Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Sarcelles

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 * (Sarcelles | talk | contributions)

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Statement of the dispute
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Description
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Since April 2005, Sarcelles has been adding pro-Falun Gong and anti-Chinese government content to many Wikipedia articles, and has started a large number of articles to fulfill this purpose. Unfortunately, many of his edits have been:


 * 1) unverifiable, or worse, patently false. The sources that Sarcelles uses are dubious at best, as evident by the many factual errors he makes. He also has a very poor understanding of the topics that he insists on writing about;
 * 2) POV, with no effort to achieve any NPOV writing on his part;
 * 3) poorly written in terms of style and grammar.

The fact is, every time Sarcelles makes an edit, at least three users (User:Abstrakt, User:Miborovsky, and User:Ran) are chasing after him, cleaning up the mess he makes. This has to stop, because it wastes the time of at least four contributors on Wikipedia.

His behavior is not isolated to the English Wikipedia; the German, French, and Italian Wikipedias have all decided to ban this user.


 * German: Problem with User:Sarcelles, User ban/Sarcelles
 * Italian: Problematic user/Sarcelles
 * French: Problematic user/Sarcelles, but somehow the fr Wikipedia's Problematic editor page seems to be superceded by something else, and I can't find his RfC there anymore.
 * Polish: The de Wikipedia says that he is also active on the Polish Wikipedia, but did not provide a link, and unfortunately none of us know any Polish so we couldn't dig it out anywhere.

The crux of the matter is, we're simply tired of chasing after this user for 7 months, of checking all of his edits, of repeatedly trying to communicate to him the standards of Wikipedia, all to no avail. We're exasperated and we'd like the community to comment on this issue.

Evidence of disputed behavior
(Provide diffs. Links to entire articles aren't helpful unless the editor created the entire article. Edit histories also aren't helpful as they change as new edits are performed.)

Since May 2005, we have been tracking Sarcelles' edits on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chinese cities.

Sarcelles burst onto the scene in mid-2005, by starting nearly 100 Chinese city-stubs. Each of the stubs was of dubious factual accuracy, dubious NPOV, and dubious grammar and style. In particular, Sarcelles would devote 3/4 of each city-stub to dubious information about the local prison system. One or two might have been fine to deal with, but over ninety of them -- each requiring cleanup, verification, and rewriting -- was a distressing discovery for many of us.

A complete list of city-stubs started by Sarcelles is at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chinese cities.

Examples of stubs started by Sarcelles:


 * Huozhou
 * Yongji (note - there is no such thing as a district-level city in China)
 * Changzhi
 * Jieyang
 * Linfen
 * Lufeng

After several contributors civilly mentioned to Sarcelles the quality of his edits, Sarcelles began to cut back: instead of allowing prison information to take up 75% of the content of an article, he restricted them to a sentence or two. But even then, the quality of his articles did not inspire confidence:


 * Shihezi
 * Note that the "Xinjiang Cultivation Corps" Sarcelles referred to is the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, founded in 1954 with its HQ at Urumqi. So how can its HQ be moved in 1950 to Shihezi? What sources was Sarcelles using?

Now, nobody is perfect and we all make mistakes. But to have the same editor start 90 stubs, all of this quality, is another thing altogether.

Sarcelles also took our advice to restrict laogai-related information to laogai-related articles. Unfortunately, many of his attempts continued to be of very poor quality, due probably to both poor sources he was using and his own poor understanding of the subjects he was writing about:


