Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Race and intelligence

User:Mathsci
Not so fast, the community has not finished dealing with this, and we don't have to stop all discussion just because someone has asked for a case. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:57, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

I've been trying very hard not to get sucked into silly edit- and flame-wars with User:Mathsci, but even the very first comment that disagree with him brought forth an immediate barrage of personal attacks. A WQA alert eventually got a non-apology apology, but personal attacks and blatantly offensive edit summaries have continued, and he seems hell-bent on edit-warring to write whatever he wants regardless of input from other editors. There's no question he's made some terrific contributions, but this kind of behavior can't be tolerated. May I suggest a one-day block to help him cool off and reconsider his approach? Rvcx (talk) 20:51, 29 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps I am simply calloused and scarred from exposure to Climate Change Probation related pages, but I am struggling to see these personal attacks you complain of and can only think that your understanding of the phrase "knee jerk" involves some activity I would rather not be familiar with. I am seeing someone who is explaining how WP uses its sources, the need for comment to be sustained by reliable third party references, that quoting something accurately cannot be libelous, and that personal appraisal of an original source is not permissible. However that latter is clearly in the domain of content dispute, which is beyond the remit of this board. Unless you can specify what part of Mathsci's comment contravene WP:NPA, I very much doubt you will get much traction here. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:08, 29 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Dismissing feedback on whether the cited sources support the statements in WP articles because I'm an "amateur" (used many times, of course never for Mathsci himself), accusing people of "making remarks off the tops of your head without any lengthy attempt to look at the sources" (despite repeated reminders that I have actually read the sources) and commenting "like a teenager playing a video game", demanding that I "get some grip on reality (unless of course you want ArbCom to be involved)", yet more allegations that I "hasn't read the sources- just knee jerk reaction", and the reversion of an edit supported by others on the grounds that "if you want to move towardss your 300th content edit do it elsewhere" seem a lot more like attacks directed at me (requiring very childish arguing over who has more "expertise" on the subject) than discussion of the content at hand. I don't deny Matsci's points about how primary and secondary sources should be used; I simply have not been able to verify the original phrasing of the text in secondary sources, and the primary sources suggest there's a good reason for that... Rvcx (talk) 21:21, 29 May 2010 (UTC)
 * My review of the comments leads me to believe that although probably within the realms of a WQA referral - can you provide a link? - Mathsci was contrasting the findings of the third party sources with your own appraisals and, notwithstanding that you may or may not be an expert in the field, that would tend to be in the realm of Original research and therefore not allowable (beyond the fact that Mathsci apparently believes your conclusions contrast to that of the reliable sources). I should note that I am not an expert at anything much than me, but a review of Mathsci's later comments - with the spelling mistakes and grammar - makes me believe that they were a little frustrated and might not have expressed themselves as respectfully as they might have. I would like to see Mathsci's comments upon this. Presently, I feel that this is a content dispute that has veered away from the preferred norms of interaction. Perhaps if Mathsci reviews the matter there might be some kind words exchanged about past comments and everyone can get on with the discussion? I will gently request that he takes a look at this section. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:18, 29 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks LHvU for letting me know about this and your truly horrible wikipun :)
 * Rvcx's edits did not match the secondary source used ; he attempted to analyse the Jensen article himself
 * There was no original research, just a summary of what appears in the secondary sources, a lot of which had been used for History of the race and intelligence controversy. Having produced 80,000 bytes of content with over 80 references, I can't really pretend not to be slightly familiar with the subject, often described as one of the most controversial papers in the history of psychology. A number of other people - from memory these include Slrubenstein, Maunus, Professor marginalia and RegentsPark - confirmed what I said.
 * I did apologize for any misunderstanding twice here (see in particular the final two statements). Mathsci (talk) 08:02, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * 11 hours after your backhanded apology, you reverted an edit with the inappropriate edit summary "Rvcx (talk) no thanks - if you want to move towards your 300th content edit do it elsewhere". (You reverted Rvcx's edit 2 hours after it was made, despite the fact that he noted it on the talk page and appeared to receive acceptance from Professor marginalia, among others, prior to your revert). Your apology appears to lack any sincerity, and it appears 2 hours was not enough to read the discussion that was underway on the talk page. About an hour later, you were reverted on the basis that there was consensus on the talk page that Rvcx's edit was fine, but you edit-warred by reverting yet again here, failing to discuss your content reversion on the talk page. What is so difficult to understand about the fact you need to discuss reversions you make on the talk page and make appropriate edit summaries that don't go against WP:CIVIL and WP:AGF? Are experienced administrators failing to teach you how to appropriately deal with perceived or actual POV pushing, or is it a matter of being stubborn? Ncmvocalist (talk) 10:02, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * And now Mathsci has reverted three times despite an apparent consensus and without a single comment on the talk page where the (minor) change was discussed. Rvcx (talk) 10:31, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Finally I see a potential sign of improvement - he's begun discussing his concerns on the talk page here; hopefully the edits in that discussion and in edit-summaries now comply with the relevant policies and preferred norms of interaction, even during perceived or actual difficult situations. Ncmvocalist (talk) 10:51, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * No such luck; "howlers" right out of the gate. Honestly, there has never been any indication that Mathsci has anything but disdain for third-party input. Rvcx (talk) 11:01, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * (ec) Rvcx is editing too fast and not checking secondary sources. Here is what the secondary source says; :
 * "But he felt that 'the technique for rasing intelligence per se in the sense of g, probably lie more in the province of biological sciences than in psychology or eduaction'; eugenic reform rather than compensatory educationheld out the solution to the problem of the nation's intelligence."


 * I paraphrased this in two distinct ways, the first (diff 1) with the words "in" and "than" missing, and the second (diff 2 and 3) slightly  closer to Wooldridge.
 * He felt that the solution lay eugenic reform rather compensatory education surmising that "the technique for raising intelligence per se in the sense of g, probably lie more in the province of biological science than in psychology or education".
 * He felt that the solution to this problem was through eugenic reform rather than compensatory education, surmising that "the technique for raising intelligence per se in the sense of g, probably lie more in the province of biological science than in psychology or education".
 * I did leave a message on the talk page but Rvcx must have been editing too fast to read them, His version tht he and Captain Occam  have edit-warred back into the article reads:
 * He felt that eugenic reform would prevent this more effectively than compensatory education, surmising that "the technique for raising intelligence per se in the sense of g, probably lie more in the province of biological science than in psychology or education".
 * This is not what the secondary source says. Indeed as the secondary sources say, Jensen's paper starts off with "Compensatory education has been tried and it has apparently failed". There are no comparatives. Anyway since there are two versions I have only reverted twice. On the talk page, Rvcx discusses what the quote means in the primary sources. He says, it means "changing people's biology", but of course it doesn't mean that all. As the secondary source states, "biological sciences" means eugenics:  population control, which in these cases - as several of the secondary sources also say - means either birth control or sterilization. Certainly that is what is in the rest of the summary. Our task is just to paraphrase Wooldridge, the secondary source. This kind of error, apparent with the mention of "Changing people's biology" in interpreting the primary source, shows exactly why we use secondary sources. Mathsci (talk) 11:36, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * I’d like to point out that when this issue was brought up at the BLP noticeboard, Jimbo Wales became involved in the discussion, and left this comment about it. His comment is about a slightly different piece of content than the one that Mathsci is edit warring over currently, but the same principle clearly applies.  According to Jimbo Wales, we can’t claim that Jensen has advocated something unless Jensen has specifically stated that he advocates it—“we need it from his own words, not the synthesis and conclusion-drawing of his critics.”  In the case of eugenics, even though some of Jensen’s critics have claimed in secondary sources that Jensen has advocated this, all that Jensen himself has stated is that eugenics is more likely to raise the IQs of low-IQ people than compensatory education is.  Mathsci is not only edit warring to try and change the article against consensus; he is repeatedly inserting material that according to Jimbo Wales is probably a BLP violation.


 * And this is in addition to his repeated personal attacks, which have been near-constant for the past several months. I can provide diffs of some of the more egregious examples from before Rvcx became involved in this dispute, if anyone needs them. --Captain Occam (talk) 12:00, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

I decided against getting involved in the WQA thread, but now that this has been taken to AN/I, I figured I should offer my opinion about it as someone who’s been the target of numerous personal attacks from Mathsci in the past. In general, the attitude I’ve observed from him is that no criticism of his behavior is ever appropriate because he’s a “user in good standing”. For an example of this, see his exchange with Keegan here. His attitude appears to be that “good standing” is a status that becomes irrevocable once it is earned, and grants immunity from any censure or negative consequences in response to policy violations.

