Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Joan of Arc

Joan of Arc
There is an edit war at the Joan of Arc page. I'm new but it seems to be an old problem. User Jhballard is manufacturing fictitious reference sources. Refer to his revision 04:24, 30 October 2005, footnote 1 and his corresponding history note. I've attempted to engage him in dialogue. It's gotten very strange. His latest discussion entry suggests Joan of Arc had hallucinogenic drugs spliced into her DNA.

Noticed the above as I was about to post. The article is flagged for revision. Jhballard appears more confused than hostile. I'm going ahead with the post I've prepared then waiting for your action. Thank you, and please advise. Durova 07:40, 30 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Jhballard and an anonymous user (possibly a banned user named Allen?) are conducting aggressive edits and critiquing through the history notes. I've attempted to return discussion to the discussion page.  Another user urged me to continue dialogue.  I am not changing their edits although their scholarship is lacking.  Please advise. Durova 21:31, 30 October 2005 (UTC)


 * This anonymous user has admitted he is Allen Williamson by responding at the above assumption made by Durova (about him being possibly banned), at the history of Joan of Arc, thusly:
 * 3 November 2005 64.12.116.197 (Edit comment: I'll drop the main point of dispute, but certain basic things nevertheless need to be cleaned up. (I have never been "banned", by the way))
 * ... meaning 64.12.116.197 is Allen Williamson. The fact that he (indeed) was never banned is not important. More important is that he admits editing in disguise. Not very Wikipedian-like. And further: I support Durova in her efforts to improve the Joan of Arc article. &#8212; HAJARS 00:02, 4 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I'll have Stevertigo take this case. R  e  dwolf24  (talk) 22:47, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

Although Durova's comments above are not direct with specific text to mediate, we can proceed if Durova agrees to refrain from such personal gestures and implications like "strange," "confused," "hostile," "scholarship is lacking," "conducting agressive edits," and etc. Mr. Ballard 01:39, 6 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Ill take it - parties can agree to mediation or not. Start tomorrow. -St|eve 08:43, 6 November 2005 (UTC) PS: left note at talk:joan of arc. Listed as Requests for mediation/Joan of Arc -SV

Request for advisement
Unfortunately our talks have broken down. The point of contention is a private document that Mr. Ballard insists on using to edit the article. Mr. Ballard believes he is descended from Joan of Arc's brother. He has a family tree about fifty years old. This unsourced document has never been mentioned in a peer reviewed publication and is unknown to the scholarly community. Mr. