Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Freedom skies

Case Opened on 02:37, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Case Closed on 18:38, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Please do not edit this page directly unless you wish to become a participant in this request. (All participants are subject to Arbitration Committee decisions, and the ArbCom will consider each participant's role in the dispute.) Comments are very welcome on the Talk page, and will be read, in full. Evidence, no matter who can provide it, is very welcome at /Evidence. Evidence is more useful than comments.

Arbitrators will be working on evidence and suggesting proposed decisions at /Workshop and voting on proposed decisions at /Proposed decision.

You may add to the as needed, but closed cases should not be edited otherwise. Please raise any questions at Requests for arbitration.

Statement by JFD
I am requesting arbitration over the conduct of Freedom skies who, in the course of editing almost exclusively to force his nationalist views on a wide range of articles, has through repeated violations demonstrated his utter contempt for Wikipedia policy. The above diffs are merely a small sample of Freedom skies' violations of Wikipedia policy. More will be submitted after this request for arbitration is accepted.
 * WP:NPOV/WP:SOAP
 * WP:ATT
 * WP:CIVIL
 * WP:CONS
 * WP:NPA
 * WP:EW/WP:3RR

This arbitration has been requested because, despite repeated notifications of Wikipedia policy by a number of different editors, involvement in several mediations both formal and informal, as well as multiple blocks, Freedom skies persists in his disruptive conduct.

Statement by DavidCBryant
I first became aware of Freedom Skies' participation in Wikipedia when I responded to this RfC from Fowler & fowler. I spent about two hours looking through the article and reviewing the edits both F&f and FS had been making. It was clear to me that Fowler & fowler was documenting his edits quite carefully, and that Freedom Skies wasn't putting much effort into his research. It was also clear that FS was running around Wikipedia placing "protect" tags on Indian mathematics and on several closely related articles, reverting F&f's edits indiscriminately, and just generally acting like a jerk at the very time I was composing my comments in response to the RfC. So i wrote my opinion of FS' behavior.

This is the first RfC in which I have participated. After writing my initial comments I read the RfC procedures in more detail, and when F&f asked me to comment again, I tried to concentrate more directly on the content of the various edits to Indian mathematics, and less directly on the spirit in which they were made. I also exchanged a few messages with Freedom Skies, keeping it as cordial as possible. I was left with the strong impression that FS has a big chip on his shoulder, and seems to think that he can just cite a title of a book, plus an Indian author's name, and that's documentation enough for any citation. I could not even verify the existence of many of the references FS had inserted in the article, nor of the authors whose names he used. DavidCBryant 00:37, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by David Eppstein
Like DavidCBryant, I became aware of this case through the RfC at Talk:Indian mathematics. The editors of that article, and other associated articles, seems to have become factionalized into two groups. On the one hand, some feel that what's in these articles should be limited to known facts about written documents and solid scholarly consensus about the interpretation of those documents, that it's better to err on the side of understatement than overstatement. On the other hand, there seems to be a faction who believe that the article should contain as broad claims for priority on mathematical concepts as can possibly be sourced: if one or two writers can be found to have speculated that some document hints at knowledge of X, then the article should state that X was known at that time, and that it's better to err on the side of overstatement than understatement. I believe Freedom skies to be a member of the latter faction, both from his pattern of edits and from his statements in the RfC.

I include myself on the side who prefer understatement to overstatement (as no doubt comes across in my insufficiently-unbiased description of the two camps above), and feel not only that greater understatement would lead to improvements in this article but also that it is more in the spirit of Wikipedia's policies, particularly WP:V and WP:RS. Which is to say, I think some of Freedom skies' edits violate those policies.

However, I'm not convinced that censuring any individual will make much difference in this conflict. Freedom skies appears to be acting in good faith, and is hardly the only one in the overstatement camp.

—David Eppstein 05:58, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Freedom Skies
I'm on a vacation (and a much needed Wikibreak) and the timing surprises me. I have volumes to say about this but I'll keep it brief. The evidence produced in dispute resolution is incorrect. The Indian mathematics dispute saw me eventually end up in mathematics, outside of the areas of martial arts and Budhhism, to which I generally contribute. I sent a note to all parties involved, explicitely stating that "I have reviewed my future with the Indian mathematics article, and have come to the conclusion that since I am under time constraints and am under such pressure in real life that adequate responses or editing actions on "Indian mathematics" are just not possible for me right now." and pulled out despite the other party asking for a fresh start and explicitely stating "I am happy to work with you on this article". The other editors have not heard or seen from me yet.

