Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
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Foul-mouthed member of VRT User:FormalDude

The matter below is beyond just a content dispute. It started with this edit on Kanye West followed by my explanation on talk [1]. This removal was supported by IP 73.239.149.166 and Throast

• [2] 1st revert by FormalDude. He cites Wikipedia:STATUSQUO for the revert but ignores its first exception, doesn't bother to add appropriate inline tags indicating the text is under discussion which is necessary, most importantly ignores Wikipedia:SQS.

• [3] FormalDude follows it 2nd revert. Me and Throast explain to him why his reverts were wrong. He is flippant about the policy requisites and says there is no consensus despite there being three people in agreement (including IP)

• [4] FormalDude adds a more bombastic, vague claim without attribution. Again, its me and Throast along with Ringerfan23 who are don't support this addition by FormalDude.

• [5] 3rd revert FormalDude reverts improvement by Throast saying "attribution not required for established RS"

• [6] 4th revert restores the addition with "One editor saying they don't quite agree is NOT a consensus. Please stop edit warring" which is false because 3 editors including me, Throast, and Ringerfan23 had indicated this shouldn't be added.

In between all this WP:BATTLEGROUND and WP:OWNERSHIP behaviour he proceeds to make matters worse.

• [7] I don't have the desire to argue semantics with someone like you. Extremely disrespectful comment. The "someone like you" is clearly intended to belittle Throast. Also shows extremely poor judgement btw. Shows he doesn't care about phrasing and semantics as long as his edits aren't reverted under any circumstances.

• Curiously decides to vote on an AfD I started right after our initial back and forth. Collapses the discussion on his talk when confronted about it calling it "petulance"

• [8] replies to me with Who died and put you in charge?

• [9] Places a {{Uw-ew}} template asking me not edit-war (the page history of the article should be clear as to who is edit-warring).

Imo, FormalDude has displayed extremely belligerent behaviour by continuously reverting any improvements to Kanye West, doesn't have a grasp of relevant policies, disregards consensus, and lacks basic civility. — hako9 (talk) 12:17, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

• While I disagreed with FormalDude's initial WP:SQSing here, which I communicated with him both in this edit summary and on his talk page (note that he only made an actual argument for inclusion after his second revert), I think that hako9's subsequent revert probably escalated tensions. That said, a civil consensus-building discussion was taking place at talk until FormalDude insulted at best my experience with the project and at worst my intelligence by implying that I did not know "basic summary style" here, at which point the discussion turned sour. FormalDude's subsequent unilateral decision to add a sentence to the lead during discussion, his multiple reverts to protect his version as written (1, 2), and him accusing me of WP:BATTLEGROUNDing do display a disruptive editing style and lack of civility that is worthy of some sort of sanction in my opinion, if only a formal reprimand by an admin. I'm actually surprised to see that no admin has stepped in to try to mediate the situation considering how prominent the contentious information is. Throast ^{{{ping}} me!} (talk | contribs) 13:45, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

  In my defense, I made a grand total of 2 reverts to FormalDude's edits, both reverts for different reasons and for different content, and more importantly with consensus. For the first revert, there were 3 editors (me, Throast, and IP 73.239.149.166 in agreement) and for the second revert there were again 3 editors in agreement (me, Throast and Ringerfan23). One would notice from the article's history that all of FormalDude's reversion to mine and Throast's edits were based on the false reasoning that there was no consensus. WP:OWNERSHIP and unilateral editing aside, his comments on his talk page and the article talk page, shows he looks at all this as a battleground. — hako9 (talk) 14:39, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Premature report from content dispute - work this out on the talk page. Consensus and collaboration require everyone to let down their guard and de-escalate tensions, and usually also requires everyone to give a lil something up. Consensus via compromise. If you still find you can’t resolve things, the appropriate process would be an RFC or the WP:DRN. This is the wrong venue for resolving content disputes and I don’t see enough here to call it a clear case for admin action.(Non-administrator comment) — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 14:44, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

I would have gone for an RFC or DRN if this was a mere content dispute. FormalDude doesn't respect consensus and his over the top and disrespectful comments are a bit much for collaborative editing. — hako9 (talk) 15:05, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Are non-admins allowed to effectively close a discussion by writing in big bold letters that a report is premature? Seems odd to me. It may be your opinion that the report is premature, but it is a behavioral report at its core, so ANI is no doubt the proper venue. Throast ^{{{ping}} me!} (talk | contribs) 15:12, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Just my opinion of the circumstances as detailed here. I have closed nothing. — Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 15:15, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Shibollethink did nothing of the sort, and that they are a non-admin is irrelevant. They are allowed to express their opinion as much as anyone else can. Lay off. --Jayron32 15:17, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

• Formaldude is edit warring here. I disagree with Shibbolethink that this is merely a content dispute. The issue is being worked out on the talk page by other users, from my reading, Formaldude has been not participating in that work except to announce the changes they are making to the text. Announcing a change is not participating in a discussion and is not establishing consensus. We should wait for their response here, but if they continue to try to force their preferred edits into the article before there is consensus on the talk page, I intend to block. They need to stop doing that. --Jayron32 15:17, 14 December 2022 (UTC)
• FormalDude's activities on Black children as alligator bait are also of note - see this edit, this edit, and this edit. (I don't really think these edits rise to a level where we need to go to AN/I over it, but since we're here already they might as well be looked at). casualdejekyll 18:04, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Blanket reversions without explanation and uncivil snark seem to be a specialty of his. I acknowledge that edit summaries are not required by policy, but they are nevertheless vital to civil discourse and efficient consensus-building. I don't see any reason why you'd ever refuse someone that simple courtesy. Throast ^{{{ping}} me!} (talk | contribs) 18:16, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

• Clarification of the title of this section. VRT = Volunteer Response Team which until recently was known as OTRS. Phil Bridger (talk) 20:44, 14 December 2022 (UTC)
• In response to Hako9 and Throast's complaints about my behavior in the dispute, I did not believe I was edit warring because a brief discussion on the talk page did not seem like a clear consensus to me, and seemed to be in-line with our policy on letting the status quo stay in the article while it is disputed. I apologize for any disruption I may have inadvertently caused. Anyone who reads through the dispute at Kanye West will see that civility has not been overwhelming by anyone there. I won't be continuing my participation there in any form. ––FormalDude (talk) 02:14, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  The reverts do seem to be a violation of WP:3RR though. 0xDeadbeef→∞ (talk to me) 12:38, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  Just to clarify, policy states "The onus to achieve consensus for inclusion is on those seeking to include disputed content." (bold mine) There is no similar requirement for those seeking exclusion to achieve consensus. Public-facing article text is to remain silent on a matter while it is still under dispute. --Jayron32 15:45, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

FormalDude's tendentious editing with multiple users, other disruptive behavior

I've been perturbed by FormalDude's behavior for some time now.

• Tendentious editing examples:

1. I vote to overturn FormalDude's RfC closure at a close challenge on August 23 at 01:50 UCT. 18 minutes later, FormalDude seemingly went to my contributions page to find this vote I had left at an RfC on Wikipedia talk:Mandy Rice-Davies applies 2 weeks prior; I wasn't very active at the time, so this would've been immediately viewable at the top of my contribs page. FormalDude, of course, votes for the contrary of how I voted.
2. I also update Corey Feldman on August 23; FormalDude removes an entire paragraph of reliably sourced content in that article four days later. (FormalDude's first & only edit to the article).
3. I create a discussion at Talk:Depp v. Heard on August 31, which FormalDude follows me to several hours later (their only edit to that page prior was a minor edit amending the archive period of talk page discussions, which was made 2 months after my first edit to that page).
4. I begin a discussion at Talk:LGB Alliance on October 26, which FormalDude follows me to 24 hours later. Again, this is FormalDude's first & only edit to that article, offering a contrarian perspective to one I offered. At this point, I'd had enough, and challenge them on their tendentious editing behavior. FormalDude responds they had been "watching this page for months" and that they have "zero interest in increasing the number of interactions I have with you", which was so ridiculous I had to post Dr. Evil's Riiiight meme in response.
5. As pointed out above, I'm not the only user FormalDude has exhibited this behavior towards. They are currently engaged in a content dispute at Talk:Kanye_West#Removing_"most_influential"_from_the_lede with several editors. FormalDude follows one of those editors to an AfD discussion that user initiated. Once again, they vote in opposition to that user.

• Other disruptive behavior

Aside from all this, FormalDude has been accused of WP:SUPERVOTING with regards to their closure at this Business Insider RfC, which is the RfC that began this chain of events for me back in August. FormalDude's closure was overturned, and it was later discovered they had voted in favor of Business Insider at a previous RfC. FormalDude has also repeatedly ([10] & [11]) called an IP "fuck-face", even after it was removed as a "personal attack". User also removed a potential suicide note from Talk:Suicide without even leaving the perfunctory "Wiki Cares" notice at the IP's talk page because the message was "borderline" suicidal, despite knowing that Talk:Suicide "is a page that attracts a lot of threats." [12]

There's also this, where FormalDude appears to have reported a user to AN for editing an article in line with RfC consensus. From my reading of that thread, FormalDude tagged the user with a DS notice prior to unilaterally adding a DS notice to the article talk page. When the other user edited to reinstate the RfC-approved version of the article, FormalDude then edit warred against the RfC consensus. FormalDude then brought the issue to AN hoping for a better outcome: a clear cut case of WP:SYSTEMGAMING.

I think a forced time-out is the only thing that will make this user change their persistent, foul-mouthed, months-long disruptive behavior. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 20:08, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

• So much incorrect here, I'm not even going to engage it. For context, Homeostasis has been holding a grudge against me that is borderline harassment ever since I filed an ANI report on them over a year ago. ––FormalDude (talk) 02:14, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  Nothing here is incorrect or misconstrued in any way. All easily provable via the diffs. It was you who called an IP a fuck face. It was you who was accused of supervoting in one of your AfD closures. It was you who demonstrably made the decision to follow multiple users through their contributions page to other RfC/AfD noms. And, for the record, the only reason I'm still aware of your existence is you tendentiously following and harassing me at multiple pages for 4 freaking months. If there's no apology and a guarantee to never engage in this behavior again, you deserve a permanent ban. This is the last thing I will ever say to you directly. Because I'm done. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 02:45, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  Homeostasis says they won't talk to me ever again, so can we make that official with a one-way IBAN then? ––FormalDude (talk) 03:07, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  This is typical argumentative snark from this user. Rather than engaging, they do this. I've never been more convinced that this user needs a permanent site ban. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 03:13, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  I'm not being argumentative, I think a one-way IBAN would help Homestasis get over their obsession with me.

  Rather than address each falsehood Homeostatis07 has leveled against me here, which would result in an equally long wall of text, I will be happy to answer any questions/concerns that editors may have about any of their misleading accusations. ––FormalDude (talk) 03:24, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  I don't know about anyone else but I'd be interested in your response to accusations of following editors to unrelated disputes. Levivich (talk) 15:01, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  I think @Levivich:, @Throast:, @Hako9: and I are all interested in @FormalDude:'s response to the examples of tendentious editing presented above. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 00:42, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Just for context, FormalDude is quick to accuse editors he's been in content disputes with of holding grudges against him. Throast ^{{{ping}} me!} (talk | contribs) 20:00, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

• • Oppose siteban - siteban is quite a serious remedy and I do not at all see that it is merited here. It looks like the user has already apologized for edit warring and has indicated they will no longer edit on that problem page. A partial block or a topic ban would be merited before a siteban in my view, if that. Andre🚐 03:17, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

    They apologized for their behavior at the Kanye West talk page, but have in fact been snarky, dismissive, and have in no way addressed their behavior at a multitude of other pages over the past 6+ months. That being said, a site ban is probably excessive. A 30-day ban is probably a better solution to preventing a repeat of their disruptive behavior. And a two-way IBAN is looking pretty damn good at this stage. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 03:29, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

• Support 30-day block Warning for personal attacks and uncivil behavior. A site ban would be overly harsh, but a month blockwarning will get their attention and should prevent future disruption. Calling someone a "fuck-face" is very inappropriate, and the type of snarky comments he's left recently at Talk:Kanye West is the definition of what can make a content dispute toxic and is disruptive to community collaboration. Iamreallygoodatcheckers^t@lk 03:58, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Iamreallygoodatcheckers: Yes, I called an IP who had doxed me at an AfD and was spamming my talk page a "fuck-face" (nearly four months ago). It's hard for me to regret that. However I do regret and did apologize for the recent uncivil comment I made at Talk:Kanye West. That is not my standard behavior and I can promise it won't happen again. ––FormalDude (talk) 04:07, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  Ok, I'll certainly regress on the fuck-face comment and with the recent eye-opener by Loki I'll change my vote to a warning for uncivil behavior. Just please don't continue with that behavior. Thanks, Iamreallygoodatcheckers^t@lk 04:29, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

• (edit conflict) Boomerang: I've been involved in some of these disputes and Homeostasis07 has a tendency to cast these same sorts of WP:ASPERSIONS wildly at anyone they disagree with. The interaction checker they link absolutely doesn't show what they think it does (when I look at it I see two users that barely interact at all; here's my own interaction timeline with FormalDude, which is substantially longer), and in many of the situations they themselves link they are as rude or much ruder than FormalDude (so for instance, the time linked above they accuse FormalDude out of nowhere of stalking them, FormalDude denies it, and they link a sarcastic meme in response). Loki (talk) 04:25, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  The interaction checker link I posted above was to demonstrate that FormalDude was tendentiously following me to an article, and that their edits in response to me were in 3 of the 4 cases I linked to above their first and only edit to said article. Please post a single diff of me being "rude" to FormalDude these past 4 months. I did post a link to the Dr. Evil "Riiight" meme in response to FormalDude incredulously claiming he had been watching one of those pages "for months" and that they have "zero interest in increasing the number of interactions I have with you". Aside from that? Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 04:44, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  So first of all, you demand I post a single diff of a thing that you then immediately post a diff of. Also, the thing you're doing right now in this discussion is called WP:BLUDGEONING. Loki (talk) 05:00, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  For one, you cast unfounded aspersions against me in a baseless MfD nomination of an essay of mine that you were required to redact by an admin which caused you to falsely accuse them of improperly using CheckUser tools on your account. ––FormalDude (talk) 05:02, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

  LokiTheLiar: posting a link to an Austin Powers meme is not "rude", and you've cast wild aspersions of my conduct. FormalDude: I did not falsely accuse "an admin" of running the CheckUser tools on me; instead, I requested confirmation that an admin who has recently been admonished by an ArbCom investigation of misusing the CheckUser tools against another user if they'd ever run the CheckUser tools on me, which is a perfectly acceptable question to ask in those circumstances. Especially since that admin has threatened me twice so far. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 05:11, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

• No action - this is some weak sauce nonsense. I see no hounding ([13]) and only mildly rude comments (save for the one directed at the IP). EvergreenFir (talk) 05:19, 15 December 2022 (UTC)
• Boomerang Take a look at Homeostasis07's comments here last month - we see the same pattern of evidence-free accusations of misconduct on the part of other editors, and a weird obsession with FormalDude. Homeostasis07 should be warned, at minimum. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 16:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  Don't ignore Bob's bad behavior while rushing to be the first to tell Alice that her angry response to Bob's provocation is going to boomerang on her. Was there a provocation? Closer can decide. Not sure my opinion matters, but I also don't think boomerang for posting the innocuous dr evil meme is anything close to actionable. Homeostasis07 is a great asset to the project, atleast more than me. Their FAs and GAs are for everyone to see. They don't deserve to be treated this harshly for bringing their concerns here. — hako9 (talk) 18:51, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  The only reason FormalDude's name was even mentioned in that discussion was because I was posting on mobile and couldn't post direct diffs at the time. Diffs were later linked to their talk page, the location of an incident several months prior. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 21:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  The amount of FAs or GAs one has makes no difference in the extent to which someone should be reprimanded for incivility. I don't care if homeostasis07 has 0 GAs or 1,000 of them. There's nothing actionable in FormalDude's alleged wrongdoing, but I find homeostasis07's behavior very much subpar. Just above we can see homeostasis07 insulting another editor by calling them "LokiTheLiar". I am also uninterested in you trying to quote stuff from WP essays to me. Just because you and homeostasis07 have some sort of grudge doesn't mean anything here is actionable besides warning you two to knock it off. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 02:51, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Trainsandotherthings: LokiTheLiar is that user's username. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 02:54, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  Beat me to it, IP. Yes, the full username of the user shown here as "Loki" is LokiTheLiar. Again, that was a mobile edit, as is this one. Click Loki's sig to see their full username. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 03:01, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  Can't argue with that. I've struck the relevant sentence. This is a good example of why people's signatures should match their actual usernames, but that's a whole other topic. Trainsandotherthings (talk) 03:14, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  I'd like to know the reason why you think I need to be warned. — hako9 (talk) 05:03, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  Sorry! My fault! (I don't have my signature match my username exactly because I realized that "TheLiar" wasn't a great second half of a username.) Loki (talk) 03:07, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, but FormalDude still shows no signs of editing collaboratively. They've been active these past 48 hours, so have clearly chosen to not explain or justify their tendentious editing when pinged above. In addition to this, they are currently engaged in a conflict at their talk page, in which they called another user "pathetic" [14], and instead of attempting to discuss and resolve the issue, told the user "do not message me about this again" [15] and "You are not welcome on my talk page." [16]. User clearly requires censure to resolve this incivility. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 03:00, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

I would disagree with your charecterization of the first diff, and the second and third are perfectly reasonable requests on one's own talk page. Happy Holidays. Dumuzid (talk) 03:07, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

I think the only person that's pinged FormalDude since his last response here was you, a ping you delivered less than a week after saying you'd stop directly communicating with FD. This recent user talk page business is nothing: when a user resurrects a two-week-old user talk page thread just to complain about a month-old content dispute, the project can survive an editor describing that behavior as "pathetic". I join the chorus of voices suggesting you drop it. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 03:37, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

The distance between a user raising a concern on a talk page and them responding again is not justification to disregard the content of the original post. In any case, it's certainly disheartening to know that 4 months of tendentious editing, insults, incivility, complete lack of collaboration, ownership of articles and disruption is inactionable. Homeostasis07 (talk/contributions) 03:53, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

No, it means your report was examined and no one agreed that there was "months of tendentious editing, insults, incivility..." etc. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 17:25, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

• Homeostasis has clearly spent the better part of a year stalking my edits, scraping the bottom of the barrel for anything that they could possibly use to accuse me of misconduct. Nobody here has voiced any major concern with my behavior that Homeostasis is so perturbed by. I really do think a one-way interaction ban is necessary since they've shown no sign that they will stop leveling false misconduct allegations against me. ––FormalDude (talk) 04:25, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Quondum

Quondum (talk · contribs) is revert warring to remove a template ({{Bit and byte prefixes}} from it's sole article, Binary prefix (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). We recently held an RFC on the makeup of these templates which only closed a few weeks ago. Quondum subst'd the template prior to the RFC closure, which went unnoticed for a short time. I reverted it once I saw the change. Now finally today, they re-add their work again and it did not generate a notification, but this time I saw the change on my Watchlist. An edit war ensued, and I've stopped reverting.

As I've repeatedly stated in my edit summaries today, WP:BRD controls here. Quondum needs to gain consensus for this change. And if they wish to orphan a template as they're doing, the proper avenue is WP:TFD and then ultimately the article talk page to discuss changes to the layout. At a minimum I'd like more eyes on this and a return to the status quo so discussion can take place. But given the proximity of the closure of the RFC, I honestly think their behavior is highly disruptive and would be open to a topic ban from computing units to be broadly construed. We literally just got a result two weeks ago. Consensus can change, but editors should not be required to engage in non-stop debate to satisfy one editor. —Locke Cole • t • c 00:15, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Quondum's edit was a good one and there was IMO consensus for it at Binary prefix. Locke Cole is a persistently disruptive editor who made no attempt to justify the reverts of Quondum's edits. Whether the template is or is not used by other articles is not an issue for ANI. Dondervogel 2 (talk) 00:38, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm glad you're here. Dondervogel 2 (talk · contribs) (who previously edited as Thunderbird2 (talk · contribs)) has been on a long-term mission to force IEC units into our articles. To say they have been tendentious is an understatement. Over many years, after WT:MOSNUM determined (at WP:COMPUNITS) that IEC units would not be used in articles, they began systemically changing units in articles to their preferred units (gibibytes, tebibytes, etc). Their problem is that the balance of sources do not support their views. In Quondum they appear to have found a kindred spirit however, and it's not surprising whatsoever to see Dondervogel 2 here to defend them. who made no attempt to justify the reverts of Quondum's edits And as we can see, they have no trouble lying as well. In two of my reverts today, I directly linked WP:BRD to implore Quondum to discuss the changes they wanted. They refused (as evidenced by their repeated reverts). I would also be open to a topic ban for Dondervogel 2 as it relates to computing units. —Locke Cole • t • c 00:43, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

No case has been made. —Quondum 02:00, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for not denying anything I claimed, it will make the process go smoother. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:53, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Locke Cole, I can't see any evidence that you attempted to start a discussion at Talk:Binary prefix yourself. Am I missing something, or are you suggesting that people be topic-banned for not doing something that you have also failed to do? AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:11, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

From WP:BRD: Discuss your bold edit with the person who reverted you., clearly I objected to the change, which is why I linked to WP:BRD in my edit summaries while reverting. The onus is on Quondum to gain consensus for the change and they need to explain why the change is necessary (especially in light of the recent RFC that was in progress when they made their initial change, and was closed just two weeks ago when they made the change again without any further attempt at discussion). —Locke Cole • t • c 04:08, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

None of your edit summaries gave any indication as to why you reverted. What stopped you from attempting to start the discussion yourself, by explaining what the issue was? AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:31, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

As I've explained elsewhere, this editor was ping'd repeatedly to a discussion about this very template and they declined to participate. The onus is on the editor wishing to make the edit to gain consensus. I had nothing to discuss as I was perfectly fine with the status quo. Stop trying to shift the burden onto me when it very clearly isn't. —Locke Cole • t • c 06:45, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

If you have 'nothing to discuss' after using WP:BRD in an edit summary -twice - you have no role to play in a collaborative environment. AndyTheGrump (talk) 06:52, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Buddy, if you had any idea how much time I've spent debating these two about IEC units, you'd apologize. Trust me when I say this, if I thought starting a talk page discussion would have worked this time I would have started one. WP:NOTSUICIDE. —Locke Cole • t • c 06:55, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

I'd have to assume, if the debate has been going on for years, that there isn't a consensus on the issue. Which makes coming to ANI asking for people to be topic-banned for editing against consensus, while failing to engage in any discussion over the matter, seem rather presumptive. AndyTheGrump (talk) 06:59, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

There is a consensus at WP:COMPUNITS, but some editors like to ignore that and push their agenda anyways. This is just the latest example of that. —Locke Cole • t • c 07:05, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Absolutely nothing in that guideline looks to me to represent 'consensus' that a table showing 'Binary prefixes for multiples of bits (bit) or bytes (B)' should not be included in an article on Binary prefix. Why the heck shouldn't we include information directly relevant to the article topic in such a form? AndyTheGrump (talk) 07:19, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

I feel like you're either deliberately not understanding me, or I'm just shitty at getting you to understand, but here is my final attempt: COMPUNITS is the current consensus, it describes when and where we use units like gibibyte/mebibyte/etc. that are, otherwise, discouraged from use. Quondum and Dondervogel 2 really really really want these units in use everywhere. Despite there being a long-standing template that has been in that article for I think over a decade, and a discussion on it's layout/naming recently concluding, Quondum elected to basically subst the template, remove the column they think doesn't belong (even though the units they removed are used the the lead of the article). It was reverted a short time later (a few weeks ago). Then they reverted again today, but in such a way as to not trigger the revert notification. This time I caught it on the same day, and an edit war ensued. Despite being ping'd to other similar discussions, they either ignore them, or the drop off, and they made no effort to gain consensus for their change.

