Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement: Difference between revisions

Important information Shortcuts WP:AE WP:ARE Please use this page only to: request administrative action against editors violating a remedy (not merely a principle) or an injunction in an Arbitration Committee decision, or a contentious topic restriction imposed by an administrator, request contentious topic restrictions against previously alerted editors who engage in misconduct in a topic area designated as a contentious topic, request page restrictions (e.g. revert restrictions) on pages that are being disrupted in topic areas designated as contentious topics, or appeal arbitration enforcement actions (including contentious topic restrictions) to uninvolved administrators. For all other problems, including content disagreements or the enforcement of community-imposed sanctions, please use the other fora described in the dispute resolution process. To appeal Arbitration Committee decisions, please use the clarification and amendment noticeboard. Only autoconfirmed users may file enforcement requests here; requests filed by IPs or accounts less than four days old or with less than 10 edits will be removed. All users are welcome to comment on requests except where doing so would violate an active restriction (such as an extended-confirmed restriction). If you make an enforcement request or comment on a request, your own conduct may be examined as well, and you may be sanctioned for it. Enforcement requests and statements in response to them may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. (Word Count Tool) Statements must be made in separate sections. Non-compliant contributions may be removed or shortened by administrators. Disruptive contributions such as personal attacks, or groundless or vexatious complaints, may result in blocks or other sanctions. To make an enforcement request, click on the link above this box and supply all required information. Incomplete requests may be ignored. Requests reporting diffs older than one week may be declined as stale. To appeal a contentious topic restriction or other enforcement decision, please create a new section and use the template {{Arbitration enforcement appeal}}. Appeals and administrator modifications of contentious topics restrictions The Arbitration Committee procedures relating to modifications of contentious topic restrictions state the following: All contentious topic restrictions (and logged warnings) may be appealed. Only the restricted editor may appeal an editor restriction. Any editor may appeal a page restriction. The appeal process has three possible stages. An editor appealing a restriction may: ask the administrator who first made the contentious topic restrictions (the "enforcing administrator") to reconsider their original decision; request review at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") or at the administrators' noticeboard ("AN"); and submit a request for amendment ("ARCA"). If the editor is blocked, the appeal may be made by email. Appeals submitted at AE or AN must be submitted using the applicable template. A rough consensus of administrators at AE or editors at AN may specify a period of up to one year during which no appeals (other than an appeal to ARCA) may be submitted. Changing or revoking a contentious topic restriction An administrator may only modify or revoke a contentious topic restriction if a formal appeal is successful or if one of the following exceptions applies: The administrator who originally imposed the contentious topic restriction (the "enforcing administrator") affirmatively consents to the change,[a] or is no longer an administrator;[b] or The contentious topic restriction was imposed (or last renewed) more than a year ago and: the restriction was imposed by a single administrator, or the restriction was an indefinite block. A formal appeal is successful only if one of the following agrees with revoking or changing the contentious topic restriction: a clear consensus of uninvolved administrators at AE, a clear consensus of uninvolved editors at AN, a majority of the Arbitration Committee, acting through a motion at ARCA. Any administrator who revokes or changes a contentious topic restriction out of process (i.e. without the above conditions being met) may, at the discretion of the Arbitration Committee, be desysopped. Standard of review On community review Uninvolved administrators at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") and uninvolved editors at the administrators' noticeboard ("AN") should revoke or modify a contentious topic restriction on appeal if: the action was inconsistent with the contentious topics procedure or applicable policy (i.e. the action was out of process), the action was not reasonably necessary to prevent damage or disruption when first imposed, or the action is no longer reasonably necessary to prevent damage or disruption. On Arbitration Committee review Arbitrators hearing an appeal at a request for amendment ("ARCA") will generally overturn a contentious topic restriction only if: the action was inconsistent with the contentious topics procedure or applicable policy (i.e. the action was out of process), the action represents an unreasonable exercise of administrative enforcement discretion, or compelling circumstances warrant the full Committee's action. ^ The administrator may indicate consent at any time before, during, or after imposition of the restriction. ^ This criterion does not