Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard/Archive32

Courtney Love (closed)
{| class="navbox collapsible collapsed" style="text-align: left; border: 0px; margin-top: 0.2em;" ! style="background-color: #ffd8a0;" | Courtney Love – Resolved. For ongoing concerns, please relist. – 19:52, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
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 * - This user is rather insistent on adding material from what may be his/her own (given the username) website cobaincase.com to the Love article. cobaincase.com is a repository of "evidence" that Kurt Cobain's suicide really was not. // Tarc (talk) 13:55, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
 * the same user has returned after his 24hr block and made the same edits to Courtney Love. He has also made new entries pushing his agenda; Love and Death: The Murder of Kurt Cobain.  Chickpeaface (talk) 23:13, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Wouldn't this fall under an easy spamming/COI matter? • Lawrence Cohen  23:17, 19 November 2007 (UTC)


 * No need to waste time here. This user is headed for a swift boot. If the behaviour continues, let me know and I'll do the necessary myself.--Docg 23:27, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Why wait? This user has a history of nothing but these types of edits, and obviously is only here to push this agenda, at least under this user name. - Crockspot (talk) 03:30, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

On review, I have banned the user.--Docg 08:40, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Easy on the trigger finger there. Isn't there some discussion or approval process before issuing a ban?  I see no valid warnings here and little or no misbehavior, just newbie-biting that lies somewhere between WP:BLP enforcement and WP:OWN.  I would have made these comments on the talk page but that's now edit protected so I'll give a case history below.Wikidemo (talk) 14:36, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

History of case
Cobaincase, a brand new user, came to Wikipedia during a period of chaotic editing of the Love article, including serious unsourced nonsense and incivility by anon IPs.. This one stands out: "you are one sick fuck. get a life."  Cobaincase's contributions were, by comparison, utterly benign. His first act here was to add a couple citation links to a seemingly unreliable website justiceforkurt.com to a section already in place regarding a theory that Love's former husband Kurt Cobain had been murdered. In response User:Chickpeaface, a near WP:SPA who has done little on WIkipedia but edit the Courtney Love article and issue warnings to other editors, reverted the edits and gave vandalism warnings to Cobaincase and an anonymous IP. The warning was clearly wrong. Whatever it is for a newbie to add a weak source to somebody else's BLP violation, it is not vandalism.

A full day later, after some intervening edits anonymous editors, Cobaincase added (and to some extent reversed reversions of) material about the murder theory and Love's inheritance of Cobain's fortune, cited to several sources. Chickpeaface gave another incorrect vandalism warning. After yet more nonsense form anon users User:Reaper X, a fairly prolific editor with some history of constructive edits to the article, reverted various editors' contributions en masse, correctly citing WP:V issues due to unreliable sources, and NPOV concerns over the attempt to discredit Love (he could have cited BLP as well but did not).  Reaper X got into a brief edit war with an anonymous IP. About fifteen hours after his last edit Cobaincase restored the portion of his addition that was deleted by Reaper X's revert.. Chickpeaface gave a third and "final" incorrect vandalism warning. and Reaper X gave a fairly reasonable but incorrect warning that any further edit would violate 3RR (in fact he was on 2RR). A few hours later [User:MastCell] semi-protected the article, which seemed to quiet some of the contentious editing. There were only a few edits, mostly minor, over the next week.

About a week later Cobaincase added a linking from Love article to the suicide controversy section of the Cobain article, and refactored a small amount of unsourced material to be more encyclopedic in tone. Chickpeaface issued yet another warning, this time accusing Cobaincase of adding unsourced derogatory information in violation of BLP. The warning would have been apt for the edits a week ago but not for these new edits, which were not derogatory and did not add material. User:Tarc, a long-time contributor to the article, reverted, making the dubious statement that adding the link was endorsing a "tinfoil hat conspiracy theory". . Two days later Cobaincase restored his edit. With his edits still in place, Cobaincase participated in a discussion on the talk page about the appropriateness of the edits.. A few hours later Tarc opened this case with the false claim that Cobaincase was repeatedly adding material from cobaincase.com (he was adding no material and it had been over a week since he added any material or linked to an external site at all. Hours after that User:Coren issued a  24-hour block citing the incorrect information provided by Tarc. (the block was also questionable because blocks are supposed to be to prevent ongoing misbehavior - it had been many hours, the evidence and cited reasons were all wrong, there had been no legitimate warnings, any dispute was then at 2RR, and the parties were talking on the talk page at the time).