I've already said below I'm fine with being rolled up in this TBAN. I'm that serious about thinking the project would be better with Dondervogel 2 and Quondum removed from this topic that I'm willing to take the L on this and walk away from the topic if it means it doesn't turn into a protracted edit war (which is where it's been the past few years). —Locke Cole • t • c 07:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

This isn't a discussion about units being used 'everywhere'. It is a discussion about edit-warring, with no attempt at proper discussion by any of the parties involved, over an article where the distinction between two differing types of units is central to the topic. If you had restored the original table (showing both types of units) and then attempted to start a discussion on the talk page, you would be in a good position to call for a topic ban, if the two contributors then refused to discuss, and reverted you. What stopped you doing that? AndyTheGrump (talk) 07:38, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Two reasons: 1) they've been ping'd to prior discussions on this very topic and ignored them, and 2) I believed the burden was on them to gain consensus for their change and that if they were serious they'd make the effort to discuss it and explain why their change was so important. —Locke Cole • t • c 07:42, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

So why, if you wanted them to 'make the effort to discuss it' did you not give them the opportunity to do so? Your last revert of the article (with the edit summary 'WP:BRD') was at 23:57. Quondum replied 'So, discuss. My rationale was at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Binary_prefix&diff=1126731358&oldid=1126728654' at 00:02. You started this thread at 00:15. Without discussion. AndyTheGrump (talk) 07:54, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Notified Dondervogel 2 of the below TBAN discussion (they've already participated above, but just to be certain they don't miss it I felt a notification was warranted). —Locke Cole • t • c 07:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

One thing that clearly needs to be noted here is the lack of tangible evidence that either Quondum and Dondervogel 2 have done anything sanctionable that Locke Cole hasn't also done. We seem to be being asked to topic ban people for taking part in an edit war that Locke Cole was also engaged in, and for nothing else beyond unverified claims about past undesirable behaviour - a part of which apparently involves not participating in yet another round of a long-running dispute. AndyTheGrump (talk) 08:05, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

You're welcome to review the last time we were here back in September, or June/July 2021 where I bring more diffs of their behavior. And maybe you missed it below, but I support an admin's idea to TBAN all three of us. —Locke Cole • t • c 08:35, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Ok, after a quick review I can confirm that there were a couple of inconclusive discussions on WP:ANI. If you don't want this to be a third, you will have to convince people that action needs to be taken. Which will need clear evidence. AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

Proposal to topic-ban Quondum and Dondervogel 2

Per my statement above (and Quondum's failure to answer any of the allegations made), I propose indefinitely topic-banning Quondum (talk · contribs) and Dondervogel 2 (talk · contribs) from all topics relating to units of measure for computing, broadly construed.

• Support as proposer. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:53, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose, as there seems to be no obvious difference in behaviour between any of the parties involved (none of which seem to have use the talk page), and because 'failure to answer... allegations' isn't legitimate grounds for a topic ban. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:17, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  @AndyTheGrump: It's not at all concerning that they are trying to side-step the RFC which had a half dozen participants (and Quondum has participated on that same page, and was ping'd not once, but twice, by Dondervogel 2 to participate there) and ran from September through the end of last month? Clearly editing against consensus and not re-engaging in discussion when reverted aren't behaviors we should tolerate. —Locke Cole • t • c 04:11, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  No, what is 'concerning' is the way you seem to be suggesting that an inconclusive RfC on 'column headers' for a template provides sufficient justification for calling for topic bans. AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:46, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose, this seems like a normal content dispute. Removing a template from an article is fine even if it orphans the template. WP:TFD#REASONS doesn't give removal from an article as a reason to propose a template for deletion, rather the other way around, it suggests that one might nominate for deletion templates that aren't being used and have no likelihood of being used. Jahaza (talk) 03:22, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Jahaza: I think you're missing that we just had an RFC to settle the layout of the templates, one that Quondum was ping'd to repeatedly (and they ignored), and they chose to side-step those discussions and unilaterally remove the template from it's only mainspace use when that wasn't even an option under discussion at the RFC. —Locke Cole • t • c 04:13, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  No, I didn't miss it. If you'd had an RFC on whether to include a template in the article, that would have been more important though. Also, the RFC closed as no consensus as to "what replacement header(s) should be (if any)."(talk) 04:19, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  There was significant discussion prior to that RFC as well that was open for really any type of proposal. I'm trying to grapple with how any editor could see other editors discussing layout and content so deliberately and at length and think "yes, they probably just want me to subst and change it to whatever I prefer instead". —Locke Cole • t • c 04:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  Them's the breaks with BRD. Jahaza (talk) 04:48, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose: The "discussion" part of BRD does not mean "I wrote an edit summary." To quote from BRD, "Discuss on a talk page: Don't assume that a re-revert edit summary can constitute "discussion": There is no way for others to respond without risking an edit war." Beyond which, news flash: BRD is explicitly optional, and remains an essay, no matter how widely quoted. Failure to be the first ones to open a talk page discussion is scarcely valid grounds for a tban. Ravenswing 05:14, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose per everyone else. As I've basically said many times, please don't come to ANI to complain about someone else not discussing if closer examination reveals you did the same thing. With very rare exceptions, anyone who comes to ANI about something which is at its core a content dispute and can't point to a talk page thread preferably a page rather than a user one, where they tried to discuss, automatically fails the basic test of ANI in my book. Nil Einne (talk) 06:26, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
• Pinging professor of computer science David Eppstein. EEng 06:28, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
• Support, but only if it also includes topic-banning Locke Cole, another long-term participant in this dispute. IEC units are a waste of time, but these disputes are even more of one. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:56, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  Mm, a tban's harsh. Giving the OP a modest trout slap is more like it. Ravenswing 07:00, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  Just to point out there's a Template:Infobox unit, so conceivably we could turn this into an infobox battle as well. EEng 08:12, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  @EEng: Please don't give anyone any ideas... —Locke Cole • t • c 08:37, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  I would Support this as well. —Locke Cole • t • c 07:01, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  In that case you should just take the page off your watchlist and walk away from it, thereby saving everyone the trouble of litigating a dramafest. JBL (talk) 19:21, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  Or, this can get resolved here and now so the disruption doesn't continue. I'm sad to see that you're fine with disruptive behavior being allowed to continue though. —Locke Cole • t • c 19:34, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  You, personally, have it in your power to end the disruption by walking away from the dispute. This method is easy and foolproof. JBL (talk) 22:12, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  I'm not the one editing against consensus... but yes, if I wanted to throw up my hands and walk away, this would stop it. But it rewards bad behavior, so I say again, you're fine with this? —Locke Cole • t • c 02:12, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  You notice how this thread is not full of people accepting your framing about what consensus is, whether other editors are editing against it, or whether either of the editors you're attacking are engaged in worse behavior than you? Because I notice that. Moreover it seems to be a common feature of all the ANI discussions on this topic. JBL (talk) 19:27, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  David Eppstein, considering that no links or evidence to anything less than 2–3 months old have been presented and my username is at the top of this ANI thread, do you stand by your topic ban support point, or perhaps you were a little hasty? It should be noted that the edits that triggered this ANI, i.e.:

  • Q (rm decimal prefixes from table: these do not belong in this context; adding full values)
  • L ()
  • Q (Decimal prefixes have no place in this article)
  • L (WP:BRD)
  • Q ()
  • L (WP:BRD)
  • Q ()
  • L ()
  • Q (We can continue your unmotivated revert until you it the 3RR limit if you wish. My change was motivated.)
  • L (WP:BRD)
  • Q (So, discuss. My rationale was at [17])

  were been dropped as a reason given that they were simply to remove an inappropriate decimal prefix column from a table in a binary prefix article (which, incidentally, no-one has voiced any explicit objection to), and that my reverts were only to revert the five unexplained reverts by Locke Cole. Also, and Locke Cole would realize this if he started thinking straight, I do not object to the use of decimal-as-binary prefixes being used in WP and largely avoid the topic. —Quondum 13:50, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

  Thanks for proving you didn't read what I wrote initially above. I linked to multiple diff's in my opening which are, functionally, identical to what you just listed. 🤷‍♂️ —Locke Cole • t • c 20:38, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

• Support IEC units are universally disruptive. Here and everywhere, they are not used. Pushing them nonstop is exhausting. Andothegrump, please don't cast aspersions about me trolling Rodeoaches (talk) 06:59, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  It'd be more likely someone would cast aspersions about this being your first Wikipedia edit. Just sayin'. Ravenswing 07:02, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  (struck !vote of checkuser banned editor —Locke Cole • t • c 18:52, 17 December 2022 (UTC))

• Oppose banning blocking etc. Seems the disruption is stopped for now and all parties are on notice. I propose warnings and then Trouts all around. Lightburst (talk) 16:37, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
• Maybe it would be easiest to start smaller, an indefinite page block from this specific article for some set of the three users. Then the article disruption here stops and can be used as further evidence if it goes on elsewhere. Yes, I'm aware this dispute is much longer than that in time, but if editors are edit warring here (and going by the story, that's what is occurring), that is one solution that does not toss babies with the bathwater of whatever other positive/negative contributions may occur elsewhere on the topic. (I haven't fully assessed the specific dispute on account of travel, just suggesting another solution that might be palatable.) --IznoPublic (talk) 21:08, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose everyone seems to have stopped now and appropriate warnings issued. Talk it out. Any further disruption can be dealt with via escalating blocks. A topic ban is unnecessary/too extreme at this point. As for IEC units, yeah...I can see a use case for them (I have a comp sci degree), but the fact is, we've decided not to use them on WP for general usage as the public is not familiar with them. Buffs (talk) 23:53, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

  That decision remains a problem for some editors. The text of MOS:COMPUNITS upholds it but the transcluded table there contradicts it when editors who don't accept the decision change the template. NebY (talk) 20:56, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Dondervogel 2

@AndyTheGrump, Jahaza, Ravenswing, Nil Einne, JayBeeEll, David Eppstein, EEng, Izno, and Buffs:

Dondervogel 2 (talk · contribs), being fully aware of this conversation and the closure of the RFC at Template talk:Quantities of bits has just reverted an edit made to bring the table at Binary prefix into compliance with that result as determined by a neutral closer. This is continuing evidence of disruption from these editors and needs to stop. What is the point of holding a months-long RFC if a pair of editors who are very much against including any of the everyday terms we use in articles can just upend the table and throw away the work whenever they feel like it? —Locke Cole • t • c 02:22, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Alright. Maybe I'm being dense here, but I'm looking at your link to the RfC in question, and lo and behold, the close result is "No Consensus to change header - There was consensus for better clarity over the issues of standards, and industry usage, but not as to what replacement header(s) should be (if any)," so I'm at a loss to identify a consensus result to the RfC which anyone is defying. Would you care to point us to one?

With that being said, you have already failed (by a fairly wide margin) to secure support for a tban. Several editors believe that you are at least as liable for sanction as anyone else. The definition of "disruption" is not "Edits I don't myself like." Do you see a wave of editors/admins agreeing with you here? It's about time for you to drop the stick and move on. Ravenswing 02:52, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm beginning to consider the merits of a topic-ban on Locke Cole confined solely to the use of the word 'consensus', given the way this word is being repeatedly used in a manner not concurrent with any reasonable interpretation of it I'm aware of... AndyTheGrump (talk) 02:55, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Seconded. JBL (talk) 19:32, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

@Ravenswing: Template:Bit and byte prefixes is the current template, at the RFC there was NO CONSENSUS to change from that header to any other header per the neutral closer. What has happened here is these two editors have, despite not gaining consensus to make the change, gone ahead and made the change. That is disruptive. @AndyTheGrump: When there is a lack of consensus to change something, then going ahead and changing it anyways is literally going against the consensus. Computer memory was one of the options in the RFC that DID NOT GAIN CONSENSUS. The consensus version is JEDEC. Do you understand me now? —Locke Cole • t • c 03:05, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

A 'no consensus' closure of an RfC is a statement that consensus could not be found. If it can't be found, it doesn't exist. If it doesn't exist, it isn't possible to go against it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:18, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

So in your opinion if there's "no consensus" for a change, then it's perfectly fine to make the change? —Locke Cole • t • c 03:20, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

There was no consensus for not making a change either - and as far as I can see, all the participants in the RfC supported changing the wording in one way or another (you yourself seem to have supported changing it to 'Computing'[18]). What they couldn't agree on was what to change it to. Which is why there was no consensus over anything. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:27, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Well, let's set aside the "So when did you stop beating your wife?" style of questioning. Is it "perfectly fine?" Beats the hell out of me; I am not an engineer, and I have no dog in the fight. But what it is is a CONTENT DISPUTE (if you insist on bolding and capitalizing statements which we are perfectly capable of reading without either). As such, it is neither an appropriate matter for ANI, nor have your foes violated any policy, nor is there a consensus to violate if there wasn't any consensus to begin with, nor are there grounds for sanctioning those who dare disagree with you on the change, nor are we likely to change our minds and agree with you if only you shout shrilly and stridently enough at us.

You have been on Wikipedia far too long to be incapable of grasping the precept that sometimes it's not that people don't understand what you're saying, it's that they don't agree with what you're saying. The only consensus in play here is the one in this ANI thread that your charges are without merit. Drop the damn stick already. Ravenswing 04:20, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

"just reverted an edit [that you, Locke Cole, made, and that does not appear to have any consensus in its favor, either]" oh okay then. JBL (talk) 19:31, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

WP:NOTANARCHY is that way. There were multiple proposals, there was ultimately no consensus. This does not mean "go ahead and act as if you have consensus anyways". I am shocked at how many people here are just fine with edit warring over something without any attempt at discussion, especially something that was previously discussed at length with no consensus for a change reached. But sure, I guess I'm the bad guy here expecting us to be able to have some stability after a months-long RFC. —Locke Cole • t • c 19:40, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Truly, it is a mystery why uninvolved observers can't understand that your edits with no consensus and failure to discuss are good whereas their edits without consensus and failure to discuss on the talkpage is tban worthy. -- JBL (talk) 19:53, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Might've been the months-long RFC that preceded it that I participated in at length and Quondum did not, even after being ping'd twice, then taking unilateral action while that RFC was in progress. But sure, we can ignore all of that. Certainly a large group of editors here appear to be. And if that's that the consensus, that consensus doesn't matter and protracted disputes are fine with no good-faith attempt to participate in discussion, I'm here for it. Frankly I get tired of discussing things, it'll be so refreshing to just edit as I see fit and ignore everyone else. Y'all have been great, thanks for this cathartic experience! /s —Locke Cole • t • c 19:57, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

There is pretty clear consensus here that no one finds your protestations convincing. You should take my advice, and apply it double to this discussion. (This is my last comment here.) JBL (talk) 20:01, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

Locke Cole cracks me up. How can he say with any seriousness "I am shocked at how many people here are just fine with edit warring over something without any attempt at discussion", when this ANI thread started due to his (or our) edit warring with no attempt from him at discussion other than "WP:BRD" (see the five links to reverts labelled "L" above which (I inserted a bit ago. Who will ever be able to take anything he says seriously? —Quondum 20:10, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm glad that my participating in a months-long RFC (which you ignored, and tried to undermine by removing the very template under discussion from it's only article-space use) is something that brings you amusement. That was my small attempt at "discussion", and it preceded your edit warring. It's disingenuous to act like I haven't tried to discuss any of the issues/concerns with that template. And it's disruptive to act outside of that framework on your own because you choose not to engage in discussion. It looks like you've lucked out Quondum, and drawn a crowd that apparently is willing to overlook this completely for reasons I can't comprehend and just let you plow ahead against consensus. —Locke Cole • t • c 20:20, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

For the record, where is this mythical consensus, and where does it say anything about subst'ing templates? —Quondum 20:44, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

At the RFC: "no consensus" is not carte blanche to take a wrecking ball to the work done so far. The subst'ing of the template is simply disruptive as it (not your subst'd revision) is the most stable version of that table that's undergone widespread scrutiny by editors. That you chose to undermine that process and the work involved with it is the problem here. It's disruptive. —Locke Cole • t • c 20:49, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

You said: "against consensus". So now you are suggesting that it was "no consensus". Evidently, you cannot point to any discussion of replacing template transclusions. You never seem to point us to where consensus that you claim is, and you never seem to point us to the non-consensus you claim is. You simply made five reverts without any relevant discussion whatsoever, and now you are condemning doing just that. I take my question answered, thank you. (Incidentally, if there was discussion in your mind, then why are you complaining that there was not discussion?) You keep claiming "consensus", and "no consensus", and then claiming no-one should make changes from your preferred version in either case. I suppose because one of these these always applies, I suppose no-one is allowed to edit anything in WP by your book (until you personally okay it?). I asked you for a link to justify that the template transclusion replacement was discussed. You have not provided it. —Quondum 21:07, 18 December 2022 (UTC)

The proposed changes to the table had no consensus. The same changes you chose to not involve yourself with, where you could have discussed the changes you wanted to make. You know, the one large discussion you were ping'd to not once but twice? And you'd previously participated in these discussions, even starting what is currently the top of what lead to this last RFC here and here. Let's try this another way: where is the consensus for your changes? After all, if you're not editing against consensus, then clearly you have discussed this and gotten some buy-in from editors, yes? WP:SILENCE is also relevant here, as the template you're edit warring to remove has been present in that article since 2010 (in a sandbox copy because it was protected due to a dispute, shocking I know; it was folded into the article-proper the same month). "My" consensus is the status quo, the over a decade of silence around including that template that you've unilaterally decided (in the face of repeated reversions) to force through the removal of. —Locke Cole • t • c 05:05, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Why is this not being discussed on the relevant article talk page? AndyTheGrump (talk) 07:00, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Presumably because some sort of consensus might actually be reached that way. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 20:18, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

It is worth noting that the no-consensus RfC regarding the disputed 'Quantities of bits' template was held without even bothering to inform anyone about it on the talk pages of the few articles it has been transcluded to: Bit, Kilobit, Megabit and Binary prefix. I get the distinct impression that the purpose of this RfC wasn't so much to determine article content as to continue a long-running dispute amongst contributors about the relative merits of various names-for-numbers systems. AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:52, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

An article talk page is hardly the correct venue to discuss editor conduct issues. What a silly question. —Locke Cole • t • c 05:23, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

It is, however, the correct venue to discuss content disputes. Granted, I can appreciate, judging from this thread, that you may just be unwilling to engage in consensus building there, given your demonstrated unwillingness to drop the stick even in the face of near-unanimous opposition. Ravenswing 07:06, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

That's adorable. I guess it's also entirely possible the group here is wrong, but that's hardly a possibility I guess. We'll ignore the months of discussion on this issue I've participated in, the RFC on this very template that I participate in at length. Quondum didn't participate in the latter part of those discussions despite being explicitly ping'd there. I suppose if we ignore the facts, I'm certainly totally out of line in someones fantasy-land version of events. In the real world, the one we're all in together, I've engaged on these issues. The onus is on Quondum to gain consensus for their changes, so far there's 3rd party agreement that there's no consensus for any of the changes we've discussed, and clearly no consensus for Quondum's changes. —Locke Cole • t • c 07:25, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• Seeing as Locke Cole is just going to keep arguing as long as we keep responding, and that consensus is heavily against taking any action (except, perhaps, by way of a trout slap at the OP), can we get a close? Ravenswing 13:03, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• Why not a TBAN for all three, as suggested above? Dondervogel appears to be practically an SPA, and the other two aren't exactly innocent either. A simple close is just going to lead to another ANI thread, sometime in the next few months, with disruptive editing from both sides in the meantime. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 13:40, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Personally, I'd be tempted to topic ban anyone who has a damn opinion on the matter being disputed, on the basis that turning an argument over such a trivial matter into the sort of long-running edit-warfare saga one might expect to see on articles concerning Balkans history is incompatible with creating an encyclopaedia. Or doing anything else useful on the internet. This is an article about how we use numbers, and label them. It isn't complicated. Those who wish to make it so are acting against the best interests of Wikipedia. AndyTheGrump (talk) 14:33, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

The problem continues

See the recent edit history of Talk:Binary prefix, and Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring#User:Kbrose reported by User:Locke Cole (Result: ). Not content with endless bickering about articles, templates and imaginary 'consensus' derived from inconclusive RfCs, we now have edit-warring over talk page posts. In an article over the use of binary prefixes. Binary fucking prefixes. AndyTheGrump (talk) 19:58, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

In the discussion above, the discussions linked from above, and specifically the discussion ATG mentions here, it seems to me consistently the case that Locke Cole's behavior has been at least as bad as that of anyone else in the discussion. For that reason, I propose Locke Cole be topic-banned from binary prefixes (or whatever the correct locus of argument is) indefinitely. --JBL (talk) 00:31, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Support: Locke Cole is seemingly neither one for civility or dropping the stick, and his contempt for those who oppose him isn't so much plain as being trumpeted. Ravenswing 13:45, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

The problem with such discussions, from my point of view, is that joining them feels useless. There are a few editors with extremely strong opinions throwing incivility at each other ([19]*) and I'm simply not interested in trying to determine who of them has the most convincing arguments. It would thus probably help the encyclopedia to remove them (not referring to just Locke Cole specifically) from the topic area so that less loud (and less extreme) voices are not longer discouraged from finding a solution. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 18:17, 25 December 2022 (UTC) (*note: I rarely need only one diff to illustrate incivility from two editors...)

Indeed. This isn't an issue with a single contributor. There are multiple people involved, more concerned with arguing over the relative merits of alternative number prefixes than over actually imparting useful information to readers. The binary prefix article itself is hopelessly bloated with what appears to be WP:OR, or at least cites no clear source. Compare it with our article on Roman numerals, which manages to more than adequately describe a much more complex system, in less words. I suspect that much of the bloat may result from the endless squabbles over the article. The talk page archives seem to confirm this, given the number of threads referring to 'POV' issues. In an article on binary prefixes. An article that fails to demonstrate that there is any significant external controversy over the issue at all - which might at least explain the endless battles, if not justify them. It is impossible not to come away with the impression that people are using the article as a battleground almost for the sake of it. AndyTheGrump (talk) 19:10, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

(participant) In part, it's an argument about whether our articles on computers, mobiles etc should use MB/GB or MiB/GiB (or both, or with equivalents in bytes, or with footnotes for every number, and so on). The conflicts are in articles about devices and at the MOS, then the template used in the MOS, then the similar templates, the article about prefixes, ANI, 3RN and probably elsewhere, it's been going on for at least 14 years, there's great civil persistence and opposition as well as great incivility, regulars at WT:MOSNUM are sick of it, and heaven help any editor who tries to engage with just one aspect. I don't think topic bans for incivility will end it. Topic bans all round might seem unfair but it's a price I'd pay. Plenty of "outsiders" then calmly reviewing and changing or reaffirming MOS:COMPUNITS might help too, I don't know. NebY (talk) 20:35, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

NebY I was thinking along the same lines. We need some disinterested editors to slice through this infinite cycle of bikeshedding. Acebulf ^{(talk | contribs)} 21:36, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) To illustrate AndyTheGrump's point, for a great comparison, look at how Kilobyte addresses it. It explains the two competing definitions in half a page, compares units for both the decimal and binary bases and points to fields where they are used. This is the reality we can have if humans and fish can coexist peacefully. Acebulf ^{(talk | contribs)} 21:32, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

@Acebulf: Sadly, the template used in that article is a different kind of good example - see edit history and talk page. NebY (talk) 21:57, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

• Support wider topic bans The article has turned into a battleground, to the detriment of the article itself. As AndyTheGrump pointed out, the article is a mess, and this dispute is not about making the article better anymore. Ideally, we would want the debate to either be carried out by people who aren't part of the dispute, or, where no actual controversy exists, is left to fade into obscurity. I support a topic ban, kind of like what ToBeFree has suggested, where we give people who have participated in the debate in a non-civil way a topic ban narrowly defined to binary prefixes. Acebulf ^{(talk | contribs)} 21:32, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

  It is pointless to suggest a topic-ban of an unspecified group of people. --JBL (talk) 22:46, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

WP:V and unsourced non-English terms

• Zhomron (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Zhomron
• Talk:Tower of Babel#WP:V applies to native/original names/phrases, non-Latin scripts
• Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 176#WP:V and foreign-language terms, non-Latin orthography in enwiki articles

Zhomron continues to edit war and edit while logged out in service of ignoring verifiability and WP:BURDEN. Happy Hanukkah. Elizium23 (talk) 20:53, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Pinging @S Marshall:. You have raised this issue numerous times and have been shut down each and every instance. The issue of your continued insistence on opening baseless sockpuppet investigations against me every single time a user disagrees with you is a topic for another time. This will be my only comment on the matter. 20:57, 19 December 2022 (UTC) Zhomron (talk) 20:57, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

Zhomron That isn't true, User:S Marshall hasn't opened any sockpuppet investigations against you at all, there hasn't been any sockpuppet investigations against you in his contributions, I think you have the wrong editor. Chip3004 (talk) 21:46, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

• No I haven't!—S Marshall T/C 21:32, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

  I think Zhomron pinged S Marshall, because they had been involved in the two mentioned conversations. I don't believe the rest of the comment is aimed at them. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 22:34, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

  I'm pinging S Marshall because they have dealt extensively with Elizium's nonsense on the topic of non-English term sourcing. How was the comment even read as me saying they are the one who is opening sockpuppet investigations???? So, again, @S Marshall:. Zhomron (talk) 23:21, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

  I think it may have something to do with you addressing them by name and then saying "you". Just a thought. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 23:49, 19 December 2022 (UTC)

  That's how I read it. Perhaps Zhomrom is not aware that the vanilla ping template adds a colon after the name. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:38, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

  You would be correct. My bad. Zhomron (talk) 15:27, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• Oh OK. I do not feel that I have dealt "extensively" with Elizium23. I have told Elizium23 that their view on non-English sources is at variance with what WP:V says. I do not think Elizium23 has listened to me.—S Marshall T/C 08:33, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

  Well both users should clearly be blocked for the edit-warring at Negev. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 11:55, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

  Now it's here, and the edit-warring hasn't continued today, so such a block would not be preventive.—S Marshall T/C 18:51, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

• The substantive issue here is whether transliterations of proper nouns need a citation. In other words, if I say იოსებ სტალინი and Иосиф Сталин both mean Iosef Stalin, do I have to provide an inline citation to a reliable source to prove it? Elizium23 thinks so, but his view is not widely shared, and those of us who actively carry out translations would like to resist this novel interpretation of our rules.

