User:SirFozzie/ArbThoughts

I decided to make this page as an adjunct to my talk page and a vow I made a while back to try to explain my actions as an Arbitrator. I don't know how often I'll update it (mostly as the mood strikes me)

This has to do with a recent Case that just closed

This case did a 180 from where I thought it would go to start, and provoked a LOT of thought from me, a lot of it of the "There but for the grace of God go I.." nature.

When the case was accepted, I thought it was fairly simple. Jimmy had promised to review his action (banning an editor from Wikipedia due to an alleged extreme conflict of interest) but had not (understandably, Jimmy has a whole heck of a lot on his plate outside the day in and day out actions on Wikipedia). So, the case came to us. I fully expected that we would end up endorsing the ban. What we got was something different.

Instead, evidence was posted that showed that a senior administrator was operating far outside Wikipedia's norms and policies to prevent what he considered a threat to Wikipedia's core values: Editors who were supposedly paid by a movement to promote that movement on Wikipedia.

As the case continued, a foundation of evidence that had looked solid as the Rock of Gibraltar instead proved to be quicksand. There was no evidence that the person in question was being paid by that movement at all, nevermind to edit Wikipedia. Did the person in question have a conflict of interest, even an extreme conflict of interest? Yes. Had that editor disclosed that Conflict of Interest, repeatedly? Also Yes.

While I cannot get into private evidence (which is of course, private), a lot of this evidence was stitched together through supposition, conclusions drawn from information from multiple sources, and as it turns out in a few cases, completely incorrect information. As the case continued, an old saying from Frederich Nietzche came to mind (and I note its been mentioned elsewhere in discussion of this case so I will not make any claims that its an original thought):

Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.

By that I mean the following: Administrators deal with things like the issues brought up in this case all the time. We perceive people as making a dedicated push to make articles more favorable to their point of view all the time (whether the articles are about sports, religion, politics, nationalist, etcetera). In more than a few cases, there can be multiple editors, in some cases even coordinating with each other to slant articles to favor their side. In one such extreme case, the Committee had to ban an entire organization from editing articles about itself, because of its coordinated attacks on articles about that organization.

But there's a very important line. We cannot become monsters to fight monsters. In this case, a senior administrator thought that they could out other editors (in some cases ferreting out their real-life identity) and use questions about their conflict of interest as a club to keep them from what they viewed as slanting the articles. In their opinion, their real-life identity inherently tainted their ability to comply with Wikipedia's norms and policies. That's where the line was crossed. Their actions (and their actions to discover and report editors identities) crossed a fundamental line that I think was emphasized properly during the case.

Comment on the edits, not the editor

That's a very important line, right there. They went from "these edits are bad, and here's why" to "These editors are bad and here's why". Now, that may seem to be a bit hypocritical, coming as it does from someone whose job here on Wikipedia involves user conduct as much as it does, but even then, we can't go on what we feel about an editor. We have to go on their edits on Wikipedia (be they edits to articles, or communication with other editors) and in this case, we actually had to use their communications off-Wikipedia that led to actions ON Wikipedia (the ban in this case was requested by evidence in a private email)

I think the whole thing is rather sad, really. We just banned one of our administrators who had contributed to Wikipedia for a long time. I personally opposed the ban, because there were other areas that they were doing laudable work in, and it might be a failing of the system that we (being Wikipedia) didn't recognize and correct this behavior until it was so far beyond the pale that two thirds of the Committee members who voted on the remedy thought that an indefinite ban was necessary.

I'm looking at my actions pre-Committee in a new light.. did I do my best to not only be even handed and fair with my administrator tools (the fact that both sides are probably glad to see me out of the area yes, I was harsh on both sides), but also, did I color "inside the lines"? That part I think I did.. others may disagree, but that's the thing.. if I continued down the same path for longer, would I have let my preconceived biases come into play?

For example, would I believe that new users in the topic area were returning socks because I had seen so many sockpuppets in the area before? Or would I automatically assume that edits on contentious articles were always an attempt to slant the article to a perceived POV, because I had dealt with so many previous wars on the article? That's the danger shown in this case. We don't see the line between "fair and unbiased editor/administrator trying to uphold Wikipedia's core values" and "biased editor who sees nothing wrong in violating the norms and policies because "they did it first". We don't see it till we cross it.. or more accurately, when other, neutral people TELL us we've crossed it.

That's the lesson I think I'm going to take from this. How important it is to recognize where the line is between enforcing Wikipedia's rules, and breaking the rules to enforce the rules. Or wondering if its a natural consequence that indeed if you fight the monsters too long that you yourself become a monster.