Starting before and continuing after the block Cobaincase did exactly what he was told to do, started adding sourced information to Wikipedia. He created three new articles, one for a New York Times bestselling book in which some prominent investigative reporters had questioned the official accounts of suicide, and one for each of the authors of that book.(see Love and Death: The Murder of Kurt Cobain, Max Wallace, Ian Halperin). Nevertheless, editors from the Love article attacked his edits. Chickpeaface questioned the notability of one author and Coren, the blocking administrator, inexplicably reverted some edits and removed sourced content and links, accusing Cobaincase of vandalizing two of his own articles.  With the other articles in place Cobaincase then linked to them and mentioned the book. Chickpeaface issued yet another bad vandalism warning. Coren added yet another inapt warning to Cobaincase's talk page, this time an "only warning" accusing him of adding "spam links" (in fact, the external links were to a book by the subject of the article).

At that point user:Doc glasgow banned Cobaincase and deleted the discussion from the Courtney Love talk page. Cobaincase reposted the discussion on his own talk page, along with some uncivil comments apparently directed at Doc glasgow., which Doc glasgow later deleted before protecting the page.

The problem, as detailed above, is that Cobaincase was never warned. Every single one of the warnings he got, as mentioned above, was either inappropriate entirely or cited incorrect reasons and thereby gave him no notice how he should improve his edits. Both his block and his ban were based on faulty information and incorrect application of policy. Cobaincase clearly seems to have issues. His only interest on Wikipedia seems to be theories questioning whether Cobain's death was a suicide. Once banned for life from Wikipedia he responded with incivility. But none of that, even if he was warned, comes anywhere near to justifying lifetime ban from the project. Although the material he adds may look like a conspiracy theory, it is the subject of several bestselling books by otherwise reputable journalists, and has been the subject of major coverage. But for the connection with Courtney Love and the fact that she is still alive, these would be the subject of valid coverage on Wikipedia. The existence and prevalence of these theories, and actions of the participants, is all sourced or sourceable to significant coverage in major independent reliable sources. They are extensively covered elsewhere on Wikipedia, in fact. The only problem is connecting them with Courtney Love, who has never been a official suspect in his death. A controversial, and troubled, public figure, she is nevertheless entitled by Wikipedia policy not to have hints or accusations of murder on her biography article unless some threshold of reliable sourcing is reached. A far better situation under the circumstances, if the concern is that Cobaincase is a single purpose account set up to defame Courtney Love, is to simply insist that he not do so. He should have been blocked under the usual escalating discipline policy, and ultimately if he would not stop adding the theory to her page, told that he may only edit on Wikipedia if he refrains from editing her article. Wikidemo (talk) 14:36, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh get a grip. Wikipedia isn't therapy. This user was here just to push a pov on a BLP. They were warned repeatedly. Nothing at all useful came from the account. We need to start putting the interests of the subjects of biographies (and indeed those of good editors) before wikilawyering about the right to due process for people who have contributed nothing useful at all. Now, sure we can wait until this user has caused more disruption and possibly chased away good editors, and then we can ban them - or we can use common sense. As for 'life ban' - that's over-dramatic twaddle. I indef blocked an account with no useful contributions - if the users wishes to create a new one and begin useful editing, there is nothing to stop them.--Docg 14:50, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * That comment, telling me to "get a grip", calling my comment "twaddle", and the summary "rubbish", following your questionable actions in banning a user, are not becoming of an administrator acting in official capacity. You should consider refactoring.  Process is important because without following procedures "common sense" leads some of our 1,400 admins to obstruct constructive editors or even go rogue in the name of the project.  You have the tools.  Please use them carefully.  You're flat wrong in claiming no useful contributions.  There are three new articles from the user.  My understanding is that a banned editor is not free to create new alternate accounts.  Am I wrong?  Wikidemo (talk) 16:09, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree that the warnings in this case were less-than-ideal, but this user does indeed seem to be an SPA. Do you propose a topic ban for Courtney Love instead? Given this user's history, I doubt they could abide with such a topic ban. Even when editing own talk page, user pushes this conspiracy theory; there's no reason that user wouldn't defame Love in any number of other articles and talk pages. Not worth the overhead, in my opinion. Keep 'em blocked. Cool Hand Luke 14:55, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Wow. This user has regularly pushed two websites in talk page discussions, cobaincase.com and justiceforjurt.com, using the latter in the actual article. As far as I am concerned, the two sites are no different as this user name-dropped them both frequently.  