Elizium23 seeks to deploy WP:V (specifically WP:BURDEN) in defence of his position. He raises a challenge to the transliteration and demands a citation. In other words, he would like to apply WP:BURDEN at the level of individual words. It's normally used on ideas, concepts, claims and contentions, though.

I'm uninvolved in these specific disputes, so I haven't edit-warred or accused anyone of socking, and I haven't edited any of the articles at issue, but I've talked to Elizium23 on policy pages and I'm a translator, so transliterations matter to me. I have sought to deploy another paragraph of WP:V (specifically WP:NOENG) in defence of my position. Citations to non-English sources are allowed, and my position is that that would include citations to languages that use alternative scripts. I think this means that the transliteration of a proper noun is inherently self-sourcing.

Two things are needed now. First, please could the kind of people who know about/are interested in conduct disputes decide whether edit-warring has taken place, whether Elizium23's conduct amounts to a crusade against transliterations, and whether Zhomrom's response to it has been disproportionate? And second, please could the kind of people who are interested in how to apply policy in practice provide some kind of guidance about the transliteration issue? I do not presently see the need for an RfC about this because as far as I can tell, Elizium23's position is unique to him. I feel the matter can be dealt with on user talk pages.—S Marshall T/C 18:51, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

IMO, if there is a dispute about a specific transliteration, that's a topic for the article's talk page, not a citation-war.

If there is a specific controversy over how to transliterate a word between languages, that might be worth investigating & documenting with cites in the appropriate article. But run of the mill transliterations of a word in general would not fit that criteria. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 19:04, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

You say my position is idiosyncratic, but I was not without support in prior discussions.

• @Blueboar said the material must be backed by the existence, if not citation, of a WP:RS.
• @TryKid said that any disputed material should require a citation.
• @Theknightwho described disputes in Mongolian that would necessitate verifiability.
• @Only in death said that a citation or expert opinion is absolutely required in cases such as Ancient Greek.
• @CMD said "all foreign names should be sourced" and refused to concur with invoking WP:BLUE.

Elizium23 (talk) 19:25, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

By the way, I am amused by your characterization as my "crusade against transliterations" as if I'm out to eliminate all foreign language names from the English Wikipedia.

What I want is for editors to put their money where their mouth is.

I'm not challenging long-standing terms or terms that are undisturbed or unambiguous to my inexpert opinion. The terms I'm challenging are the ones in dispute, the ones that get changed back-and-forth by IP users, the ones that get added en masse by a so-called expert who's too arrogant to cite a source because the buck stops with them.

Surely foreign names and words are verifiable, if only we have the right sources. Overall, I'd like to see more of Wikipedia be truly verifiable, and to that end, why isn't it a good thing to have sources backing up terms that have been disputed or challenged? Elizium23 (talk) 19:30, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

I have been to the page and read here, and I confess, I am still mystified by the exact contours of this dispute. Elizium23, what would your preferred edit actually look like? The Hebrew, with a citation? The English with a citation? Both? Happy Holidays to all, regardless! Dumuzid (talk) 19:30, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes. Elizium23 (talk) 02:52, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

You... want a citation that the Negev is called "the Negev" in English? Zhomron (talk) 04:43, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Any genuine dispute about a transliteration should be decided on the article talk page by the reliable sources, but what we are seeing here are disputes made up by a Wikipedia editor that don't exist in the outside world. Phil Bridger (talk) 19:37, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

Here are some more substantive issues:

1. Cursive Hebrew: complete with letterform graphics uploaded by Zhomself.
2. Solitreo: Hebrew letters in square and Rashi
3. Zhom's uploads to Commons: letterform graphics
4. Al-Yahudu Tablets: OR? Part deux (I mean part Beth)
5. Moabite Alphabet: table of letterforms
6. File:Sanchuniathon fam tree.png

• I have gleaned these from Zhomron's edit history, and I hope this paints a clearer picture of the issue at hand. Zhomron's been adding lots of scholarly sourced stuff to articles, and clearly writes well and knows a lot of specialized topics. He knows them so well in fact, that he's literally written the book on several forms of Hebrew scripts. You can see above that he's contributed entire tables to the language articles and even uploaded graphics of letterforms not found in Unicode. Those tables and letterforms are all lacking in citations. You know what I think? I think he knows this so well that he doesn't need to reference a source while creating such tables, and it irritates him that anyone would slow him down by demanding sources be located.
• So you see, if you have any question about the way a word is written in Samaritan, you can look it up on Wikipedia, because it came out of Zhomron's head.

Elizium23 (talk) 17:50, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

I also see that @Rhemmiel lost a dispute over a transliteration. Sad. Elizium23 (talk) 17:54, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

If anyone else but me was wondering what Wikipedia's guidelines say about transliteration, the relevant page appears to be Wikipedia:Romanization and the guidelines for individual languages linked from there. As far as I am aware transliteration (unlike translation) is largely a mechanical process, much like a routine arithmetic calculation. I would think that, for the same reasons as the arithmetic, a specific transliteration that follows the standard rules for its language would not need published sources explaining how each step of the transliteration follows those rules. —David Eppstein (talk) 08:50, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• @S Marshall: Would it be possible to get a clarification on your statements: "do I have to provide an inline citation to a reliable source to prove it?...Citations to non-English sources are allowed, and my position is that that would include citations to languages that use alternative scripts". The first part implies you don't wish to need citations, but the second part states your position is that a certain kind of citation could be used for this. CMD (talk) 09:04, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• Oh, yes, sure. Let me show my working.  :)

1) I am allowed to cite sources in foreign languages.

2) This includes sources in languages that don't use our script. So for example I am allowed to cite sources in Russian.

3) The Cyrillic (Russian script) for Iosef Stalin is Иосиф Сталин. Strictly speaking, this could also be transliterated as Iosif Stalin or Joseph Stalin.

4) If I speak Russian well enough to translate from Russian to English on Wikipedia, then I know the Cyrillic alphabet.

5) By policy at WP:NOENG, and by established custom and practice on Wikipedia, I am permitted to self-certify which languages I know. Others who also speak those languages are welcome to check my translations for accuracy.

6) The Russian language source will not say that Иосиф Сталин means Iosef Stalin. Why would it?

I hope that you can see from this that transliterations of proper nouns between different scripts are (a) trivial for people who know the alphabets, and (b) incredibly hard to prove to doubting Thomases who don't know those alphabets. Because they are trivial, I hope the community will agree that for an editor with dual fluency, a transliteration is self-sourcing.

I also hope that the community agrees that WP:BURDEN applies to claims, thoughts and ideas. It should not apply at the level of individual words! We don't want people saying "OK, you've given me a citation to say that Berlin is the capital of Deutschland, but how do I know that Deutschland means Germany?" That would be unworkable for our translators.—S Marshall T/C 10:37, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• @S Marshall: Thanks, I see what you mean. To clarify my remarks quoted above, an editor using the term Иосиф Сталин because it appears in a source is very different from an editor using Иосиф Сталин without a source that uses Иосиф Сталин. It appears you are talking about the first instance, whereas my remarks applied to the second. CMD (talk) 13:06, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

@S Marshall, thank you for assuring us that Wikipedia editors are reliable sources, and that there is never any controversy over Wikipedia:Diacritical marks. Elizium23 (talk) 11:03, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

The use of a word is a claim in and of itself. Surely you would demand citations for use of the word "terrorist", or "died" in a BLP. A non-English, non-Latin word consists of multiple claims: "this is how X is translated, this is how it is written, these are the shapes of the letters, these are the accent marks used, this is the direction of the writing." A phrase also makes claims about word order and idiomatic expression.

Your examples of citing non-English sources are another false premise. Editors may request quotations of any source, whether English or not, and translations of quotes into English are also necessary! Said quotes can be recorded within a citation so these can be attested in the wikitext, unlike the say-so of a random Wikipedia editor who is adamantly opposed to attesting anything with a damn citation. Elizium23 (talk) 11:11, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

@David Eppstein the issue is not mere transliteration, in many cases, but actual translation or even original, untranslated native terms. The issue is not always single words or names, but can extend to phrases, sentences, paragraphs and passages, because I have seen long swaths of non-English written into articles.

Transliteration, you claim, is as easy as 2+2=4. You refer to a non-PAG page on transliteration into the Latin character set, when that's not even the issue. If you wanna transliterate "social media" and "internet trolls" into Phoenician cuneiform, and claim that that's WP:BLUE, knock yourself out.

But we're not merely worried about transliterations from English words, so you've solved a strawman. Elizium23 (talk) 10:56, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

By way of example, here's what Zhomron has been doing.

• I write in Rosetta Stone that an excerpt of the Demotic script is "Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ Λόγος, καὶ ὁ Λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν, καὶ Θεὸς ἦν ὁ Λόγος."
• I speak Demotic and I can attest that this is what the Rosetta Stone says.
• I don't need no citation, any idiot can pick up the stone and read it.
• Now I'll remove your maintenance tags and refuse to use the talk page rather than insulting and dismissive edit summaries.
• I ran out of reverts so I'll log out and use an IP to continue the edit-war.

Elizium23 (talk) 11:24, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• I do not know whether the disputed proper nouns are transliterated accurately. They're in languages I don't speak.

Our translators are depressingly accustomed to the situation where someone who doesn't understand a language tries to make a truckload of work for someone who does. WP:V says I have to prove my claims, but I can do so in any language. What I write has to be verifiable by someone who speaks the language of the source. It does not have to be verifiable by you.—S Marshall T/C 11:31, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Very much with S Marshall here. Absent some showing that the transliteration in question is contentious for some reason, this just helps no one, especially in the case of something as well known as the Tower of Babel. I could transliterate בָּבֶל as "Babel" or "Bavel" or "BBL" or "BBhL" or "BVL," and I could defend any one of those. Anything but the first, however, would simply be confusing to a reader of a generalized encyclopedia. For my money, no cite needed absent extraordinary circumstances. Cheers and Happy Holidays to one and all. Dumuzid (talk) 15:42, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• Strawman vanquished! Again!

Elizium23 (talk) 17:01, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

In fairness, first time for me. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 17:02, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Chiming into to say that S Marshall is 100% right. In these cases, if you don't read the language being discussed, you couldn't actually verify the information even if there was a perfect citation attached. You wouldn't understand the citation in the same way that you don't understand why the claim is self-evident. Many things are self-evident to those who read the language, even if you can't understand why, and most things that are self-evident to people who read the language will, ipso facto, not be explicitly addressed in academic publications.

Not to be unkind, but I think Elizium23 is looking for the illusion of understanding, to feel that a superficial capacity to "verify" the claim has removed the barrier his lack of knowledge had previously presented. But no amount of citation will actually enable him to understand the claims or underlying data. The best editors focus their editing on areas in which they are knowledgeable enough to contribute fully. Elizium23 isn't always wrong, and some editors are definitely too lax about citation -- but it's extremely difficult for someone like him to distinguish where citations are genuinely necessary, so his time is probably best spent on other tasks. GordonGlottal (talk) 17:52, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• Noting I have blocked Zhomron for a month for logged-out sockpuppetry as part of this dispute. This is emphatically not to say that there is no legitimate objection to Elizium's edits regarding romanizations. I think Elizium would do well to just walk away from that particular topic. There is no shortage of material actually needing citations; perhaps that would be a better thing to focus on. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 00:53, 24 December 2022 (UTC)
• Comment I've reported Zhomron previously for not filling out the edit summaries, yet no one has done a thing; and I see there is questioning about Zhomron's unsourced additions. Not only that, the user has been frequently adding biblical verses as citations to support biographical content, but per WP:RSPSCRIPTURE that type of sourcing Zhomron has been using contradicts WP:RSPSCRIPTURE and as result has degraded the quality of articles. Zhomron will only continue this poor-qualtiy editing once the block has expired. I urge this community the extend the block to indefinitely. Wikipedia is not taking a loss, on the contrary, an indef block will preserve the quality of articles. Please extend to indef. Judekkan (talk) 20:56, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Tamzin:, that block was not preventive. The disruption had stopped days before you blocked. Looks completely punitive to me.—S Marshall T/C 14:36, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

  @S Marshall: They had previously been warned for loutsocking, on the same IP no less. WP:BLOCKPREVENTATIVE allows for blocks to prevent imminent or continuing damage and disruption to Wikipedia; deter the continuation of present, disruptive behavior; and encourage a more productive, congenial editing style within community norms ... based upon the likelihood of repetition. Given that there was no indication that the disruption had stopped for good, I would say all three prongs of that apply here. A block (hopefully) sends the message, where a simple warning did not, that they cannot continue to behave in this manner. (Contrast, say, someone who logs out to vandalize a single time, then realizes they've made a mistake and never does so again.) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 19:21, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

  Well, okay, fine, but, also, not fine. That block might be strictly within the rules but outcome of your decision there is to sanction the editor who, in this case, was being less disruptive.—S Marshall T/C 15:23, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

  @S Marshall: To be clear, I was responding to this from the SPI side. This is not an attempt to in any way resolve this thread, just to resolve an SPI that was before me as a clerk. (In fact I only noticed the AN/I thread after blocking.) Like I said, the fact that I blocked Zhomron doesn't mean their objection to Elizium's edits was invalid. It looks to me like this is a situation where Elizium23 either needs to agree to listen to the large number of editors saying that his edits are often problematic, or start an RfC somewhere to settle once and for all whether there is consensus for those edits. (Everyone appears in agreement that these {{cn}}-taggings are sometimes justified, but I think Elizium is misreading that as a wider-reaching consensus than it is.) If he won't do either of those things, sanctions are probably in order. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 21:47, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

  It's difficult to get an RFC going when the last two noticeboards haven't even figured out what the issue is. Elizium23 (talk) 04:26, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Elizium23: You've gotten quite a few responses from experienced editors. If you feel people aren't understanding you, that sounds like a problem with how you are communicating. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 09:21, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  Well, five of them in WP:VPP understood rather well, and support my position. This thread is lopsided the other way, and I believe ANI is not the place to litigate content disputes. Elizium23 (talk) 09:24, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  Only one of the five you've cited—CMD—seems to agree with your position. The other four said things not dissimilar to what S Marshall and others have said here: basically, "sometimes but not always". That sort of issue is the province of AN/I. Do you intend to continue making these edits without gaining a consensus that they are consistent with V (and with a rough consensus tending the other way)? -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 10:17, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

In what sense am I not following you, Elizium23? Explain it to me briefly and clearly.—S Marshall T/C 12:24, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Proposal: Unblock Velthuru

Okay, transliterators, here's another case!

• Pyrgi Tablets (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Cippus Perusinus (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Velthuru (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Please unblock Velthuru because they can personally vouch for all additions they made to those two articles. Elizium23 (talk) 17:06, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

I am not sure this is a good reason to unblock someone who appears to have been pretty obviously disruptive, but I suppose reasonable minds can differ on the subject. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 17:33, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Nope, that's a good block. RickinBaltimore (talk) 18:07, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Velthuru has been hugely disruptive, constantly spewing random data in random places and often promoting positions that are nowhere in the scholarly literature. Please don't unblock him. ThanksJohundhar (talk) 18:38, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

This isn't a constructive way to process losing an argument, mate. Zhomron (talk) 18:22, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

These are good examples of where there is genuine dispute about a translation/transliteration, rather than something made up by a Wikipedia editor, as is the case with Negev. Couldn't this whole section be closed now by any admin with a block of Elizium23, who has been shown to be editing against consensus in many articles and wasting our time? Phil Bridger (talk) 19:24, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

• I think it would be surprising if a sysop blocked Elizium23 at this point. He's engaging in discussion and not currently reverting. His wish is to challenge content he sees as unsourced, which I think is commendable. There isn't an explicit paragraph in policy that counters his position, so although my position appears to be attracting more support so far, it's reasonable for him to persist for the time being. This conversation could maybe result in a useful essay or guideline about transliterations.—S Marshall T/C 19:41, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

  This subsection is about as straightforward a violation of WP:POINT as one could imagine. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 12:48, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  (To be clear, I’m not calling for a block, just observing that the situation has continued to develop.) 100.36.106.199 (talk) 12:50, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Wimpus engaging in disruptive editing

Wimpus has made a series of edits changing any mention of "pregnant person" to "pregnant woman" or the plural form of these phrases. That had been told to stop by NatGertler, which has been rebuffed. Many of these edits are still live and have not been reverted. One of my latest reverts of such changes, as seen in Abortion in California, has also been reverted. I believe these actions need to be reviewed. Jay Coop · Talk · Contributions 21:01, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

See also this discussion. In multiple instances, woman/women was initially written, but changed to person(s) by various editors (see for example [20],[21],[22],[23],[24]). Wimpus (talk) 21:34, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

I don't see any policy-based reason given for complaining about Wimpus' edits. This discussion at the Village Pump (Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)/Archive_161#Gender-neutral language in human sex-specific articles) was closed with the statement, the use of gender-neutral terms in articles is encouraged, but it is important to balance it with the need to maintain "clarity and precision". As outlined below, the terminology in articles, especially medical articles, is dependent upon the support of reliable sources and it is expected that editors would use the same terminology presented in said sources. This is quoted at the WP:GNL essay.

The fact is that the vast majority of sources on pregnancy, including ones being cited, use the term "pregnant women" - Google Scholar can verify this. This is true of the sources cited as well. (e.g. [25][26][27]) It is not the place of Wikipedia editors to engage in WP:Original research by using different terms. The vast majority of the encyclopedia likewise uses that term, such as at pregnancy and abortion. MOS:CONSISTENT applies within articles, such as for this edit. Additionally, the term in normal English speech and writing is "pregnant women", so language-change advocacy by inserting this unusual term is not appropriate - and almost always if you look at the page history when it was first inserted, it was an IP, WP:Student editor, or other newbie rather than an experienced editor who generally knows better. This is the standard term for the group as a whole; terms about human biology don't generally account for every rare exception lest the wording become ridiculously unwieldy and WP:UNDUE.

The editor filing this report falsely claimed that the Village Pump discussion I linked above "did not reach a consensus" and quoted the closure consensus out of context. Actually, the consensus was unanimous against the proposer, and the part cut off is very clear about the importance of using the terminology found in the sources. Crossroads ^-talk- 21:48, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

That discussion merely comes to hold that there is not a bright-line rule demanding the use of "persons" in all cases. In almost all of their edits, they give no reason with no edit summary.... the exceptions being today when he blamed another editor for being "ideologically inspired", and then dozens of such edits previously, when they made it clear that it was their own politics driving this (""Reverted back to non-PC version".) I have not reviewed every edit, but he has done this in at least one case where the usage at the source is mixed -- the About page in question does at times use "women", but also such phrasing as "reproductive freedom for every body" (emphasis theirs) and "people who choose to work while pregnant". Given that pregnancy is a state that people who are legally and socially girls or men can end up in, this is not an unreasonable inclusiveness. Whatevef reason they are doing these edits, they should not be done automatically and without summary. That they claim it's okay because they are undoing someone else's edit should at least make it clear that these edits are controversial. --Nat Gertler (talk) 22:12, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

So, the specific phrase pregnant people is not mentioned in that specific source? Pregnant women however is quite acceptable and commonly used, while pregnant people is merely controversial and might confuse readers. Wimpus (talk) 22:19, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

The specific phrase "pregnant people" is not used in that source... nor is the phrase "pregnant women". And it is unclear who, if anyone, would be confused by the term "pregnant people"; is it people who assume that women are not people? --22:24, 21 December 2022 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by NatGertler (talk • contribs)

As mentioned by Crossroads: "The fact is that the vast majority of sources on pregnancy, including ones being cited, use the term "pregnant women"." Wimpus (talk) 22:33, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

"Pregnant people" is an odd turn of phrase somewhat like "womxn", and is taken by some as implying that pregnancy is somehow genderless in its impacts in an "all lives matter"-esque fashion. It can be confusing as it implies trans men were studied for a certain aspect when they usually were not, which is WP:OR and trans men's hormone therapy could affect whatever is being stated.

The source states, Together, we can ensure an environment that guarantees every woman the right to informed and empowered choices....Educate about the issues affecting our reproductive freedom, and the impact they have on the lives of women and families. This includes our annual flagship publication, Who Decides? The Status of Women’s Reproductive Rights in the United States....Shift the cultural discourse around abortion access specifically, and reproductive freedom generally, to end the stigma and shame that some place on basic health services and that hinder women from accessing the care they need. So no, this source does not justify the drive-by IPs and such who try to purge mention of "women" from pregnancy in such an WP:UNDUE fashion. That is a problem and should be fixed. And the closure was indeed very clear about using the terminology in the sources.