apply if the original action was imposed as a result of rough consensus at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard, as there would be no single enforcing administrator. Appeals and administrator modifications of non-contentious topics sanctions The Arbitration Committee procedures relating to modifications and appeals state: Appeals by sanctioned editors Appeals may be made only by the editor under sanction and only for a currently active sanction. Requests for modification of page restrictions may be made by any editor. The process has three possible stages (see "Important notes" below). The editor may: ask the enforcing administrator to reconsider their original decision; request review at the arbitration enforcement noticeboard ("AE") or at the administrators’ noticeboard ("AN"); and submit a request for amendment at the amendment requests page ("ARCA"). If the editor is blocked, the appeal may be made by email through Special:EmailUser/Arbitration Committee (or, if email access is revoked, to arbcom-enwikimedia.org). Modifications by administrators No administrator may modify or remove a sanction placed by another administrator without: the explicit prior affirmative consent of the enforcing administrator; or prior affirmative agreement for the modification at (a) AE or (b) AN or (c) ARCA (see "Important notes" below). Administrators modifying sanctions out of process may at the discretion of the committee be desysopped. Nothing in this section prevents an administrator from replacing an existing sanction issued by another administrator with a new sanction if fresh misconduct has taken place after the existing sanction was applied. Administrators are free to modify sanctions placed by former administrators – that is, editors who do not have the administrator permission enabled (due to a temporary or permanent relinquishment or desysop) – without regard to the requirements of this section. If an administrator modifies a sanction placed by a former administrator, the administrator who made the modification becomes the "enforcing administrator". If a former administrator regains the tools, the provisions of this section again apply to their unmodified enforcement actions. Important notes: For a request to succeed, either (i) the clear and substantial consensus of (a) uninvolved administrators at AE or (b) uninvolved editors at AN or (ii) a passing motion of arbitrators at ARCA is required. If consensus at AE or AN is unclear, the status quo prevails. While asking the enforcing administrator and seeking reviews at AN or AE are not mandatory prior to seeking a decision from the committee, once the committee has reviewed a request, further substantive review at any forum is barred. The sole exception is editors under an active sanction who may still request an easing or removal of the sanction on the grounds that said sanction is no longer needed, but such requests may only be made once every six months, or whatever longer period the committee may specify. These provisions apply only to contentious topic restrictions placed by administrators and to blocks placed by administrators to enforce arbitration case decisions. They do not apply to sanctions directly authorized by the committee, and enacted either by arbitrators or by arbitration clerks, or to special functionary blocks of whatever nature. All actions designated as arbitration enforcement actions, including those alleged to be out of process or against existing policy, must first be appealed following arbitration enforcement procedures to establish if such enforcement is inappropriate before the action may be reversed or formally discussed at another venue. Information for administrators processing requests Thank you for participating in this area. AE works best if there are a variety of admins bringing their expertise to each case. There is no expectation to comment on every case, and the Arbitration Committee (ArbCom) thanks all admins for whatever time they can give. A couple of reminders: Before commenting, please familiarise yourself with the referenced ArbCom case. Please also read all the evidence (including diffs) presented in the AE request. When a request widens to include editors beyond the initial request, these editors must be notified and the notifications recorded in the same way as for the initial editor against whom sanctions were requested. Where some part of the outcome is clear, a partial close may be implemented and noted as "Result concerning X". Enforcement measures in arbitration cases should be construed liberally to protect Wikipedia and keep it running efficiently. Some of the behaviour described in an enforcement request might not be restricted by ArbCom. However, it may violate other Wikipedia policies and guidelines; you may use administrative discretion to resolve it. More than one side in a dispute may have ArbCom conduct rulings applicable to them. Please ensure these are investigated. Closing a thread: Once an issue is resolved, enclose it between {{hat}} and {{hab}} tags. A bot should archive it in 7 days. Please consider referring the case to ARCA if the outcome is a recommendation to do so or the issue regards administrator conduct. You can use the templates {{uw-aeblock}} (for blocks) or {{AE sanction}} (for other contentious topic restrictions) to give notice of sanctions on user talk pages. Please log sanctions in the Arbitration enforcement log. Thanks again for helping. If you have any questions, please post on the talk page.

