User:Herostratus/Cumfart incident

I wanted to check the sequence of events here to make sure I had a proper handle on what happened.

(After this ANI post, other editors began to enter into the picture at Creampie (sexual act) and Talk:Creampie (sexual act) and it gets complicated, so we'll leave those pages.)
 * September 20, 2010. 3:20, I posted an improved version of the article graphic to Creampie (sexual act). Edit summary: "add improved image, see talk". This is the diff.
 * 3:20, September 20, 2010. 3:20. I posted a message to Talk:Creampie (sexual act). Content of message: "I have installed an improved version of the original image, with a little more color (why should the poor woman have to have plain sheets - a nice print is much better). If anyone prefers the original version, we can discuss aesthetics here on this talk page." Edit summary (automatically generated):was "new section", and new section name was "Upgrade to image". This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010. 14:24. I posted another message to Talk:Creampie (sexual act), mostly housekeeping which is not related to this case - I added an Oldafdmulti template and removed the template requesting a photo - but also edited Talk:Creampie (sexual act) to add a link to an old discussion at . (I shouldn't have done that, particularly because I had misremembered the page history and thought that this old discussion had been deleted from Wikipedia; sorry. (Note though that bjaodn.org seems a pretty harmless site.)) Edit summary was "Photo? Please no photo. Also listed previous AfD discussions (this page is actually eligible for a G4 speedy)". This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010, 21:19. RaseaC edited Creampie (sexual act) to restore the previous image. Edit summary was "Undid revision 385846150 by Herostratus (talk) rm nonsense)". This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010, 21:19. RaseaC edited Talk:Creampie (sexual act). Content of message was "I reverted it, there's no reason to change the image." Edit summary was "rm". [This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010, 21:54. RaseaC edited Talk:Creampie (sexual act) to remove my external link. Edit summary was "rm per wp:talk." (In my opinion this was entirely proper.)
 * September 21, 2010. 22:08. I edited Talk:Creampie (sexual act), Message began "'[T]here's no reason to change the image' is not actually an argument. There is plenty of reason to change the image. It's a fairly poor image to begin with..." This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010. 22:10. I edited Creampie (sexual act) to restore my version of the image. Edit summary was "Reverted to revision 385846150 by Herostratus; Please do not characterize improvements as "nonsense", and use Talk page for actual arguments rather than just saying 'No reason for change', thanks." This is the Diff.
 * September 20, 2010, 22:20. RaseaC edited Talk:Creampie (sexual act) Message began "This is an encyclopedia...", went on to characterize my contribution as "inane" and "a joke" and ended with "Please stop." (RaseaC then went on to properly chastise me for improper link mentioned above with, albeit with characterization of it as "purposely misleading". Edit summary was "rp". This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010, 22:21. RaseaC edited Creampie (sexual act) to restore original version of image. Edit summary was "(Undid revision 385994237 by Herostratus (talk) there is no encyclopedic rationale for adding smiley faces to an image". This is the diff.
 * September 20, 2010, 22:29 RaseaC posted to WP:ANI. This is the diff.
 * My next contribution (excepting one unrelated one) was to was on September 20, 2010, at 2:10, to User talk:RaseaC. The message began "Hi RaseaC. Hey, no need to go to ANI (although it's your perfect right and I'm not offended). I have a talk page, and I'm friendly. In my opinion what you want is some form of Dispute resolution..." The edit summary (automatically generated) was "new section". (The title of the new section was "re Creampie (sexual act)".) This is the diff.

Couple points:
 * I think I have stated somewhere that RaseaC had at first reverted without engaging on the talk page. That is wrong, I see going over the diffs. I misremembered, which I should have not done.
 * I'm not seeing any serious uncivility here on anyone's part. Maybe on my part for "[use] actual arguments"; Maybe RaseaC if you want to cherry-pick "nonsense" and "inane" and "maliciousness" and "purposely misleading" or whatever. But that's life in the marketplace of ideas, you can't worry too much about stuff like that in my opinion.
 * There is a case for calling this edit warring, but if this is edit warring I'm not seeing a case where any one party is clearly at fault. It's two editors, not one editor against a consensus bunch of editors or whatever, and if there is edit warring, its not really egregious edit warring, in my opinion. Anyway, no one has claimed edit warring.
 * I'm still not clear what was being claimed, actually. I think ('m not sure) that it is probably sub-acceptable graphics skills on my part. If that is the deal, that would OK. I'm certainly not any kind of great artist (although I have contributed several dozen graphics and I've only gotten a couple of complaints, which were handled amicably.)

Anyway, a couple of passages in RaseaC' seem to stand out to me:


 * "I can personally see no reason for making this change yet the user has attempted to justify the change on the talkpage."
 * "I'm not interested in getting in to an edit war so would like some sort of intervention, though I'm unsure what options are available."

I think a reasonable response to the first point might be "Well, other editors are allowed to explain their reasons for edits on the article talk page, even if you personally don't see the reason for the edits."

I think a reasonable response to the second point might be "OK, here are some of your options, per Dispute resolution..." Or maybe "Have you tried talking to the other user?" Or maybe "This is the admin board - admins perform certain tasks associated with running the Wikipedia smoothly, such as deleting pages and blocking vandals and disuptive editors. Our role is sometimes misunderstood, and so we often get requests for "some sort of intervention" but are unable to honor many of these vague requests as it is not in our purview. Here are some pages that would help..."

I mean, the poor guy was asking for help. Looks like he sure came to the wrong place. In fact as noted above, I had to help out the editor, which I shouldn't have had to do since 1) answering ANI requests is not a normal part of the tasks I choose to do here, and 2) the person had, after all, been a little bit shirty with me, and 3) the person was, after all, opposing me in an editing dispute. But whatever. No problem. Here to help.

The problems that followed after this have to do with what, in my opinion, are structural problems with the way this board is operated, which is a separate issue. Herostratus (talk) 15:55, 22 September 2010 (UTC)