I would certainly hope that isn’t how Wikipedia works. For a user to remain in good standing should be contingent on their staying civil, and not engaging in disruptive behavior, and I don’t think Mathsci can reasonably expect to stay in good standing after his behavior towards Rvcx and David.Kane during the past week, as well as his behavior towards me, Varoon Arya and Ludwigs2 over the previous several months. Assuming it’s the case that Mathsci’s history of contributions does not excuse him from having to abide by policies such as WP:NPA, I think it would be beneficial for an administrator to give him a hard dose of reality about this, and that it would help avoid similar problems from Mathsci in the future if an admin could make him aware that he does not have free reign to ignore WP policy without any fear of negative consequences. --Captain Occam (talk) 00:54, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

I concur with LHVU. This matter is related to the endless disputes about Race and intelligence. User:David.Kane made a post on WP:BLPN essentially arguing that academic sources have made libelous claims about Arthur Jensen, and has been supported in this position by User:Off2riorob and User:Rvcx. Mathsci has pointed out that there is substantial scholarly coverage of Jensen's positions and has explained the substance of this coverage and given citations and links to where it appears. Off2riorob and Rvcx do not appear to have followed up on these citations/links, and Mathsci is expressing frustration that other editors are not doing their reading. I find Mathsci's reaction entirely understandable; sadly, Wikipedia editors cannot be graded down when they show that they don't have command of the sources. In any event, nothing that Mathsci has said in the diffs provided is uncivil, and bringing the matter to ANI borders on the vexatious. --Akhilleus (talk) 04:19, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree. For more background (not related to Rvcx) see this. In short, several SPA editors have been using WP:CPUSH to promote their views across a wide range of race and intelligence articles. Mathsci is about the only obstacle preventing SPAs and other enthusiastic editors from having free reign. Johnuniq (talk) 04:49, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * This is simply not consistent with what happened. Off2riorob and Rvcx followed up on the only citation necessary to validate a BLP violation, the writing of the subject. The violation has recently been corrected as a result of this. Mathsci made efforts for several months to maintain his virulent anti-Jensen material. His behaviour towards other editors during this time was appalling. mikemikev (talk) 06:21, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Frankly, I don't think the content dispute here is that significant. It's crazy that such a protracted discussion was needed to change just a few words to ensure the text is verified by sources (both primary and secondary—let's not get into a lengthy debate here, but suffice it to say I think both are relevant). I have no particular interest in views across that article space.
 * What is significant is Mathsci's stubborn and confrontational attitude, and his assumption that he is entitled to insult and ignore everyone who disagrees with him, even over the smallest details, on the basis of his "score" in terms of number of edits. I didn't think that was the way Wikipedia was supposed to work. Rvcx (talk) 10:12, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * My view, after reviewing what is written since I logged out, is that there is a content dispute relating to the subject, that Mathsci has used terminology that is not optimum, and those instances are being pursued in an effort to limit Mathsci's input in the dispute. The latter is not going to work, so I suggest that the point of contention is taken to dispute resolution; RfC or WP:3O would be my suggestion. To the parties I would comment, Mathsci might consider choosing their words a bit more carefully, and Rvcx, Off2riorob and others should separate the content dispute from the civility issues and find a way to get consensus on the content matter. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:17, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * With all due respect, it seems like LHvU is trying to taint other editors with MathSci's bad behavior. I have been incredibly careful to separate civility issues from content issues; thus the attempt to discuss civility here and at WQA and focus entirely on content at BLPN and the article talk pages. It is consistently MathSci who employs ad-hominem in content disputes and tries to deflect civility complaints with arguments over content. It is consistently MathSci who argues that other editors have no right to provide input, purely on the basis of who they are. It is MathSci who laces every comment with "anyone who disagrees with me is an idiot and they should fuck off" attacks, on multiple occasions actually threatening to escalate to ArbCom purely because an editor had the temerity to suggest that he could be in the wrong. I don't think any one comment is particularly egregious, but the overall message, sense of entitlement, and pattern of personal intimidation are both clear and intentional. At some point administrators should intervene to let him know that such an attitude is not acceptable, regardless of how many "content edits" he has made. Rvcx (talk) 12:28, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Akhilleus: 1) If you are going to make claims about me, then you ought to have the courtesy of making a direct link to the material. Here is the BLPN section in which I raised the issue about Arthur Jensen. 2) The first two uninvolved editors (talk and Rvcx) to comment agreed with me. Jimbo Wales was also supportive. And MathSci has given up on defending the specific edit that we had a problem with, that Jensen "has recommended separate curricula for Blacks and Whites." And the reason that he has given up defending it is that Jensen did no such thing. Now, we all make mistakes. If MathSci would just admit that this claim does not belong in Wikipedia, we could all move on. But, as is his usual practice, he engages in a blizzard of irrelevant citations and ad hominem attacks. This issue in this thread is whether or not such attacks belong on Wikipedia and, if not, what ought to be done about MathSci's behavior. Do you really believe that MathSci's behavior here and elsewhere is not "uncivil?" David.Kane (talk) 12:29, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Some editors in this thread seem unconvinced that MathSci's behavior is unacceptable. Perhaps they are right. But they should look at the history of MathSci's behavior as discussed in previous ANI threads:, , , and. Note that other examples are available. My point is not to claim that MathSci is always wrong (or always right) in these debates. My point, counter Johnuniq, is that complaints about MathSci's behavior are not specific to his edits of Race and Intelligence related articles. His behavior is consistent, as best I can tell, across the range of his interactions at Wikipedia. Rvcx's experience with MathSci is completely typical. Is this what experienced admins want to see at Wikipedia? If so, I have little doubt that MathSci will continue to give it to us good and hard. David.Kane (talk) 13:00, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Let's just take a look at the diffs shall we? The first two diffs refer to: . It was determined by a member of ArbCom that this user was wikihounding me and continued to so under a new account: they have been iinstructed by that member of ArbCom to deists. Next diff from 2008 ends as follows: I would like to add that this matter is resolved, as far as I am concerned. It was unfortunate that Mathsci and I got off to a bad start but the situation has calmed down and I'm sure we'll be able to co-operate in a constructive way in the future. I most certainly do not want to see Mathsci blocked, he has made many constructive edits and is valuable to Wikipedia. He has offered his apologies and I've offered mine for our heated exchange and I believe that no more needs to be said about it. I wish to thank the other users and administrators involved in this discussions for constructive and meaningful comments that helped to diffuse the situation. JdeJ (talk) 20:19, 1 October 2008 (UTC) The fourth diff was about Ethnic groups of Europe where a Suomi editor was removing good edits by which are still in the article. Normal nationalist issues there. The fifth diff is by Danko Georgiev, MD, who was blocked for a week for attempting to out me as Alan Weinstein, then head of department in Berkeley,and actualy a friend of mine. So you get a γ- for accuracy but an α+ for misrepresentation and attempted harrassment. Mathsci (talk) 14:16, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Note as an uninvolved editor, I have made a temporary change to stop the edit-war short of protection and blocks. See my comments at the talk and come to a consensus that does not violate policy. Enough is enough - if anyone involved wants to continue edit-warring about this matter, they proceed at their own risk. Ncmvocalist (talk) 13:40, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't feel that strongly about it and there is no ongoing edit war as you claim. So I have restored Rvcx's version, despite its very mild inaccuracy, which I don't really care that much about. However I do care about secondary sources as they represent one of the pillars of wikipedia editing policy and I hope other editors will continue to respect and abide by  those policies. I'm sorry for spoiling the fun for the peanut gallery. Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 13:50, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I think others can assess for themselves whether there is an ongoing edit-war from just looking at your reversions     . That is, the same person usually doesn't make 3 identical reverts on the same page within 24 hours if that person doesn't "feel very strongly" about something, nor do they wait until the third revert before even bothering to discuss their issue(s). Some people take a long time to learn, but I suppose it would be better late than never. Cheers, Ncmvocalist (talk) 14:10, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Even if this instance of edit warring ends up being resolved here, I hope there can also be a solution to the problem of Mathsci’s repeated personal attacks. This problem has been going on for as long as I’ve been interacting consistently with Mathsci, which is for around four months, and unless an admin does something about it I doubt it’ll be changing anytime soon. --Captain Occam (talk) 14:25, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Hmmmm, by now all these AN/I discussions have become part of "History of the race and intelligence controversy" as well. Count Iblis (talk) 14:30, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * There needs to be an end to the personal attacks on Mathsci, as well. Some of Mathsci's comments do appear to be personal attacks, but so do most of the edits of the people complaining.  — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 14:48, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Comment  At the moment it does seem to be a team of editors picking on me all over wikipedia. It includesd the familiar WP:SPAs: David.Kane, Mikemikev, Captain Ocaam and Varoon Arya. I edit Bach Organ Music. I'm editing Orgelbüchlein at the moment. I have the two main English languages source books by Russel Stinson and by Peter Williams (both edition). I also have also have severaal version of the scores. Previously I created Great Eighteen Chorale Preludes and Canonic Variations. has followed me to this article and has started questioning the sources and the standard orthography. However, in all Bach editions there is now a standard spelling which I am adhering to. Breitkopf used a different convention in the nineteenth century, but adopted a different convention along with all other publishers of urtext editions from 1969. I have both of the German Breitkopf editions. In his edit summaries Varoon Arya has started questioning all those sources: the scores, the definitive book by Peter Williams, The Organ Music of J.S. Bach, Cambridge University Press and The Orgelbüchlein by Russell Stinson, Oxford University Press, the only book wholly devoted to the subject. I am preparing a long table with 164 entries and he inserted apostrophes of the 19C version, which has now been dropped, probably beacuse of adherence to the autograph, now available in facsimile. Why is he leaving such sneering comments, why isc heasting doubt on the sources and why has he followed me to this article? I think this a concerted attempt by a team of 3 or 4 users to wikihound me. Mathsci (talk) 15:35, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Arthur Rubin: even if that’s true, I think when you look at some of the worse examples of this from Mathsci, they’re of a different caliber than anything that’s coming from the people who are annoyed at him. Here’s a small sampling of some of the worse examples of this from Mathsci.  There are a lot more than this that I could provide, but I think these are probably sufficient to demonstrate the point I’m making.