 * Tewu: started by Sarcelles on June 16, 2005; vfd'ed on July 8, 2005. Original text:
 * Tewu is the comprehensive term for Ministry of Public Security of China and Ministry of State Security. Its field of work includes both intelligence and police service. It is a system, which includes 6-10 Office, which is a system for the persecution of Falun Gong. ...
 * Tewu is the Chinese word for "spy". We wonder what source led Sarcelles to believe that "spy" is a "comprehensive term for the Ministry of Public Security". Not only is this POV, it is also factually false.
 * Human rights abuses by Anhui police: started by Sarcelles on August 17, 2005; vfd'ed on October 7, 2005. Original text:
 * Human rights frequently are abused by police of Anhui province of China. This has to be seen in the context that Anhui still is seen as a part of China which is less developed than the entire East of China excluding Manchuria. It is administered by the Public Security Bureau, whose director is Cui Yadong. In 1995 police in Anhui province launched a campaign to hit and eradicate five religious groups.
 * In addition to being rather POV, this brief stub managed to make two assertion that were false: firstly, Anhui is far from being "less developed than the entire East of China excluding Manchuria"; the issue is complex, but Manchuria is historically the industrial powerhouse of China. Though recently stagnant, it still boasts an industrial base, the 5th and 7th largest cities in China, a few important ports, and crossborder trade (with Russia), all of which Anhui lacks; its GDP per capita (12000 RMB) is also nearly twice that of Anhui (6200 RMB). (These can be calculated from figures on Wikipedia.) Secondly, the Public Security Bureau does not "administer" a province; it is simply one of many agencies under the People's Government of Anhui, which is in turn just one of the five head organizations in any given Chinese province (Party Committee; People's Government; People's Congress; Consultative Conference; Supervision Commission). We wonder what source misled Sarcelles into writing these things, or how much discretion Sarcelles had in writing about things that he didn't really know about. Nevertheless we were once again forced to chase after him and clean up his edits.
 * Zhong Chan Er Bu: started by Sarcelles on September 17, 2005; vfd'ed on September 28, 2005. Original text:
 * Zhong Chan Er Bu is a military intelligence agency of the People's Republic of China. It also is active in other countries. Within other countries representatives of the Zhong Chan Er Bu often are in consulates/embassies. It also has the purpose of gaining technological knowledge. 
 * We have been unable to identify the agency that Sarcelles is trying to refer to, and hence cannot verify its existence.

Nor is Laogai the only area in which Sarcelles was specializing. He had, in the meantime, started a large number of poor quality stubs on ethnic churches in Asia. A vfd was put up for these, which resulted in some being deleted and others redirected to other articles:


 * Mien churches
 * Lisu Church
 * Rawang churches
 * Tujia Church
 * Northern Zhuang churches
 * Lahu churches
 * Wa Churches
 * Akha Church
 * Jesus Family
 * and several more

Recently, Sarcelles has abandoned writing articles on cities, and has switched to having articles on individual prisons and Reeducation through labor camps. His sources for these, as usual, is the "Laogai Handbook". However, many of the articles he created are not laogai ("reform through labor") institutions. Reeducation through labor camps, known as Laojiao, have nothing to do and are completely separate from the laogai system. One must wonder how he was able to find information on prisons and laojiao from a handbook about laogai. We find his continued insistence at inserting material known to be inaccurate (such as List of Laogai institutions, created very recently, which blazenly label several Reeducation through labor camps - whose authenticity we are not sure - as Laogai - which we all know to be false for a fact.)

 to be completed 

Evidence of behavior (expanded list)