Wimpus, I would urge you not to make any dispute in this regard about 'ideology' or 'PC' as such, and to be careful never to come off as calling another editor ideological. Use of an edit summary noting the Village Pump consensus and that it aligns with the cited source (and checking that it does) is strongly encouraged. I'm not an admin but I think that advice is all that is needed here. Crossroads ^-talk- 22:37, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

What you are arguing as per the sources goes both ways. If a source states "pregnant person", then it is expected to use the terminology used in the source, as per the Village Pump discussion. However, we have also seen an example of Wimpus changing "pregnant person" to "pregnant woman" when the source never made mention of the latter, as indicated in their Sophie Lewis edit. One telling sign about the source used in this article is the passage that states "roughly 1,000 people in the United States who still die as a result of pregnancy and childbirth each year". Judging by this edit, it doesn't appear that Wimpus is applying the Village Pump discussion equally. Moreso, it appears that the user just has a vendetta against the phrase "pregnant person". Jay Coop · Talk · Contributions 23:22, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Except the VP goes against the norms used by this encyclopedia of using the term more commonly in use. WP:ADVOCACY is replacing source analysis. How long after Kiev changed its name to Kyiv did it take Wikipedia to accept the change? Yet here a term barely used is accepted without question. Google trend search shows a flatline at bottom of screen for "pregnant person" compared to "pregnant woman". Slywriter (talk) 23:33, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

I do not object to giving a more detailed and appropriate edit summary (and in hindsight I should have done earlier). I was actually baffled by the edits of some the student editors and thought that it would be clear that those (and similar) edits would be considered as inappropriate, but some editors seem to approve such lingo. Wimpus (talk) 23:46, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

Most do get reverted, and I've seen many, many different editors revert it, usually just one at a time. A few slip through and then later on sometimes someone thinks the person reverting it is the one being a problem, especially if many are done in succession without edit summaries. Like you now say - an edit summary really helps. Crossroads ^-talk- 23:55, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

I have to concur with Slywriter; "pregnant person" is a barely-used term, and Wikipedia should not be adopting activistic language like this, not until it has become the mainstream usage, if that ever happens, which seems unlikely.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:35, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

The source cited there uses "women" a lot too, e.g. "In [Firestone's] foundational 1970 manifesto The Dialectic of Sex, she identifies the biological family as the basis for women’s oppression because it establishes women as an underclass by forcing them to bear the brunt of gestational labor". In any case, the Sophie Lewis article is very much an outlier; the vast majority of the edits are to medical topics with medical sourcing using standard terminology, yet the original complaint was about the entire set. Crossroads ^-talk- 23:48, 21 December 2022 (UTC)

The complaint was about the practice wherein the editor is making the change everywhere, with no sign of checking sourcing, hiding his changes with lake of edit summary, and so forth. So far no one in this conversation has said that "pregnant women" is never to be used. However, the editor relies on a conversation that said that "pregnant people" is not always to be used as if it said that it was never to be used. Telling them not to point out that they were making the edits for PC reasons would seem to lend to covering up what is going on. When they're not getting rid of "pregnant people", they're getting rid of "enslaved people" or "Black man, so it is hard to say that political correctness is not the concern at hand in their recent edits. --Nat Gertler (talk) 00:17, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Remember though that these are basically belated reversions of edits that were themselves originally made by drive-bys (who themselves gave no indication of checking sources) for "PC reasons", just in the opposite direction, which per the 'not advocacy' policy is more of an issue. (Also these two diffs here are nearly 2 years old now.) What matters here is the substance of the edit (which as pointed out so far were either good or at worst were well within reasonable disagreement and not ANI-worthy) and communication with other editors - which is the edit summary issue which they above said they "in hindsight" should have used. Anyway we can see if admins here really think anything else is needed. Crossroads ^-talk- 08:11, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Wimpus links five examples in their comment above of these edits being made. In four of the five linked, the editors who made the change to 'people' are editors in the top 5 ranking of edits to that page. Please avoid denigrating the contributions of primary editors to pages by describing these edits as "basically belated reversions of edits that were themselves originally made by drive-bys (who themselves gave no indication of checking sources)." Finding this out took me two minutes, likely less time than it took to write your post above. Parabolist (talk) 09:46, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

As you can also see, user Dgarza2 (first link) and user H. Lee, Future UCSF Pharm.D. (fourth and fifth links) are student editors. One of the review criteria of their assignment is Do the edits reflect language that supports diversity, equity, and inclusion? That criterion might be detrimental and seems to reflect language-change advocacy. Their instructor, user Health policy seems to make similar edits. Wimpus (talk) 10:21, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Those student editors seem to encourage eachother to eliminate certain words:

"...however there was some inconsistency with the non-edited areas of the article that still referred to pregnant persons as mothers."

"I agree that breastfeeding isn’t the most relevant and if included should be revised to be gender neutral."

"Areas for continued improvement on the page is to revise the use of gendered language (e.g., changing mother to terms like "pregnant person" and "gestational parent" ..."

"What will you add? More gender inclusive language (ie changing mother to gestational parent or birthing parent)".

Wimpus (talk) 11:12, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

As noted by Nat Gertler, the earlier VP discussion and closure merely confirmed there is no consensus to adopt gender neutral language universally in sex-related health topics. Nothing more. That the VP closure is mentioned in the essay (not consensus guideline or policy) Wikipedia:Gender-neutral language is because Crossroads put it there. There is a common myth repeated by language conservatives that Wikipedia must use the words that appear in our sources. I wrote an essay about that: WP:OUROWNWORDS.

AN/I is not the place to argue about "pregnant woman" vs "pregnant person", though I note that Catherine, Princess of Wales, used the phrase "not the happiest of pregnant people", which was duly and uncritically repeated in the Daily Mail. The phrase therefore has Royal Approval and all the king's subjects are in joyous agreement over this. :-). Seriously, both sides of this language debate are equally language activists, and some editors contributions history to the project demonstrate a single minded determination to enforce their own conservative language preferences. The way Wikipedia deals with issues like this that have no consensus and are unlikely to develop one (given the political climate in the area) is to discourage editors on both sides from flipping words towards their preference. Editors contributing new text should have their word choices in this matter ("person" vs "woman", for example) respected and changes made only if clearly incorrect. But equally, editors should not expect to get away with flipping "woman" to "person". I also warn editors from labelling students and new young editors "activists" just because of the way they naturally would write and the improvements they want to make to the project. -- Colin°^Talk 12:33, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Referring to other editors as "language conservatives" is inappropriate and giving equal validity, as is saying that "both sides" are "equally language activists". With the reasoning above then there is no limit on word choice no matter how rare in the actual sources (e.g. womxn, MOS:PBUH), while someone reverting such a person is simply dismissed as a "conservative". The actual MOS, such as at MOS:CAPS, does treat sources as relevant.

The assertion about "the way Wikipedia deals with issues like this" is unsupported and not at all true in my experience - I have seen many, many experienced editors revert changes like this, while those making the change in the first place are almost always newbies. It is not a "no consensus" matter, both in terms of consensus-by-editing and the explicit VP consensus above which did state terminology in articles...is dependent upon the support of reliable sources and it is expected that editors would use the same terminology presented in said sources. Crossroads ^-talk- 14:41, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

• Let's cut to the chase here, apart from a few edits, before the "pregnant person" edits this is an editor who last edited over a year ago to, as they said in their edit summaries, do such things as "revert politically correct language". Which, of course, is what they've reappeared to do again [28], in their view. Are they here to build an encyclopedia, or are they here to right what they consider to be great wrongs? The answer is the latter, of course. Black Kite (talk) 15:04, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, but you're discussing the actual editor and the things they did. You are not confronting Crossroad's theoretical Wimpus, who was just happening upon the phrase "pregnant people" in the article they were editing, checked to see that it was a recent change by newbie editor, verified that such phrasing is not used in the source, used reversion tools so that the editor who had made the change would be notified, and included an edit summary to make clear their objection, all as part of their normal editing efforts. You ought not besmirch this Platonic ideal of Wimpus with the actual Wimpus at hand... --Nat Gertler (talk) 16:46, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

As I stated earlier, I should have added an edit summary, but that omission doesn't make such phrasings as pregnant people, birth giver, gestational parent or people with uteri entirely acceptable. Wimpus (talk) 17:17, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

What is not acceptable about pregnant people in the example you chose? Are you holding that women are not people? That Native Americans are not people? That readers will not understand what pregnancy is, or what people are? Did you delve into the source... not that that paragraph has a source, but did you delve into the source for the previous and next paragraphs, find a copy of the book, and make sure that it said "pregnant women" and didn't allow for, say, those who may be pregnant but falling into one of the categories that are now identified as two-spirit? Or is it just that a perfectly understandable phrase does not fit your politics? --Nat Gertler (talk) 19:18, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Guessing you didn't read the source either before typing all that. Otherwise you would know the entire section is unsupported by the source. So no the source did not expound on categories as it's a book about plants, focused on plants, not human sexuality and identity. Slywriter (talk) 19:39, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

@Nat Gertler, I find pregnant people offensive, as we do not know whether these bodies identify as people. Therefore we should use gestational bodies, as suggested by student editor Apaulik. Wimpus (talk) 19:44, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

We've got an editor here carrying around a big "block me" sign, how much longer do we have to make them wait? --JBL (talk) 20:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Asking questions like Are you holding that women are not people? is clearly intended to mock someone. My response tried to demonstrate that certain edits (of the student editors) can not be taken seriously and are impossible to defend. Wimpus (talk) 20:24, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Your response demonstrated no such thing. It merely claimed that there was some problem with the acceptability of the phrase in that context.... without a lick of claim of what was unacceptable about it -- a stance you continue to hold. All I could do was offer possibilities about what objections could be raised to it. --Nat Gertler (talk) 21:17, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

As told by others, it is not merely a neutral term for pregnant women. Readers might think that transgender men are specifically included or discussed by this designation, while the original contribution didn't emphasized (any of) this. Wimpus (talk) 21:34, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Pregnant people is not meant to be a neutral term for pregnant women, but a term for a larger group that that includes pregnant women without pointlessly excluding others who may be pregnant. There are times when it's reasonable to exclude others - when a study was done on pregnant women, for example. This does not appear to be part of it. Is there some sourced reason to exclude the possibility of girls or trans men or two=spirits from this? Or is it possible that the original material was posted by someone who thought "pregnant women" covered all pregnant people, as you seem to want? --Nat Gertler (talk) 21:49, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Just want to briefly chime in to say that "pregnant people" also includes intersex individuals, who are certainly a biological reality. Statistically, there are probably something on the order of 1.5 million in the world today, and some of them who would not classically be considered to be a "woman" are capable of becoming pregnant. Cheers to all. Dumuzid (talk) 21:52, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Statistically, that is still a rare exception (see also [29]) and commonly transgender men are biologically women. Using gender-neutral language might have other unwanted effects (see [30]).Wimpus (talk) 22:26, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I was using a prevalence of .018% for my estimate, whereas your source argues against 1.7%. Indeed, a rare exception, but when it likely concerns hundreds of thousands of individuals, I think it worth accounting for. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 23:02, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

That's not the term we use in standard English, and it carries a very specific connotation that makes it more than just another way of referring to women. Is there any evidence that the specific Native American culture that used jojoba had individuals who did not identify as women but were anatomically capable of pregnancy and engaged in reproductive sex? The IP making that edit certainly didn't present any. The WP:BURDEN lay with the IP. Crossroads ^-talk- 20:02, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

That is indeed a term we used in standard English (here it is in use in to-be-read-by-the-general-public pages of the CDC, the Mayo Clinc, The Los Angeles times, Cosmo), and :"pregnant people" is not meant to be a term that is just another way of referring to women, but as a way of referring to people who are pregnant (many women are not.) In the case of Wimpus making a claim in this discussion that "pregnant people" is not acceptable and using that as an example, the burden is actually on him to show that it is not acceptable, rather than just stating a vague opinion as fact. --Nat Gertler (talk) 21:34, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Of course many women are not pregnant; it's specifically about what term to use for the group who are. It's possible to find rare uses of "pregnant people" - as is true for any such word or phrase - but looking at the dataset as a whole, usage is minimal. Google Scholar has 2,840,000 results for "pregnant women", but only about 1/337th that many for "pregnant people". Google Trends and even more so Google Books Ngrams (for the last 20 years) have minimal usage.

Intersex was mentioned above but intersex conditions (also known as DSDs) still occur based on sex; they are not a third sex or gender. As such, most of them who can get pregnant identify as women.

Per policy the sourcing burden and onus for consensus that replacing "pregnant women" with "pregnant people" is acceptable in a given usage lay with those who had added it in the first place. Like I said above, though, Wimpus (and anyone) should still use informative edit summaries and WP:FOC. I'm certainly not disputing that. Crossroads ^-talk- 23:00, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

As such, most of them who can get pregnant identify as women. Given this statement, you would agree that there are intersex individuals who identify as male capable of pregnancy? Dumuzid (talk) 23:03, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

At that point the mention of intersex is superfluous though. In any case, it is clear that the vast majority of sources do not write so as to give undue weight to rare exceptions, even in stuff that is unrelated to sex; e.g. at human body. So we follow the sources' lead. Crossroads ^-talk- 23:08, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I'll just note that you didn't answer my question. Cheers. Dumuzid (talk) 23:20, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Crossroads, the data you're pulling up is mostly quite dated. Your supposed Ngram for the "last 20 years" actually ends in 2019, so is lacking the latest three years, which in terms of this terminology is old. If we go to Google Scholar and pull up material just from this year, we find that "pregnant women" gets 28,800 hits, while "pregnant people" gets 2450... which means if we're talking current day, we're not talking about 1/337th, but better than 1/12th.... not a majority, but not an ignorable bit of trivia either. (If we start looking at the singular, it's "pregnant woman" at 9670, "pregnant person" at 1240, so more than 1/8th!) On top of that, without starting to dig through article by article, we don't know what portion of the "pregnant women" examples have the term standing for every pregnant person, and how many may be specifically and solely about women.... but I can tell you that 2 of the first 4 that show up on the "pregnant woman" are case studies, so they are talking about specific individuals of known gender, not the general case. --Nat Gertler (talk) 04:43, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Ngrams doesn't go later than 2019, I tried. That's still plenty recent to be relevant. Even 11/12 or 7/8 would be considered a strong consensus in a Wikipedia discussion. That the singular "pregnant woman" turns up some case studies is hardly surprising or relevant to the general case. Crossroads ^-talk- 05:43, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, and the fact that Ngram has a dated data set makes it a problem to use when we have more recent data, and when the most recent portion of the Ngram data itself shows that usage of "pregnant people" and "pregnant person" was undergoing a rapid increase in the last few years of its sample. The frequency seen in the 2022 Scholar material further makes it clear that things had changed much by 2022, which is the year in which Wimbus's edits took place and we're actually having this discussion. And a case study is going to be listing a specific person, about whom the specific gender can be known -- no one here is saying we should not be using "pregnant woman" when discussing a specific person whose age and gender are known. That is not the generic case where "woman" is just being used as a frequently-correct assumption. Eliminate those specific cases and it is likely that the percentage of times that "pregnant person" is used in the generic increases substantially.... so yes, it is relevant when we're using the ratio to discuss the generic case. --Nat Gertler (talk) 14:19, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Plurals are never about specific cases and about groups, and eliminates that ambiguity. Examining that data shows that the rate of increase of "pregnant people" is nowhere near enough to become more than a tiny minority, and even more importantly, "pregnant women" has also been increasing in usage, and with a steeper line. Crossroads ^-talk- 17:17, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Plurals can indeed be about specific cases -if a novel has "Brenda and Charise, the two pregnant women I met on the bus", then that is a pair of specific cases, and not a general statement, and will show up on the Ngram as an example of "pregnant women". You seem to be trying to use the outdated Ngram data to predict the future, when your methods fail at even predicting the past, as the sizable increase of portion of Scholar data from your throughout-collected-history to just-2022 shows. And statistically, "pregnant women" can be increasing in total number quicker than "pregnant people" but still be losing the percentage of the pregnancy discussion. (For those looking on who haven't deal with statistics: imagine that one year there 100 animal coloring books published, 98 about kitties and 2 about puppies. The next year, there are 200 such publications, 160 about kitties and 40 about puppies. Kitties have gained more books year-to-year, adding 62 as opposed to puppies' 38, but percentagewise puppies have gone from 2% all the way up to 20%, a bigger share of the larger pie.) All of this continues to be an aside to what Wimpus seems to have been actually doing, which is making these changes regardless of context and sourcing, and doing it in a way that didn't make it clear what he was doing. --Nat Gertler (talk) 22:39, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Having read most of this thread, it seems pretty clear that Wimpus is trolling. Can someone please TROUT them at least? --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 23:06, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

That's a pretty serious accusation. To me, with just a very light sprinkle of AGF dust, this looks like someone making a large number of edits that they believe improve the encyclopedia - that might be WP:DE if it were done against established consensus, or if they refused to discuss the edits when challwnged, but even then there's a wide gap between that and trolling. I'd urge you to set out exactly what it is in the evidence presented that makes you think that Wimpus is trolling, or to retract that. Girth Summit _(blether) 06:57, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Wimpus saying things like "trans men are biologically women" seems disruptive and a form of trolling, in my mind. --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 19:31, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Really, in the context in which it was said? In response to a comment that "...'pregnant people' also includes intersex individuals, who are certainly a biological reality. Statistically, there are probably something on the order of 1.5 million in the world today, and some of them who would not classically be considered to be a 'woman' are capable of becoming pregnant...", Wimpus's reply, "Statistically, that is still a rare exception (see also [92]) and commonly transgender men are biologically women...," doesn't strike me as disruptive or trolling. Yes, more accurately Wimpus should have said biologically female, but I don't read that error as being evidence of an intention to troll. Levivich (talk) 20:09, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

No, here on his talkpage, where he says "Trans men are biologically women, as well as girls." There was no reason for him to have said that. --Rockstone^{Send me a message!} 05:38, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Nat Gertler's doubts about the phrase ''pregnant women'': "Except the part where it leaves out girls and trans men... "

My response: "Trans men are biologically women, as well as girls."

Could you please explain why my response, from a biological point of view, would be incorrect. Wimpus (talk) 08:17, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

• Ruling on terminology is not suitable for ANI. Please start a central RfC regarding the issue of "pregnant person" vs. "pregnant woman" with some examples to make it clear what is being discussed. I looked at Abortion in California and it was an edit on 3 October 2022 that introduced "pregnant person". Wimpus changed "person" to "woman" on 20 December 2022. No comments have ever been made at Talk:Abortion in California. Either side could be said to be on a campaign and an RfC is needed to settle the matter. Johnuniq (talk) 01:39, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
  • By the way, if an RfC is wanted, please first take a few days to draft wording including the RfC's scope (which articles/guidelines might need changing) and with a clear actionable outcome. The draft needs to be widely publicized to get views from those involved. Johnuniq (talk) 06:40, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

    There was a similar RfC that I mentioned here. Wimpus (talk) 07:11, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

    That wasn't a "similar RFC" because it asked for all sex-related articles to be entirely gender neutral. An RFC on this matter in the current political climate in the US, UK and other countries would be so disruptive as to, imo, warrant admin action against the person starting it. It is abundantly clear that our society is quite divided. The Scottish Gender Recognition Reform Bill, passed yesterday, is so divisive that Westminster reaction to it is being seriously described as a nail in the coffin for the United Kingdom (i.e. independence for Scotland). Transgender issues have been adopted as a culture war tactic by right-wing politicians in the UK and US and look set to feature highly in the coming elections. I don't think any discussion on Wikipedia would rise about being a proxy for editors political views, and display a similar level of toxic bullshit from certain parties.

    Being upset about "pregnant person" and yet being entirely unfazed by "pregnant teenager" (which is similarly "desexed") is a shibboleth for editors holding strong conservative or gender critical beliefs. Editors going around with a search-and-destroy behaviour on keywords that make them turn red-faced, or with a huge watchlist that they use solely to revert-to-conservativism, are activists. Crossroads above accused me of "giving equal validity" when saying both sides were activists (though as usual, Crossroads links to entirely irrelevant policy). Well, actually, an examination of editor contributions makes it very clear that one side is overwhelmingly and devotedly activist, and it is the conservative/gender-critical editors. And newcomers who are actually contributing new material are the first casualty in that war.

    The real concern for AN/I is not whether one style of writing is better than another. That is a matter for Wikipedians to decide as they write and discuss writing articles (not for our sources to decide for us). At present there is no consensus and no remote possibility of a consensus universally favouring one style or another. We know how to deal with that kind of issue, and have done since Wikipedia was created. We tell both sides of the activist war to find another hobby on Wikipedia or find another hobby full stop. -- Colin°^Talk 08:48, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

    This is an incredible level of politicization and assumption of bad faith to be making at ANI. Crossroads ^-talk- 17:17, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• People going about changing "pregnant person" to "pregnant woman" should be asked to stop, and if they don't stop, should be blocked. Same for people going about changing "pregnant woman" to "pregnant person". If anyone thinks Wikipedia's MOS should prefer one phrase over the other, they should start an RFC and get consensus for it before making mass changes, rather than engaging in WP:FAITACCOMPLI editing. Same for "Black"/"black" and any other MOS issues. Levivich (talk) 19:14, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

  Even if the cited source speaks only of "pregnant women"? [31] Also in most of the cases here it only became "pregnant people" because someone changed it from "pregnant women" which according to you was also bad - so reverting a bad edit is also a bad edit? Crossroads ^-talk- 23:03, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

  Any edits reverting Wimpus, if you'll allow me to roughly quote you, would basically be belated reversions of edits that were themselves originally made by a drive-by. I trust the judgement of the primary editors of articles over an editor who comes back once every couple months to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. I understand he's doing them in support of a greater content conflict you seem to be involved in, but the issue here is a conduct one, so your bludgeoning of this discussion in an attempt to solve that content conflict aren't really helping. Parabolist (talk) 03:51, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

  There's no reason to trust the regular editors at a particular article more than someone who comes back once very couple of months. What counts are the edits themselves, and adherence to policy and guidelines. An experienced editor who is crazy busy fighting against advocacy might well turn up at numerous articles sporadically in an attempt to hold the line against small groups of well-meaning and/or inexperienced editors who hang out at specific articles attempting to move the content in the direction they feel is correct. I would say that student editors given guidance by their instructor that may run counter to a WP guideline (or which establishes guidance where none exists) could be an example of such small groups that would need correction by an experienced editor familiar with NPOV and especially DUE, which hardly any student editors are equipped to properly deal with, even if they can only manage a visit to the article infrequently. Mathglot (talk) 19:41, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

"There's no reason to trust the regular editors at a particular article...What counts are the edits themselves, and adherence to policy and guidelines." – Thank you. Common sense isn't necessarily common on Wikipedia. I've seen too many hubristic personalities with beaucoup WP history use one-track-mind sources to sprinkle bias into article content ... and then bitch, moan, and snark when another editor comes along and undoes the knot. Pyxis Solitary (yak). L not Q. 12:09, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Reverting a bad edit can also be a bad edit. Consider the concept of editing wars; we don't fail to sanction one side just because they are correcting errors on the other side. Do not be so desperate in your need to erase "pregnant people" that you are avoiding the concerns about Wimpus's actual methods. --Nat Gertler (talk) 15:33, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

The introduction of pregnant person at Abortion in California, as mentioned above, could be an illustrative example. The original change was a good-faith edit by a user with several previous improvements to the article, and wasn't even the main point of that particular edit, but ended up igniting the edit-warring. I've restored a previous, uncontentious version of the lead sentence, and referred editors to this discussion at Talk.

It was a fair bit of work to analyze and (hopefully) defuse the issue at that one article. Had Wimpus gone into the details of that one case to that extent, perhaps they would've come to a different conclusion about the edits, and acted differently. As it happened, their first edit had no edit summary, and second one could've been better worded, and by then we were in warring territory (which didn't end there). But had I noticed a pattern of changes of this nature at numerous articles, would I have done that amount of work analyzing the article history, the user's contributions, and the progression of the lead sentence over time at each article involved in the pattern? No way; it's way too much work.

I think what happened here, is that Wimpus noticed a pattern of edits in a contentious area, wanted to improve them with good faith edits, and may have interpreted all such changes as POV edits, which clearly not all of them were (such as at Abortion in California, which clearly was not POV), even assuming some were. They could improve going forward, by giving a better edit summary the first time, and if reverted, either disengaging or raising it at the TP, or as now seems more apt, at a centralized discussion about the pattern of edits. There is nothing actionable here; taking it in the worst light, an admin might raise a discussion at their talk page, advising better use of edit summaries, a reminder not to 2RR if it could be misinterpreted, and to go into greater depth of analysis when undoing a change in a possibly contentious area, especially if it involves the lead sentence, and/or to raise a TP discussion if possible. That's really all this amounts to. Mathglot (talk) 22:31, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

User:Mathglot your summary seems to suggest this is simply a minor issue with one article. But the complaint is about a series of edits, which serve no other purpose than to locate articles on Wikipedia containing the phrase "pregnant person/people" and replace them with "pregnant woman/women". You have in fact over analysed one article to a degree that Wimpus did not. They cared not how that phrase came to be, only that it should be flipped to the stylistic preference they hold. At Jojoba, the article had said "pregnant person" since May 2022. The Moderna COVID-19 vaccine had "pregnant people" since March 2021 and that text was not only added by the top #4 contributor to the article but also, to the annoyance of those who repeatedly and falsely claim (when it suits them, yet loudly rejected when it does not) that we are compelled to use the stylistic conventions of our sources, repeats the language used by the CDC source and also by the underlying research. I could go on though the many other edits.

What we have here is just a classic case of an editor with a personal stylistic preference, a style controversy that is currently highly political, seeking out words and phrases they dislike and flipping them over in a series of edits. This is what AN/I is for, to tell them to stop, and if necessary, to force them to stop. Mathglot, your claim that Wimpus "noticed a pattern or edits in a contentious area" and "wanted to improve them with good faith edits" is frankly bullshit. All evidence suggest entirely the opposite, that Wimpus is engaging in activism editing, and needs to stop that. -- Colin°^Talk 20:53, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

I must have been unclear, as my point didn't get through at all. I never meant to imply that this is a minor issue with one article, and I well understand that this is all about a pattern of edits. What I was attempting to point out, is what happens in the real world when one editor is faced with what appears to be a pattern of edits across a wide range of articles that one views as questionable. Sometimes I see a pattern like that, and I try to run around, undoing the damage in dozens of articles. In so doing, sometimes I am too hasty and I end up "correcting" something I shouldn't have, because it is simply not possible with 24 hours in the day to give every individual case the attention it deserves. It's a judgment call, insofar as how much detail to go into with each case, versus missing a huge number of cases because you're analyzing every case to death, when they don't deserve it. The driving force here would be, how to allocate my time for the greatest improvement of Wikipedia as a whole.

There is no perfect solution, but in cases like that, I try to do the best I can, and hope that the vast majority of my adjustments are improvements, and that for the ones I didn't analyze sufficiently and made the wrong call on, that I'll get pushback from someone, who will either point out my error, or simply fix it. I'm grateful for either type of response.

So the point that was unclear in the above, I guess, is that the Abortion in California was merely illustrative of one of those "too hasty" cases, a case that was maybe in that "false positive" minority; where "fixing" it by simply changing the wording, was the wrong call here. I see no evidence that the main thrust of Wimpus's editing was anything other than motivated by a desire to improve Wikipedia as a whole. Perhaps there was some overeagerness, perhaps there could've been more analysis in some cases, but overall trying to move things in the direction they thought was the right one, therefore here for the right reasons. I don't see any evidence that suggests the opposite, and a mere pattern of performing the same edit across a broad span of articles is in no way an indication of "activist editing"; vandal fighters often exhibit exactly the same pattern.

When you have a contentious issue at Wikipedia, there are often innumerable SPAs, anons, one-shot editors from Twitter- or Reddit-canvassed threads, that run around making POV edits all over the project. It cannot be the case that when one editor notices that happening, that they are prohibited from acting in good faith against it in a way that is observant of Wikipedia p&g, simply because they are one person and the source of all the problems was a diffuse ant army and it would therefore be considered a "pattern of activist edits" on their part to fix them all. In so doing, they will likely make some wrong calls, as in the Abortion in California case, now fixed, for the greater good of fixing a lot of problematic edits. If the content question underlying the series of fixes by one editor becomes contentious, as it apparently has in this case, then it is still a content-based disagreement, and like any such, it should be discussed at a Talk page, and not at AN/I. Since this one spans numerous articles, it should likely be discussed in a centralized location, likely one of the WikiProjects dealing with women, medicine, or gender-related questions. This is simply the wrong venue for such a discussion.

However, I just don't see evidence of "activist editing" going on here. If a discussion about the content is raised somewhere, then yes, they should stop for the duration of that discussion until it is resolved. Given that it's being discussed here (although incorrectly in my view as a behavioral, and not a content issue), Wimpus should stop making edits of that nature for the time being. But if no content-based discussion is forthcoming in a reasonable time (two weeks?), then I'd say they have the green light to carry on, maybe with a little more attention to edit summaries and to case-by-case analysis, as previously noted. Mathglot (talk) 21:37, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree that in certain cases I should have analysed the history of the article more carefully and I should have added an informative edit summary. Whether this content dispute will settle in the near future, seems doubtful. Wimpus (talk) 07:45, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I notice “and not made the edit” is missing from this list of things you should have done differently. 2600:4040:AFB3:4100:8CDA:DA3A:49D9:374A (talk) 13:25, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

As is "and checked the sources". --Nat Gertler (talk) 13:30, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Mathglot, you spend a lot of time discussing hypotheticals and quite imaginary scenarios, which are not relevant here, but didn't actually look seriously at the edits of Wimpus. They really do not demonstrate an editor discovering "what appears to be a pattern of edits across a wide range of articles that one views as questionable". This is an editor who's edit history since 2020 demonstrates gender-related language activism.

Another example: the article Theca lutein cyst was transformed from a tiny stub to a comprehensive article by a bunch of student editors. They added value to the project and wrote the article the way young people write in 2022. It is frankly terrible that some editors in this AN/I discussion view those students as the problem. In contrast, Wimpus did no article expansion but imposed his own style preference without edit summary, and as part of a session of making three dozen such edits.

Wimpus your comments here do not suggest to me that you get what the problem is with your edits. It isn't that you should have analysed the history of the article or that your edits would be ok if they had a better edit summary. It is that you sat down one afternoon and searched Wikipedia for "pregnant person/people" and flipped them over to "pregnant woman/women", which is simply language activism. And you continued doing that for more than thirty articles till someone asked you to stop. Don't do that. -- Colin°^Talk 13:58, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Colin, you've quoted "gender-related language activism" multiple times, now, but your saying so doesn't make it true. That is just your opinion, presumably because you disapprove of the content of the edits. It would be perfectly consistent and understandable for another editor to see the inclusion of pregnant person in numerous articles as gender activism of precisely the opposite sort, with each of you yelling gender activism at the other. Differing opinions than yours on this point are conceivable within the framework of proper adherence to WP P&G, which means that this is a content dispute, not a behavioral one.

You see a series of edits which you disapprove of by one editor, all tending in the same direction wrt a particular phrase, and you're shouting, Stop! But unless you can demonstrate that there is some kind of intention to circumvent Wikipedia p&g, the worst that could be said is that the edits are a group of edits that didn't achieve consensus. But we don't even know that, because there hasn't been a discussion about consensus for this language, and the behavior has stopped. In broad outline, all I see is a series of WP:BOLD edits which violate no policy, followed by some complaints, followed by no more edits of that type. So, remind me again why we are here at the UCIBB (the urgent, chronic, intractable behavioral board)? This is a content issue, plain and simple, and if it's important to you, then you could discuss your disapproval at a content discussion elsewhere, where your position may gain consensus (or not). Go write something on Wimpus's UTP, if you think they were too hasty, or not careful enough, or something. Meanwhile, I would wish that some admin would put this discussion out of its misery, as there isn't anything remotely urgent going on here or any egregious behavior that needs to be immediately stopped by means of admin tools. Mathglot (talk) 17:09, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

In saying that there's not activist editing going on, Mathglot, you seem to be looking at only the edits and not the reasons the editor has given for the edits, from his criticizing use of non-gendered terms for being "PC" to his saying that trans men are biologically women and also girls. The fact that you can say that other edits can be accused of being activist does not serve to make his not; certainly one can find many situations on Wikipedia and in the greater world where there are activists involved on both sides. There is an argument that it shouldn't have been brought here, but that shouldn't require ignoring the context of what was done. --Nat Gertler (talk) 18:18, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

It isn't just "my opinion", Mathglot. You seem absolutely determined to have a theoretical discussion about a fictitious user who is doing no harm. Wimpus made a sequence of edits to over thirty articles that did nothing other than change from "pregnant person/people" to "pregnant woman/women". Mathglot, I would count that as "gender-related language activism" if it went the other way too, so there's no need to bring in whatever you think my own preferences are.

MOS:STYLERET is something that has led to Arbcom restrictions on editors: we do not flip-flop between arbitrary style preferences of individual editors, and this guideline very much applies "when MOS ... gives no specific guidance", which is to say "nearly always". MOS provides word-choice guidance only very very exceptionally. I don't understand your claim "the worst that could be said is that the edits are a group of edits that didn't achieve consensus". They didn't seek consensus and the edits demonstrate editing behaviour that our guideline forbids, full stop.

I do sometimes wonder if some editors feel unable to write without having an RFC all the time, or having rules that appear to dictate every word they pick . Honestly, 99.9999% of what actual content producers write on Wikipedia is just whatever pops into their heads as they summarise their sources in their own words.

You and I both know that language in this area is contentious and subject to real-world conflict that shows absolutely no sign of resolution. Editors must not bring that conflict to Wikipedia by flip-flopping to one preference or another. No good comes of that. -- Colin°^Talk 19:00, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

You asserted that this is the way young people write in 2022. As a person who is only slightly older than your average medical student, I can testify that this is not the case. It has nothing to do with age; as shown here and here, this wording was used because the class instructions and instructor told them to do so, and they policed each other. Sounds a lot like arbitrary style preferences of individual editors to me.

Also, "pregnant women" and "pregnant people" do not necessarily mean the same thing; if the sources being cited for a claim speak only of "pregnant women", then to use "pregnant people" is a form of WP:Original research. If an entire class uses the term all over the place anyway because they were misinformed to do so, then correcting that may require a series of edits all making that very change (ideally with edit summaries, but we all know that at this point). Crossroads ^-talk- 21:35, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

"Told them to do so" and "policed" is adding an incredibly sinister tone to what looks like collaborative editing. If they didn't want to make those changes, they simply wouldn't have made them. Again, I would ask that you and Wimpus please stop trying to denigrate and insinuate things about these editors in your attempt to win this content disagreement. Wimpus responding to my comment about him being the drive-by editor with "well they were student editors" was bad enough. There is a very clear advocacy issue at work here, and it's solidly with Wimpus. Parabolist (talk) 01:48, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

"adding an incredibly sinister tone to what looks like collaborative editing". Depends on the collaboration, doesn't it? As someone who has dealt with one too many students adding poorly written and poorly sourced content into articles (the stubborn ones smack of activist editors), who often have no clue about Wikipedia policies and guidelines, I'm willing to believe the "told them to do so" and "policed". These students come to Wikipedia with an assignment, but how particular subjects are selected by instructors and students, and how they are supervised on the academic end, warrants closer inspection by Wikipedia. Pyxis Solitary (yak). L not Q. 04:02, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Actual real editing practice by young and often student editors would suggest that Crossroads is very much one of a kind, rather than representative of an age group. The very policy Crossroads links to says "Rewriting source material in your own words while retaining the substance is not considered original research". Anyway, this is a distraction....

The problem with this discussion is that some editors think AN/I is the place to have an argument about style or original research. But those who actually looked at Wimpus's edits know that they simply sat down and googled for text they wanted to replace for personal style reasons. One of the reasons MOS is so reluctant to pronounce one style of words better than another is the fear that editors will sit down of an afternoon and do exactly what Wimpus did. Wikipedia is unique with this problem - most other publishing platforms are stuck with what got published the first time and only rarely make latest edits and usually when there's a significant revision warranted. It is entirely a behavioural matter, which would be the same no matter which direction Wimpus's political compass faced. Editors who seek to permit that kind of behaviour because they personally happen to agree with the outcome (or because, em, they do more or less the same) are also the problem. This really is not how Wikipedia works. It works, as the encyclopaedia that anyone can edit, by permitting editors to write pretty much how they see best. And by valuing content creators over editors who's contributions to article space just demonstrate political activism. Those editors, get asked to stop. -- Colin°^Talk 08:55, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Cheng123xx sock puppet

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Please block these four account, Sorcerex sock puppet

• Ikan Kekek (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• AXXXXK→ (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Sankatic (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Yann (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Tools: Editor interaction utility • Interaction Timeline • SPI Tools

Cross-wiki abuse and LTA,multiple locked users duck to this 4 users, such as Cheng123xx, NgaiHing1612, HK Ngai Hing 1610, 藝興大廈1612, Sorcerex, ChengLx123, Melvorano V, Wing1991hk, Foundation Mathematics IVE, Mong Kok Buildings 201405, Hmtvie, AXBXABX123, Abcdefghixx, NgaiHingMansion, Snxcenta, NG HING MANS, Mx+c mxc^2, Sor Truth, Wexjenx, Dammy0000, HMTfan, Yi Yiu, Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, Jesteer, What 42, Audaciousy, Torque Twister, 2a01b747412344d18a3aeb6e527c1b, 領展愛民.

Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Sorcerex 124.217.188.87 (talk) 11:20, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

This looks like trolling to me. Acroterion (talk) 12:34, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Acroterion idk, you can report them to stewards of global lock, the page is protected there 124.217.189.244 (talk) 12:41, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Masti ? 124.217.189.244 (talk) 12:42, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

No. Yann is a COmmons admin, Ikan Kekek is a respected Commons editor and a WIkivoyage admin. Sankatic is not registered here, and while AXXXXK has an undistinguished record, there is nothing obviously problematic. I am, however, interested in 124.217.188.87. Acroterion (talk) 13:10, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm thinking a range block might be in order seeing this edit here. RickinBaltimore (talk) 13:17, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree. Yann would probably know who's behind this, but it's probably not worth the trouble, I'd just block the range. Acroterion (talk) 13:22, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

The range is 124.217.188.0/23 but there appears to be some collateral. Black Kite (talk) 15:15, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I've blocked the /23 for 72h in the hope that it prompts our time-wasting friend to go do something productive. I fear it will not, but I'm quite fed up of cleaning up these messes at SPI and seemingly now here as well. firefly ( t · c ) 10:05, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

This user is Cheng123xx sock, this LTA can self-edited and directed, 2 and 3 is him/her, commons have been block them, AXXXXK is main account, please see [32] and [33].--MCC214#ex umbra in solem 14:34, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

• Or we can need block AXXXXK, this source is enough.--MCC214#ex umbra in solem 14:39, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Socking. -- Tamzin[cetacean needed] (she|they|xe) 07:46, 27 December 2022 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I think we should global lock Ikan Kekek and Sankatic, AXXXXK doesn’t active and Yann is innocent 124.217.188.204 (talk) 04:33, 27 December 2022 (UTC) argee, lock Ikan Kekek and Sankatic 124.217.189.205 (talk) 06:02, 27 December 2022 (UTC) I support Yann isn’t a sock of him 124.217.188.55 (talk) 06:47, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• This content is copy in my SRG request.--MCC214#ex umbra in solem 15:01, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Socking. -- Tamzin[cetacean needed] (she|they|xe) 07:46, 27 December 2022 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I found few more users may related to him, Hammrhear, Knoterson, Emberess, Shirleyprieto, Kiszek, AXXXXX1 124.217.188.204 (talk) 04:36, 27 December 2022 (UTC) MCC214 see this 124.217.188.204 (talk) 04:36, 27 December 2022 (UTC) MCC214 Shirleyprieto, Kiszek and Yi Yiu are Cheng123xx’s classmates, he base on their names to create account 124.217.188.248 (talk) 05:13, 27 December 2022 (UTC) second socklist Hammrhear (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) Knoterson (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) Emberess (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) Shirleyprieto (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) Kiszek (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) AXXXXX1 (talk+ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) 219.76.38.26 (talk+ · tag · contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RBLs · proxy check · block user · block log · cross-wiki contribs · CheckUser (log)) Tools: Editor interaction utility • Interaction Timeline • SPI Tools 124.217.188.55 (talk) 06:51, 27 December 2022 (UTC) 219.76.38.26 has been global blocked 124.217.188.62 (talk) 07:22, 27 December 2022 (UTC) MCC has already reported Hammrhear [34], but other still hasn’t, he also use fake signs from two of his sock, I think he forgets their password 124.217.188.62 (talk) 07:27, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

PlatinumClipper96 - WP:POVPUSH, edit warring and retaliatory reverts

I today reverted an edit by PlatinumClipper96 at Chingford [35]. The page history here shows that this user has been asserting and re-asserting that bold edit on that page since February 2021 and he has been reverted scores of times by multiple editors. This talk section [36] looks at the matter and shows that there are clear guidelines on the content in question in WP:UKTOWNS and WP:UKCOUNTIES and editor consensus is also established and the information was removed yet again in November. His re-insertion of the material today, without establishing a new consensus in talk, clearly merited reversion in my opinion, and I requested he take it to talk. He did not.

In apparent retaliation the editor has trawled through my edit history over the last month or two, and just reverted my edits on 20 pages, these being:

1. Fulwell, London
2. Goddington
3. Morden
4. Plumstead
5. Hatch End
6. New Addington
7. Kevington, London
8. Newyears Green
9. West Heath, London
10. Harlington, London
11. Bickley
12. Longford, London
13. Sundridge, London
14. Plaistow, Bromley
15. Derry Downs
16. Pratt's Bottom
17. Ramsden, Orpington
18. Kenley
19. Bexleyheath
20. Hayes, Bromley

This is not an isolated behaviour. This editor repeatedly reverts to his preferred wording and this is WP:POVPUSHing. The content issue is that the editor wishes to assert the minority view that historic counties still exist within their original borders and so towns such as Chingford remain in those counties. This is against Wikipedia guidelines at WP:UKCOUNTIES and WP:UKTOWNS. Guidelines say Use language that asserts past tense - We do not take the minority view that the historic counties still exist with the former boundaries., and there is a whole wikipedia fork at Wikishire [37] set up to push this view. This editor and a couple of others have been pushing this minority view by editing this information into Wikipedia pages over a period of time. This editor edit wars his version in. See also, for instance, edit history at Romford, and the talk page discussion at [38] I have attempted to reason with the editor on article talk pages and in a thread at the London Wikiproject [39]. They do not engage with the issue, have accused me of trawling their edits (I haven’t, but they clearly trawled mine for this mass reversion of my edits).

My view is that this editor is knowledgeable about some aspects of London, and other edits they make are valuable, but this issue is endemic. It is not going to go away, and their method of reverting and not seeking consensus asks questions about whether they are WP:NOTHERE. I wonder whether the community might consider whether a topic ban is called for. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 22:21, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Id personally also like to support this, having seen multiple edit wars by the same user over multiple years over countless articles with tens of users. The tactic appears to be to frustrate users into giving up, as many of the pages involved are low traffic and unlikely to have many contributors at one time. Every time i see this user, their "contributions" are simply reverting edits and pushing political ideologies which are contrary to guidelines as described above. Whats listed above is mostly one days worth of edits, and this happens on a frequent basis - This is not their first edit war, and without intervention it will not be their last. Garfie489 (talk) 22:52, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

I reject the accusations Sirfurboy has made here. Utterly defamatory and lacks important context. I would strongly encourage administrators looking at this discussion to view this talk page discussion at WikiProject London for context (specifically today's contributions).

My edit to Chingford took into account the talk page discussion Sirfurboy cites, and I made a bold edit to the article today with slightly different wording, using LondonEast4's suggestion of including the historic county of Chingford in the second paragraph. Sirfurboy reverted this bold edit 9 minutes later. I made no further edit, and took it to the linked talk page discussion he suggested I take further discussion to after I suggested discussing this dispute on his talk page. Extremely misleading, if not slanderous, to say "I requested he take it to talk. He did not.".

Having made this edit [40] to Croydon last month, Sirfurboy made a number of changes [41], resulting in the only mention of Surrey in the lead being that Croydon "was formerly an ancient parish in the Wallington hundred of Surrey". Guidance at WP:UKTOWNS clearly states that the lead of UK settlement articles should include the place's historic county if different to ceremonial county. I restored my wording, as Croydon ceased to be a parish long before it became part of Greater London in 1965 (when Sirfurboy argues it left the historic county of Surrey). Sirfurboy effectively restored his wording, and I made no further edit to this article.

Sirfurboy then begins to trawl through my edit history, beginning a long series of edits (many of which are reverts to my edits) to historic county wording in articles he had no prior history editing, starting with Romford, Leytonstone, Edmonton, London, Ilford and Stratford, London. He does, however, start a series of discussions across talk pages, some of which I contributed to (including Talk:Woodford,_London#Woodford_is_not_in_Essex. He then begins mass editing Greater London place articles with stable wording, most of which neither of us had ever edited, using, by his own admission, Google Search to find articles that did not include his preferred wording. I outlined my objections to his wording on both his talk page and today at WikiProject London. I have today reverted many of these bold edits, highlighting my objections and pushing for discussion rather than continued mass edits, which Sirfurboy continued with today.

The reverts I made today were not a "retaliation", but a response to a series of similar bold edits he made today at Kenley, Ramsden, Orpington, Pratt's Bottom, Derry Downs, Plaistow, Bromley and Sundridge, London. I made my objections to this new wording in the relevant edit summaries and on the WikiProject London talk page discussion linked in my first line. I then reverted similar bold edits he had previously made, which had not yet been changed. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 23:31, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

To answer some specific points in that response: I already linked to the WikiProject London talk page above. Agree that it provides context. There is also context on my user talk page User talk:Sirfurboy#Counties... where PC96 attempted to raise the content discussion there and I signposted to the Wikiproject London page. The editor has 3 times accused me of trawling his edits, but, on the contrary, it is clear by looking at these 20 reverts listed above, that 19 of them were on pages that PC96 had never edited before reverting my edits. [42]. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 23:53, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

This dispute is only the latest outburst in a very long and seemingly endless dispute about how best to treat historic counties in the UK, in England especially. The cause is the poorly constructed guidelines from over 20 years ago that allow no room for compromise of any sort. I have intentionally kept out of this current argument. PlatinumClipper96 is not a disruptive editor pushing a point of view without any substance. The guidelines that state We do not take the minority view that the historic counties still exist with the former boundaries are nothing more than opinion. There is unambiguous evidence, in statute law and in quality secondary sources that shows the historic counties have never been altered (in any relevant way), never abolished and never had boundaries changed. The issue is whether they hold any relevance to the point of being notable in today's UK. The guidelines do not cater for that discussion but instead assert a factually incorrect opinion that is of peripheral importance. So finger pointing at an editor for correcting factual errors as best as possible is unhelpful and unfair and I would say contrary to wiki policy. Incidentally, it is also misleading to imply that PlatinumClipper96 is part of a small minority. There have been regular and many very high quality editors who have also questioned the current guidelines going back many years. I regard Sirfurboy also as a quality editor and I am tentatively engaged with him in what seems to be a reasonably open minded discussion about this HC issue. Time will tell if it bears fruit. By way of a general observation, the issue is both simple and complicated, not helped by freely used ambiguous words and phrases, and, IMO, by a cohort of old school editors with entrenched minds (opinions all expressed in good faith of course and no offence intended). Besides that old-school group, there will always be clamoring newbies eager to leap into the fray thrusting daggers into those editors who dare to think outside the square and question established doctrine. In summary, I cannot comment on the technicalities of this presumed edit war, but the subject itself is not about one person pushing an isolated opinion. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 08:49, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Roger, thanks, but ANI is not the place to discuss the content dispute. This report is about editor behaviour. The editor has trawled through my edits and reverted my edits on 20 pages, 19 of which he had never edited before. This is not the only issue either.

PlatinumClipper96 mentions the Croydon page, so to examine that: his bold edit was here,[43], I and Dave Biddulph attempted to adjust the edit - without reversion -to a form of words that did not assert Croydon was in Surrey: [44]. PC96 reverted to his version [45] on 14 Nov, 11:01. I then immediately took this to talk, posting at 11:39: [46] GrindtXX pointed out the established guidelines and Spinney Hill made an edit that resolved the situation [47], consensus established, guidelines implemented. With a clear editor consensus, PC96 did not edit that page again.

After that, and despite it already being clear to this editor what the consensus and guidelines say, PC96 has reverted my edits on other pages at:

Romford [48], and [49], I initiated talk: [50]

Enfield, London [51]

Woodford, London [52] and [53], I initated talk: [54]

Whitechapel [55], I initated talk [56]

Fulwell, London [57], I initated talk: [58]

So in each case the editor does not discuss in talk before editing against a consensus he is aware of (in Romford, his edits removed a comment on the page asking editors to discuss in talk before putting in an edit that says Romford is in Essex). He simply reverts to his preferred version, forcing the case to be re-opened in talk pages time and again. This is a huge time sink, which appears to be a strategy. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:12, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• Not this shit again. Easy resolution - simply block (or topic ban from county related articles) anyone from the co-ordinated little group who continues to push the fringe views about historic counties and refuses to follow the quite reasonable guidelines on this subject. That will sort the problem out until the next account turns up. A typical previous total waste of everyone's time can be seen at a previous ANI here. Black Kite (talk) 09:17, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
  • In fact... if I were not literally about to leave for a few days over Xmas, I would block PlatinumClipper96 for their behaviour here. Going back reverting another's contributions is one thing, doing it in violation of topic guidelines is quite another. PC96 - if you do this once more, I will block you. If any other admin thinks it is deserving of a block anyway, please feel free. Black Kite (talk) 09:23, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
    • Sirfurboy, yes, I see your point and perhaps I did stray off topic. I was just trying to support someone I saw backed into a corner. But, as I said, I have kept out of this latest dispute and so cannot comment on any detail from either side. Incidentally, I need to thank Black Kite for his most illuminating contribution: informative in many ways. A true ambassador for what makes Wikipedia the institution it has become. I too look forward to that imminent Christmas break: surf, stubbies, slip, slap and slop. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 09:45, 23 December 2022 (UTC)
      • I continue to be befuddled by this back and forth about historic counties and the drama it creates. I agree with Black Kite that TBANs may be needed for those who refuse to drop the stick... firefly ( t · c ) 09:51, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

The fact that you are befuddled by the back and forth nature of this (never-ending) dispute is evidence enough that the guidelines need to be clarified. Not referring to the current PC96-SB spat, acting contrary to consensus that contradicts policy is not grounds for a block. Rather, it is grounds for urgently revisiting the guidelines with fresh thinking. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 10:07, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

No, it's grounds for making sure the irredentists who refuse to follow Wikipedia guidelines don't waste any more of our time. This issue has been discussed ad nauseam, so it's time for those on the "losing" side to either accept the result or stop editing Wikipedia. Phil Bridger (talk) 11:16, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

And those guidelines seemingly are being addressed through the proper channels, not by reverting edits and edit warring as PC96 has done on multiple occasions. As already mentioned, a discussion about updating guidelines is very much separate to the discussion of edit warring to force ones belief of what guidelines should be. I feel Sirfurboy's put this already much better than i can, but going through an editors history deliberately to undo and war their contributions when said contributions are in line with all relevant guidelines should never be tolerated.