So if we wish to be technically correct, then we may substitute the latter site in place of the former in my original BLP posting.  Wikidemo's assertion of a "false claim" though is highly disingenuous. Tarc (talk) 15:11, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Civility in WP:AGF and a little humility, please. You made a seriously inaccurate claim in bringing this case and the user you complained about was blocked based on that.  I show by cite to the record that despite your statement that he was promoting his website, he had never linked to that website and it had been ten days since he linked to the other one, which is clearly a different site owned by a different person.  Feel free to show me if I am wrong.  Wikidemo (talk) 16:09, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Calling you out for making nitpicking, meritless criticisms of my BLP report is not uncivil. That this user actually used one unreliable website instead of a different unreliable website within the article itself really has no bearing on this serious and persistent violations of policies regarding living persons.  Article talk pages are subject to the same BLP policies as well, and this user frequently cited cobaincase.com there in his attempt to defame/slander the subject.  So either way on this, you are quite wrong. Tarc (talk) 16:40, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Just what I thought. Unless you want to continue claiming black is white, accusing someone of a serious violation they did not commit is more than a nitpick, and turning the attack on me by calling me "disingenuous" is uncivil.  Please try to do better.  Wikidemo (talk) 17:15, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The user committed BLP violations by citing justiceforkurt.com in the article.
 * The user committed BLP violations by citing cobancase.com in the article's talk page.
 * The user continued to commit BLP violations after numerous warnings, discussion on the talk page, a 24-hour timeout, a BLP report opened and resolved, and finally resorted to vulgar invective towards an admin.
 * Warnings, a short block, input from un-involved users, etc... changed the user's behavior not one iota.
 * An indef solves it quite nicely. They are free to create another account with a fresh start, while this WP:SPA is frozen.
 * Q.E.D. Tarc (talk) 17:32, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I think perhaps there is a misunderstanding of BLP here. You suggest that banning user from Love's article would be enough, but that's not true. BLP applies everywhere, even on talk pages, and user has done nothing but post this poorly-cited Love-centered conspiracy on every page sen bothered to edit. Even putting aside the possible COI issue and the user's history of incivility, there's plenty of grounds for this indefinite ban.
 * Editing is not a civil right. We're just trying to make an encyclopedia here, and this user&mdash;in short time&mdash;amply demonstrated that they do not share our goals whatsoever (BLP, NPOV). This SPA was an advocacy account plain and simple. Cool Hand Luke 17:51, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I believe I understand BLP pretty well. The Cobain conspiracy theories have been tolerated and treated as encyclopedic content elsewhere, but not in the Love article.  That actually raises some interesting issues.  Whether or not editing is a right, and whether this user potentially can be a productive editor or is allowed a right to start over with a new account, administrative actions ought to make sense and be based in policy.  This one was sloppy, and if you are uncareful you will snare good editors with the bad.  Wikidemo (talk) 18:25, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I have reviewed this again, but I think my action was the most appropriate in the circumstances. I am confident that I am not "uncareful" enough to snare good editors. If I am, on that occasion, I'm sure someone will point that our.--Docg 18:39, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
 * There was absolutely nothing at all sloppy about Doc's actions. He defended the encyclopedia by removing bogus conspiracy theories which libel and slander a living person, which had been repeatedly inserted by a POV-pushing single-purpose account in violation of Wikipedia policy and common sense. Ultimately, if an encyclopedia user cannot contribute in keeping with our policies, they're blocked. Doc should be applauded for taking this bold action, not nitpicked. FCYTravis (talk) 19:33, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * If that's the case, I can see why it looks like WP:OWNership of the Love article, but user's edits appear to have been outside of acceptable limits on every page they contributed to. I share FCYTravis' opinion. Cool Hand Luke 19:52, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Postscript - Kurt Cobain
I'd like some people who know about these things to examine the following in light of WP:BLP and in the interests of neutrality and balance. Whilst this tinfoilhattery may merit mention, I'm not sure it merits this - I've already removed some weasel wording.