<= The onslaught continues here. I think Varron Arya is trying to provoke an edit war. Fortunately the German 1991 Breitkopf edition is in exact agreement with the two books in its spelling and use of apostrophes.Mathsci (talk) 16:45, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * In response to a detailed explanation from Varoon Arya of why Mathsci’s preferred version of an article violated NPOV, Mathsci writes “Sorry, what you write is nonsense. Please stop wasting my time.” (This was Mathsci’s entire response to VA.) He considered this a sufficient rebuttal to Varoon Arya’s points to revert any efforts to address the NPOV concerns that VA was raising.  I don’t think any of the rest of us consider snide comments like this a sufficient response to policy-based arguments that Mathsci makes.


 * “BTW if you revert my edits you are very likely to be blocked for a considerable period of time, possibly by ArbCom.” I don’t think any of the rest of us have threatened Mathsci with blocks to try and scare him out of reverting our edits. He’s also done the same thing in some of his edit summaries, such as this one: “you'll be blocked if you repeat this POV-pushing”.


 * “From the blog previously linked to his user page, Captain Occam has an extreme point of view in real life, which also extends to forms of holocaust denial.” I think this is probably the worst example, both because it’s false, defamatory and completely unsupported by anything in my blog or elsewhere; and also because I’m of Ashkenazi (European) Jewish ancestry and had relatives who died in the holocaust. The fact that I’m of Ashkenazi ancestry is mentioned in one of the userboxes on my userpage, which I know Mathsci has looked at, because at several points he’s brought up information he found at external sites that I’ve linked to there.  I think he could have known both that this comment was false, and also how offensive I’d find it.  And obviously, none of the rest of us have made these sorts of defamatory personal claims about him. --Captain Occam (talk) 15:29, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Arthur, could you back that up with diffs? Honestly, "most" of the edits from people complaining are personal attacks? I don't see a single instance on BLPN or the race/intelligence talk pages where I've made a personal attack against Mathsci. This thread contains links to dozens of diffs where Mathsci has. The attempt to paint everyone with the same brush in an attempt to exonerate Mathsci's uncivil and domineering behavior is an embarrassment to Wikipedia. Rvcx (talk) 15:43, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Ugh. When are you people going to realize that Mathsci - no matter how much support he has from certain editors and admins - is an inveterate troll who uses intimidation, harassment, political gamesmanship, and other emotional tactics to try to dictate wikipedia content. He is simply not worth the trouble he causes. It's truculent ciphers like Mathsci that make editing wikipedia an excruciating experience.

So long as you all allow Mathsci to turn every page he touches into a full-scale cockfight, Wikipedia will not be the encyclopedia anyone can edit, and it won't be a pleasant place to edit at all, at least not for anyone who doesn't kiss Mathsci's a$$.

No point in belaboring this issue, so I'll leave it at that. do with it what you will. -- Ludwigs 2 16:19, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Did you come here after this invitation from  ? He has a habit of requesting "help" from other editors, either here, on other noticeboards or articles he's trying push his point of view on. Mathsci (talk) 16:51, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Because a polite "this may be of relevance to you" is far worse than soliciting allies with personal attacks. Rvcx (talk) 17:02, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * No, Mathsci; all Occam did was point out that you are (once again) engaging in bad behavior. If I had noticed on my own I would have made the same comment.  I do not need help or invitations from other editors to recognize how badly you pervert the principles of Wikipedia.  I am, in fact, shocked that other editors seem to think your behavior is acceptable.  but that is between them and their own consciences.  -- Ludwigs 2  21:44, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

@Ludwig2, yes your characterization of Mathsci's techniques are fairly correct. That said, they are also tactics being used by you and many of the SPA accounts that Mathsci mentions. The main difference between his edits and the others using similar tactics is that his edits are generally solid, whereas the edits of others are symptomatic of pov pushing. His behavior is not excused by the higher quality of his edits, and neither are the edits and behavior of the SPA editors excused by Mathsci's behavior. At the heart of the matter is the ability to edit wikipedia using well sourced secondary sources with a neutral point of view. Shining a spotlight on his behavior without discussing the underlying context and editing problems is a perfect example of tolling behavior. A.Prock (talk) 17:15, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Aprock, are you accusing me of being an SPA account? Are you accusing me of trolling? Or are you simply diverting attention from the complaint about Mathsci's behavior? I'm sorry, but given the number of people that have had problems with Mathsci, it's a bit ridiculous to argue that all of them were at fault. The pattern is Mathsci himself; if you want to start threads about other editors (including me) then feel free. Rvcx (talk) 17:23, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * @ A.Prock: AProck - I've never had a squabble with you (or even thought badly of you).  In fact, I can count the people I've had squabbles with on Wikipedia on one hand - everyone else on Wikipedia I communicate with well and cooperate with carefully and thoughtfully.  My problem with Mathsci is that despite (or perhaps because of) his obvious skills as an editor, he treats other editors in a rude and supercilious fashion, one that I (personally) refuse to put up with.  If he were to interact with me in a civil and restrained manner, then I would have the highest opinion of him, and we'd get along well.  Because he insists on treating me like vermin, however, I find myself consistently having to clip his wings.  I have no use for people who think they are God's gift to Wikipedia, and I have no compunctions about telling them what I think about their bad behavior.


 * No one gets trouble from me unless they bring the fight to my door, but I have little tolerance for bullies. Mathsci has a long track record of bad behavior, and he has brought the fight to my door more than once.  Until he cleans up his act he should not expect me to be gentle or silent in my disapproval.  -- Ludwigs 2  22:05, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, Mathsci's behavior does cross into the realm of inexcusable on occasion. If you read the WP:CPUSH essay, you'll see that Mathsci's uncivil reactions are one of the typical outcomes for editors working on articles where WP:CPUSH is ongoing.  A big part of the problem here is that there is an attempt to move the discussion away from content and editing issues to personal civility issues.  This is a big reason why there are so many problems dealing with the WP:CPUSH problems.  For uninvolved editors, civility issues are a lot easier to identify, pursue and discuss than content issues. A.Prock (talk) 22:38, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * No, Aprock. The problem here is your attempt to move the discussion away from civility issues (which is what this complaint is about) to content disputes (for which this is not the right venue). Mathsci's behavior cannot be dismissed as an understandable reaction to manipulative POV-pushers—he has consistently treated every editor who disagrees with him in the same uncivil way from the very start. It would great if a good writer and researcher were also good at working with other editors, but unfortunately that's not the case here. Pretending there is not a problem with Mathsci hasn't worked so far and unless something is done about him the problems will continue in the future. Rvcx (talk) 23:02, 30 May 2010 (UTC)


 * We're never going to resolve this dispute at AN/I or via RfCs: I think only ArbCom can deal with this situation. Long-term POV pushing by single-purpose accounts has turned the whole area of race and intelligence into an intractable battleground. I'd like to see all SPAs in this area topic banned. Fences  &amp;  Windows  17:58, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree entirely. The continued attacks on Mathsci here and elsewhere are a distraction and a blot on the project -- no one should be subject to such vitriol simply because they're trying to uphold core Wikipedia standards.  The SPA activity needs to be curtailed, and these accounts blocked from editing, or, at the very least, put under severe editing restrictions regarding both the "race and intelligence" subject area and attacks and complaints about Mathsci. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:17, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Fences and Beyond My Ken: 1) This complaint against MathSci was bought by Rvcx. Would you describe him as engaging in "vitriol" or as an "SPA"? 2) Am I one of the editors who you seek to block? The only reason that I engaged in this thread is because Akhilleus mentioned by name in a misleading fashion. David.Kane (talk) 18:52, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * This is all a smoke screen. If we step back and look at the bigger picture, Mathsci may be involved in a few minor incidents from time to time, but he is not the problem on race related articles. Rather it is civil POV pushing, tag teaming, edit warring SPAs who are creating an atmosphere conducive for incidents. The solution to this problem already exists, topic ban POV pushing SPAs, and repeated threads on ANI will reduce or cease altogether. Unfortunately there has not been enough political will to implement this solution, though almost everyone, including the SPAs themselves, have acknowledged the existence of POV pushing SPA editing. Wapondaponda (talk) 19:23, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Wapondaponda: Given your rampant sock-puppetry in the past, you are probably doing MathSci more harm than good by chiming in here. I, at least, have never "acknowledged the existence of POV pushing SPA editing." David.Kane (talk) 20:34, 30 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Easy excuse to divert from the main problem and I have heard it countless times whenever editors try to discredit any edits I make. From my experience, it doesn't work very often which is why I am still quite active on Wikipedia. If a suggestion is good for this encyclopedia, it really shouldn't matter, and it usually doesn't matter who it is coming from. There might be a tendency to focus only on the negative, but there are some positives, I've been editing Wikipedia for five years now and I have experienced many of these controversies before. During that unfortunate period, Mathsci did participate in getting me blocked. But from my time on Wikipedia, I have encountered Mathsci's edits in a diverse range of articles. Most are uncontroversial and of good quality, so I am confident that Mathsci is not a POV pushing SPA, and that when this particular flare-up is over, he will move on to work on other articles. Overall he is a net plus to the encyclopedia. I cannot say the same for the band of SPAs currently holding a number of race related articles hostage. Captain Occam, Mikemikev, Bpesta have all acknowledged in one way or another that they are SPAs. Wapondaponda (talk) 04:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

(convenience break)
I find it incredibly discouraging to see that even in the face of conduct from Mathsci of the sort that Rvcx and I have linked to above, behavior which has no equivalent from any of the users complaining about Mathsci in this thread, Beyond my Ken and Fences & Windows both believe that the solution is to punish everyone but Mathsci. It really seems like what Ludwigs2 described might be the case: that there are certain administrators who will support Mathsci regardless of what he does, and that since Mathsci is aware of this fact, he knows that he has free reign to violate any policies here without any fear of negative consequences.

