Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2007-10-30 Armenian nationalism

Mediation case opened. Andranikpasha 16:00, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Who are the involved parties?

 * Andranikpasha
 * Dbachmann

What's going on?
User Andranikpasha alleges that Dbachmann's editions at Armenia-related articles are not neutral, unsourced and consist elements of anti-Armenianism.

What would you like to change about that?
User Andranikpasha respectfully requests one thing


 * Administrator Dbachmann is requested to recuse himself from any further dealings with the Armenia-related topics until such time as this topic reaches a permanent steady-state. Say ninty days.

Relevant discussions
Context:
 * Talk:Armenian nationalism
 * Talk:Martiros Kavoukjian
 * Talk:Mitanni
 * WP:FTN
 * also Talk:Aratta, Talk:Urartu, Talk:Armenia etc. etc.
 * WP:RS, WP:UNDUE
 * Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Armenia
 * (, etc. etc.)
 * User:Dbachmann/Wikipedia_and_nationalism
 * User:Dbachmann/Wikipedia_and_nationalism

constructive contribution to these discussions is most welcome. --dab (𒁳) 10:36, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Mediator notes
I am coming here as a mediator with a keen interest in working towards resolving ethnic conflicts. I have, however, no background knowledge about Armenian nationalism, and I ask both parties for patience with me in that regard. This can be seen as an advantage, since I am uninvolved in any of the existing discussions.

My role as a mediator here is to help both parties. I will be looking and directing both parties to look towards ways to win, without making the other side lose. (See win-win situation).

The request of this case is for one user "to recuse himself from any further dealings with the Armenia-related topics until such time as this topic reaches a permanent steady-state. Say ninty days.", I think it would be fair if this were done symmetrically. If both parties agree to recuse themselves for an agreed time from editing an agreed set of articles then we can already close this mediation. If you have any idea for a modification of this agreement, please let me know, it may still be easier to agree on this than to go through a full mediation process.

If we don't have the easy way out, then I propose that we go through the items one by one, so that nobody gets overwhelmed.

I appeal to both parties to cooperate: The better both sides cooperate, the better for all of us. This is easier here than in the wild discussions on other talk pages because it is mediated. I can help create a cooperative atmosphere by words or by actions, such as deleting statements that I deem not constructive. Please see this as a chance to get results that have not been achieved in the discussions so far.

I think this case has considerate potential for win-win situations: Dbachmann is well known and respected as someone who is fighting against all nationalism. The Armenians were themselves victims of terrible nationalism during the Armenian genocide. This alone could offer a wide field of common ground. I don't know if this works, but why not give it a try? &mdash; Sebastian 08:24, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Name of this case
I renamed the title from "Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2007-10-30 Possible anti-Armenianism by Dbachmann" to "Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2007-10-30 Armenian nationalism" and added the necessary template to talk:Armenian nationalism. The reason for this change is that our instructions at Mediation Cabal clearly states that a mediation must be connected with an article and mandate putting the template there. This makes sense because:
 * Titles that characterize people make it harder to encourage both parties to focus on issues, instead of people. People have issues with each other; we can only resolve these issues, and we can't change people here.
 * "Anti-Armenianism" is not a crime on Wikipedia, so we're not interested in investigating that allegation. Wikipedia is not built on the unrealistic ideal that we can force everybody to be unbiased. The beauty of NPOV is, that it provides ways to collaboration and create a reasonable encyclopedia despite - or maybe even because of - our differences.

I chose Armenian nationalism as the eponymous article for the following reasons:
 * That article is among the articles mentioned in this request.
 * By its title, I assume that it is the central article for this group of issues.
 * The name is short and easily understandable. &mdash; Sebastian 08:24, 31 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Armenian nationalism is not seems to be good name as my case was not against or for Armenian nationalism, but against some possible POV or OR addings which I think have no any relation to the Armenian nationalism... My case is about possible anti-Armenian nationalism, not Armenian! (Andranikpasha 12:50, 31 October 2007 (UTC))