Procedural notes: The rules governing arbitration enforcement appeals are found here. According to the procedures, a "clear, substantial, and active consensus of uninvolved editors" is required to overturn an arbitration enforcement action.

To help determine any such consensus, involved editors may make brief statements in separate sections but should not edit the section for discussion among uninvolved editors. Editors are normally considered involved if they are in a current dispute with the sanctioning or sanctioned editor, or have taken part in disputes (if any) related to the contested enforcement action. Administrators having taken administrative actions are not normally considered involved for this reason alone (see WP:UNINVOLVED).

Appealing user

GRuban (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – GRuban (talk) 15:06, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sanction being appealed

Block and topic ban of User:KoshVorlon [10].

Administrator imposing the sanction

Fluffernutter (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)

Notification of that administrator

[11]

Statement by GRuban

From this diff and this explanation it looks like KoshVorlon was blocked for insisting on retaining the justification for his !vote on Talk:Bradley Manning/October 2013 move request, specifically: "Bradley Manning is a guy". This is selective enforcement: Fluffernutter writes "The discussion guidelines made clear that comments about what gender you feel Manning is or is allowed to be are off-topic", however you will notice that the justifications "Chelsea Manning is a woman" by User:Georgia guy, "she is a woman", by User:Konveyor Belt, and "Chelsea Manning is a woman", by User:I JethroBT have been allowed to stand. This has been extensively discussed on the Fluffernutter's talk page, and on WP:ANI, where she requested any appeal be made at WP:AE. [12][13] So here it is. (FWIW, I haven't voiced an opinion in the move request itself.) --GRuban (talk) 15:06, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Response to Fluffernutter: It's a heck of a guideline that's only going to be enforced on one side, because not enforcing it on the other doesn't cause ill will (?!?). "Boys shouldn't hit girls and girls shouldn't hit boys, but if girls still hit boys it's all right because the boys won't complain about it?" Trust me, it causes ill will. You see for example, me, right here, an editor, one who was not involved in the discussion itself, feeling ill will, from that very selective enforcement. I'm not going to speculate on your motivations, but I will outright object to the blatant bias evidenced by your actions. Yes, Kosh behaved badly after your initial action. But your initial action was downright wrong, as several people have pointed out to you. That makes all subsequent actions you took stemming from that, also wrong. --GRuban (talk) 15:50, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Response to EdJohnston: As I linked to above, when a number of editors appealed to Fluffernutter, she wrote "Folks, I'll reiterate for you what I told Kosh a few lines up: if you want to contest the actions I took under Discretionary Sanctions policy today, you need to make that appeal either to Arbcom directly, or to the Arbitration Enforcement noticeboard." Is this, then, to be one of those bureaucratic runaround scenarios? "Sorry, you can't file this appeal here at office A. You must go to office B. And if they tell you to come back to me, and this leaves you with nowhere to appeal to, that is not my problem."?

And as to why I'm filing this instead of KV - well, because I'm outraged, and because meatball:DefendEachOther, and because he won't do it, and because, well, frankly ... no offense intended KV ... he's not a very good advocate for himself. If you follow the discussion at the pages I linked to, you'll see a number of people starting to argue for leniency, but then changing their minds based on Kosh's actions after the block. Floq, just below, is another example. So, frankly, I'm quite glad he's not involved. In this case, yes Kosh behaved badly after he had an injustice inflicted upon him. That doesn't make the initial injustice right. --GRuban (talk) 19:35, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Response to sche: I'm much obliged to Fluffernutter's attempting to keep a lid on the chaos. But defining "Bradley Manning is a guy" as a deletable and ultimately blockable statement, while leaving "Chelsea Manning is a woman" untouched is clear selective enforcement. I'm not asking that Fluffernutter be publicly flogged, I'm just asking for consistent enforcement of the clearly stated rules, not "I think I'm not going to enforce this one because one side won't cause as many problems". --GRuban (talk) 20:11, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Fluffernutter