Aren’t either of the admins who are saying this aware that at this point, no more than half of the users currently complaining about Mathsci’s behavior are SPAs? The only users currently making these complaints who could arguably fit that definition are me, David.Kane and Mikemikev. Rvcx, Ncmvocalist, and Ludwigs2 clearly aren’t SPAs, and the first two became involved in the article only as a result of it being brought up at the BLP noticeboard. The current conflict between them and Mathsci is the result of them trying to remove material that (as I explained above) according to Jimbo Wales is a BLP violation, and Mathsci edit warring to reinsert it. Following Jimbo Wales’ instructions about how to comply with BLP policy is not POV-pushing, and the editors who initiated this complaint because of how Mathsci reacted when they tried to do this aren’t SPAs. In this situation, do you seriously think the problem is just with “POV-pushing SPAs”? If David.Kane and I weren’t involved in these articles, and it were only Rvcx and Ncmvocalist trying to remove the BLP violations, is there any evidence that Mathsci would be treating them any differently from how he currently is?

I really hope I can get through to you about what’s actually going on here, although I don’t have all that much hope about it. My understanding of the current situation is that Mathsci knows he can ignore whatever policies that he wants here, because he expects admins like the two of you to support him regardless of what evidence or arguments are presented against him. And judging by what I’ve seen thus far, it looks like he might be right that this is the case. If he is, then we may as well abandon all pretense of users being judged objectively on the basis of their behavior—apparently, the only thing that really matters is who the admins personally like or dislike. --Captain Occam (talk) 06:18, 31 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Captain Occam canvassing, and forum shopping . Beyond My Ken (talk) 07:41, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * If they were no POV pushing SPAs, would many of these incidents exist. The history of these articles suggests not. This dispute has been running for eight months, Mathsci was not initially involved and during the mediation he did not participate for 2-3 months. During Mathsci's absence there was still name-calling, incivility, edit warring and blocks. It is evident that the real problem is the existence of SPAs rather than Mathsci's edits. Wapondaponda (talk) 08:50, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * Ludwigs2 may not be an SPA, but Mathsci was, for some time, the only remaining editor complaining about his (sorry, I can't think of a word which is both accurate and not a personal attack, ummm, let me think), "mediation" on Race and intelligence. He has a personal interest in Mathsci's being discredited, as it's the only way that his "mediation" might not be considered a reason for a ban.  — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 08:56, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The characterisation of the personal behaviour on Wikipedia of Mathsci by Ludwigs2, although strongly expressed, has much truth in it. Apart from that, the edits by Mathsci and his supporters to the article History of the race and intelligence controversy‎ seem to me and to several other people to be tendentious and slanted. Attempts to place a NPOV flag on that article have been repulsed. Xxanthippe (talk) 09:23, 31 May 2010 (UTC).
 * There is zero truth in Ludwigs2's unfortunate characterization of Mathsci as an "inveterate troll", a few paragraphs above. Mathsci doesn't make "deliberate and intentional attempts to disrupt the usability of Wikipedia for its editors" (see WP:TROLL). On the contrary, a deep care for the encyclopedia seems to be what motivates Mathsci (and, admittedly, sometimes make him lash out in crude hyperbole). ---Sluzzelin talk  10:49, 31 May 2010 (UTC)


 * "Captain Occam canvassing, and forum shopping ."


 * Wouldn't it be appropriate for you to look into what's actually going on before making these sorts of accusations about me? I contacted Black Kite because he specifically asked me to contact him if there's more edit warring on these articles.  As for Ludwigs2, I contacted him because during the four months that I've been interacting with Mathsci, he's the only person who's been the subject of more personal attacks from Mathsci than I have, and in a thread about Mathsci's personal attacks it seemed like it would be appropriate to have Ludwig's input.


 * If you look through the three AN/I threads in which Mathsci tried to get Ludwigs2 banned because of his actions as mediator, the first two of which were started by other users and hijacked by Mathsci, you'll see that Ludwig was begging Mathsci to raise his content disputes within the mediation itself, and Mathsci repeatedly refused. Mathsci's complaints in all three of these threads were almost exclusively either personal attacks on Ludwig, or content disputes over the article that he was attempting to resolve via administrative action against the user he disagreed with without attempting any form of dispute resolution with them, even when the user he disagreed with was specifically requesting this.  This last thing is something he's done several times with me and David.Kane also.


 * Arthur Rubin and Beyond My Ken, are you going to make any attempt to address the points I've made about the attitude you're expressing here? Or are you going to continue expressing what appears to be blind support for Mathsci, while refusing to acknowledge any of the evidence that's being presented that his behavior really is his own fault, and not someone else's? --Captain Occam (talk) 11:36, 31 May 2010 (UTC)


 * No, actually, I'm not going to make an attempt to address the points you've made. I agree that Mathsci can be abrasive, but, as he's not violating any of the Pillars, the good of the encyclopedia should be considered.  Mathsci has made more constructive contributions than all the people who have complained about him, combined.
 * For those who consider this contrary to my view of Betacommand, so be it. His bots may have made more constructive edits than his detractors, but they also made more nonconstructive edits than his detractors made constructive edits.  — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 16:16, 31 May 2010 (UTC)


 * I think the diffs that I and others have posted are sufficient to demonstrate that Mathsci is violating the fourth of the five pillars: “Wikipedians should interact in a respectful and civil manner”.  Mathsci isn’t avoiding personal attacks, he isn’t avoiding edit wars, and he isn’t assuming good faith about just about any of the users that he disagrees with.  I agree that he’s made a lot of constructive contributions also, but I don’t think that should grant him carte blanche permission to ignore policies such as WP:Civility and WP:NPA, which seems to be both his own attitude and the attitude of several of the admins who’ve commented here. --Captain Occam (talk) 16:43, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I think the many posts I have read of yours over the past months are more than sufficient to show that you are a civil POV-pushing single purpose account whose contributions are not conducive to improving an encyclopedia writen from a neutral point of view. As such, your comments get from me exactly as much consideration as they deserve. Beyond My Ken (talk) 19:54, 31 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, this is exactly what Ludwigs2 and I are talking about. I guess it’s good that you aren’t afraid to state it publicly:  that as an administrator, your decisions in cases like this one will be based on your personal opinions of the editors in question, and will disregard any evidence that’s presented if you don’t like the users posting it.  Is there anyone else who feels this way? If there are any other admins who’ve decided ahead of time that they aren’t interested in handling situations like this one objectively, I think it’s useful for those of us who are the targets of Mathsci’s personal attacks to know about that. --Captain Occam (talk) 01:13, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I am not an administrator, will never be an administrator, and as far as I know have never presented myself as an administrator. Were I an administrator, you would have been blocked long before now.  My judgment is that you are a net negative for the project.  Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:57, 1 June 2010 (UTC)


 * @ Sluzzelin: Actually, Sluz Mathsci has made a protracted, deliberate, and intensive effort to disrupt the ability of me and numerous other editors to edit wikipedia, from simple name-calling and derogative slurs to non-communicative reverts to active efforts to get us blocked, banned, or otherwise prohibited from editing. You may agree with his ends (which is fine by me if you do) but his means fully satisfy the definition given in TROLL. That may make him a moral troll in your eyes - an interesting category that bears some consideration - but troll he is, beyond any but the most remote shadow of doubt.  That he is inveterate is obvious by inspection, since he has done it consistently for months (likely years), and shows neither remorse nor any inclination to stop.  Deal with it.


 * I will credit Mathsci with being intelligent, dedicated, and interested in improving the encyclopedia. He can be all that and still be a detriment to the project, because his attitude is so poisonous that it makes working anywhere in his vicinity nauseating.  I can tell you this from harsh experience: most of the people Mathsci complains about (whom I largely disagree with) respond to reasoned discussion; Mathsci (whom I largely agree with) does not.  Attempting to engage Mathsci in reasoned discussion will produce nothing except a string of insults and mildly paranoid complaints.  He has good days where he will talk things out for a while, but as soon as it becomes clear that he is not going to get precisely what he wanted at the start he turns to ANI or other administrative venues to try to enforce his preferred outcome.  His mere presence makes any possibility of properly communicative consensus impossible, because as soon as any consensus he doesn't like starts to emerge he will disrupt the consensus with accusations, insults, calls for administrative action, and any other disruptive technique he can wangle to prevent consensus from being reached.  If you can think of any behavior that is more against the principles of Wikipedia I'd love to hear it, because I sure as hell can't.  -- Ludwigs 2  00:23, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

Someone please topic ban the SPAs already
Or is it necessary to go to Arbcom every time that a topic ban of a POV pusher is needed? --Enric Naval (talk) 12:05, 1 June 2010 (UTC)


 * A modest proposal. Clearly the normal processes of editing on these pages have broken down, and all parties are now convinced that they, and they alone, are in the right amid competing and increasingly acrimonious demands for retribution and justice.  Justice is something that this board is never going to be able to supply, and so the problem comes back time after time.  When this sort of train-wreck happens, I suggest to the community that everyone, but everyone, be barred from the page for a period of say three months.  That is, nobody who has edited this page or its talk page in the past may edit either for a period of three months from the date of their last edit (enforced by a block of commensurate length if violated).  This isn't intended to be "fair" or "right", because that's not we can or should aim to do here.  Instead, that's what the orderly construction of the encyclopedia demands.  The encyclopedia does not, and never will, require these particular people to be editing this particular article at this particular time.  There are thousands of people who might be able to make a better job of it, and they can have the chance.  94.196.217.26 (talk) 14:22, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: The above is the second edit of this IP. Beyond My Ken (talk) 15:44, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