Sorry, this was indeed rash by me. However, as I said, "Anti-Armenianism" is not a crime on Wikipedia. Nor is "Pro-Armenianism". Seeing how you are not even addressing my point, I feel it would have been better if I had just closed this mediation on the grounds that it was inappropriate. I still have some hope, though, that we can work this out, but I really need you to come to this with an open mind, which includes reading and understanding our pertinent rules and guidelines. &mdash; Sebastian 17:17, 31 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I have nothing against the changing of the name but better if it is a consensus! maybe call it "Armenian nationalism" (with ""s as this case needs facts if it is a nationalism) or Armenian nationalism or not nationalism (as the case is about points which seems to be unrelevant to Arm. nationalism). If this is not OK you can suggest any other! Andranikpasha 21:59, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Background
User Andranikpasha marks these editions of Dbachmann as problematic: (After I made this list, new dubious editions by Dbachmann took place. I'll have to look at them as maybe they need to be discussed here, too.) Andranikpasha 16:00, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) Here  is an unsource calling of Armenian historian, prof. Rafael Ishkhanyan an "Armenian nationalist author".
 * 2) Here  Dbachmann changed his wordings and wrote: "Armenian nativist Rafael Ishkhanyan". "Armenian nativist" is not only unsourced but aslo is a fully OR by him (there isnt such a term in historiography or anywhere else, for example, Google doesnt give even one answer  for "Armenian nativist")
 * 3) Here  without any explanations at the "Page summary"  Dbachmann marked a large number of Armenian and Armenian-American historian's works and researches as "Armenian nationalist literature": this is a unsourced adding, and among the authors of the marked books are respected scolars (Professors, Dr's, only A. Varpetian is a writer-philosophist) with different views and the only common thing for them is that they were cited the Kavoukjian's books.
 * 4) Here  Dbachmann changed the words of a direct quotation to an OR explanation: "...Hovnanian in a 2006 interview expressed support for Kavoukjian's identification of Armenia as the "ancestral home of the Celtic tribes"", despite the source never asks that Kavoukjan marked "Armenia as the ancestral home of the Celtic tribes", but that Kavoukjian's work dedicated to the Caucasian(not only Armenian)-Celtic relations and the possible pre-Homeland of Celts at Caucasus (not directly Armenia, Little Caucasus is a border for Armenian highland).
 * 5) He never answered to my questions about some of these and other problems at the article's talk page until I wrote to his personal talk page . In his answer he called prof. Ishkhanyan's idea's "so much nationalist bullshit" (unsourced): Ishkhanyan's "nationalist bullshit" ideas are used for the state-published historical and encyclopedical books for Armenian kids, he was one of the authors of Armenian Soviet Encyclopedia, a WWII veteran, a professor of Yerevan State University, an academian and a member of Soviet Armenian parliament. He is a prominent and well-known person for Armenia, and Dbachmann's unsourced words are not shown respect to his memory.
 * 6) Or another article: "Armenian nationalism" created by Dbachmann: there are 3 external links for this article, all three are Turkish or Azeri extremely-biased anti-Armenian "sources" ,; here  Dbachmann added an Azeri personal site from Geocities as an external link.
 * 7) In the same article he added an OR "The need of the Armenian diaspora to derive its identity from anti-Turkish sentiment has been denounced as detrimental to the normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey, to the disadvantage of the Armenian state." When I ask him for a source he didnt represent any.
 * 8) Here  Dbachmann added: "...Armenian nationalism has notably been opposed to Turkish nationalism, especially over the refusal of the Turkish government to recognize the Armenian genocide." (no page summary, unsourced, no any facts on these claims). Its well-known that the refusal of Turkish government to recognize the Armenian genocide is a point of focuse of many respected democratic, human rights activist movements around the world, its a point of focuse of many prominent and not so well-known multi-national persons including Orhan Pamuk, Taner Akcam and Hrant Dink. Dbachmann is going to represent here that focusing as something special for the nationalists, thats not right: its something specific for many humanist, international movements (including non-nationalist Armenian people or the "Union against Genocide" of Turkish intellectuals).