To excerpt the explanation I gave yesterday about why I redacted part (not all) of Kosh's comment in the RM: "I am attending to the RM solely in an administrative capacity, and my goal is to keep the conversation from running off the rails into BLP violations and personal attacks. In light of that, "[person who identifies as a woman] is a woman" is neither inflammatory (you'll notice that no one from any side of the dispute has objected to comments of that type prior to this) nor a potential BLP violation (a significant portion of the community feels that denying a transperson's gender identity is problematic on BLP grounds, but no one feels that affirming it or not addressing it is a BLP violation). So comments affirming Manning's gender identity may be contrary to the guidelines, but they are benign in comparison to comments refuting it, which have been shown to cause ill will and disruptive derails, and I am trying to use the lightest touch possible in adminning the RM. I took (and will take) the step of redacting someone's comment only in the case of things that are likely to cause serious issue." I will also note that I have removed similarly problematic commentary from the other "side" of the discussion. Again, my goal here is to not allow the discussion to slide into the type of personalized free-for-all that doomed the last one. Accusations that I am somehow "selectively censoring" users' opinions to sway the vote one way or another because I am somehow "involved" are both perplexing and, honestly, hurtful while I'm trying to do an utterly thankless job that every other admin was too wise to attempt.

As far as Kosh Vorlon's block, it was not because he held a particular opinion, but because he repeatedly reverted a discretionary sanctions action in what appeared to be the heat of anger. Despite my making multiple attempts to explain how discretionary sanctions work and how and where my action could be appealed (and, indeed, allowing that my actions could certainly be mistaken as I'm only one person, so he should feel free to appeal), Kosh instead chose to edit war his commentary back into the RM with comments like "censored by impartial admin because IDON'TLIKEIT works for admins", "Calling bullshit bullshit" (both at [14]), and "Revert me again fluffernutter and I'll revert right back. You have NO RIGHT to revert me per WP:TPO READ IT" ([15]). And indeed, all this reverting was done while Kosh was under a 0RR restriction.

@AutomaticStrikeout: I'm not sure how much clearer I can make it that I use "problematic" in the sense of "problematic to the ability of the community to have this discussion without bloodshed." I'm not somehow judging whether I think "s/he is a woman/man" is right or wrong; I'm reacting to the fact that we have recent past experience that has shown us that commentary like "He is NOT Chelsea, not legally, not biologically, not even reliably. Yes I know, he says he wants to change his gender, but he hasn't done so yet nor is he notable under the name Chelsea assuming he DOES decide to do this anyway ." is perceived by a significant portion of the community as a BLP violation that is potentially harmful to the subject, and that whether or not it is one, it will either way cause the conversation to go off the rails catastrophically.

@EdJohnston and Sandstein:: I don't see any provision in discretionary sanctions policy that disallows third-party appeals. I agree that they're suboptimal, especially when the sanctioned party can't or won't participate, and your judgment may say that one may not be appropriate for this case, but I don't see anything in current policy flatly prohibiting them (and I feel pretty crappy for having apparently provided wrong information to people on ANI about how DS appeals work). If "only the sanctioned party may appeal" is an AE or DS policy, it probably ought to be made clear in those written policies, neither of which specifies who is allowed to appeal, to prevent future instances of incorrect information being supplied to upset people. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 19:01, 3 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by AutomaticStrikeout

This is a very clear case of selective enforcement, in my opinion. Furthermore, I would suggest that Fluffernutter's involvement in the dispute over Kosh's original comment was such that Fluffernutter should have felt comfortable issuing a block. Certainly, the topic ban was excessive and should be immediately repealed. AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 15:40, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@ Fluffernutter: If you think it is problematic to !vote on the basis that Manning is not a woman, but then you imply that is not problematic to !vote on the basis that Manning is a woman, haven't you shown that you are biased as to the outcome of the RfC? AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 15:46, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@ Fluffernutter: If it's not possible to state that Manning is not currently a woman without getting into trouble, what is the point of having the RfC? AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 16:19, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@ I JethroBT: "...implied disbelief that Manning would ever be a woman..." Kosh stated that Manning hasn't changed gender yet. I don't see how that implies that Kosh believes Manning will never change gender. AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 16:19, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@ EdJohnston: Kosh can't come here and make the appeal himself because he's blocked. AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 17:48, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@ Knowledgekid87: The block was for one week. AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 14:18, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It has become apparent that the fight against abusive misuse of admin powers is a losing cause. Shame on Wikipedia. AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 14:40, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by I JethroBT