The fact this is just one example in years worth of similar conduct shows something at least needs to be done to prevent future misconduct. This user has been previously reported for bad faith edits according to their talk page by Uakari [[59]] along the same issue last year and seemingly did not learn from this. In fact, PC96 summarises the removal of their previous warning from the talk page as "Removing rubbish" according to the talk page edit history. Maybe after continued edit wars by PC96, its time we take out the trash? Garfie489 (talk) 11:19, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

@Sirfurboy - utterly misleading yet again. On Romford, the comment left on the page was "PLEASE GO TO THE TALKPAGE BEFORE CHANGING THIS TO ESSEX". There have been several occasions over the years where editors have replaced "east London" with Essex. This is not something I have ever tried to do, and this comment was irrelevant to whether or not, or what tense, the historic county is included. I removed this comment as my edit introduced wording that clearly distinguished the fact Greater London is the current ceremonial county and that Essex is the historic county. As for the Croydon edits last month, Dave Biddulph did not join you in "attempting to adjust the edit - without reversion -to a form of words that did not assert Croydon was in Surrey" - his edit solely corrected a spelling error [60].

"So in each case the editor does not discuss in talk" - another falsehood, just like your claim that I did not take your Chingford revert to talk. I cannot be expected to have the same discussion about the same topic on each relevant article. I engaged in talk at Talk:Woodford, Talk:Romford, Sirfurboy's talk page, and WikiProject London, amongst others. In the midst of discussion, and without engaging in content discussion with me, you continued mass editing your preferred wording, using Google Search to find articles (most of which neither of us had ever edited) that mentioned historic counties in a way you disapprove (as you admit here [61]).

As you seem to have an issue with me reverting your bold edits, it is worth mentioning again the way you trawled through my edit history. You had never previously edited Ilford, Chingford, Romford, Woodford, Edmonton, London, or Enfield, London, amongst others. My reverts to your bold edits (making the same changes on articles about the same topic) are justified. Your mass edits, which you continued making to dozens of articles despite ongoing discussion, were disruptive.

@Black Kite - Sirfurboy's mass edits were bold and the topic of discussion. He continued carrying out mass edits to stable wording across Greater London articles neither of us had ever edited regardless. I fail to see why I was wrong to undo his most recent bold edits and encourage further discussion. I fail to see why it is acceptable for him to carry out reverts to bold edits having looked at user contributions, but not me.

Many of Sirfurboy's bold edits were in violation of topic guidelines. As I point out on WikiProject London and Sirfurboy's talk page, Sirfurboy removed all mention of historic counties from a range of Greater London place articles. WP:UKTOWNS topic guidelines are crystal clear that the historic county of a UK settlement should be included in the lead where ceremonial county is different. Other bold edits introduced misleading wording claiming places ceased to be in their relevant historic county in 1965, which is factually incorrect. There are no consensus or guidelines stating this is correct or what should be written.

Some of these reverts were made because Sirfurboy's version constituted a violation of topic guidance at WP:UKTOWNS. The rest were made because the wording Sirfurboy had introduced was factually incorrect (nothing to do with guidelines) I had never previously edited the majority of these pages, so I was reverting to existing stable wording, not my versions.

The guidance that says "We do not take the minority view that the historic counties still exist with the former boundaries" is in WP:UKCOUNTIES, which is topic guidance for county articles. Saying a place is in a historic county in a town article does not mean historic counties exist "within their former boundaries" or not. I would argue my edits are not in violation of the guidelines, except the line in WP:UKCOUNTIES (guidance for county, not town articles - big difference) saying "use language that asserts past tense". This is currently being discussed, and, as Roger 8 Roger said, these guidelines have been subject to question from a large number of editors. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 11:25, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

@Garfie489 - That was when Justgravy reported me on the 3RR page for accusing them of edit warring. Here's the report. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 11:39, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

@Garfie489 Thanks for linking that past discussion. I see that Uakari stated that MRSC had also mooted a topic ban be petitioned for over this. I also note this very pertinent comment from Uakari in that thread: You (PlatinumClipper96) are aware from all the links I and others have provided to guidance, RfCs and ANIs, that the consensus does not align with your belief in the persistence of historic counties, yet you and a small number of other editors have taken it upon yourselves to disregard the consensus and edit your own chosen selection of articles to match your belief anyway. That is bad-faith editing, which is what this comes down to, irrespective of the fact your belief in the persistence of historic counties is false. You realised you weren't going to get your way by discussing, so you decided to change the articles anyway. I don't really have anything more to say to someone who thinks that is an appropriate way to approach editing Wikipedia. I expect administrators will step in from here, to take action regarding your deliberate disregard for consensus and to clear up your vandalism to the London areas articles in particular, which in the end has added nothing of any import and has simply caused a lot of work to rectify. I'll just wait until that process is complete, and do my best to restore the articles at that stage - I'm in no rush!Uakari (talk) 00:07, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

And incidentally, PC96 is also making this bizarre claim that I am mass editing; even, elsewhere, wikilinking the page WP:MASSEDIT. This page defines mass eddting thus: "Mass editing is editing that occurs when a single editor makes the same change to a large number of articles, typically employing the assistance of a tool such as the AutoWikiBrowser." My changes are bespoke, made over a protracted period to a small number of pages (maybe 25 or so thus far), and are often accompanied by other edits to improve the pages (e.g. [62] ). So like his other accusations of my alleged bad faith, I really don't think this term applies. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 12:00, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

@Garfie489 "going through an editors history deliberately to undo and war their contributions when said contributions are in line with all relevant guidelines should never be tolerated" - the edits were bold and the changes were the same. Previous wording was stable, and had not been edited by me on 19 out of 20 of those pages. Again, the reverts were to address Sirfurboy's new wording that either violated WP:UKTOWNS guidelines by removing the historic county entirely, or introduced factually incorrect information (saying a place was in its historic county until 1965, as if the creation of Greater London in the London Government Act 1963 impacted the set of what are known as historic counties).

Sirfurboy went through my edit history in a similar fashion following my proposed new wording at Croydon he disagreed with, before beginning a series of edits across Greater London articles to implement his preferred wording, rather than engaging with discussion. If the fact I used Sirfurboy's list of contributions to find and revert the same bold edit he made across articles is an issue, why should Sirfurboy's use of my edit history be considered acceptable?

Again, my reverts were to bold edits Sirfurboy made across articles he found using Google Search, about an issue in the midst of discussion. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 12:16, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Sirfurboy went through my edit history. Fifth time you made that accusation. It still isn't true. Demonstration is above. So again, 19 of these 20 retaliatory reverts are to pages you never edited before. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 12:38, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Anyone is welcome to view your edit history following my edits to Croydon on 14th November. You immediately began making retailatory reverts and edits to articles you had never edited before, including here at Romford [63], here at Enfield [64], and other articles I mention further above.

To address your quote from Uakari, I'd encourage anyone to take a look at the context of this dispute in August 2021 on this talk page. It includes the "consensus" referred to (specifically citing an RfC proposing that county articles primarily be about historic counties, and the guidelines in question). PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 13:04, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

That RFC, a 2018 proposal by Roger 8 Roger to change the WP:UKCOUNTIES guideline, was closed with no consensus to adopt any of the proposed changes to the project guideline. Though Roger 8 Roger has repeatedly called the WP:UKTOWNS guideline not fit for purpose and said they would launch an RFC, they have not done so and both guidelines remain. NebY (talk) 13:34, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Thanks NebY for linking. Roger 8 Roger's RfC specifically proposed making the historic county the default meaning of "county". Consensus against this does not mean consensus is against inclusion of the historic county alongside current ceremonial county in town articles.

Often disputed is the tense of this inclusion. I'd argue present-tense wording does not imply historic counties exist or not. I'd also argue that the WP:UKCOUNTIES guidance that they "no longer exist within their former boundaries" is inaccurate and does not reflect the wikivoice (not sure there is any clear consensus, as this discussion is frequent and loud on both sides), but irrelevant to the issue of mentioning "is in the historic county of" in town articles as "historic county" distinguishes it from current administrative boundaries, and does refer to a specific set of boundaries.

Discussion needs to continue, perhaps here, and an RfC initiated with the aim of updating these guidelines to ensure they reflect consensus. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 13:50, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Discussion needs to continue. Sigh. No, Filibustering with walls of words every time you're challenged needs to stop, and you need to stop editing and edit-warring contrary to guidelines in order to force clumsy text into the first sentence of articles in the pursuit of some bizarre political correctness. and an RfC initiated? Initiate it. NebY (talk) 15:20, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Support this entirely. It seems ironic that in an investigation over bad faith edits, PC96 is engaging in bad faith edits as their defence. As Sirfurboy states, theyve made the same disproven accusation 5 times - and they appear well aware of the correct procedure's for consensus on their opinions, and Wiki policy.... yet still still choose not to pursue these methods and instead default to edit wars. Unless i have anything to contribute, i will refrain from further comment because its clear filibuster by PC96 will just fill this page to the point its hard to moderate. Garfie489 (talk) 15:48, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

This is ridiculous. The edit history shows a pattern of WP:NOTHERE. Disruptive editing on a single topic and endless forum shopping. Should be blocked. MRSC (talk) 13:13, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

@Black Kite, MRSC has reverted my reverts to Sirfurboy's bold edits at Kevington, London, Hatch End, Bexleyheath and New Addington, in which he removed any mention of the historic county.

You said if I were not literally about to leave for a few days over Xmas, I would block PlatinumClipper96 for their behaviour here. Going back reverting another's contributions is one thing, doing it in violation of topic guidelines is quite another. PC96 - if you do this once more, I will block you.

Has MRSC not, by your logic, reverted in violation of topic guidelines, which clearly state the lead should include the historic county if a place's current/ceremonial county is different? PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 13:16, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• It's very simple really. I was born in Middlesex, but my birthplace, Pinner (where, as it happens, I could see Hatch End from my bedroom window), became part of Greater London two days before my seventh birthday, and it has been so since. At the same time the local authority area became the London Borough of Harrow (yes the London borough). We have given the fringe editors more than enough opportunity to deny the reality as it has stood for more than half a century, so it's time now to get them to accept it, at least as far as editing Wikipedia articles is concerned. If they will not accept it voluntarily then we need to force them to by blocking. Phil Bridger (talk) 18:12, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

  When I saw the word Middlesex I almost moved this to the "pregnant person" thread. EEng 20:03, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

  The East, South, West and Middle Saxons gave their names to Essex, Sussex, Wessex and Middlesex respectively; but what became of the North Saxons? The answer is that they settled in Nosex, and failed to thrive. Narky Blert (talk) 08:00, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

  If it wasn't the season of goodwill I'd tell you to get your coat. Phil Bridger (talk) 17:24, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

@user:Phil Bridger, you said, "It's very simple really. I was born in Middlesex, but my birthplace, Pinner (where, as it happens, I could see Hatch End from my bedroom window), became part of Greater London two days before my seventh birthday, and it has been so since." Yes, I agree. So what? What is your point? Forgive me, but this sort of thinking amounts to background clutter from editors who do not really xxxxxx (well, I will leave what I was about to write to your imagination). Comments like this made repeatedly by different editors make me dispair. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 23:09, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Then despair. Regardless of anything else, the edit warring and retaliatory editing of PC96 deserves a block. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 20:05, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

I would accuse Sirfurboy of doing exactly that, but on a much larger scale. It took him 9 minutes to revert my bold edit to Chingford. He went on an editing spree, rummaging through articles I had edited following my initial encounter with him at Croydon, as explained above. Do his reverts and retaliatory editing not constitute edit warring? Sirfurboy has now reverted all my recent reverts to his bold edits. Some of these bold edits violated topic guidelines by removing any mention of the historic county. Just to reiterate Black Kite's comment: Going back reverting another's contributions is one thing, doing it in violation of topic guidelines is quite another. Does this not apply to Sirfurboy? And why doesn't he discuss my objections to his new "until 1965" wording instead of reverting reverts to this new wording (which would be factually incorrect whether historic counties were abolished or not)?

He is now continuing to rummage through Greater London articles, either inserting this new wording (e.g. [65], [66], [67], [68], [69]) or removing any mention of the historic county from an article (e.g. [70], [71], [72]). Take a look at Sirfurboy's contributions and see for yourself. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 16:20, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

@Phil Bridger "yes the London borough", "We have given the fringe editors more than enough opportunity to deny the reality as it has stood for more than half a century, so it's time now to get them to accept it" - of course Pinner is in London, the London Borough of Harrow and Greater London. I would argue Pinner was in London before it became part of Greater London in 1965, when it was, by all means, in Middlesex. I am certainly not one of those editors who try and claim a place is currently in their historic county instead of London or Greater London. I'd just like to see ceremonial counties and historic counties clearly and accurately distinguished. PlatinumClipper96 (talk) 15:43, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

And why doesn't he discuss my objections to his new "until 1965" wording a few thoughts here:

1. PC96's claim that the 1965 wording is new is incorrect. The wording was already widely used on pages, and I was seeking wording that had an established consensus, so used that. A couple of examples are at Mill Hill and Edmonton Hundred. PC96 only reverted 20 of my edits, after I reverted one of his. He did not revert any others;
2. PC96 reverted to a form of words he knew was not compliant with the guidelines, rather than making any attempt to improve the wording. This is not new behaviour. In this edit,[73] PC96 reverted back in wording he knew had been challenged, and knew was not compliant with guidelines under the pretext that the challenge removed other information that had not been challenged. The other information was changing the word "northeast" to "north". There was no attempt to improve or find a compromise. Clearly a resonable action would have simply been to change northeast to north again, rather than to edit war in challenged material. Objections are just a smokescreen to cover attempts to re-insert this material. He used the same tactic here,[74] and no doubt other places. Again, this looks like a strategy;
3. This report is not about the content dispute itself, it is about editor behaviour. A long running campaign by an editor to insert wording in many articles for reasons of WP:POVPUSHing that introduces a litany of edit wars (e.g. his 18 attempts to assert the wording over a 20 month period at Chingford, most recently being opposed by LondonEast4 among others). I have quoted Uakari above from previous disputes where he has said That is bad-faith editing, which is what this comes down to, irrespective of the fact your belief in the persistence of historic counties is false. You realised you weren't going to get your way by discussing, so you decided to change the articles anyway.;
4. I note that throughout this case, PC96 has failed to acknowledge an issue or apologise for these actions, but he has doubled down on them by attacking me. I expected that attention, as I brought the ANI case, but there is plenty of evidence above that this editor has warred with very many editors over a very long period. His attempts to ask "what about..." (whataboutism) rather than acknowledge an issue with his own behaviour suggest that the issues raised here are not resolved.

I have never brought an ANI case before, but I believe this issue has been so persistent, and the behaviour sufficiently uncollegiate, that I would like to request the community consider a topic ban. I am at least the third editor (evidenced in this thread) to have made that suggestion. Plenty of others here have argued for a block. I am not looking for an indefinite block of this editor, but I do feel his actions warrant a restriction of some kind upon editing about historic counties.

I am not sure what the process is for requesting a topic ban, but at this point I will address PlatinumClipper96 directly and ask: would you agree to a voluntary topic ban from making edits regarding historic counties, broadly construed? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:31, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Disagreement with RFC heading section

I opened an RFC with a straightforward RFC heading. Shortly after, Iskandar323 added a post in the heading section titled "Text with updated sourcing". I moved Iskandar323’s post to the "Discussion" section and addressed his edits there, but Iskandar323 reverted and left a "disruptive editing" warning on my talk page.

My understanding is that the RFC heading section is reserved for the RFC proposal (rather than for counter proposals, which is something that could be added in the "Discussion" or "Survey" sections). The issue here is that having a counter proposal where the heading is makes it very confusing and obscures any other counter proposals.

Also the bludgeoning has been awful on that talk page (and will likely ensue here, sorry about that). Since Iskandar323 seems to be an experienced editor, I'm seeking input from others. Thanks, and wishing happy holidays to everyone. Iraniangal777 (talk) 15:06, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

An RFC should have a 'name' rather then a 'date', as its title. GoodDay (talk) 15:10, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Well, that's both unhelpful and ridiculous. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 16:40, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

In your opinion, only. GoodDay (talk) 16:46, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Next time, you should probably open a plain discussion with your proposal, rather than an RFC. That way, other editors would have been able to improve sourcing, bring up alternative proposals that could be part of an eventual RFC, etc. RFCs are not meant to be a way to force others to a vote without meaningful discussion. Adding an update to the header made sense, because the RFC proposal made an explicit mention of a single source, while other sources were added later. It would be misleading if the RFC still implied there was only one source. MarioGom (talk) 16:21, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Or for those who prefer wiki-jargon, WP:RFCBEFORE. 100.36.106.199 (talk) 16:40, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

You shouldn't move other editor's posts in a discussion, even if you think you think they were incorrectly placed. The moderation of discussions, particularly own's own RFCs or RFCs on the talk pages of pages with discretionary sanctions, is best left to admins, whose help you should request if you think there is a problem. As MarioGom notes, a particular problem with this RFC is that the topic was never even raised in an ordinary discussion before being raised as an RFC discussion, as WP:RFCBEFORE suggests. RFCs are best reserved for intractable problems over which no agreement can be reached through normal discussion; otherwise, for mundane issues, it is really just a waste of community time. Here, one issue that was raised was the singular nature of the sourcing - an issue that an ordinary discussion with other editors could have readily shed light on. The talk page warning was for removing reliable sources from the main article, not for anything related to the RFC. Iskandar323 (talk) 12:07, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

• For the sake of factual accuracy, there was a discussion and a revert before this RFC was opened. My question here is about RFC format standards and whether Iskandar323 is disrupting it by adding his counter proposal in the same section where the RFC proposal is. Iraniangal777 (talk) 07:59, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Many issues at MBC 4

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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First off, I've already requested article protection at WP:RPPI.

Getting to the crux of the problem- there are many Tunisia-based IPs and ranges that have been adding many disruptive and unsourced things for the past two years or so. I've previously asked regarding these issues to another user here, to which I was told to, "report the ranges as they get used and identified". There are many targetted articles from these IPs, but one of the main problematic articles is MBC 4. Looking at it in its current state, there's so much text everywhere (even in the lead), and apart from a few things in the lead, most of it is unsourced.

I'd love to get this article protected (may I suggest for a long period of time rather than just a few months?...), as well as restore a less-chaotic version. Sadly, it seems like one of the oldest versions before all the '102.---' and '197.---' IPs would be from November 2020, especially considering this is one of the following edits.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Magitroopa (talk) 11:34, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Damn...I've seen some poor articles in the past, never one this extreme. I see in the history that various experienced editors have tried cleaning it up in the past, but the IPs are relentless. Schazjmd (talk) 13:56, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Also likely much copyright violating going on judging by the copyright boilerplate in many of the descriptions. Canterbury Tail talk 16:15, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

I cleaned up the lead; an IP restored the old one plus a bunch more fancruft within 2 hours. I think this article will be a losing battle without long-term protection. (I added an "endorse" to Magitroopa's request at RPPI) Schazjmd (talk) 16:21, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

I have semi-protected the article for one year. Let the cleanup proceed. Cullen328 (talk) 16:59, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Thank you, @Cullen328! Schazjmd (talk) 17:17, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

@Cullen328: Unfortunately, it seems like the same IP(s) is rampant at List of programmes broadcast by MBC 4 as well, adding more random things (such as...) Thinking that might need protection as well. Magitroopa (talk) 05:32, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

I have semi-protected that article for a yesr too. Cullen328 (talk) 18:57, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Adikako

I added content to an article, but User:Adikako disagreed and decided to use rollback on my edit and give me a level-2 warning for vandalism. After I asked for an explanation, I was told something that showed that this user didn't consider it vandalism. Aside from vandalism and one's own edits and userspace, WP:ROLLBACK permits its use only for ban/block evaders and widespread bad edits. Obviously this user didn't consider my edit either one of those. As well, addressing such edits as vandalism is problematic from a WP:BITE perspective — and when I went to Adikako's talk page, I found a week-old warning for personal attacks and biting newcomers. Given this pattern of behaviour, would an admin please remove Adikako's rollback rights? 120.21.174.47 (talk) 22:58, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Just so you know, you were meant to notify Adakako of this discussion - don't worry, I've done that for you. MiasmaEternal☎ 23:33, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

Drama, drama. An experienced editor edit warring with people who have voiced their disagreement in a technically incorrect way.

Regarding the personal attack warning, the discussion in question was at User talk:IlIlIlIIIIIlI (permanent link); all that has been removed so far is an automated warning by Cluebot ([75]). Looking at it, I see a slightly inadequate yet understandable response to edits such as Special:Diff/1128251410 and Special:Diff/1128252213.

So no, that alone doesn't demonstrate a pattern of behavior that immediately requires removal of rollback. Asking for permission removal is best done with clean hands; WP:EW and WP:ONUS may be worth a (re-)read. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:41, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

The diffs you provided don't support your statements, IP editor. Your edit was reverted with Huggle, and har an edit summary, and you did not get a warning for vandalism but for disruptive editing. --bonadea contributions talk 23:46, 25 December 2022 (UTC)

I'm not going to say if I was in the right or wrong, but threatening to report me to ANI for "being reckless" is not a good move. In my case it was a misunderstanding from their edits, but their edits seemed like vandalism to begin with. RPI2026F1 (talk) 00:00, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Regarding the assertions that Adikako has a "pattern of problematic behaviour", if you go and check out any RC patrollers talkpage, there will inevitably be plenty of complaints, unless they remove or archive them. Most editors need a BITE warning now and again, it's not that unusual. Making a single personal attack is hardly grounds for removal of rollback permission.