The decline of Buddhism medcab case has not been solved due to my actions at all. It has been solved due to the simple reason that User:Tigeroo, another involved party, has been inactive. I bought this to Utcursh's attention and he suggested to [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Freedom_skies#Re:_Decline_of_Buddism_in_India_medcab_case wait for some more time. Tigeroo might be taking a wikibreak."].

The dispute resolutions have worked (and hopefully will work). Since the RfC at Indian mathematics I've been careful to not engage in edit wars. One such example is Taxila, where despite having legitimate references I pulled out as the situation may have escalated.

Many regards,

Freedom skies 07:27, 16 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Note: Following this message I have shifted my statements of response to Paul B, CiteCop and Rama's Arrow and my statement about the timing from this project page to here. I had already crafted and saved those responses on the project page and thought I'd shift them in case anyone is interested instead of blanking them completely.


 * Freedom skies 18:05, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Dbachmann
If Freedomskies has indeed reformed and refrains form edit warring, arbitration may not be necessary now. There is no doubt he is editing in good faith, and that the episode is frustrating for him as well.

But, his behaviour has been so disruptive at times as to fall under blocking policy, no arbitration case required either. Since it is always difficult to block people who disrupt Wikipedia "in best faith", it would be useful for the arbcom to give their opinion which incidences would have qualified to be treated as falling under the disruption clause, in the interst of efficiency: nobody has an interest in an endless series of "Indian patriot" arbcom cases, all alike (1, 2, 3) which do nothing but waste dozens of man-hours which should go into writing an encyclopedia. My thoughts on nationalism on Wikipedia in general are here. Freedomskies isn't by any meeans an extreme example, he's just one among many many very parallel problems we keep running into. dab (𒁳) 10:16, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Paul B
I came across Freedom Skies almost by accident when looking at the Zen article. I engaged with him in a very frustrating debate. His edits were a familiar instance of Indian (or rather Hindu) ultra-nationalism of a kind that is to be seen in many Wikipedia articles. As Dbachmann says, he is by no means unusual. He sometimes edits in tandem with other individuals who have similar views. I do find his methods of editing and arguing to be extremely problematic, since he will act in a trial-lawyer fashion to squeeze any argument or evidence to fit his pre-conceived point of view. It has been virtually impossible to engage in a reasonable discussion with him. On the Zen article he persistently accused other editors of being part of a "Han cabal", as though the history of Zen were a matter of claiming it for either China or India. He refused a mediation on the grounds that the mediators were likely to be sympathetic to the "Han cabal". Paul B 15:08, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Djma12
My experience with Freedom Skies stems from the Foreign influence on Chinese martial arts article. Though I was initally frustrated by what seemed to be obstinate and nationalistic edits, he soon became engaging and cooperative when approached in an academic manner. I am happy to state that I have had, and continue to have a fruitful editing relationship with Freedom Skies.

I can understand how some editors may be frustrated. Some of his sources are sub-par, preferring quantity over quality. Furthermore, his wording has a tendency towards NPOV, often stating hypothesis as fact. However, I found this to be generally due to enthusiasm rather than bad intent -- he has been very flexible with me in working out these issues when I point them out.

Freedom Skies is a very passionate and strong-willed editor -- a classic example of a wiki tiger. When approached in a confrontational manner, he responds strongly. However, when approached in a cooperative fashion, he responds cooperatively. Though he can still probably tone down his personal attachement to articles, he is also making active efforts to improve his editing. He would do well to read WP:COOL, perhaps probation at the most, but there is no need to ban an improving editor making good-faith edits.

Djma12 (talk) 19:26, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by CiteCop
The purpose of Wikipedia is to produce the highest-quality encyclopedia possible. Unfortunately, much of Freedom skies' conduct is a direct attack on the credibility and accuracy of Wikipedia and, therefore, its value as an encyclopedia, by persistently making false assertions about the content of sources as well as citing questionable sources.

I asked Freedom skies to produce his sources for some claims he had made about ancient Indian scientific discoveries, including the calculation of the Earth's circumference and theories of gravity. I made a good faith effort to verify those citations by reading the cited sources. Not only did the sources he produce not support any of his claims, but the words "circumference" and "gravity" didn't even appear in a single one of the four sources he produced, nor did either of the quotations he attributed to those sources. Not only that, but the four sources he produced were all papers self-published by Subhash Kak who, on the subject of the history of science, is a fringe theorist.