Please examine: Love and Death: The Murder of Kurt Cobain and Kurt Cobain and Tom Grant (private investigator)--Docg 19:47, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * If this hadn't blown up so quickly I would have recommended that. Also the articles on the two authors of Love and Death (you can follow the links from that book).  Notability and verifiability are clearly not the problem.  It's clear there is a conspiracy theory and the theory itself is widespread and notable.  But what to do when the defamatory claims people make against each other become an encyclopedic subject all their own?  Perhaps one can cover the theory and simply excise any accusations against Love.  Wikidemo (talk) 00:16, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * BTW, I see the book article has been stubbed, which seems best. I would suggest the murder conspiracy theory about Kurt Cobain be moved to a separate article on the subject, and the mention in the main article limited to a subheading and a short paragraph plus link.  At the very least it's got a weight / fringe problem.  There's enough smoke there for the subject to be notable on its own, but a low-odds theory about a famous person's death shouldn't take up such a large part of the article.  The article should focus on his life and work. Wikidemo (talk) 00:20, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I didn't have time to do anything today, but I'd like to register my uneasiness with the idea of forking out the theory from Kurt Cobain. Yes, it does have too much space in the Cobain article, but the answer to that is to edit it down to the essentials. It seems noteworthy enough to merit a reasonable degree of coverage, but we don't need to go into as much detail. Think of the poor journalists whose book we might stop people buying! Xmas is coming and they need the money. Anyway, Kurt's death was a big deal, however he died. I'm not happy with the Grant article either right now, but that seems easier to fix. Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:41, 21 November 2007 (UTC)


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Steve Kurtz (closed)
{| class="navbox collapsible collapsed" style="text-align: left; border: 0px; margin-top: 0.2em;" ! style="background-color: #ffd8a0;" | Steve Kurtz – Conversation dormant. Please relist for ongoing concerns. – 14:02, 13 December 2007 (UTC)
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I believe this article is written to be intentionally biased and portray the subject as a victim, which serves the subjects political, professioanal and personal agenda.

I have made several attempts to add a simple reference to sworn depositions, by Edith Balas, and Joan Maier, in a 1998 Federal Court case, US District Court, Case number: 2:98-CV-01516, Pittsburgh, PA, on discrimination. Edith Balas and Joan Maier were not part of the lawsuit, but were witnesses for the plaintiff. Steve Kurtz was not part of the lawsuit, but was a witness for the defendant. The depositions reveal valuable historical information about Kurtz.

Edith Balas is an Auschwitz survivor, and was part of a small art history department, that Steve Kurtz joined as a faculty member, in 1995. In her deposition, she describes her experiences with him, which contradict the articles POV, and Steve Kurtz as an innocent victim. Joan Maier, in her deposition, supports the statements by Edith Balas.

This is not an active case, and there is no agenda, other than to offer readers access to information which is not biased towards painting Kurtz as an innocent victim. The reference does not contain the subject of the lawsuit, nor is it's subject being discussed here.

The editor, FreshAcconci, repeatedly removed my entries. He cited shifting WP rules, on why they should be removed. When I then, only tried to post the reference to the case, under the "see also" heading, it too was deleted.

Later, when I defended my entry in the discussion section, I inadvertantly made a reference to my identity. I later removed this reference, because I had previously received physical threats during the lawsuit in Pittsburgh. I emailed Fresh Acconnci offline, and asked him to keep these edits out, because it put me in harms way. He ignired this request, and then, immediately added the edits back in, and used them to insight further accusations towards me. Finally, after several attempts to reason with him, he agreed to remove them. But within minutes, another editor, also involved in the arts, removed a complete entry I made on the discussion page, and then later, addded the reference to my identity back in, in another edit.

The efforts these 2 editors have made to keep out the reference to the 1998 deposition of Edith Balas, has been very aggressive. They say it is because they wish to keep the article neutral, but in truth, by only including information which supports one view of Kurtz as a "victim", they have created a biased article to serve their agenda.

They are both colleagues of Kurtz, as they work in or participate in his profession. They have something to gain professionally by maintaining the article in this light. I am not in the arts professionally, and have nothing to gain or lose, by adding this reference.

It is not derogatory to add the reference. It does however allow the readers access to a legal document, that offers more information about Kurtz and his history, which does not paint him with a singular brush.

I am not trying to provide a new analysis on Kurtz. I am only wishing to add this reference into the article, as it is a primary source on him.