 * 1) Huozhou
 * 2) Yongji
 * 3) Changzhi
 * 4) Jieyang
 * 5) Linfen
 * 6) Lufeng
 * 7) Qinzhou
 * 8) Luohe
 * 9) Heshan
 * 10) Heze
 * 11) Hegang
 * 12) Fuyang, Anhui
 * 13) Xuancheng
 * 14) Shahe
 * 15) Tongren
 * 16) Fuquan
 * 17) Qingzhen
 * 18) Jishou
 * 19) Liling
 * 20) Xifeng
 * 21) Jianyang
 * 22) Yuxi
 * 23) Jian'ou
 * 24) Ruili
 * 25) Simao
 * 26) Linxia
 * 27) Shizuishan
 * 28) Shangluo
 * 29) Yulin, Shaanxi
 * 30) Ya'an
 * 31) Meishan
 * 32) Luzhou
 * 33) Zhongxiang
 * 34) Shishou
 * 35) Shangyu
 * 36) Jincheng
 * 37) Jinzhong
 * 38) Tengzhou
 * 39) Jining, Shandong
 * 40) Linyi
 * 41) Tieling
 * 42) Chuzhou
 * 43) Chaohu
 * 44) Qiongshan
 * 45) Sanhe
 * 46) Jiutai
 * 47) Mudanjiang
 * 48) Jintan
 * 49) Baishan
 * 50) Gongzhuling
 * 51) Tongcheng
 * 52) Fengzhen
 * 53) Changji
 * 54) Wuzhong
 * 55) Xilinhot
 * 56) Tongliao
 * 57) Shihezi
 * 58) Bole, Xinjiang
 * 59) Kuitun
 * 60) Wusu
 * 61) Huainan
 * 62) Shiyan
 * 63) Wuzhou
 * 64) Ji'an
 * 65) Baicheng
 * 66) Liaoyuan
 * 67) Siping (city)
 * 68) Sanmenxia
 * 69) Jiaozuo
 * 70) Hebi
 * 71) Maoming
 * 72) Qingyuan
 * 73) Heyuan
 * 74) Yichun, Heilongjiang
 * 75) Jixi
 * 76) Suihua
 * 77) Qitaihe
 * 78) Lengshuijiang
 * 79) Shaoyang
 * 80) Shangqiu
 * 81) Suining
 * 82) Leshan
 * 83) Jingmen
 * 84) Chaoyang
 * 85) Linqing
 * 86) Anqing
 * 87) Sanming
 * 88) [Nepalese_House_churches]
 * 89) Protestants in Nepal
 * 90) [Slave_market]
 * 91) [Min Bei]
 * 92) [Protestants in Mozambique]
 * 93) [Bengbu Public Security Bureau]
 * 94) [Fellowship of Evangelical Friends]
 * 95) [Evangelical Church of North Vietnam]
 * 96) [United Protestant Church]
 * 97) [Église Adventiste du Septième Jour]
 * 98) [Talk:Nepal/archive1#Further_comments]
 * 99) [Montagnard Evangelical Church]
 * 100) [Yemen]
 * 101) [Vietnamese Church]
 * 102) [Miao Churches]
 * 103) [Akha Church]
 * 104) [Wa Churches]
 * 105) [Korean churches]
 * 106) Puyi_Church
 * 107) Articles_for_deletion/Manchu_churches
 * 108) [Filipino diaspora]
 * 109) [Chinese intelligence activity in other countries]
 * 110) [Lao Cai Province]
 * 111) [Ha Giang Province]
 * 112) [Tuyen Quang Province]
 * 113) [Mission évangélique au Laos]

an example of some of Sarcelles work: from the articles on Chaoyang,Jingmen, and Filipino diaspora original text was:

"Chaoyang (朝阳) is a city with several 100,000 inhabitants in Liaoning province of the People's Republic of China. Within the prefecture there is a variety of mining. Chaoyang City Brainwashing Center exists. There also is a Office 610 in Chaoyang. The Songling, where fossils have been found, are not far from here."

"Jingmen is a city with more than 100 000 inhabitants in Hubei province of the People's Republic of China.

Laogais Chenjiashan Prison houses severe criminals. Shayang Fanjiatai Prison produces candle lights for import to the U. S.. Shayang Guanghua Prison had real profits of about 21 million yuan at about the year 2000. Shayang Hanjin Prison includes an aluminium goods factory. Shayang Xiaojianghu Prison includes a Printing Plant. Shayang Liujiaxiang Prison includes a Brick and Tile Factory. Shayang Zhanghuyuan Prison includes a Brick and Tile Factory. Shayang Maliang Prison includes a cement plant. Shayang Qibaoshan Prisom is a prison, which includes a farm. Shayang Pinghu Prison is a prison which was established in 1958. It includes a chemical plant. The other prisons in Shayang District are Shayang Miaozihu Prison, Shayang Xiongwangtai Prison, Shayang Yangji Prison and Shayang Hanjiang Prison."