On the other hand, you didnt even wait for a response to your query on their talkpage before reporting them. Within 5 mintues of starting editing, you were (ironically) threatening to take someone to AIV. Within 10 minutes of starting to edit you had already decided to take Adakiko to ANI. If your IP wasn't an Australian Vodafone address, I'd think you were WP:BKFIP. Mako001 (C)  (T)  🇺🇦 06:05, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Emmanuelope comes again without consensus nor discussion

• Emmanuelope (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

This following user, Emmanuelope has come back to Wikipedia and appears to only serve the purpose of disrupting Wikipedian contributions. Since they've returned (they go hiatus every time they are warned and edit wars begin, gaming the system), they have focused their same disruptive contributions on both Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas articles, replacing imagery with old, outdated imagery without any consensus whatsoever. Others revert their contributions, and yet they steadily continue again. Looking at the talk page history for them at Talk:Emmanuelope, they blatantly disregard any effort for communication. When will this end, administration? - TheLionHasSeen (talk) 04:49, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Lo and behold, they even haphazardly threatened to false report someone who is reverting them for what they've done previously: see diff history. - TheLionHasSeen (talk) 04:55, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

• Mm. For an editor with only 44 mainspace edits, Emmanuelope is racking up an impressive number of reverted edits coupled with a near-complete lack of response to invitations to gain consensus for their changes on the appropriate talk pages. Ravenswing 05:35, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Very. - TheLionHasSeen (talk) 14:18, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

IPv4 user: edit warring, personal attacks, threats of sock puppetry

• 142.198.135.5 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

1. Edit warring on A.N.S.W.E.R.: [76] [77] [78] [79] [80]
2. Unsourced POV on Kateri Tekakwitha: [81] [82]
3. WP:ABF begins: [83] [84]
4. Personal attacks: [85] Future sock puppet [86]

Elizium23 (talk) 08:31, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

That looks like block evasion by Herede. JBW, Ponyo, you've interacted with that user, am I wrong? Just my two eurocents, but that looks like a user capable of contributing usefully to the encyclopaedia if the behavioural problems could just be sorted out. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 09:41, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Justlettersandnumbers I totally agree. Someone like this might get quite a large proportion of the editing they would like to do established if they would be willing to cooperate and compromise, instead of getting scarcely any of it to stick because they prefer to behave so uncooperatively. However, my experience over the years is that, unfortunately, such people are never likely to reconsider their ways. As for being Herede, I don't think there's any doubt about it. I have blocked the IP address for a few months, but of course the person will fulfill their promise to just come back on another IP address. My experience is that the one hope of making any progress with someone like this is to try to block each IP address as soon as possible after it comes into use, and revert all their editing, so that they learn that their repeated block-evasions achieve nothing. I will also look to see whether any page protections are worth considering when I have more time. JBW (talk) 15:28, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Wikiman92783

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Wikiman92783 (talk · contribs)

On Turkish language: "Lick my b... n...". Also possibly abusing other IPs: [87], [88]. Beshogur (talk) 11:44, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

IP editing from 85.104.52.110 blocked for 1 month; Wikiman92783 blocked indefinitely for personal attacks after a block for the same behavior, disruptively editing while logged out, and edit warring. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 20:49, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

User:Randy Kryn reported by User:Fountains of Bryn Mawr

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Page: Milky Way (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

User being reported: Randy Kryn (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Previous version reverted to: [89]

Diffs of the user's reverts:

1. [90]
2. [91]
3. [92]
4. [93]

Diffs of edit warring / 3RR warning: [94]

Diffs of attempt to resolve dispute on article talk page: [95] - Long rambling unfocused (multiple conflicting suggestions and cross talking) discussion stalled and editors seem to have gone on to other things - so no apparent consensus for change. Revert war stopped by admins and page restored to WP:STATUSQUO and protected[96][97]. Randy Kryn has started reverting again[98], Tried reverting to WP:STATUSQUO with suggestion to use talk page and reach consensus[99] first but they reverted again[100]. Fountains of Bryn Mawr (talk) 14:59, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

• Good, we may finally get this long discussion resolved. First of all, there was no chance of a 3RR violation, I know and respect the barrier. The result of the dispute seems obvious to me, per two firm MOS guidelines, page and site consistency, and a recently closed RfC. But this may need another time-consuming RfC, which is where this seems headed (and seemed headed per the discussion but then it stalled weeks ago so you and I have kick-started it again). Good research and links by the way, you seem dedicated to your viewpoint in this dispute which is commendable. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:11, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

  Umm. We've had this before, I think. I had even fully protected the page. Randy Kryn and Fountains of Bryn Mawr, are you asking for indefinite partial blocks or what's the point? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:34, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Per page status quo I've changed it back to the incorrect form (per site wide consistency and MOS), was going for sitewide statusquo. As for me, no block requested of course, have never asked for one for anyone - as Wikipedians we can work things out and this issue seems to have now been focused upon again so maybe we can get some resolution to the concerns. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:42, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

The first step of working things out could be stopping to revert even if the current state of the article doesn't match your favorite state of the article. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:44, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I changed it back to where Fountains of Bryn Mawr claims page status quo. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:46, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, I had first not seen, and then misread, Special:Diff/1129667525. Well then, I think there's nothing administrative left to do here. The article now has a tag saying "The factual accuracy of part of this article is disputed", which seems to be an overstatement if I understand the dispute correctly, but I guess anything that attracts attention to the talk page is beneficial in the end. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:53, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

This discussion has resulted in an RfC, so thanks to all involved (may finally get this page question resolved): Talk:Milky Way#RfC on our Solar System vs the Solar System. Randy Kryn (talk) 02:01, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

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Someone who is not here to act wisely and beautifully

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Wise and Beautiful Editor (talk · contribs)

This user's very first edit was to jump into a contentious argument on a talk page and use the {{hat}} template with a snide remark. Their second edit was to create a new section on the same talk page calling for another editor to be topic-banned. Other contributions for this editor:

• I’m sorry it’s so difficult for you to accept reality, friend [...] Now stop using this talk page as a blog for your ludicrous and banal political views.
• You are probably one of the 5 worst and most brazenly ideological editors on the entire site; you literally do nothing but post inspirational Alexander Hamilton quotes and 3000 word essays on your banal political views

They have been warned more than once, and do not seem interested in stopping ("Removed rude editor's "comment". If you're going to post a form letter, don't post at all jackass").

This seems to me like a sock of another editor, User:Tritler, a previously indeffed SPA made to be rude on that same talk page (and with the same arguments). Either way, however, it does not seem like they are here to build an encyclopedia. jp×g 15:26, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Look, the person whose misconduct you should be discussing is User: Greg L. Multiple other threads have had to be closed on that talk page due to Greg's repeated gross violations of Wikipedia's Not Forum policy. You want to see the conspiracy theory forum post I was trying to remove? Here:

"Why the hell are we still discussing this? Roth went into hiding for fear of his life after Musk published a portion of Roth’s Ph.D. thesis because it was too sexually left-field for the denizens of San Francisco. Mentioning it in this article would be a galactic WP:BLP violation given the circumstances.

I’ll answer my rhetorical question as to why we’re still discussing this:

We’re still discussing the issue of how “Musk seemed to suggest that Roth wants to sexualize Mormon youth and expose them to pedophilia, which was all debunked long ago” is because all this drama is just a multi-layer facade over the real, central issue. Roth had been working behind the scenes to censor the story about Hunter Biden’s laptop and squelched and silenced any voice that brought up the subject in a manner contrary to Dems. And by “Dems,” I mean Twitter personnel too because, after all, Twitter is headquartered in San Francisco and filled to the rafters with young idealistic tech workers with rampant self esteem.

Roth himself (now that he’s out of a job) admitted that those actions were sort of an *oopsy*. The only voices allowed on Twitter discussing the Hunter Biden laptop story were people like Adam Schiff, who were declaring that the story was fabricated Russia propaganda and it had been “debunked long ago.” Schiff had to know the truth.

Now that Musk fired Roth and demonized him with that tweet (that was obviously Musk’s intent), and now that Musk is revealing the truth regarding how the Hunter Biden laptop story was censored by Twitter, it’s an embarrassment for Democrats. And now the Dems don’t like Musk. I get that. But that’s just tough for them and they can take a bite of that Waaaaah-burger. You can’t keep a conspiracy of even three people secret indefinitely unless two of them are dead. It utterly baffling that the Dems could possibly think they could forever conceal this and that the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth wouldn’t eventually come out.

The other, second layer of the multi-layer facade is Wikipedia is written by wikipedians and they’re human. And now that America is so God-damned polarized, there are conservative wikipedians right here, on this very talk page, battling with liberal wikipedians, all of whom are beating around the bush making abstruse arguments, pretending to don their virtual powdered wigs and quote constitutional law, and quoting this & that, all in a vain effort to seem smart-smart, reasonable, and unbiased. Horse feathers. No one is pulling the wool over anyone else’s eyes.

Before an RS reports on what Musk “seemed to suggest,” they best report what both Roth and Musk "actually wrote” so readers can make an informed decision. And when the RSs don’t, an encyclopedia shouldn’t be running about quoting news sites that make the most sensational claims. Why? Because Wikipedia is not a newspaper or gossip column. An enclopedia faithfully and accurately provides the full and true facts so readers can properly understand the issue. [*sound of audience gasp*] To do otherwise and let partisan gamesmanship undermine a properly formed consensus on these talk pages erodes Wikipedia’s articles and turns us into the National Inquirer. Greg L (talk) 07:08, 18 December 2022 (UTC)"

How exactly is this editor allowed to get away with using Wikipedia as a blog for posting this, repeatedly? This is not an isolated incident. Wise and Beautiful Editor (talk) 15:59, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Wise and Beautiful Editor blocked indef by Bbb23. Sarrail (talk) 16:32, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

• No comment on the merit, but two comments on the style: Including the ATP, this is the second time an editor has made a snarky remark about this new editor’s username. Please WP:NOBITING. Secondly, the comment “This seems to me like a sock of another editor,” is out of line. There is an open, baseless SPI [101] against user: Soibangla that includes her name which I think should end in a boomerang. In any case, let that play out at SPI and not be brought up at ANI concurrently. That article page is a mess right now and likely could benefit from multiple time outs. Wise and Beautiful Editor is not the prime offender. O3000, Ret. (talk) 16:34, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

  Dear Admins: we need more of you, please, to join the small number who actively keep an eye on these hotbed articles and offer warnings or guidance real-time. Otherwise, by the time a case shows up at AE or ANI, it's very difficult to parse the dynamics of the page editing and behavioral environment, due to highly motivated complainants and cherrypicked diffs. SPECIFICO talk 17:04, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Agreed -- the current mechanism for maintaining civility on this talk page is basically that it only happens after someone gets dragged to a drama board. And this is mostly done by political enemies, which means we have to choose between "participating in a process of retaliatory reporting" and "doing nothing about people saying grotesque things to each other". Quite unfortunate. jp×g 17:10, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Eh, well, the problem starts at RfA, which has been such a snakepit for so many years, and has long been a contributing factor in many able and active editors wanting no part of it ... so that a single new admin a month is doing well for these days. The process needed to be taken out of the community's hands long ago, but that's a problem that's outside of ANI's remit, and has long been insoluble anyway. Ravenswing 19:08, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

@Objective3000: It's true that this person is not the sole cause of rancor, but they were certainly not helping. And it doesn't seem likely to me that soibangla was involved here, but the talk page in question has been getting attacked by socks for weeks (I gave my reasoning for this person being a sock in the original post here, and they have since been confirmed by CU). The outcome of the soibangla thing shouldn't have any bearing on this, which would be grotesquely uncollegial WP:NOTHERE conduct regardless of socking. jp×g 17:07, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

The major cause of disruption on the TP are Greg L (who failed to get Soibangla blocked this morning) and Trueitagain. The major causes of disruption in the article are Trueitagain and numerous, new IPs which is why I asked for PP this morning. All of this disruption is on the opposite "side" of the arguments from the just blocked editor. No one has brought the major offenders to any admin site. O3000, Ret. (talk) 17:17, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

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Misrepresenting sources in astrological sign articles

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176.143.3.201 (talk · contribs) repeatedly changes the dates the sun enters and leaves the signs of Gemini and Cancer (astrology) to dates different than provided in the cited source, Encyclopedia Britannica. I left a talk page warning, and Aloha27 (talk · contribs) left a final warning. The user has not engaged in any discussion. Jc3s5h (talk) 17:39, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) They just violated WP:3RR at both articles, and I have reverted for the fifth time. You could have gotten a faster response had you issued a 3RR warning and then reported to WP:AN3. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 18:48, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

True. Blocked for two weeks though; the only edits the block will likely prevent are further edit warring. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 21:04, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

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All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office

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Since 18 December the editor User:49.248.75.82 has made several contentious edits to All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office. See this for the most recent example. All those edits have been reverted, two editors have repeatedly asked the IP (in edit summaries and on the IP's Talk page) to discuss their desired content on the article Talk page, all of those requests have been ignored, and there is no indication the IP is going to stop. This disruptive behavior is not distinguishable from vandalism, so page protection or a topic ban is here requested. JoJo Anthrax (talk) 18:23, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Blocked – for a period of 72 hours: User talk:49.248.75.82#Partial block. El_C 20:02, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

• What nincompoop came up with a name like All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office? It sounds like something out of Brazil (1985 film) --perhaps downstairs from Information Adjustments. EEng 10:05, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Dubious narrative pushed with provocative edits by User:Niyskho

User:Niyskho seems to have an agenda against Chechens, removing the mention of them in several articles (1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Here he claims that the "Chechens were relatively recently invented by the Russian conquerors", a very dangerous statement which has no place on Wikipedia and reminded me of a series of vandalistic edits by various allegedly Ingush editors against Chechen articles in the past, see this --Reiner Gavriel (talk) 21:30, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

I noticed this issue here: Chakh Akhriev on Dec. 22. I decided to wait and see what the editor's subsequent edits would be, and they are what I expected. This editor's overall approach is untenable —Alalch E. 21:58, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

Note that there is a related section above: #Vandalism and slander by the user Reiner Gavriel —Alalch E. 22:41, 26 December 2022 (UTC)

The mention of the Chechens was removed because there is no mention of them in the sources! In the same article about the Ingush society "Vyappiy" there are no mentions of Chechens in the sources, you are confusing Vyappiy with Akkins, and this is a very gross mistake!

I did not insult the Chechen people, I only cited a historical fact that was said by the Caucasian scholar "Nikolai Yakovlev", you better not raise the topic of who offended whom, because you yourself switched to insults here

And I note that I add information exclusively with sources, and delete texts in which there is no evidence, and you are engaged in vandalism, I asked you to discuss the problem with me in the "discussion" section here. But not only did you not respond to my call to discuss this problem, you also started an "edit war", so follow the rules of Wikipedia, and stop your Vandalism, and your friend (who also has not the best reputation) should not have been dragged here . Niyskho (talk) 00:09, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I will ask the administration to notice how many useful edits this user cancels, just compare my contribution and his contribution to the development of these articles: 1,2, 3, 4. For now, I will refrain from editing these articles until the administration makes a decision regarding the vandalism of this user, he once again canceled my edits. Niyskho (talk) 00:20, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

1. I am not confusing the Vyappiy with the Akki people. You are more than aware of that. I have checked the Russian Wikipedia article on the Vyappiy and it is you again who removed the mention of Chechens in the article. I find this very suspect.

2. The "insult" you are accusing me of is not an insult, I am merely talking about the creation of Ingushetia as a republic. Prior to that, many of the tribes that are part of Ingushetia today did not consider themselves as Ingush.

3. You asked me to engage in the talk page after deleting nearly the entire article (see edits prior and after)

4. See above. You basically deleted most of the article, so I simply re-edited the text back in.

--Reiner Gavriel (talk) 00:59, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• 1. What was in the Russian Wikipedia, and what is happening here in the English one are completely different cases, we are now talking about the fact that you attribute the Ingush society "Vyappiy" to the Chechens without evidence, although this society has nothing in common with the Chechens, just and there is no evidence for this in the sources.

• 2. You know perfectly well that this is a violation for the Ingush. Just the same, all Nakh groups united under the common self-name "Galgay", and this is a historical fact.

• 3. Where did I delete the entire article? I just made the article even better and more informative, what kind of slander is coming from you? My work, Your vandalism

• 4. Another violation in your piggy bank, for insulting and slandering me. Niyskho (talk) 01:31, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  stop your Vandalism | you are engaged in vandalism | the vandalism of this user | My work, Your vandalism. @Niyskho: WP:NOTVAND. Mako001 (C)  (T)  🇺🇦 03:49, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• Niyskho this person is suspected of using multiple accounts. Banned for bypassing a block in the Russian Wikipedia project and using multiple accounts.--Товболатов (talk) 15:16, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• And are you writing this? A proven virtual which of several accounts is engaged in vandalism and propaganda on the Russian Wikipedia? it's funny to hear that from you. Niyskho (talk) 19:27, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Page editing conflict and trolling

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• Larry Keel (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)
• Melcous (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Floydiantrooper (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

I'm slowly working in updating a page, Larry Keel the musician, and another editor User:Melcous, has started to take over and remove things faster than I can keep up with and mostly unwarranted. The edits I make are in line with overall guidelines, even if she doesn't see it that way. I can cherry pick things from the guidelines to crop on other people's edits as well, but don't. I've told her I'm trying to slowly make a ton of update stories this page and she keep changing things and making edits while I'm trying to work. I'd like the page locked and me allowed to work on it this week beofe either gets opened. She is actively trolling the site of a wonderful musician thst I'm trying g to make sure has a proper page that accurately and factually describes the artist. This is ridiculous and is creating a page that iant even accurate. She isn't worried about accuracy or helping me make a good artists page, she is just trolling and attacking the content. Floydiantrooper (talk) 00:13, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

You described your edit here as "just factual", when it's overtly promotional. Perhaps you're too much a fan of this musician to write about him dispassionately. You should be discussing the content disagreements on the article's talk page. Schazjmd (talk) 00:28, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• The OP failed to notify Melcous of this complaint. I've indeffed the OP for disruption, including promotion and personal attacks.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:34, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

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Trueitagain

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Single-purpose account whose entire edit history consists mainly of accusing editors of bias and a leftist conspiracy, pushing unreliable sources and questioning apparently good sources despite repeated warnings on their talk. WP:SPA, WP:NPA, WP:NOTHERE, WP:IDHT, WP:RGW [103] [104] [105] [106] [107] [108] [109] [110] [111] [112] [113] [114] Andre🚐 04:34, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

The user is badly behaved, but then they're new (or I'm AGFing that they are). I've posted a last warning. No prejudice to any other admin deciding to block right away. Bishonen | tålk 11:40, 27 December 2022 (UTC).

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User:Tony1

Tony1 has been warned several times about misleading edit summaries and false reasoning given for edits he has made to various lists of shipwrecks and ship launches.

• 1st edit; to list of shipwecks in January 1887. Edit summary was "Script-assisted style fixes, per MOS:NUM". I explained that MOS:NUM did not cover flags, but WP:FLAGCRUFT did, and that there were difficulties in changing {{flagcountry|UKGBI}} to {{flagu|UKGBI}}.
• 2nd edit; to list of shipwrecks in July 1889. Edit summary was "Script-assisted style fixes, avoid flags in infoboxes". As there are no infoboxes in use in the list, I issued a clear warning that removal of flags with misleading edit summaries would result in this being taken to ANI.
• 3rd edit to List of ship launces in 1806. Edit summary was "Script-assisted style fixes, per MOS:NUM". Again this edit does not fall under MOS:NUM.

So, the issues caused have been clearly explained to Tony1, and yet he seems not to care. Both warnings were removed from his user page so he has read and understood them, yet carries on making the edits and leaving false edit summaries. Not sure what the solution is here, either a ban on using the script, or a ban from editing lists of shipwrecks and lists of ship launches, but something needs to be done. Mjroots (talk) 06:32, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Tony1 has been notified of this discussion. Mjroots (talk) 06:34, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I don't see the seriousness of this needing to be brought here. What if the edit summary were changed to "Script-assisted style fixes". I would consider this a slightly inaccurate edit summary of little consequence, not a misleading edit summary as if a vandal were trying to hide something. MB 07:03, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

@MB: there are two issues. Firstly the misleading edit summaries, and secondly the disruption these edits are doing to the lists of shipwrecks and ship launches. The use of flags in these types of lists is well established. WP:FLAGCRUFT does not apply here. If an editor uses a script, they are still responsible for all aspects of editing using the script. That includes the accuracy of edit summaries. Mjroots (talk) 07:16, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Question, why do you think a section of the MOS not apply in this particular area? To my understanding local projects cannot override the MOS. Common use doesn't mean correct and I think those flags should all be removed (but not replaced by country acronyms.) Too many areas, small projects etc, are spamming pointless low res flags that don't serve any purpose other than decoration in many areas of the project. Canterbury Tail talk 13:38, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree. But flags are everywhere when it comes to ships. I could see one in an infobox on individual ship. But in these list articles, they are a garish distraction. I would like to see them gone too, but that is a conversation to be had somewhere else. MB 01:32, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

I stopped editing lists-of-shipwrecked articles some weeks ago. I don't see the problem. Tony (talk) 07:47, 27 December 2022 (UTC) Ah, I see one edit to a list of ship launches. The flags were deliberately retained after Roots's complaint a few weeks ago. What on Earth??? Tony (talk) 07:51, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

It looks like I need to spell out how these edits are disruptive. I believe I've explained why the edit summaries are disruptive. Changing {{flagcountry|UKGBI}} (United Kingdom) to {{flagu|UKGBI}} (UKGBI) is disruptive because UKGBI is a meaningless initialism. UKGBI was created as a shortcut to save typing "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland" everytime that flag was required. Apart from that particular disruption, other countries are affected by changing from {{flagcountry}} to . Flagcountry is used specifically to create a piped link, using Flagu instead displays the target, not the intended link. Mjroots (talk) 09:31, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Ah, so your complaint is all about linking country-names, is it? Tony (talk) 02:12, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

No, it's about misleading edit summaries, and the disruption caused by your edits. Particulary after I explained the situation and you removed the post from your talk page. You are at liberty to do that, but it means that the message has been read and understood. Mjroots (talk) 04:21, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

I agree with the editors who think that this is a storm in a teacup. The edits and their summaries fall within the remit of style fixes. In particular the substitution of {{flagcountry}} with {{flagu}} is in conformity with WP:LINKING notwithstanding the "meaningless initialism" of {{flagu|UKGBI}}, which appears to be a red herring. I urge admins to close this thread. -- Ohc ^{revolution of our times} 02:45, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

@Ohconfucius: the changing of {{flag}} and {{flagcountry}} to {{flagu}} across the hundreds of lists of ship launches and lists of shipwrecks may be possible. As this affects so many lists, a full discussion would need to take place before implementation. Mjroots (talk) 04:21, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

User:Beccaynr

Hello, I created an AfD for a bio article and one of the respondents, Beccaynr, has been taking various actions in response:

• Tendentious editing on the subject's article Zainab Salbi in response to the AfD including:

• Edit warring 3RR reverting my edit that removed redundant content about the subject's education appearing twice on the article [115] reverting maintenance tagging edits I added on tertiary sources, especially in the context of the BLP and active AfD discussion: [116][117]. I put a 3RR notice on their Talk page[118], which they promptly removed[119]. In response, they put the same notice on my Talk page[120] despite no indication of edit warring on my part.[121]. WP:NBASIC presumes notability on the basis of secondary sourcing independent of the subject, so without tagging tertiary sourcing appropriately, it could be wrongly assumed that the sources are secondary and providing notability, especially in the context of the open AfD.
• Using a self-published US government source which attributes both the author and publisher as "Bureau of International Information Programs, United States Department of State" on a BLP WP:BLPSPS, and doing so to add contentious and potentially defamatory information about the subject that she called former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein as her uncle.[122]. Individual sections have contributors but the overall authorship is attributed to the Bureau. Also not sure what the jury is on using government reports for BLP sources.
• Mass adding links to book reviews on the article[123][124][125][126][127][128]
• Adding unsourced OR with very serious claims about the subject[129]
• Adding trivial fluff, such as the address of a house the subject and her family moved to[130]
• Adding sources of dubious/unknown reliability such as the Yemen Times for BLP information, including for contentious content like the subject being raped [131][132]
• Despite the AfD pointing out as a prime issue the need for secondary sourcing independent of the subject to show notability, Beccaynr has been adding including but not limited to tertiary sources (examples [133][134][135]) and mixed prose/subject quotes interviews (not independent of the subject and largely primary) to magazines (examples :[136], and [137] which Harper's Bazaar Arabia article even tags it as an interview on the website and mentions "Zainab Salbi tells Bazaar’s editor-in-chief Louise Nichol")
• Copying over "Washington Report on Middle East Affairs" and "reliefweb" sources and information (with some rephrasing) from the Women for Women International article without explanation: [138][139]

• Pinging admins on multiple Talk pages seemingly to try to get me blocked over a tban unrelated to the AfD.[140][141]. The admin determination was "no violation", calling Beccaynr's claim a "stretch"[142]. Despite this, Beccaynr attempted to push the matter further[143].
• Possible WP:TAGTEAM on the AfD by Beccaynr and another editor CT55555. The AfD's edit history speaks for itself[144] but to give one example, in response to a comment by DragonflySixtyseven[145], both started to oppose Dragonfly in rapid succession[146][147][148][149]. Both editors (Beccaynr and CT55555) had acknowledged that they often comment on the same women's bio AfDs together as part of "tilting the scales of gender imbalance on Wikipedia"[150][151]. I don't know if this violates anything so I'll leave it to admins.

All of the above is within the last 48 hours, and I'm concerned this will get worse if left unattended. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Saucysalsa30 (talk • contribs)

• As an admin who is involved in this AfD, I wish to add a few comments to the points raised above (but I'll leave it to uninvolved admins to render a judgment). This AfD has been extremely contentious due to Saucysalsa30's behavior, in particular attempting to WP:BLUDGEON anyone who disagrees with them. Myself and others have attempted to explain that in our opinion Zainab Salbi appears to meet Wikipedia's notability guidelines, with plenty of reliable sources to support this. In response to the discussion, Beccaynr began improving the article by adding sources, which is a frequent occurrence during an AfD and something that is usually praised. I don't believe Beccaynr has done anything wrong here, especially not at the level requiring a posting to the Admin Noticeboard. As an added data point, Saucysalsa30 is currently under an arbitration enforcement sanction, namely a six-month topic ban from the topic of "Kurds and Kurdistan, broadly construed, including Peter Galbraith and Iraqi chemical attacks." I don't think this AfD comes under that topic ban but Saucysalsa30's behavior in the AfD does seem similar to how they acted prior to being banned from those topics.--SouthernNights (talk) 12:06, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Hello, I understand you may want to defend someone whose perspective you agree on on the AfD (thanks for at least disclosing you have been very active on that AfD), so I can understand the stretch to say there isn't a problem with edit warring/3RR (which a whole board is dedicated to), tendentious editing including adding extreme claims about the subject with poor or no sourcing, and other described issues. The casting aspersions is uncalled for too.