While I do not defend Kosh's reverts, I will mention that any instance of pronoun usage (i.e. he or she; his or her) is not substantially different than what I and others (including Kosh) have stated: it expresses an opinion about the gender of the individual, plain and simple. There are many such comments on both sides (and while it is technically possible to avoid pronouns altgoether, it's not exactly convenient given the nature of the discussion.) I do not believe it is fair to redact comments on that basis, whether editors plainly state Manning as a man or a woman. That said, Kosh's comments did not merely include such a declarative statement of gender, but implied disbelief that Manning would ever be a woman on whatever subjective terms Kosh deems sufficient. I believe fluffernutter's actions were appropriate given prior concern that these statements are needlessly inflammatory. I, JethroBT ^{drop me a line} 16:13, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

@AutomaticStrikeout: ...assuming he DOES decide to do this anyway (emphasis from original) is an unnecessary editorialization of intent from where I interpret this disbelief. I, JethroBT ^{drop me a line} 16:32, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by Floq

At the risk of muddying the waters, I should point out that the 0RR restriction that Fluffernutter mentions above was an informal agreement between Kosh and me, not something imposed on him by ArbCom or ANI or anything. It was voluntary in the sense that we agreed that if he followed those rules, the problems that were making me consider an RFC/U would go away. And they basically have, until now; those were the real problem areas. The reason I suggested the 0RR restriction was for cases just like this, where he tended to revert in the heat of the moment, seeing only his side of the argument. If he had stuck with the agreement, he wouldn't be blocked right now.

That said, I can't really argue with the block, and haven't got the time to investigate the overarching issue of even-handedness or fairness or what have you. I think the duration could be safely reduced to time served if he agreed to abide by those rules, except that the stupid, childish attack account he created on Meta gives me no reason to bother lobbying for it. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:48, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, one more comment while I'm here: I think a third party request like this should be OK, particularity since the issue is not only the KV block, but also the claim (which I stress again, I am not making, just saying it's there) of selective enforcement. This seems like a reasonable thing for AE to look into. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:54, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by TParis

Just noting, so it doesn't get lost in Fluffernutter's comments, that she has not been one-sided.--v/r - TP 18:07, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by -sche

Because admins took a hands-off approach to it, the previous Manning RM descended so deeply into a pit of ugly quarrelling about things unrelated to the policy question of "what should this article be titled?" that after nearly two million bytes of Arbitration case, the Arbitration Committee appears poised to topic-ban numerous editors from different sides of the dispute. Fluffernutter's largely thankless efforts to keep the current RM running more smoothly and on-track by redacting off-topic, inflammatory portions of several comments, including Kosh's comment and comments like this, are among the factors which have so far kept this RM from descending anywhere near as far back into the aforementioned pit. Fluffernutter has shown restraint and allowed many questionable comments, and the underlying !votes of partially redacted comments, to stand (whereas the first RM's closers said they discarded/ignored off-topic votes entirely in their close). In short, her redaction of Kosh's comment was appropriate, her block of Kosh after he edit-warred was an appropriate discretionary sanction, and the topic-ban she issued, while perhaps a bit long, is an appropriate measure (in light of Kosh's previous comments re Manning / the Manning article) to prevent recurrence of problematic behaviour. -sche (talk) 19:56, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by KoshVorlon as emailed to AutomaticStrikeout

I actually can't use the template on my page as I'm IP locked per Teles on meta.wikipedia.org. (I'm locked untill Oct 8 2013 - and no, I don't want it removed. I did what he said I did and I'll take my medicine for it ).

You may want to check Fluffernutter's diffs (especially where she says I reverted her), you'll find I didn't revert her at all. I removed her text saying she's redacted part of my vote, but I didn't re-insert my vote the first time.

The sequenece of events is this:

1.) I posted my vote as on the Bradley Manning move page: here

Fluffernutter reverted me here

I began talking to her on her page. She was reverted by by MzMcbride here.