"Filipino diaspora are the Filipinos outwith the Philippines. The diaspora numbers about 5 million persons. Two million Filipinos live in the United States. Many members of the Filipino diaspora have been subject to trafficking of people. In 1985 4407 citizens of the Philippines were expelled from Japan. In Spain, Greece and other countries trading centres for Filipinas and other women, who are trafficked exist. On slave markets in Serbia, Bosnia and other countries women are shown in a naked state."

Applicable policies
{list the policies that apply to the disputed conduct}
 * WP:NPOV
 * WP:V
 * WP:RS

Evidence of trying and failing to resolve the dispute
(provide diffs and links)


 * May 15, 2005
 * June 19, 2005
 * June 20, 2005
 * June 22, 2005
 * June 23, 2005
 * July 22, 2005
 * July 28, 2005
 * September 2, 2005
 * September 19, 2005
 * November 4, 2005
 * January 5, 2006

Users certifying the basis for this dispute
{Users who tried and failed to resolve the dispute}

(sign with ~ )
 * ran (talk) 18:56, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Abstrakt 21:11, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Miborovsky 21:30, 25 January 2006 (UTC) (User:Hmib on some of these pages)

Other users who endorse this summary
(sign with ~ )
 * As noted below, this editor appears to be ignoring a consensus that his articles are questionable. Robert McClenon 17:57, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
 * All the above-said equally applies to Sarcelles's articles on Russian subjects. They are poorly written and may read as intended to offend. --Ghirla | talk 18:07, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Response
''This is a summary written by the user whose conduct is disputed, or by other users who think that the dispute is unjustified and that the above summary is biased or incomplete. Users signing other sections ("Statement of the dispute" and "Outside Views") should not edit the "Response" section.'' ''


 * I have to admit, that some of my sources are not reliable, for example the World Christian Encyclopedia. The Laogai Handbook however can be taken as a serious source. The Laogai handbook actually exists as an online version. Sarcelles 18:17, 26 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Would you mind elaborating? How does being simply online qualify as a serious source? Last I checked the handbook (and its mother site) was published by a FLG organisation. Since when did FLG become the authoritative experts on the Chinese penitentiary system? The handbook itself does not list any sources it took. -- Миборовский U 21:22, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
 * I doubt that the handbook was published by a Falun Gong organisation.

Sarcelles 15:00, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):

Outside view by McClenon
The statement is made that the French, German, and Italian versions of Wikipedia have all decided to ban this user. Was this done by admins, by an ArbCom, or in what way? Could diffs be included to this Wikis? If the admins who took those actions know English, can they certify or endorse this RfC?

This is a special case because, on its face, it looks like a content disupte rather than a user conduct dispute. The editor in question does not appear to be accused of personal attacks, for instance. I have not researched and am not qualified to research whether the user's posts are correct or incorrect, and so am not ready to endorse the summary. However, if the user has continued making edits that are considered unverifiable or wrong for a period of six months and has failed to discuss them with other editors, then the disregard for consensus and lack of cooperation are also a conduct issue.

Has mediation been requested? If so, what was the outcome of the mediation?

Has this editor simply ignored the requests to discuss the questionable posts, or has there been dialogue with no effect?

Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):
 * 1) Robert McClenon 20:34, 25 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Hello. We think it's a user conduct dispute because, despite us repeated telling him that articles are required to abide by WP:V and WP:RS and not be WP:HOAX, he has taken little to no action in attempting to improve either his writing/spelling/grammar or the accuracy of his articles. We've pointed out several incidents up there, (eg. Tewu =/= spy), informed him about it, and advised him to verify his sources, check his spelling/grammar, and stop copy-pasting things from websites on topics he (professed to) know nothing about. I've added the other Wiki's actions against Sarcelles, but the French one seems to be missing. -- Миборовский U 22:01, 25 January 2006 (UTC)


 * As I mentioned above, I agree that disregard for consensus and lack of cooperation are conduct issues. I am not commenting on whether those are the case because I am not qualified to research the validity of the posts, which would require a knowledge of Chinese that I do not have.  I would be interested in whether he has completely ignored your requests to provide verifiable sources, or whether he has engaged in dialogue that has gone nowhere.
 * Robert McClenon 22:49, 25 January 2006 (UTC)


 * No, we have repeatedly asked him to provide verifiable sources (besides the Laogai Handbook which, as we explained above, is not a verifiable source), but he has neither provided them nor responded to our messages on his talkpage. -- Миборовский U 00:01, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Revised outside view by McClenon
Following a review of this editor's talk page, I can see that there have been numerous statements of concern about this editor's posts, both about their verifiability and their overall quality. These concerns are not limited to articles about places in China, but also include articles about places in England. It appears that he has acknowledged those posts but has paid little attention to them. It appears that the source for most of his articles is an encyclopedia in French that is considered by other editors to be biased. Also, Wikipedia policy is that sources for articles in the English Wikipedia should be in English, or should be translated from other language versions of Wikipedia.

Concerns have also been expressed about the quality of the English in his articles. That would not in itself be a user conduct issue, because other editors can always improve the quality of prose. However, articles that are poorly written and questionable are doubly annoying.

My conclusion is that this editor has shown a pattern of disregarding a consensus that he is adding too many unverifiable and poorly sourced articles, and of ignoring efforts to discuss them.

Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):
 * Robert McClenon 17:56, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
 * agree Derex 06:29, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Some information for McClenon
I am among the people who had to deal with Sarcelles' activities in de:. Sarcelles was banned after a lenghty discussion and a procedure similar to the arbitration comittee here in en:. Even though Sarcelles' mother tongue is German, it was completely impossible to discuss with him and he continued the activities even when the discussion about his ban was going on.

In fr:, there was not much discussion or procedure. His edits in French were incomprehensible to the speakers of French, because his command of French was not good enough (and maybe he used some free online translator). So, after a few warnings, he was banned because his edits were classified as vandalism.

In it:, he is actually not banned, but he got numerous warnings aswell, the same goes for nds:.

I hope it helps... -- Herr Klugbeisser 08:32, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

I dealt with Sarcelles' activities on fr:, trying to clean up after him and the like. I wish to point out a misunderstanding in the above: though his actions came under scrutiny for the reasons stated above, he was banned for disruptive use of sock-puppets, as explained here by fr:User:Hashar, a sysop with developer privileges. _R_ 17:17, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
 * These sock-puppets were user with a probably native level of French.

This leaves this claim unfounded. Sarcelles 16:03, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Outside view by Alex Bakharev
I have not looked into the China-related stubs by User:Sarcelles but on the Portal:Russia some editors had the similar complaints about him. Sarcelles produced quite a number of substubs (1..3 sentences) on minor Russian politicians, often unreferenced and a kind of POV (e.g. the only information on a governor of an Oblast is his name, name of his oblast and the statement that he is a an Anti-Semite). On the other hand all the factual information he provided was true (in some rare cases outdated) and there was no context arguments with him. I think that his overall contribution was positive and significant. Without Sarcelles quite a number of Russian minor politicians would not have any information about them at all and now they at least have substubs specifying their name, position and sometimes their birth date. I think this was the case with the Chinease cities as well - better have a stub or even a substub than no info whatsoever. I feel Sarcelles will be more popular among other editors if instead of e.g. 90 substubs he would produce e.g. 20 properly referenced stubs or e.g. 5 good articles; but if Sarcelles is having more fun producing large number of substubs, his hard work is still very usable and appreciated. abakharev 06:26, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Outside view
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Users who endorse this summary (sign with ~ ):

Discussion
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