Thanks,

From FCYTravis
67.170.116.209 (talk) 07:48, 23 November 2007 (UTC)Other2
 * You must immediately refrain from any attempts at inserting the information, as you have an irreconcilable conflict of interest on the issue. In keeping with your wish for privacy, I have redacted my previous posting, which contains a diff in which you admit the conflict of interest, but you cannot have it both ways. You cannot simultaneously demand privacy while pretending to be a disinterested party - which you are not. If you again insert the information, you will be blocked from editing the encyclopedia. FCYTravis (talk) 09:22, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

My Reply to FCYTravis
I do not have a conflict of interest with Steve Kurtz. This is an incorrect accusation, based on no legitimate facts. WP allows for direct observation. As I mentioned before, I worked with Steve Kurtz in the past, and observed the depostions in question. This is no more of a conflict of interest than anyone else currently working with him, or working in his field who will gain by supporting his agenda, or someone who shares his political agenda and wishes to see it maintained. I think it is pertinant to include the reference to the testimony of Edith Balas. It is a legitimate primary source. I would like to add it to the See Also section. I have been stopped from doing this. I believe there is an active bias on the part of the editors involved in this article, to not allow other information in which does not support their agenda. This is against WP policy. Other2 (talk) 22:23, 23 November 2007 (UTC)Other
 * Once again, you cannot have it both ways. You have admitted your conflict of interest in the issue at hand. If you wish the specific conflict to be kept private, you will refrain from involving yourself in the article in question. You cannot keep inserting it and simultaneously demand that users refrain from discussing your potential self-interest in inserting it. FCYTravis (talk) 23:36, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

My Reply-- You are using circular logic, in order to convey a false premise. There ALREADY has been a discussion of my possible self-interest, and there is no legitimate claim. What about your self-interest? How can you block me from adding a citation, to a legitmate historical public document: the sworn legal testimony of Edith Balas. This has nothing to do with me. It is from a case long ago closed, and settled. The premise of the case has no relation to Steve Kurtz and should not be included. But the depositon of Edith does. And again, what is your background? Where do you work, in what field? Where did you go to school? How do we know you are a neutral editor? 67.170.116.209 (talk) 01:59, 24 November 2007 (UTC)Other2
 * I will say it one more time. If you insist on pressing this issue, then you may not make any claim to "privacy" as to the matter of the lawsuit. You have admitted your own potential bias here, and you may not continue to edit the subject behind the shield of "privacy." Either cease editing the article, or I shall cease giving you the courtesy of not spelling out the true extent of this matter. There is a clear question as to why you may want to insert unsubstantiated and potentially irrelevant statements from a legal deposition into the biography of a living person.
 * I am happy to make clear the fact that I am entirely non-involved in the case and do not personally know any of the parties. FCYTravis (talk) 03:16, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

You talk as though you have some other interest than you have stated. In any case, it is a moot point, as I believe it is more meaningfiul what detail you and others want kept out of this documement. I will not attempt to add anything further to the article, as I said earlier. I believe as it appears in other sources it will make the omission here seem meaningful.67.170.116.209 (talk) 04:25, 24 November 2007 (UTC)Other2


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List of people described as Maoists

 * - This "article" consists solely of a list of about two dozen names, not a single one of which has any source or reference whatsoever. It's a blatant violation of WP:V and WP:RS. Furthermore, since a few of the people on the list are still alive and might well object to being described as "Maoists," it's also a violation of WP:BLP. All the unsourced entries should be removed, and, since the article would then be empty, the article itself should be deleted. *** Crotalus *** 11:52, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I've blanked the list (which has been tagged as uncited for a year) and prodded it; I doubt it would get speedied. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 16:18, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Someone deproded and restored the uncited list. I nuked per BLP.--Docg 18:09, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Considering he people on the list, who were apparently all very clearly very much self-declared maoists and proud of it, as shown by the WP articles, it should have been sourced not deleted. Not my subject, but if anyone wants to do it, I'd support deletion review, which is the proper remedy for over-extensive BLP concern. The BLP policy was not meant for article like this. We have real problems to work on.DGG (talk) 04:54, 28 November 2007 (UTC) DGG (talk) 04:54, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I just looked at a couple of the extant articles of people formerly on that list. From the existing articles, there is no evidence that neither Amiri Baraka nor Fred Hampton, to name two I checked, could be described as "Maoist." Several other names on the list didn't even have associated articles. No list is better than a broken, incorrect list. If this is going to be restarted, it must be scrupulously sourced. Even the very description of the page - "admirers of Mao Zedong" is broken. "Admiring" Mao doesn't make someone a Maoist. FCYTravis (talk) 05:33, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah, article was useless, and would have to be re-written from scratch to avoid BLP issues. If anyone wants to write a new article with sources, it should not be speedy deleted. They're free to write it: no need to DRV. Cool Hand Luke 05:47, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I am happy to undelete this if anyone is offering to immediately go through it, rewrite it, and ensure it only has referenced entries to self-described Maoists.--Docg 11:53, 28 November 2007 (UTC)