This pattern of misrepresentation and questionable sourcing characterizes many of Freedom skies' edits, including those to Indian mathematics and the entirety of the Foreign influence on Chinese martial arts article. That's not an isolated incident; that's a modus operandi.

When a pattern of behavior is so persistent and so resistant to correction, it becomes increasingly difficult to excuse this as human error or an excess of enthusiaism. Past a certain point, it is simply an insult to editors' intelligence to ask them to continue assuming good faith.

When other editors attempt correct his edits, Freedom skies has been known to react with incivility, personal attacks, or the occasional edit war, typically marked by edit summaries like "removing sourced edits is vandalism" though his citations are misrepresentative and his sources questionable. For example, he once told This Fire Burns "Actually, I can assert that India's achievements are inherently great. It's a fact, try living with it." POV, soapboxing, incivility and rejection of consensus have never been captured with such concision. Not to mention peacock language.

Other editors are effectively blackmailed into compromising WP:RS with the threat of disruptive conduct. That said, when an editor in a conflict with Freedom skies is willing to budge on WP:RS, his treatment of them becomes more civil. His treatment of editors who insist on high standards for cited sources on the other hand...

The price of a fruitful editing relationship with Freedom skies and editors like him seems to be the credibility and accuracy of citations and, ultimately, the credibility and accuracy of Wikipedia. Is that a price worth paying?

Statement by sbandrews
I only came across user Freedom skies in the indian mathematics RfC. While this user was certainly pushing a particular point of view he responded well to the RfC, was civil - in fact polite - and things quickly calmed down. That said the user was in the middle of exams and so didn't have time to participate fully. Don't we all push our own point of view? I didn't look at all the above difs - some seem rather old - people change. Regards sbandrews (t) 12:19, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Rama's Arrow
It is distressing for me to see 2 users for whom I have a lot of respect - JFD and Freedom skies - being unable to get along. I think this is where the problem lies. I would urge the committee to accept this case because it is complicated. To quote Sherlock Holmes, the featureless and commonplace crimes are the most difficult. There is no outright trolling, unconscionable personal attacks or brazen disruption. At the same time, the lack of authoritative guidance can lead to the situation worsening. I think this is a great opportunity for arbitrators to "guide" the parties on how to behave, how to treat each other and how to resolve content disputes without causing disruption through personal misconduct.

To be clear, I haven't interacted with Freedom skies over any article for 4-5 months now, but I largely share the opinion expressed by Dbachmann and Sbandrews. Freedom skies had been very boorish and aggressive, but that was 8-10 months ago. His personal conduct has shown steady and increasing improvement. At the same time, I see that it remains very difficult for several users to resolve disputes with him and he does continue editing with an emotional and biased mindset. No doubt, he needs to be sent a strong message. 10 months ago, I might have requested arbitration myself but as Freedom skies has improved his behavior and increased the quality of his edits, I suggest to the arbitrators to please keep that factor in mind. My personal suggestion for a remedy is probation for personal conduct and editing without bias.