it appears Andranikpasha is getting all worked up because he apparently understood I was trying to defend the official Turkish position on the Armenian genocide. That is not the case at all. It is perfectly obvious that the Armenian genocide merits the description "genocide" as much as any other genocide. Just as it is perfectly obvious that Turkish nationalist revisionism in turn fans Armenian nationalism. We have an entire article on that effect, viz. Rise of nationalism under the Ottoman Empire. I find it difficult (and not too engaging) to follow Andranikpasha's line of thought, but his indignation seems to somehow be based on assuming that by mentioning Turkish attitude towards Armenians I am somehow endorsing it (which is of course perfectly baseless). All of this doesn't change that authors like Martiros Kavoukjian having notability as "historians" in Armenia is a textbook illustration of nationalist antiquity frenzy. Of course we cannot expect that any academic takes note of authors like Kavoukijan at all, so that we are lucky to have at least a passing review in academic literature in "Nationalism, politics, and the practice of archaeology in the Caucasus" (1996). Any serious editor would not put up an argument about the credibility of Kavoukijan, so that I must consider attempts to spin this author into anything resembling credibility as trolling, and I am not prepared to discuss this further. dab (𒁳) 10:52, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Just some points: * (one item moved to )
 * Not Talk:Mitanni, nor WP:FTN#Armenia_2, Talk:Aratta are within this case as they're not related to the marked editions and never were watched by me,
 * I dont know whats your purpose to add Ararat arev and 68.122.96.243 here, as they are blocked users (as I see he was blocked even before I started to edit at Wiki) and never were included in our discussions and editions.
 * Dab wrote: "he apparently understood I was trying to defend the official Turkish position on the Armenian genocide". Sorry you're not right. What I see really dangerous its the precedent to call "the opposition of refusal of the Turkish government to recognize the Armenian genocide" as something specific for the Arm. nationalists. Im even not sure Arm. nationalists focused on it (you hadnt sources), and as I understand real Armenian nationalist never cares what the Turkish government think or refuse.
 * "All of this doesn't change that authors like Martiros Kavoukjian having notability as "historians" in Armenia is a textbook illustration of nationalist antiquity frenzy". Dab sorry it seems you're used to make serious claims without any facts. No ideological propagand ot anti-progagand! you marked a long number of Armenian historical books nationalist just cuz they cited Kavoukjian (just cited, by the way not the book which were called once "chauvinistic"). The authors are respected people and noone here had to hear a POV that all of them were nationalists. Just mark facts, sources, and to not have a long discussion pls try to justify your addings by sources and your own explanations why that editions were necessary. Andranikpasha 12:50, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Administrative notes
Not so fast, please! As I wrote above, we need to do things in order.

First and foremost, we don't even know what this case is about. I realize now that I made a mistake when I renamed this without seeking agreement. Let's clear that up first; I'm moving the discussion of this into its own section,.

Secondly, this discussion here is an example for what we don't want on a mediation. Dab wrote "I am not prepared to discuss this further". He has the right to refuse this mediation, which is likely if he sees this as just another time consuming random fight. To keep this from happening, it takes discipline and from all of us.

I asked that we go through issues one by one, and now we already have a big heap of unstructured arguments. On top of that, inflammatory language like "the other side is getting all worked up" are precisely what keeps emotions escalating. To avoid this, I propose the following. Do you have any other ideas?
 * 1) I can delete or reword all messages that are not pertinent to what all sides agreed to discuss, or that use inflammatory language. (In the case of rewording, I would add "modified by mediator" after the signature.) Are you fine with that?
 * 2) Alternatively, or in hard cases, we could communicate by individual e-mails between each of the parties and me; I would then only post what I extracted here. This is however very work intensive, and it will slow down the mediation.

I think Dab's statement is a great example for where mediation can be helpful. Hidden in a lot of tough wording, I see an attempt to find common ground. Dab writes that he is against Turkish nationalism, because he thinks Andranikpasha is, too. Let me say this as a neutral observer: I would also have thought that Andranikpasha might be against Turkish nationalism, and I was really hoping this could provide some common ground. My impression is that Andranikpasha felt so compelled to fight Dab, that, instead of trying to see this common ground, he brought up more ammunition from god knows where, just so he could write "Sorry you're not right.". This mindset has to stop, or there will be no mediation. Mediation is not about who's not right, but about how we get out of this mess. Is that clear? I really need the cooperation of both sides to change this from a battle to a mediation. &mdash; Sebastian 17:17, 31 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Its OK and Im agree!! Just one thing- if Im (or everyone) is not agree he should have rights to ask what he think (and try to do it in a less aggressive manner, Ill try too! PS- Sorry youre not right were related to "he apparently understood" as I dont think if Dab is trying to defend the official Turkish position). Andranikpasha 22:05, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Closing
After exchanging e-mail with requestor, we agreed to close this case. This was a misunderstanding; Requestor was actually not seeking cooperation with the other party, so mediation can't help him. I learned from this that we need to spell this condition out more clearly, and before accepting a case, I need to check all conditions. &mdash; Sebastian 01:21, 3 November 2007 (UTC)