Consensus on her talk page became three to one , however, she insisted that she was right and that consensus didn't matter and she reverted against consensus here (she's now at 2rr). She placed a note at this time saying " Material redacted from this comment pursuant to discretionary sanctions. Do not restore except after following the appeal procedures listed there ".

I changed only her note, but did not resotore my original text here , (Admnittedly that wasn't smart, but, I didn't revert her )

Fluffernutter hit 3RR here

I remnoved my vote entireley, re-wrote the vote to have only policy reasons on it and yes, I did add text on the top stating that it had been censored by Fluffernutter and posted it. (this isn't a revert either, however. The definition of revert is:

Reverting means undoing the effects of one or more edits, which results in the page being restored to a previous version.

I hadn't done so,I didn't restore it to a previous version, I updated re-worded my comments, although my vote remained "Oppose".

Fluffernutter went over 3rr here

So, no, I didn't revert her at all, she, however, reverted against consensus (check her talk page and the ANI page ), violated 3RR, violated TPO, she also violated WP:LOCAL CONSENSUS.

———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

The above was sent to me via email by Kosh, who gave me permission to post it here. AutomaticStrikeout (₵) 01:37, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Further remarks from KoshVorlon:

I read Sandstein's comments and am dissapoinated , as it seems (unless I mis-understand what he's saying ) that he's stating that's it's okay for Fluffernutter to break 3rr (which is a bright line rule), violate consensus (which is a cornerstone of Wikipedia), selectively enforce an (at this time ) uneforceable "discretionary" restriction.

I saw unenforceable because the version she's attempting to enforce is still a draft version and not an approved version, not because I don't believe in Arbcomm's ability to enforce the existing version of the sanction. The existing (and approved ) version of this sanction here.

This version , firstly, doesn't include anything related to the Manning article at all, second, it states that enforcemant can be taken if:

if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to a topic within the area of conflict or its closely related topics; restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; imposition of mandated external review; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project.

Please note "expected standards of behaviro , or any normal editorial process". I added a vote (B), Fluffernutter reverted (R) , I discussed (D), this is normal editorial process. Normal behavior includes not violating 3RR, obeserving consensus (which Flufffnutter did not ) observing WP:TPO (which she did not ).

Also note at the top it states: Any uninvolved administrator

She is not uninvolved, therefore her restriction is moot.

Further there is nothing in the approved version of sanctions that pertains to WP:LOCAL CONSENSUS. (It exists on the draft version only - which has yet to be approved and it therefore not enforceable at this time )

I violated at best 1RR and only that.

I respectfully request the block be lifted and the ban be removed , I further request the right to revert Fluffernutter's revert

Comment by Knowledgekid87

I feel that Fluffernutter was justified in the block but not for the topic ban as that is a bit over the top. I would recommend the block be reduced to 1 week at the most and/or I would recommend after the week block is lifted that Kosh told not to edit on the Manning move request until the move is concluded. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 04:07, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Edited 10/04/13 - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 21:15, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion among uninvolved editors about the appeal by GRuban

KoshVorlon's emailed comments have now been added here by AutomaticStrikeout. (It is unclear at this stage whether this request can be considered as a legitimate appeal.) The discussion guidelines on the RM page explicitly warned about avoiding discussion of gender and indicated that discretionary sanctions applied to the RM discussion. KoshVorlon ignored those guidelines at the time; appeared unwilling to recognize that fluffernutter was acting in an administrative capacity enforcing DS; and in reverting on the RM page left an inflammatory edit summary. The creation of an attack account on Meta confirms that he was acting in an unreasonable and aggressive manner. As others have pointed out, fluffernutter's redaction of Arkady Rose's comments shows that she was acting in an even-handed way. The account of events copied here from KoshVorlon's email does not seem particularly reliable. "Redaction" and "reversion" have been confused. In addition he still has not acknowledged that fluffernutter was acting as an administrator and, going one step further, appears to be accusing her of edit warring. Mathsci (talk) 03:30, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comment by Kyohyi

The question comes down to wether or not Fluffernutter's methods of facilitating the discussion can be construed as an administrative action, and wether or not they made them involved. Discretionary Sanctions allow an uninvolved administrator to sanction an editor in areas related to the sanctions. The question then comes to what is a sanction, is redacting an editors comments considered a sanction? Is redacting an editors comments an administrative action? If the answers to these questions are Yes, and Yes then Fluffernutter remained uninvolved and only acted in an administrative capacity, and those comments cannot be re-instated without coming to AE. If not, then Fluffernutter may have become involved while not intending to, and if involved, their block and ban of Kosh would be in violation of Discretionary Sanctions. --Kyohyi (talk) 14:04, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Result of the appeal by GRuban

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.