It's necessary to go to ArbCom. Or at least see if consensus can be built on this board for banning someone. Even if I thought someone should be banned (and I'm not saying that, because I haven't looked deeply into the matter), I wouldn't do it unilaterally, because I have no desire to be dragged through the wikilawyering that would inevitably ensue. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:01, 1 June 2010 (UTC)


 * While it does appear to be necessary to go to ArbCom, the community should really take a close look at this. What we have here is a situation where several accounts are collaborating, on-wiki and sometimes off-wiki, to edit as well as create as set of articles that appear to push what may well be a minority or fringe point of view about race. Perhaps these accounts are well meaning but the reality is that wikipedia's articles on race are likely to reflect their views because of the sheer number of accounts and because of their unusually long persistence. We shouldn't want this situation to persist and should immediately, and consensually, topic ban these editors from all articles in the category race. A community ban rather than an ArbCom case is what is really needed here. --RegentsPark (talk) 17:42, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * So admins here are going to let Mathsci get away with this? I am disgusted by Mathsci's poisonous defamation, and by those who support him. The constant counter argument is 'SPA', which appears to be nothing more than a mindless term of abuse. mikemikev (talk) 21:01, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, it's a fairly precise term of art, and totally appropriate. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:39, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * "precise"? Let's take an example. Am I an SPA? David.Kane (talk) 21:44, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Although you do make edits to topics around a liberal arts college in WIlliamstown to a certain extent, most of your efforts are on race-related articles and from a very particular point of view. It is the fact that you keep inventing new ways to WP:CPUSH that makes your edits particularly problematic. Very few of them seem to be geared to improving the encyclopedic content of wikipedia. Even some of your edits related to Wiliiams College have been problematic. The now deleted article on EphBlog currently in you user space  until yesterday was a vindictive  attack page, violating almost every aspect of WP:BLP. Unnotable individuals were maligned: the statements about them came up within the first 30 items in a google search on their names. Professor marginalia blanked most of the BLP violations. The article EphBlog was deleted by administrators not once, but twice. Mathsci (talk) 08:06, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

So, I guess that we could do a separate ban proposal for each SPA? To tell the good from the bad? --Enric Naval (talk) 22:45, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The current group of SPAs does not have a homogeneous editing history, they differ in their extremity of SPA editing. The most extreme is Captain Occam, who despite being an editor since 2006, with over 2000 edits, has edited less than 100 unique pages and only edited about 32 unique articles. Captain Occam is the "ringleader" and the other SPAs have congregated around him. Some are Captain Occam's verified meatpuppets and other are potentially unverified meatpuppets. Some editors were not initially SPAs, having only a made a handful of edits prior to the eruption of this dispute, but have recently morphed into SPAs by significantly increased their edit count on race related articles. While these editors are not homogeneous in their editing history, their approach to race related articles is homogeneous in that they are all, civil POV pushing,( with the exception of Mikemikev, who tends to use words like idiot and nitwits all too frequently). As I have mentioned previously on Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents/History_of_the_race_and_intelligence_controversy, there are few pure SPAs, but we have a new breed of SPAs who take great care to avoid obvious policy violations. But their net effect is what is worrying as they have successfully managed to drag a dispute from as far back as October 2009, which is about 9 calendar months. It is possible that a prolonged dispute is in fact a more potent form of advocacy then actual article content, because such disputes are spread over several noticeboards. Nine months is a lot of time, and non-SPA editors involved in this dispute could have used this time more constructively in other areas of Wikipedia. It is probably a good time to put an end to this. Wapondaponda (talk) 00:59, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Don't you see David Kane's objection, though: If the problem is SPAs, and he's not an SPA, then clearly there is no problem! QED! Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:37, 2 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Support topic ban of the SPAs. The field of race and intelligence is littered with fake science and erroneous conclusions, and is a massive target for those of a particular interest. These SPAs have defeated each attempt to curb their enthusiasm using their ability to overwhelm any normal person's ability to unravel their arguments. An admin needs to step in and see the obvious: enough is enough; the SPAs need to edit their own websites for a while because it is just creepy to focus that much energy on converting the race and intelligence articles on Wikipedia to promote your point of view. Mathsci is the only obstacle preventing these SPAs from using Wikipedia to "prove" certain conclusions regarding one of the least understood human features (intelligence in general, and race and intelligence in particular). This have been raised in several places, notably here. No, David Kane is not technically an SPA, but yes his actions are indistinguishable from an SPA at this stage and he needs to take a break from this topic. Johnuniq (talk) 04:16, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Am I an SPA? Xxanthippe (talk) 08:17, 2 June 2010 (UTC).

I'm placing the requests in separate sections (I'm not up-to-date with the drama, so I'm missing a few people). --Enric Naval (talk) 20:57, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

Varoon Arya says that he isn't going to edit the topic anymore.

Distributivejustice retired back in May 2010. --Enric Naval (talk) 21:57, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

TechnoFaye edited almost exclusively R&I topics from November 2009 to April 2010. He seems to have moved to greener pastures. --Enric Naval (talk) 22:07, 2 June 2010 (UTC)


 * @Enric Naval: You are correct that filing an ArbCom request doesn't necessarily override a community discussion, but I think that, in this case, it has basically sucked the air out of the room. With the possibility of an ArbCom case hanging like a sword of Damocles, it's unlikely that you're going to get a lot of action on these requests.  Besides, I don't really think that we were on the cusp of a community decision which the filing of the ArbCom request cut off. This issue (SPAs/Race and intelligence) has come up a number of times recently on AN/I, and it has yet to really get significant traction outside of a number of people with firm opinions (myself included) -- more's the pity, since, to my mind, that lack of interest doesn't speak well at all for the community. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:30, 3 June 2010 (UTC)

Request to topic ban Mikemikev from Race and Intelligence topics
Mikemikev created his account in 2007 and made 29 edits until December 2009. Since then he has made 380+ edits, almost every single one inside the R&I topic. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:57, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * comment I tend to agree with this proposal as I have not seen Mikemikev as a positive contributor to the articles, but rather as somewhat of a troll more concerned with blocking progress and dragging out discussions endlessly than with improving articles in a collaborative spirit. If a less severe measure is required it might be to impose a 0rr for Mike on race and intelligence related topics. ·Maunus· ƛ · 06:20, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * comment I agree that Mikemikev should behave more politely. But, Maunus, surely you agree that the vitriol that MathSci regularly shares with us is at least as objectionable? Indeed, from my interactions, Mikemikev is just as polite as those with whom he is dealing. In interactions with well-behaved editors, he is well-behaved (independent of whether or not he agrees with them). In interactions with MathSci, he behaves as MathSci behaves. Needless to say, I wish that everyone would behave better! But any 0rr sanction that is applied to Mikemikev for "troll"-like behavior should apply to all editors who exhibit that behavior. David.Kane (talk) 22:17, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The difference is that Matsci adds and improves content. But yes I also support 0RR for Mathsci.·Maunus· ƛ · 04:47, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * If ever there was a page that needed a prescription for medical marijuana, this article is it. Arbcom seems to be taking an interest - why don't we drop this and let them deal with it?  -- Ludwigs 2  05:34, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I think, rather, that it's you that needs to chill out a little. "Christ on a stick", "I'll get an admin if you don't do what I say", "medical marijuana". These are hardly the level-headed responses one expects from a person who held themselves out as a  mediator. It's been explained, both here and on the ArbCom page, that those two seperate processes are not incompatible and may run simultaneously.  The choice has been made to continue exploring community bans here -- if you have something pertinent and relevant to say, by all means contribute, but your semi-hysterical interjections are really not terribly helpful, and do not at all reflect well on you or your cause. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:47, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * When I'm a mediator, I act like a mediator; otherwise I deal with people on the level on which they operate (what can I say, I'm a complicated guy...). Judging by your behavior, you seem to believe that attacking newbies and engaging in witch-hunts is constructive and civil behavior, and I treat you as a person who believes such ridiculous things ought to be treated.  fair enough?  or am I misreading your behavior?  -- Ludwigs 2  20:19, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * P.s., and by the way: what in heaven's name is the 'cause' you think I have? as far as I know I'm just responding to a mess of crapulence. The fact that you have an agenda does not mean that everyone you encounter does as well.  I'm just tired of all this, and doing my best to put a plug in it in what limited ways I can.  -- Ludwigs 2  20:26, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Please, do not be disingenuous. Despite your presentation of yourself as unbiased in this scuffle, it's quite clear from the totality of your noticeboard comments on this subject where your sympathies lie.  A modicum of intellectual honesty, please. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:19, 5 June 2010 (UTC)


 * My only 'sympathy' here, Ken, isn't a sympathy at all, but rather a pronounced antipathy to bullies. Please note that you have never asked my opinions on content, never (to my knowledge) engaged me in content discussion, never (so far as I can tell) even looked at the article in question.  You are a third-party editor with second-hand knowledge raising a ruckus about an issue that you haven't taken the time to understand; I'd call you disingenuous right back, but the term is too sophisticated to apply to what you're doing.  -- Ludwigs 2  02:21, 5 June 2010 (UTC)


 * There is no need to ask you your opinion on this matter, Ludwigs2, because it is apparent to anyone who has read your many posts on this subject. The cluebat should have hit you when you realized only people on one side of the issue consider you to be impartial.  This is not the first topic in which your disingenuity has been notable - your behavior on the Ghost issue  was similarly infected with falseness. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:34, 5 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't really give a flying f@ck how people on either side of the issue misconstrue my opinions. You're entitled to try to cast me as a partisan if you really think that will help your cause, and I'm entitled to cast you as a complete idiot for doing so - which is pretty much what brings us to where we are...  The problem we're having here, Ken, is that I am always as fair as I can be within the limits of my understanding, and fairness is so alien to your mindset that you can only interpret it as opposition.


