd had an editorial review committee, editors could have gone
there about his original-research and NPOV violations when he first
turned up in May, without having to wait for sockpuppet checks or for
him to violate other conduct-related policies.

I should add to this, however, that I'm grateful to the arbcom for the
decisions they reached in the end, as they managed to stop his
activities here completely.

Sarah



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