• This is marked as 'arbitration enforcement appeal by GRuban'. But GRuban has not been sanctioned by anyone per the case. GRuban wants to appeal the block and topic ban of User:KoshVorlon. Though it might be harmless to have a bit of a discussion here, we don't normally take action on third-party appeals. EdJohnston (talk) 17:21, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If User:KoshVorlon wants to appeal, he can fill in the template {{Arbitration enforcement appeal}} on his user talk. Someone will then copy it over for him. EdJohnston (talk) 17:55, 2 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• I agree with EdJohnston. I would dismiss this appeal because the appellant has no standing: they are not the user whose block is contested. The draft revision of the discretionary sanctions procedure makes this clear: "Only an editor under sanction may appeal that sanction". This dismissal is without prejudice to any appeal by the blocked user themselves; I have not formed an opinion about whether the block was a justifiable exercise of the discretionary sanctions authority.  Sandstein  18:30, 3 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Any concerns about the abuse of discretionary sanctions authority (to the extent the allegations of "selective enforcement" constitute such concerns) should be submitted to the Arbitration Committee itself rather than to this board, which has no authority to discipline administrators. But that should only be undertaken in the case of serious concerns about "consistently ... questionable enforcement administrative actions", not because of concerns about individual actions. See the draft provision in the last paragraph of the section Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions/2013 review#Role of administrators. The contributors to this thread should keep in mind that it is disruptive to make allegations of serious misconduct, including against administrators, in fora that are not dedicated to the resolution of such concerns, or to misuse this board as a discussion forum about issues that are not within its scope. Without administrator objection, this thread should be closed soon.  Sandstein  18:44, 3 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• I've read the message attributed to KoshVorlon above. It doesn't seem to be meant as an appeal, because while it criticizes the blocking admin's conduct (which is beside the point in a block appeal, see WP:NOTTHEM), it doesn't ask for the block to be lifted, or give reasons why it should be lifted. Also, if I understand this message correctly, KoshVorlon is under some sort of global block (?) until 8 October, that is, longer than the duration of the local block being discussed here. In that case, even in the case of an actual appeal, it's doubtful that it would be worthwhile to examine this block on the merits because even if this block were to be lifted it would have no effect on the longer global block. Because of this, I'm still of the opinion that this board has no basis on which to do anything and that this thread should be closed.  Sandstein  05:48, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
• I've received a message by KoshVorlon that reads in pertinent part: "I would submit her [Fluffernutter's] conduct in, and of itself, is wrong, violated at least 1 cornerstone of Wikipedia (Consensus) and violated at least one "bright line rule" (3RR), and that because of that, her block and ban are invalid." That can be understood as an expression of intent to contest the sanctions, and we can process it as an appeal.

  However, the reasons submitted for the appeal are invalid. Any improper conduct by Fluffernutter cannot be the subject of an appeal against her sanctions, but would need to be addressed separately through the dispute resolution process (see again WP:NOTTHEM). The only question this board can review is whether the block and topic ban of KoshVorlon – because Fluffernutter determined that KoshVorlon's edits at [16] and [17] were disruptive – was a proper exercise of the authority granted in Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Sexology#Discretionary sanctions.

  Now, I can imagine several arguments against the appropriateness of this sanction, but none of them has been submitted here. Rather, all arguments against the sanctions have focused on so-called "selective enforcement", or on questions related to the underlying content dispute. As explained above, these are not issues that are subject to review by this board. Because no valid reasons for this appeal have been submitted, we ought not to process it further.