 * and that's just plain sad...


 * Now, if you want to continue this spitball fight, let's take it to my talk page, where I can give you a thorough and unrestrained piece of my mind. I don't see any need to waste any more space in ANI on this trivial bitchiness.  -- Ludwigs 2  06:04, 5 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Ludwigs2, I prefer to deal with observable facts and the reasonable and rational analysis of them, and I am unwilling to dive into the fetid pool of shrill hyperbole you seem fond of swimming in whenever anyone disagrees with you. So, as a result, you have the last word!  Please make good use of it - you might want to attempt to rehabilitate whatever scraps of your self-styled reputation for "neutrality" are left, but it's your choice ... I'm not going where you've gone. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:11, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Request to topic ban Bpesta22 from Race and Intelligence topics
Bpesta22 created his account in May March 2010. He has since made 149 edits, every single edit inside the R&I topic. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:57, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Just to point out that he's a professor who's published research on race and intelligence in the journal 'Intelligence', and was drafted here to satisfy the 'expert needed' tag. mikemikev (talk) 21:16, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Has he confirmed his identity with OTRS? Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:29, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think it matters whether his identity is confirmed. Almost all of his edits have been on the talk pages, and I would have to say that all  even more of them were at the invitation of the "mediator".  If he were reminded of Wikipedia policies, he could be a constructive editor, even on topics where his views are, shall we say, "other than mainstream".  — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 22:29, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The only reason I asked about confirming his identity is that it seemed as if some special pleading was going on: this guy's an expert, treat him differently. Well, maybe so (not that experts don't have to follow policy as well), but the first step then is to confirm he's actually an expert, and which expert, since this is not a subject in which biases among even experts are unknown.  Without some confirmation of identity, he could be a dog, for all we know. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:51, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Christ on a stick, BPesta can prove his expertise (or lack thereof) by the quality of references and breadth of scholarly knowledge he provides. the GOOD FAITH ASSUMPTION here is that he is a new wikipedia editor who is applying whatever specialized knowledge he has.  Get off his back and let him edit!


 * If you guys have an unquenchable urge to piss on someone, try it with me - I've been around long enough to give it no mind, and it seems to be a popular pass-time in your crowd regardless. Just don't make me ask an admin to step in and enforce BITE (which I will do if you keep trying to jump on an editor with as few edits as Pesta).  -- Ludwigs 2  04:07, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Any editor who claims to be someone specific in real life must have that claim verified through OTRS if they wish to "pull rank" regarding, for instance, articles about them. I see no reason that such a necessity should be different for someone claiming to be an expert on a specific subject, if they or others desire for them to be treated differently from other editors. Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:33, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Except at no place that I'm aware of did BPesta make the claim that he should be listened to because he was an expert. That was mostly TechnoFaye in some of her rantier moments.  So again, unless he starts asserting that he should have some special editing privileges due to his supposed expertise, leave him alone.  Hell, Mathsci frequently spouts off about how people should listen to what he says because of his skills, and he's only a mathematician - Pesta has said or done nothing comparable. Maybe we should be talking about banning Mathsci, instead, if misrepresentation of expertise is the issue...  -- Ludwigs 2  14:30, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * The special pleading came from mikemikev at the top of this very thread. Beyond My Ken (talk) 15:07, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * ok, so it's mike and faye. I still think you should back off with bpesta. he's a newbie, he seems to be earnest, he seems to have scholarly skills, he seems to be calm and reasonable (particularly noting the abuse he's taken). if he'd started anywhere on wikipedia except in the middle of this con-flagellation event you'd be welcoming him with open arms as a real asset to the encyclopedia - don't drive him away in your mutual efforts to hump the hell out of Occam and Mike.  -- Ludwigs 2  17:13, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * His first edit was in March 2010. I didn't check when his account was created. Concur that every edit was inside the R&I topic, but still oppose a topic ban. Would consider an article-space ban if still necessary after the "ringleaders" are restricted. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 22:33, 2 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Oppose Bpesta has done nothing to deserve a topic ban. He is a bonafide expert in the topic area and came here by invitation. He has done nothing but contribute valuable knowledge in the talkpage discussions.·Maunus· ƛ · 06:17, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. The problem here is not so much Bpesta, but rather the manner in which he came to Wikipedia. Bpesta is meatpuppet of Captain Occam as they appear to have met off-wiki, maybe on a blog somewhere, though Captain Occam did disclose this. The problem is Captain Occam introduced Bpesta as neutral expert in the field of Race and intelligence. It turns out that Bpesta isn't exactly neutral and isn't exactly and expert. Aparently Bpesta has some major conflict of interest issues regarding race and intelligence research. He also appears to be more active as a blogger, as he claims he has blogging about race and intelligence for more than 20 year, than he is a researcher. Captain Occam attempted to sway the dispute in his favor by misleading the community about the opinions and credentials of a so-called expert. Wapondaponda (talk) 12:16, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I assume you’re referring to this. Please don’t misrepresent what I’ve said about this, which is what you’re currently doing.  There are two important points here:


 * 1: I had been interacting with Bpesta22 for less than three days when I suggested that he become involved in these articles. This was not an example of me asking one of my friends to become involved here for the purpose of helping me (which is what meatpuppetry is); this was an example of me (by pure luck) happening across someone who would satisfy the article’s need of attention from an expert, and deciding to take the opportunity to provide a service for the article that it was tagged as needing.
 * 2: I did not know what Bpesta22’s opinion was about race and intelligence until after bringing this up with him.


 * Nothing I have done with regard to Bpesta22 is in any way different from what would be the completely normal course of action for any editor seeking to satisfy the article’s need of an expert, and I’ve made this very clear in all of my comments about this. For you to continue assuming bad faith in this context, and misrepresenting what I’ve said about it in order to support your assertion of bad faith, reflects very poorly on you. --Captain Occam (talk) 06:00, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Which blog was it? aprock (talk) 16:42, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Lol, my own wiki thread. I admit to having no interest in being a member of the Wiki community. Most of my contribution to the race/iq article has been in the discussion section, though I did draft parts of the "spearman's hypothesis" and "reaction time" sections. I don't think I need to defend my vita here-- it is what it is.


 * I was invited here by CO, but there was nothing nefarious about it. We "met" on scienceblogs as I was involved in a very long and emotional debate on Greg Laden's blog. If anyone wants to read what happened just google my name and Laden's (warning, there are about a dozen different blogs on the topic, so try to read the older ones first).


 * I am time limited so a ban here might be a good thing-- if I continue, my interest is only to add to the discussion section and not to do any editing of the articles. However, to the extent you accept my expertise in this area, I have never seen a neutral article on this topic in any internet source with authority. I was hoping Wiki might be different.


 * Finally, as time goes on, more and more old scientists will have grown up on the internet and might see value in helping Wiki accurately characterize their fields. If that's true, many might have a more negative reaction to the treatment one gets here than I do. -Bpesta22 (talk) 18:32, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * lol - well, yeah... wikipedia currently  is 'scholarship-lite'; less-filling, and it can't always claim to leave a good taste in the mouth.  but it is what it is.  maybe in 10 years or so the wild-west mentality will have settled out a bit and tha danged thing will start to work the way it's supposed to.    -- Ludwigs 2  19:55, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I can't see Bpesta's involvement as anything other than exemplary contributions from a subject-matter expert. He's seldom (if ever?) made arguments purely from expertise or authority, instead using his familiarity with the literature to provide references and background for discussion. The very notion that any editors here are happy dismissing someone with knowledge of a subject and such a light touch in editing suggests major cultural problems at Wikipedia that bear examination. Rvcx (talk) 22:26, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I cannot agree. Many of his references were apparently to his own work (or at least, a real person with a very similar name), and there is definite dispute as to whether those works are "mainstream".  However, although not good, I don't see anything worthy of a ban.  — Arthur Rubin  (talk) 06:25, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Request to topic ban David.Kane from Race and Intelligence topics
David.Kane created his account in June 2006 and made 600+ edits (approx) to assorted articles. In October 2009 he edited a R&I article for the first time. Since then he has made 1300+ edits and 99% of them are inside the R&I topic (Ashkenazi intelligence, Bell curve, Snyderman and Rothman (study), etc). --Enric Naval (talk) 20:57, 2 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Apologies for not contributing to Race and Intelligence related articles during my first three years on Wikipedia! I will try to make up for this laziness in the future. David.Kane (talk) 01:58, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Besides the race/IQ related articles, aren't virtually all your other prior edits directly related to your college and your blog devoted to it? In other words, single purpose editing in articles that you had a very intense personal involvement in? Professor marginalia (talk) 03:56, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Professor marginalia: No. Although many of the edits were done under the names of colleagues I was working with, I am the primary force behind three articles that have nothing to do with my blog: Elimination of fraternities at Williams College, Robert Gaudino and Rubin Causal Model. It is fair to say that I have three major interests on Wikipedia: issues related to race and intelligence, issues related to Williams College and issues related to Donald Rubin's approach to statistical inference. Apologies if these interests are not wide-ranging enough for your tastes. David.Kane (talk) 12:15, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Again, you've mischaracterized my question and given a slippery answer. Two of the three articles you've listed to demonstrate you weren't single purpose editing articles related to your college are in fact related to your college.  The edit history of the third shows you've made 11 out of approx 350 of the edits-and strangely, when I googled the Rubin Causal Model to see if it too was related to the college I found quite a few discussions applying the model to an analysis of race differences written by someone sharing your name. Professor marginalia (talk) 13:17, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I (mis)interpreted your reference to "your college and your blog" to be about articles related to both things, not articles related to one alone. I have certainly made scores (hundreds?) or edits related to Williams College topics, especially alumni of the college. But I thought that the primary purpose of this thread was to bad SPAs. If I have made hundreds of edits related to Race and Intelligence type articles (none until after spending 3 years on Wikipedia) and hundreds of edits related to Williams College and scores of edits related to a random collection of topics, then how am I an SPA? Feel free to argue that my behavior means I should be banned, but don't accuse me of being an SPA. David.Kane (talk) 12:52, 6 June 2010 (UTC)