Contrary to Dab's view, I think the committee can finish this case relatively fast as several notable precedents exist and if the workshop is kept limited to "constructive" suggestions and not the usual slugfest :)  Rama's arrow  13:41, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Dangerous-Boy
Freedom skies is an excellent editor. There is no need to punish or reprimand him. His citations and research are accurate and he his only dispute nationalist chinese propaganda. JFD routinely changes articles Freedom skies edits to suit his extreme POV. I find it unfair that freedom skies has been subjected to this kind of tirade and it should be removed immediately. It was of time which could be contructively toward make wikipedia a better project. I find unbelievable that JFD has the nerve to bring such an arbitration toward freedom skies when he could be accussed of the same slander himself. Kindly remove this arbitration and let live go on. It is a waste of everyone's time.--D-Boy 19:55, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Wiki Raja (sock of blocked user Indrancroos)
Freedom skies is very passionate about martial arts and India in general. I'd have to admit, he has edited quite a bit. So far, I have not seen anyone else take such an initiative in maintenance of the Indian martial arts page like him. Over the past several months I have also noticed a change in him after reading his and others posts in the Indian martial arts talk page. Rama's Arrow has also noticed this. I guess this is through after being on Wikipedia for a while. Also, sbandrews statement about Freedom skies civility on Indian Mathematics is an example. It is a learning process for all of us. I do agree with Dbachmann that Freedom skies has been editing in good faith. In regards to nationalism, ethnicity, religion, or ideologies, I feel that is the driving fuel for Wikipedians of particular interest just as long as we do not get into conflict with the other party in regards to POV issues. In that case, if there is no way for both parties to agree on a particular issue, then I recommend that POVs from both sides be presented to enhance NPOV and non-biasedness on Wikipedia. To be honest, there are much worse editors on Wikipedia in which Freedom skies does not come close to. In regards to this matter please let me suggest for both parties to engage in more constructive dialogue instead of arbitration. Wiki Raja 23:58, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Gouranga(UK)
I have had a somewhat limited amount of interactions with User:Freedom skies. He helped with edits in the Buddha as an Avatar of Vishnu article during a period of POV clean-up here in Nov 2006, and recently in the Yoga article here. In neither instance did I come across any cause to doubt his sincerity or competence as an editor. Regards, Gouranga(UK) 12:45, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Endroit
My sole encounter with Freedom skies was in Civilization, where he appeared to be revert-warring blindly in support of an errant POV. After our discussion in Talk:Civilization, where he accused me of "Chinese nationalism", I provided conclusive proof of why he was wrong. Then he backed off from his POV, and then things were fine after that.--Endroit 18:36, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by MichaelMaggs
I first encountered Freedom Skies in November last year, in connection with edits to the Bodhidharma and Zen articles. He was using citations profusely but, I thought, in a wholly improper way. I wasn't sure at that time whether he simply lacked an understanding of scholarly citation methods, and I assumed good faith and tried to explain quite carefully what I thought was wrong, unfortunately without complete success. While he and I eventually parted on good terms, I ultimately felt that trying to improve those two articles was simply going to take too much time and effort, and I backed off. As a result, I have edited here much less than I would otherwise have done. I really thought that Freedom Skies would benefit from a mentor, but I see that that's been tried and hasn't been a great success either. It's very frustrating, as Freedom Skies has moments when he seems very friendly and amenable to discussion; regrettably, he appears to find it hard to keep his enthusiasm for his unique point of view in check. --MichaelMaggs 21:49, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Statement by Johnbod
I have had no contact with Freedom Skies, but have had with the two new likely sockpuppets, about whom I must say I had been suspicious. I have added a brief summary of this to the Evidence page. I've only just become aware today that this case was related, hence my late appearance here. Johnbod 22:37, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (5/0/0/0)

 * 1) Accept. - SimonP 14:32, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * 2) Accept. Charles Matthews 20:25, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * 3) Accept FloNight 23:04, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * 4) Accept The Uninvited Co., Inc. 01:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * 5) Accept. Matthew Brown (Morven) (T:C) 02:26, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Temporary injunction (none)
=Final decision= All numbering based on /Proposed decision (vote counts and comments are there as well)

Consensus
1) Wikipedia works by building consensus through the use of polite discussion. The request for comment process is designed to assist consensus-building when normal talk page communication has not worked. Sustained edit-warring is not an appropriate method of resolving disputes, and is wasteful of resources and destructive to morale.


 * Passed 8 to 0 at 18:37, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Freedom skies
1) has repeatedly engaged in edit-warring, for which he has been blocked numerous times.


 * Passed 8 to 0 at 18:37, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Freedom skies
2) has used sockpuppets during this Arbitration case.


 * Passed 6 to 0 at 18:37, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Remedies
Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Freedom skies placed on revert parole
1) is placed on standard revert parole for one year. He is limited to one revert per page per week, excepting obvious vandalism. Further, he is required to discuss any content reversions on the page's talk page.


 * Passed 8 to 0 at 18:37, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Freedom skies must use one account
2) Freedom skies shall select one account and use only that account. Any other account used may be indefinitely banned. Pending selection of an account Freedom skies may not edit Wikipedia.


 * Passed 6 to 0 at 18:37, 3 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Clerk note: 4 May 2007, user acknowledged that he was aware of this remedy and stated that he elects to continue editing as User:Freedom skies. Newyorkbrad 06:30, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Log of blocks and bans
Log any block, ban or extension under any remedy in this decision here. Minimum information includes name of administrator, date and time, what was done and the basis for doing it.