  Also, in a prima facie look at the editing history, I do not see an obvious reason why Fluffernutter's sanctions ought to be undone. Her actions appear to have been guided by the meritorious intent to prevent a heated and emotional debate from becoming too inflammatory, rather than by any prejudice or intent to abuse her authority. In addition, KoshVorlon's apparent creation of the attack account meta:User:Fluffernutter is a todger (as Mathsci points out) in reaction to the sanctions appears to confirm that KoshVorlon lacks the social skills required to participate in discussions about divisive social issues, and that sanctions preventing them from doing so are therefore required.

  For these reasons, I would decline the appeal.  Sandstein  11:52, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• User:KoshVorlon has made clear above that he won't be able to file an appeal in the usual way on his talk page. Though I don't know the details, he may be affected by a global IP block after a bit of unpleasantness at Meta. It is worth noting that Fluffernutter imposed a six-month topic ban, and when Kosh resolves his current IP difficulties he will still be able to to appeal that sanction if he chooses to do so. The statement by Kosh that was transmitted above does not exactly help his case. In a quick look at Fluffernutter's actions it is hard to see any obvious problems with her use of discretionary sanctions. As I noted in my original comment I don't perceive that GRuban has standing to appeal someone else's sanction. I agree with Sandstein that we should take no action on this request. EdJohnston (talk) 14:11, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below.
Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.

Request concerning Mathsci

User who is submitting this request for enforcement

Cla68 (talk) 10:15, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

User against whom enforcement is requested

Mathsci (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Sanction or remedy to be enforced

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Race and intelligence

Mathsci interaction ban

Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it

1. [18]

Additional comments by editor filing complaint

On 17 September 2013, Mathsci was given an interaction ban between him and I. Soon after, Mathsci announced he was taking a break. The day he returned, he posted an image on his userpage and linked to two Wikipedia articles in the caption he placed with the image. The first wikilink is the name of my organization of employment. The second wikilink is to an article on the small community in which I reside. It has been there for two days. Someone brought it to my attention today.

As you should be aware, Mathsci has a history of escalating disputes like this with other editors. He has outed other editors on four separate occasions. He has pursued editors in which he was involved in a dispute to other noticeboards or Internet forums where they participate. Of all the threatening behavior I've ever witnessed in my seven years of Wikipedia participation, I have never seen one rise to this level.

I did not email ArbCom because Mathsci has made it clear in several recent comments that he has an inside connection with at least one, if not more ArbCom members [19]. Therefore, since I cannot trust that they will handle this correctly, I have no choice but to post it here publicly, at great risk of my privacy.

I ask that the administrators please make Mathsci stop. Once done, please oversight the image edit from his userpage, then oversight this enforcement request. Thank you. Cla68 (talk) 10:15, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested

Could someone please notify Mathsci? Cla68 (talk) 10:15, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Done, though in my opinion such required notifications would not violate your own interaction ban.  Sandstein  10:21, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion concerning Mathsci

Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.

Statement by Mathsci

Statement by EatsShootsAndLeaves

As much as I think I'm on reasonable terms with Mathsci (I could be wrong, of course), but if there were such obvious attempts at outing (regardless of the IB), is there a reason why they are not indef-blocked right now? See User:Ecoleetage and others for precedent? ES&L 14:48, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Statement by (username)

Indeed, apparently Mathsci should just have done this on an external website, and then Cla68 would be cheering him on.

Notes from arbitrators

• Several edits, including the original posting by Mathsci referred to in Cla68's statement, have been suppressed as they are reasonably interpreted to be attempted outing. To the best of my knowledge, Mathsci's emails to Arbcom are not treated any differently than those from other editors. Risker (talk) 14:32, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
• To expand on what Risker has said, Mathsci has no special relationship with any arbitrator (and if he has contended that he does, he is wildly mistaken). This enforcement request should be treated like any other. AGK [•] 15:45, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Result concerning Mathsci

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

• I have seen the edit in question before it was oversighted and am waiting on a statement by Mathsci, which should be made as promptly as possible. I note that several edits to the section containing this request, which I have not seen, were also oversighted. All who comment on this request are warned not to publish any potentially private information or they may be blocked or otherwise sanctioned. I advise other editors to comment only if they have evidence that can help us resolve this request, rather than just an opinion that they wish to express.  Sandstein  15:22, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]