 * oppose: My experience of David Kane is as an intelligent and cooperative editor. It might be beneficial to impose a 0RR on R&I related topics to avoid the slight tendency to tagteam editwars. I think the same 0RR rule should be extended to Mathsci.·Maunus· ƛ · 06:23, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Support, I think it will be quite difficult to make a case for a topic ban against David.Kane. This is because on the surface, he is one of the politest editors one will encounter. Despite this, I consider him very much part of the problem. A topic ban should be considered, not as a means of punishment but because his contributions have contributed to edit wars and much of the hostility surrounding this dispute. David.Kane was given the task of re-writing the race and intelligence article during the mediation. I took no position on who wrote the article, stating that anyone could write it as long as they stuck to what the disputing parties agreed on. David.Kane wrote an article that was heavily biased towards the hereditarian view point and mostly considered what only one side of the dispute had agreed on. When he was done there was major escalation in the revision history of the article which was the beginning of the post-mediation dispute. DK is probably a very good example of a civil POV pusher because he uses the appearance of politeness and cooperativeness to give the impression of neutrality, when in fact when one looks at his contributions, they tend to be biased. DK once suggested that he would like the race and intelligence article to one day be a featured article. Nothing wrong with wanting any article to be a featured article, but I found it quite absurd and premature to make such a suggestion considering that the article is still quite unstable. Maybe even callous since DKs edits are pro-hereditarian and the subject matter involves controversial subjects such as eugenics. Wapondaponda (talk) 12:07, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Support: I've only been watching this situation for a few days, but this editor seems to be overly aggressive with reverts, reverting material added from secondary sources without having even checked those sources. He also seems to misuse policies, especially BLP to justify these reverts. While the material added does refer to a living person, the sources are reliable. Other scholars work, published and vetted by reliable publishers, is in no way libelous and does not expose Wikipedia to any legal threat. Analysis of the subject's work, both positive and negative, is pertinent to the article. I am typically pro-enforcement of BLP issues, but the only reason I could see for excluding a reliable source here would be if there were a known personal (not academic) feud between the source and the subject. Yworo (talk) 12:17, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I like to think that reasonable editors can, in good faith, disagree about the appropriate application of BLP and that such disagreements should not lead to topic bans. An concrete example of a BLP-related revert that I have made in this article is here. Note the comment from Jimbo Wales:


 * Sorry to come in late here, but I want to agree with Off2riorob on the philosophical point here. "Contentionus claims require exceptional citations" is a concise statement, beautifully put. Now, as to this particular issue, and whether that burden of proof has been met, I don't think so, but I am not certain. I read enough of the discussion which follows to think that is almost certainly has not been met, but I applaud that people do seem to agree that in order to claim that Jenson "has recommended separate curricula for Blacks and Whites" we need it from his own words, not the synthesis and conclusion-drawing of his critics.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 21:32, 28 May 2010 (UTC)


 * In other words, Wales applauded my initial revert. Now, obviously, just because Jimbo Wales believes X does not mean that X is true or that X should be Wikipedia policy. But is Yworo really suggesting that doing something that Wales thinks is a good idea is grounds enough for a topic ban? (If the exact rules for BLP were made more clear in how we should deal with this tricky case, then I would follow those rules. But, as that discussion shows, the rules are not clear. In fact, I have since made an effort to figure out what the rules are and/or should be. See here and here.) Summary: A good faith attempt to abide by WP:BLP (and using criteria that several non-involved editors have agreed with) is a poor reason for a topic ban. David.Kane (talk) 13:38, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I'd happily agree in this case, if and only if the discussion went on before the reverts. The matter is not as critical as unsourced personal libel and immediate reversion is completely unnecessary and disruptive. Yworo (talk) 15:07, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * WP:BLP makes it fairly clear that reverts before discussion are allowed, if not encouraged, in the case of potential BLP violations. "Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced—whether the material is negative, positive, neutral, or just questionable—should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion." (Emphasis mine.) Again, reasonable editors may disagree in good faith about whether, in any particular case, a revert should occur before or after discussion. But do you really think that me (and Jimbo Wales) having a different opinion from you is grounds enough to ban me? David.Kane (talk) 16:45, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't believe that your pattern of activity, which combines rapid reverts with civil point of view pushing, is good for Wikipedia. That is, I believe it is disruptive to the topic. So, yes, it is grounds enough (for me) for a topic ban. I don't believe anyone has suggested Wikipedia-wide banning, and I wouldn't support it if someone did. I'd love to see you contribute in other areas for a while. Yworo (talk) 16:51, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * 1) Have you examined the history of my edits? (I think you should before presuming to support a proposal to ban me.) Once you do, you will see than 99% of my "rapid reverts" are in cases of BLP violations, where rapid reverts are not only allowed, they are encourage. In other disputes, I rarely, if ever, engage in rapid reverts. 2) What POV do you think I am pushing? 3) Any fair reading of the history of the Race and Intelligence article will show that it was just as problematic before my arrival as it has been since then. David.Kane (talk) 17:00, 3 June 2010 (UTC)


 * I've reviewed the situation, yes. I simply think that the views of other academics of Jensen's work are indeed relevant, even if they have understood Jensen in a different light than you do. Even if they may misrepresent his views, I believe these views of his work should be included in the article unless the misrepresentation is intentional and intended to harm. The publishers of this material had every opportunity to ask for rewrites or omissions if their legal team thought there was an issue. How a person is perceived is simply part of life, and in this case it's not even how the individual but rather his writings are perceived. To me, this is actually almost outside the purview of BLP, which I understand to be intended to protect individuals against personal attacks against their character, not negative views of their academic work. I believe you have positive intent, but are simply taking things too far. Yworo (talk) 17:12, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Your position that mistaken descriptions of Jensen's views should be allowed "unless the misrepresentation is intentional and intended to harm" is perfectly reasonable, but that is not consistent with current policy as described at WP:BLP. Even if the misrepresentation is unintentional and not intended to harm, policy still demands that we remove it immediately and, afterwards, seek discussion at the appropriate Talk page. As best I can tell, your complaint is not with my actions but with WP:BLP. And, perhaps, WP:BLP should be modified to align more with your views. Once it is, I will act in accordance with it. I just don't see why you would seek to topic ban a fellow editor because you disagree, not with him directly but with WP:BLP. David.Kane (talk) 22:11, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * This has been explained but you refuse to accept it: the BLP doesn't expect, require, or allow editors to judge whether or not every claim about a scientific study that happens to have been authored by a BLP is absolutely, unequivocally, definitively "true" in every conceivable sense of the word to your complete and total satisfaction. The BLP policy is fine. Just fine.  Your failure to understand how to apply it is the trouble spot. Professor marginalia (talk) 22:48, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Since Jimbo Wales agreed with the revert that I made, perhaps he also suffers from a "failure to understand how to apply" WP:BLP. Perhaps he should be topic banned as well? David.Kane (talk) 23:00, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Not by a country mile did he do any such thing. You've overplayed this card.  Ad nauseum.   And then some. Professor marginalia (talk) 23:07, 3 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Wales wrote: "we need it from his own words, not the synthesis and conclusion-drawing of his critics." This is my position too. Which part of Wales comment is unclear to you? David.Kane (talk) 01:50, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, the part where it doesn't say what you've omitted when quoting his comment here because it doesn't support your case. The part where he said, "Now, as to this particular issue, and whether that burden of proof has been met, I don't think so, but I am not certain." This equivocal and preliminary feedback was not the Universal Golden Ticket you seem to think it is. For many reasons that don't warrant belaboring here the discussion didn't end there and Jimmy Wales was absent from the discussions that followed after. His preliminary remarks make sense given the relatively simplistic, somewhat myopic formulation of the issue as it was initially presented. But regardless if you could be ultimately judged "correct" in your reverts at the end of the day, you have never had any such endorsement from Jimmy Wales.  Stop trying to pretend you were given some magic Golden Ticket to revert at will because it's preventing you from listening to any other constructive feedback on this.  Professor marginalia (talk) 04:06, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Support: For the good of wikipedia, I support this topic ban. As also for mikemikev above. I need to examine the history of the other editor listed above but, because of travel commitments, will be unable to do so until early next week (when, if this is still open, I'll be happy to comment). --RegentsPark (talk) 00:12, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Request: RegentsPark's Support above is clearly misplaced in the middle of the already existing discussion between me and Yworo. It belongs either at the bottom or top of this section. I moved it to the bottom but, alas, DustFormsWords (talk) reverted that change for reasons that are unclear to me. Could someone fix this? David.Kane (talk) 02:58, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I moved 00:12 post by User:RegentsPark into date/time order. -Wikid77 (talk) 11:29, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Support That much interest in defending Jensen and promoting one side of the race and intelligence issue is not helpful for the encyclopedia. People who actually research the brain are not in the slightest bit interested in this topic because science is a million miles from understanding intelligence in anything more than a general what-happens-when-we-poke-it kind of manner. However, there are plenty of people who want to push a certain POV and their enthusiasm conflicts with WP:NPOV. Jimbo cannot be expected to sort through the details of every issue and, while Jimbo's guidance offered above is perfectly correct in general and the principle should be carefully followed regarding the wording used, in the case of Jensen there are multiple scholarly and secondary sources which can be used to clarify Jensen's attitude, and this editor's insistence on reverting all such expressions is not helpful. Johnuniq (talk) 04:07, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Support. I first noticed this user when he created Between-group differences in IQ, clearly a WP:coatrack carefully weighted to provide support for scientific racism. This user and his team are quite single-minded in their desire to have Wikipedia say that certain races have genetically lower intelligence. This is not only incorrect, but it is a POV that is motivated by something other than building an encyclopedia. Abductive  (reasoning) 05:07, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Support In race-related articles, David.Kane is trying to change wikipedia so that it makes a minority point of view look as if it has been accepted by mainstream science. Standard textbooks do not support this view; indeed for example IQ and Human Intelligence, an undergraduate textbook by the psychometrics expert Nicholas Mackintosh, gives the standard arguments why the hereditarian viewpoint has not been accepted. This kind of editing verges on "activism" and is highly inappropriate for an encyclopedia. Mathsci (talk) 08:37, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Strongly Oppose for 5 reasons. During the past 2 weeks, it appears David.Kane has been on good behavior, and we cannot prove his actions would change. I looked at his contribs: 10 edits to articles (in 5 days) is NOT a danger to slanting WP text. As for article content, I don't mind if an editor always edits to one side of a debate, as long as the articles remain NPOV-neutral. Considering the subject of race/IQ, it is unlikely that any editor could sustain a bias against all other editors: it is like saying he is a danger to "proving Einstein wrong" (there is no danger). Meanwhile, David.Kane is named as a party in WP:Arbitration (case: Case#Race_and_Intelligence), so his absense might influence the outcome. For those 5 reasons, he should NOT be topic-banned from Race/IQ. -Wikid77 (talk) 12:05, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, so we make an exception to allow his participation in the Arbcom case (anyways, arbcom pages are under the control of arbcom and its clerks, and they can allow anyone to edit a case page independently of any ban). --Enric Naval (talk) 53:27, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Support needs to edit outside this area for a while to gain experiance and perspective. Has clearly become a problem and is not helping the probect at the moment. Verbal chat  13:32, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