Your repeating the same claims contrary to policy on the AfD, including that primary sourcing non-independent of the subject such as interviews with subjects talking about themselves provide notability[152] contrary to WP:NBASIC, got to a point that another admin DragonflySixtyseven got involved to put yours and others' misunderstandings of policy to rest.[153][154][155] Also, WP:NOTTHEM. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 12:29, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

@SouthernNights: I disagree on you assertion that this doesn't come under the topic ban, as the article xplicitly states, with a reliable source, "In 2008, WFWI produced a report with an introduction by Salbi, based on 2004[4] and 2007 surveys of Iraqi women, including Kurdish, Shi'i, Sunni, Christian, Turkmen, and Sabai'i.[16]" The presence of Kurdish falls within the scope of "Kurds and Kurdistan, broadly construed, including Peter Galbraith and Iraqi chemical attacks.", which makes the editor eligible for a block - albeit a flimsy one, but a block all the same. Perhaps one that would allow the afd to run its course in peace (say two weeks?) would be enough to reinforce the "leave it alone" message from the ban. TomStar81 (Talk) 14:29, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I'd missed that. Thanks for pointing it out. But since I'm involved in the article and AfD as an editor, I can't make that call so it'll be up to another admin.--SouthernNights (talk) 14:50, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

@TomStar81 @SouthernNights Something else you missed. El_C has already sorted that out taking that into consideration in case you missed the above diff and with Beccaynr making this point.[156] " No violation. On its face, none of the items mentioned primarily concern WP:KURDS, so even with WP:BROADLY in mind, it seems like a bit of a stretch.". Beccaynr has also apologized for this confusion in this ANI section.[157] Saucysalsa30 (talk) 18:04, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

@Saucysalsa30: you cite this edit as evidence of "unsourced OR with very serious claims". Can you explain how you came to such a conclusion? Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 15:39, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

The "Experiencing psychological abuse from Hussein, Salbi's family sent her out through an arranged marriage to an older Iraqi American living in the US when she was 19 years old. The marriage was abusive and shed escape three months after, but did not return to Iraq due to the First Gulf War in 1990." part was unsourced despite it making significant assertions about a BLP subject's life. It was since fixed as a result of the significant editing going on on the article. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 18:13, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

That text was in the article when it was nominated for deletion [158]. Beccaynr (talk) 18:20, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Saucysalsa30, none of that content was added by Beccaynr. Can you strike that from your report and review your diffs to ensure you didn't make any similar mistakes? Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 18:20, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• The only WP:BLUDGEON here appears to be going on with the OP, who has edited the AfD 20 times, and is still removing citations from the article with, it has to be said, some fairly shaky rationales, despite the fact that the subject of the AfD appears to be clearly notable. Adding that to the fact that the OP already has one topic-ban for being unable to edit collaboratively with others, the fact that this article has at least a tangential connection to that topic, and the fact that they do not be able to use (amongst others) WP:TAGTEAM, WP:NOTTHEM and WP:SPS correctly, I would suggest that there is nothing for ANI to deal with here. I would suggest to the OP that when you already are the subject of a topic ban, subjecting your behaviour to ANI may not be the best idea in the world. Black Kite (talk) 15:59, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Black Kite For clarity, the topic ban was, as conceded by the imposing admin, based on incomplete understanding and not looking through diffs provided carefully, only after realizing most of the accusations were false, and them confusing what different people did. They didn't lift it on the basis that the decision was already made and I agreed to wait out the time. Another admin reviewing it called the sanction decision a "mess" and did not support it, but isn't involved in AE. Just wanting to clarify these false aspersions. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 18:09, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  Really? Can you post the diffs? — rsjaffe 🗣️ 18:20, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Acroterion, could you address Saucysalsa30’s statement? — rsjaffe 🗣️ 18:27, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  Pretty sure the imposing admin Acroterion didn't say anything like what Saucysalsa30 is claiming, as show by these diffs: [159] and [160]. --SouthernNights (talk) 18:34, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  That is just one example, and it was in response to [161], which was the crux of the accusation and on which the tban was based. On AE, they were firm the accusation was true despite these same diffs showing it not to be. After the fact, I pointed out the details again on their Talk page, and it became not a matter of what I allegedly was guilty of, but "litigate individual issues", which is not what that was at all.

  Anyways, the aspersions from Black Kite are entirely unwarranted. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 18:48, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  The admin doing the external review did it over IRC, asking me questions in real time and all. I gave diffs and so on and went for over an hour. Having put in substantial, real-time effort, they didn't see it anywhere near as clear-cut the same way the imposing admin did, that the accuser was not entirely scrupulous (to put it mildly), etc. I later thanked them on their Talk page.

  To give a couple examples of the imposing admin from the time of the appeal of the imposing admin just missing details which were easily cleared up by diffs: [162][163]. Ex: The accuser provided (false) private evidence to ArbCom accusing me of making real-life threats which ArbCom very obviously threw out. Acroterion claimed that I had provided said evidence. The AE appeal, suggested I make it by an admin, did show that Acroterion had made sloppy mistakes with understanding the original AE section.

  Also considering I built and led a consensus with Buidhe, GregKaye, and other editors to dramatically improve an article in very poor shape, the "for being unable to edit collaboratively with others" line is casting aspersions at best. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 18:40, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  For at least the fourth time, I reviewed your conduct extensively, and no matter how many times you assert to the contrary, your topic ban was imposed because you've repeatedly bludgeoned discussions and treated other editors as opponents to be defeated [164]. Your assertion that I imposed your topic ban through negligence, or that I somehow admitted fault is laughable, and I grow tired of hearing it. Saying something a dozen times does not make it true, and there's a consistent thread of IDHT in your conduct [165] [166] [167]. I I have better things to do today than to argue with you. I have warned you. about boundary-pushing [168] This is another example of this conduct, both in terms of the topic ban and your overall conduct. Acroterion (talk) 21:00, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• Before I went to bed yesterday, my plan for today included trying to figure out how I could informally try to deescalate issues with Saucysalsa30 and how to address various content issues in the Zainab Salbi article. I regret that I did not more fully explain my request for clarification about the scope of the Tban as an attempt to address the issue early on, before there might be a blockworthy issue, and my plan was to apologize today. So Saucysalsa30, I am sorry that I did not better explain my perspective, and your interpretation of my comments has given me a lot to consider if I ever have questions about the scope of Tbans in the future. Thank you, Beccaynr (talk) 17:49, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Beccaynr Thank you, I accept your apology. While there are some pending content issues, a couple BLP issues (using dubious sourcing like Yemen Times for highly contentious content is a big one), synth/OR, and failed verification, the big issue is around finding sourcing that according to policy presumes notability. The sourcing added is overwhelmingly primary, tertiary, "staff" profiles on self-published websites, and so on that may add verifiability but do little for notability. Most of the participants on the AfD came after these edits, and didn't dig into the sources (in good faith, I can't blame them for not wanting to waste their time) and context before making a vote on the assumption that sources added = notability. GoodDay below had fallen into the same trapping. The problem we have at hand is: 6 or 7 editors are struggling to find the "secondary sources that are reliable, intellectually independent of each other, and independent of the subject" to presume notability, and this is regardless of the AfD which has already been unduly influenced by the new surface-level. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 19:02, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Thank you, for making me aware of the Afd. GoodDay (talk) 18:32, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

You're welcome. Please see WP:NBASIC. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 18:53, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

• Comment I have closed the AfD in question as a clear snow keep as there was not a scenario where that discussion is closing any other way. I leave discussion about whether bludgeoning existed and by whom to other editors. Note, Sausaysalsa30 appears to have been fishing for their preferred outcome. See User_talk:Liz#Question_about_how_AfD_works. Star Mississippi 19:48, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Appreciate your work on this @Star Mississippi: as well as @Liz:'s usual excellent reply on their talk page. Jahaza (talk) 19:55, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Just noting conversation with OP at User_talk:Star_Mississippi#AfD_closed_3_days_early_despite_non-notable_sourcing (which I have no issue with). I'll be mostly offline for the balance of the holiday week after this evening, so pardon any delayed response. I have given Saucysalsa my blessing if they believe DRV is the answer. Star Mississippi 02:11, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

• Comment. I was fully involved in the AfD but I'd purpose a boomerang. Firstly, on my involvement editor had commented that I violated WP:BLUDGEON in the talk page, Talk:Zainab_Salbi. I might have made a slightly off-topic comment, which I apologise, though I don't agree with the BLUDGEON assertion, however that has already been resolved on the user's talk page. However, looking at this user's encounters with other involved editors, the user asserted that Beccaynr could be canvassing because their involvement with a WikiProject, stating that I came across your userpage and your dedicated efforts to preventing deletions of women bio articles and your membership with WikiProject Women in Red, and of note, which one of the two other commenters on the AfD also belongs (I assume out of good faith that no off-wiki canvassing is involved on my AfD). I have a better understanding now where your perspective on the AfD may be coming from, which is inaccurate and bordering on an aspersion. On User:Liz's talk page, the user left a biased message as the AfD is progressing, commenting that the keep votes are spurious, when User:CT55555 interacted with this user, they commented that other users' activities in the talk page, including myself, are tendentious editing and repeatedly claiming that non-independent, primary sources..., per here. Moreover, despite that others could have reasonable intepretations, the user has stated good-faith attempts of adding sources as being comparable to WP:GAME, per Talk:Zainab Salbi#COI tag. I don't have issues with the editor's interactions with myself but IMHO their interaction with Beccaynr is not ideal. Thanks, if my details are incorrect do let me know, if any parts are inaccurate or confrontational here do reply and I will strike. Note: I anticipate that the opening user might post a reply critiquing my comment, which I acknowledge and respectfully disagree. Thanks! VickKiang (talk) 20:43, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

  See also 1, 2. VickKiang (talk) 00:10, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  @VickKiang This is all a gross misframing, especially after you expressed regret for your bludgeoning to me[169], including "That is unfortunately a bit high, but looking at the discussion overall I do not think I've excessively replied to other comments that would result in others perceiving that I might be bludgeoning the conversation. I unfortunately post long-windedly and sometimes too long in some forums". I'm not going to pull up all your diffs but I'm more in shock with the blatant falsehood in this.

  "the user asserted that Beccaynr could be canvassing" You are not only assuming bad faith, but being dishonest because I made no such comment.[170] I praised and empathized Beccaynr's involvement with WikiProject Women in Red, and said I don't believe there's any canvassing. My kind comment was also right after Beccaynr tried getting me blocked with admins over an irrelevant tban that admins agreed was no violation and giving me a 3RR warning for no reason despite no edit warring. How do you spin that to "asserted could be canvassing"? Saucysalsa30 (talk) 00:52, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  Off topic is not an apology. I’ve highlighted in my original replies that you commented substantially more to than I did, your cherry picking is completely inaccurate. Also in case you missed what you quoted yourself, I do not think I've excessively replied to other comments that would result in others perceiving that I might be bludgeoning the conversation.VickKiang (talk) 00:54, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  I didn't say you apologized. I said you expressed regret for it. Also you should avoid saying demonstrably false claims about people to push actions against them. That is not good faith. Saucysalsa30 (talk) 00:58, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  I guess more explanation is needed regarding which part at all I violated WP:AGF. So in your ANI, you opened with Possible WP:TAGTEAM on the AfD by Beccaynr and another editor CT55555. The AfD's edit history speaks for itself[155] but to give one example, in response to a comment by DragonflySixtyseven[156], both started to oppose Dragonfly in rapid succession[157][158][159][160]. Both editors (Beccaynr and CT55555) had acknowledged that they often comment on the same women's bio AfDs together as part of "tilting the scales of gender imbalance on Wikipedia"[161][162]. I don't know if this violates anything so I'll leave it to admins. WP:TAGTEAM says, in one of the lines, There is no Wikipedia policy or guideline regarding tag teaming. Tag teaming that clearly falls under the narrow definition in this essay generally violates other guidelines and policies such as disruption or canvassing (which are guidelines). A group of editors acting in unison does NOT in itself constitute tag teaming. If you indeed are not trying to comment that User:Beccaynr and User:CT55555 might violate canvass, why would you open with TAGTEAM to begin with, and then post a caution note on my talk page?

  Moreover, I have not said any false or demonstrably false comments. If you strike the part about TAGTEAM, which an user above said that you are misintrepreting, I will acknowledge and strike as well. But your comment as it stands is inaccurate, which is additional to your claims that I had bad faith. To User:Star Mississippi, you said An observed issue is there's a WikiProject Women in Red whose objective is preventing red links and changing red to blue, which includes preventing deletions of women bios. Most (6) of the participants on the AfD were members of this project. I'm not saying with any certainty that canvassing was involved, but a WikiProject dedicated to on-site activism of this nature can be disruptive especially for standard procedures like AfDs. (diff). VickKiang (talk) 01:55, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Saucysalsa30: And also in case you're unaware of this, when you open an ANI and some other editors disagree with your conduct, it's out of procedure to remove the entire thread, which you did, without the consent of other editors. VickKiang (talk) 02:00, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Also, my full paragraph also has the line which I acknowledge, but I don't think that is the case here. In case you didn't read the line don't think, I clearly said I did not bludgeon there, so I'm confused where you got expressed regret for your bludgeoning to me from, but this line is an obvious misrepresentation of the actual diffs. VickKiang (talk) 02:06, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

• Comment. I've started a WikiBreak for at least two weeks, see my contribs. I don't agree with the replies to my comments, and respectfully disagree how my actions were depicted by the ANI filer. However, continuing to comment here would likely generate more heat than light. I appreciate every user who commented in the AfD for their work in building a consensus. User:Saucysalsa30 and User:DragonflySixtyseven, thanks for your constructiveness in aiming to maintain the quality of the encyclopedia. User:Beccaynr, User:CT55555, and User:SouthernNights, thank you for your substantial improvements to the article in question. Also, as I commented here, I am fully aware that my comments could require WP:BOOMERANG. As such, admins uninvolved to this AfD, including User:Black Kite, User:TomStar81, and User:Acroterion, in the meantime please feel free to examine my edits and warn or sanction if necessary if you agree that some of my comments are contrary to assuming good faith. Thanks for your time and diligent admin work.

Thank you for everyone here sincerely for your work again. Bye for now, will likely return to editing again from my Wikibreak after this discussion is over. Thanks for your support! VickKiang (talk) 05:18, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

EvergreenFir

My IP was blocked and appeal denied by EvergreenFir. I edit the wikipedia page for Marion, Virginia, a town of about 6,000. I volunteer to do this so our town can have a presence on the web. All information I have ever entered is factual. A logical, detailed explanation for the block has not been provided to me. That's plain wrong, and so is a 3 month block for no apparent good reason. I fully realize there are ways around it but it's the principle of the matter. I can certainly clearly see why wikipedia is always begging for money when one visits any random page. People are reluctant to support a thing so willing to treat its contributors and/or readers as unfairly as I have been by this administrator! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.234.13.5 (talk) 15:10, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

This needs to be handled through the unblock appeals process, not here. Please see WP:GAB. 331dot (talk) 15:14, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I've checked the page history for Marion, Virginia, and cannot see that any of the IPs used to edit the page in the last 18 months are currently blocked - either individually or as part of a range block. When appealing the block, please make sure to specify which IP you are talking about. Collateral damage from blocks does unfortunately happen. There are solutions, but as with most things in life you are far more likely to find a suitable resolution by being polite and giving full details rather than complaining about unfair treatment at the outset. firefly ( t · c ) 15:20, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

As for "begging for money", that is the Wikimedia Foundation, not the volunteer Wikipedia editors. They have current assets of about $250 million. Cullen328 (talk) 17:02, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

(non-admin explanation) IP editor, the explanation on the talk page for your current IP, 67.234.13.5, is that it's blocked by a different admin altogether, for block-evasion (which is to say that an editor who was registered with a user-name, and got blocked, was trying to use this IP instead of their blocked user-name, so the admin blocked this IP too). I'd conclude that your internet service provider is assigning dynamic IP addresses, so your IP address keeps changing. One of the IP addresses you used had been blocked by EvergreenFir, possibly for reasons that are nothing to do with you. The simplest thing is, assuming you are an innocent WP user who has never been blocked, to create your own proper account, and then you won't be dependent on the good behaviour of those who have, at some point, been assigned the same IP address as you. In particular, if you're using public computers (for example at a local library), you are very vulnerable to other people's behaviour being indistinguishable from yours. Elemimele (talk) 18:02, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I do hate to but in, considering I've been yelled at before, but if possible, you should get a account. Accounts let you not have to worry about this whole kerfuffle. SniperReverter (Talk to me) 22:46, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Repeat vandal

Point me in the right direction, if not here. I've noticed what appears to be a repeat IP vandal on Template:Connecticut Women's Hall of Fame that goes back to October. They have left their contact info in one of the more recent edit summaries. I've temporarily blocked the IP, and protected the template, but am wondering if I should be doing anything else about this repeat offender. Chances are, if they're doing it on this template, they're doing it elsewhere on Wikipedia. — Maile (talk) 17:56, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

TheFanet: personal attacks and vandalism

Could we please show the door to this user, whose second edit is politically motivated vandalism, and the third one is this? Ymblanter (talk) 20:54, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I put a 31-hour block on this account, which is the minimum block template for anything. However, looking through all the guidelines and essays, I must say that I am surprised about how vague and iffy Wikipedia is about dealing with such behavior. — Maile (talk) 23:01, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

I also put a 1-week protection on the article, as it was already changed by an IP from the Ukraine. — Maile (talk) 23:17, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. Ymblanter (talk) 06:34, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Stonewalling by Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel

My attempt to convert Template:2022–23 Top 14 Table into a Module:Sports table standard (1) was reverted by Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel (2). Following WP:BRD, I went to the template's talk page and asked why they did so (3), and they responded within minutes (4). I criticised one of their arguments, though expressed a willingness to help implement stats in the table they wanted to include, if only a reliable source for the stats could be found (5). They did not respond for five days. I admittedly made the mistake of interpreting this lack of response as a sign that it was safe to restore my changes (6). Within two hours of this they came back to revert the changes again with quite a rude edit summary (7). This understandably upset me, and my following unsuccessful attempts – on both the template's talk page and their talk page – at getting them to come back to the discussion show it (8)(9). It did not help that they were continuing to edit the template in the following days, while not responding to my messages (10).

It was around this time that I first came across WP:DISCUSSFAIL, and tried my best from thereon to follow its instructions. I pinged them on the template's talk page and placed a {{Talkback}} note on their talk page (11)(12), but got no response. They did however clear most of their talk page twelve days later with an edit summary that simply read Idiots. (13) I then followed the next step and placed another {{Talkback}} note (14). After eighteen days, they still did not respond. I then took the next step and restored my changes, and placed on the template's talk page a slightly-modified version of the message recommended by WP:DISCUSSFAIL (15)(16). This prompted a very quick response within the hour after many weeks of silence, reverting the edit once again and leaving a short and slightly aggressive reply that did not address any of the points I had raised a whole month prior (17)(18). I sincerely believe that Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel is not acting in good faith and is deliberately stonewalling to avoid discussion, and I am now here hoping to find some sort of resolution to this. — AFC Vixen 🦊 21:27, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

With the greatest of respect, I have found this whole module argument nonsensical, to an extent where I am not even interested to have this conversation. I have over and over in the page's discussion said that the format is the same for all other seasons, so there is no need to change. That was my argument finished and I do not want to endlessly continue it without resolution. Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel (talk) 22:09, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

This isn't exactly showing a collaborative spirit... BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 22:15, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Of course I believe also that I do not show spirit in this reply, same in my talk clear, where I thought all the talk was idiotic, mine included. But I just want to leave this conversation behind without any aggressive attempt to reignite it. Thanks, Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel (talk) 22:28, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Looking it at the diffs, it seems to me that AFC Vixen has been making a good faith effort to improve wikipedia, and is reasonably entitled to at very least a clear explanation of why you believe the template should remain as it is. It's clear that you do think that the status quo should remain, but you haven't clarified why. Just reverting over and over again without any explanation isn't an appropriate response; it's WP:BRD, after all.BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 23:09, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

You did not say anything "over and over". You had only ever replied precisely once, and then disappeared from the conversation. Please understand that this was the problem. — AFC Vixen 🦊 22:30, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Maybe "over and over" was exaggerated, but you also approached this FrenchFootball user was involved in this conflict with you before I was and he has seemed to not engage in any conversation with you. It now appears you only want to target me as I am the one who updated the table continually and actually made a first response. If it was about a topic where there is no normal standard, then I would engage in the conversation very gladly. I am avoiding this so I don't find you an annoyance to an extent where I would be throwing insults, because having done this before and faced the consequences, I'd rather not. Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel (talk) 22:42, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Of course I would have a problem with an editor who refuses to recognise outstanding issues while at the same time blocks any efforts to resolve those issues and uses sarcasm and insults in their edit summaries. FrenchFootball never did that, so why would I have an issue with them? All these tangents you make still do not answer why you think the the current table is better than the more widely-used and feature-rich Module:Sports table, and why a factually incorrect source should continue to be used in the table. To repeat myself, I can easily create a column for the individual bonus points to appease you, but only if there is a reliable source that can verify them. The official table does not have such stats, and neither does Le Figaro, the BBC, or Sky Sports. I cannot understand how you find these concerns "nonsensical" and "idiotic". — AFC Vixen 🦊 23:16, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Nonsensical that you don't seem to have any problem with any previous season, or any season of the the Pro D2, Premiership, URC, Champions Cup, Challenge Cup or the near 150 seasons of the Six Nations. Mikey'Da'Man, Archangel (talk) 10:07, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Why do you keep making these WP:OTHERSTUFF arguments instead of responding to the issues raised? — AFC Vixen 🦊 11:59, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

User:Babylone1969/Tseirpsaduj06

I reported this user to WP:AIV, but it seems like this user's disruptive editing is not quite obvious enough for them to be reported on that page. Aside from these two accounts, they have also edited logged out, e.g. User:176.131.197.220. Their main focus seems to be a fictional album named "Fela Fela Fela" which I cannot find any proof for the existence of, despite this they have added it to multiple pages (see the page history for The '69 Los Angeles Sessions). They have also made some edits that are very clearly subtle date change vandalism, e.g. this unexplainable change, and this edit which appears to be them logged out, under one of their targeted pages. I would recommend blocking both accounts owned by this user, as well as User:62.34.116.136 which appears to be their current logged out address. If there is any doubt that these are the same person then I would recommend use of CheckUser just to make sure, but I believe that there is enough behavioral evidence for CheckUser to not be necessary. VronaMrk30 (talk) 23:12, 27 December 2022 (UTC)

Without evaluating the merits, neither the named accounts or the IPs have edited recently. It's kind of a waste of time.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:55, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Legal threat and obvious WP:NOTHERE

[171] - pretty much speaks for itself. Home Lander (talk) 01:39, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Indef blocked by Bbb23, who beat me by this much. – Muboshgu (talk) 01:51, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Administrator's conduct review request

Could uninvolved administrators look into the conduct of User:Zero0000 in the following talk page diuscussion generally and this this sub-section specifically?

• When asked about use of his administrative tools to remove his edit comment during this discussion, the administrator's response was It didn't have to be removed. I chose to remove it. see here.
• Another issue that concenrs me is his his aproach to BLP, regarding living authors like David Patterson (historian) published by Cambridge University Press or Wolfgang G. Schwanitz published by Yale Press (It has to be weeded out... Schwanitz is on a personal crusade to prove that the Holocaust was inspired by al-Husseini... see here). Generally, the administrator believes the claims about living authors like "Zero thinks X is a fanatic". here is OK and no need to provide links to his serious allegations on the talk pages.

Best regards, Infinity Knight (talk) 12:32, 28 December 2022 (UTC)