Question: The related ArbCom case seems likely to go forward. Given that fact, is it possible that I would be topic banned beforehand? (I don't fully understand the relationship between ANI and ArbCom.) I find some of the claims above to be quite tendentious but hesitate to engage with them in more detail, given that Jimbo Wales (and others below) have told all of us to "take a rest, please." So, unless there is a chance that I will be banned, I will be following Wales' advice and not participating in this thread any further. David.Kane (talk) 14:55, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Community-imposed sanctions and ArbCom-imposed sanctions are two seperate things. If the community imposed a sanction before ArbCom rules, ArbCom would normally recognize that. If their sanction was more stringent, it would prevail, but the lifting of the ArbCom sanction would still leave the community sanction in place, and it would have to be lifted by the community. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:52, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the explanation. So, if my preference is to not be topic banned before the ArbCom process starts (I would have much fewer problems with a topic ban that occurred as part of a global package of changes resulting from ArbCom) would you advise me to either a) Address the arguments made by those voicing "Support" above or b) Listen to Jimbo Wales and "take a rest?" I am not experienced enough to know which is the best course of action to avoid a topic ban. David.Kane (talk) 20:07, 4 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I think it depends on what you feel the outcome will be. If a topic ban seems inevitable, then there's little reason to put energy into rebuttals, but if it's a close thing, will you feel badly if you didn't put up a fight?  That's your call.  My take is that once things have come to this pass, counter-arguments are not very effective at reversing the opinions of people that have already !voted, so I suppose your strategy should be to inhibit any kind of bandwagon effect by providing arguments in your defense which will discourage others who may be on the fence from coming in against you. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:29, 5 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose: There are better ways to resolve content disputes than trying to dispense with your opponents.  -- Ludwigs 2  23:08, 4 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Given your view on this, I'm not surprised that you are opposing. --Enric Naval (talk) 08:12, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
 * so, you object to the fact that I told DK to be calm, reasonable, and level-headed in spite of the treatment he's getting here? That seems to reaffirm what I said to him: that the main goal is to harass him into doing something dumb and emotional that he can get blocked for (see wp:BAIT).  why else would you not want me to tell him to remain calm?  yeesh. -- Ludwigs 2  16:41, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
 * No, as you very well know, because Enric Naval had already raised his objections on your talk page, he's objecting to this, from your post that he linked to: David, don't let this get to you. This is all bluster designed to make you feel paranoid , more than an actual threat. Standard hazing from the pseudoscientists ; don't sweat it too much.    Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:25, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
 * So why is he objecting to my telling David not to let it get to him? In fact, if this effort were not mostly 'bluster designed to make him [DK] feel paranoid', then both you and Eric would be calmly trying to work out a proper solution to the problem you perceive, and this entire thread would be a quarter of its length and eminently civil.  but instead, you both are doing your best to inflame tempers, and are succeeding in causing consternation left and right.  So in fact it is bluster designed to make him feel paranoid, and he should be aware of that, and everyone with a lick of common sense and compassion will hope that he does manage not to let it get to him.  In fact (and I probably shouldn't say this, but I'm feeling smug), my main goal here has been to get you guys to bluster at me for a while so he has some breathing space.  I think that has pretty much been a success, so please continue.    -- Ludwigs 2  21:30, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, I've got you pegged now. Sorry that it took me a bit, but I see it clearly now - thanks.  It explains everything: the bluster, the excitability, the right-back-at-you attitude, the lack of self-understanding, the misapplication of words like "pseudoscience", the inability to carry out an effective mediation (a task which requires maturity, balance and empathy), the propensity for cliquishness and an "us vs. them" mentality, the feeling that every disagreement is akin to being bullied.  It all adds up, and as a result, I'm withdrawing from engaging with you.  Time and development will almost certainly round things out a bit, so all this won't necessarily be held against you - but that's your look-out, not mine.  Be well. Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:43, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
 * BTW, it's Enric, not "Eric". Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:43, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Interesting... I wonder what it is you think you've got 'pegged'?  seriously - you're obviously trying to suggest something, but it's not clear from your language what that might be.  it could be that you've got it right on the nail, in which case we're good; but I have a suspicion that you have something else in mind, in which case we have some more work to do.  If you'd care to clarify we can talk it out, and if you don't care to - - time will tell.  It's not like this problem is going to go anywhere until we reach a mutual understanding.
 * Sorry for the Eric/Enric thing - missed that totally...   -- Ludwigs 2  00:24, 6 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose. I think it’s important to step back from this proposal about David.Kane, and think about what it’s actually based on. A topic ban is being proposed because several people think he’s been adding information to the articles that isn’t neutral, and removing information from them based on a misapplication of BLP policy.  In other words, this is a content dispute.  That on its own doesn’t invalidate this proposal, but what does is the fact that none of the users supporting it have made any attempt at dispute resolution with him.  In fact, the person posting this proposal (Eric Naval) has not, to my knowledge, discussed this dispute with David.Kane in any way except to say that he thinks David should be banned for it.


 * Believe it or not, I’ve had some content disputes with David.Kane also, and he can confirm this. He and I were able to discuss the disputes in a reasonable manner, and the rest of the community was supportive about it, and I’m confident that at this point our disputes have been resolved.  Based on my own experience with this, I’m also confident that any of you could resolve your own content disputes with David.Kane in a similar manner, but none of you have even made an attempt at this.  Have we really reached the point now where whenever someone disagrees with changes made by another editor, suggesting a topic ban for them is the first response? --Captain Occam (talk) 20:34, 5 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Support, at least for six months. The pattern ob obsessive and problematic editing has been going on far too long. Yes, there have been attempts at dispute resolution. We don't need to demand shrubberies when someone's conduct has been under debate on these noticeboards for so long, he can hardly be unaware that his conduct is considered problematic. Guy (Help!) 09:38, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Elephant in the room
A lot of this discussion seems to centre around disputes caused or exacerbated by Captain Occam, who nonetheless escapes censure because it is the people he is recruiting, supporting and enabling who are being most disruptive. I am uncomfortable about that. Taking Wikipedia disputes off-wiki, as he is clearly doing, is not appropriate, especially in contentious areas like this. I wonder if the heat in that article might reduce without his "help". Guy (Help!) 09:44, 6 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I started work on this collection of articles before I met Occam and will continue long after he has gone. If you have a problem with his behavior, then devote a thread to that topic (with diffs). In the meantime, please do me the courtesy of assuming that I have a mind and will of my own. Anyway, since there are now 4 votes to accept at ArbCom, it looks like this dispute will be moving there sometime soon. David.Kane (talk) 12:38, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

Badger in the hallway
Is this Guy really an admin? Isn't there some kind of procedure to have that revoked? mikemikev (talk) 18:27, 6 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Guy's a curmudgeon (maybe worse than me, even), but I've never seen or heard of him abusing his sysop bit. Best to restrict yourself to battles that need to be fought.  -- Ludwigs 2  18:46, 6 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, as you know Ludwigs, I'm happy to defer to your good advice. But with an Arbcom case looming it would nice to see these people, in the words of Georgewilliamherbert, "Knock it off". mikemikev (talk) 18:59, 6 June 2010 (UTC)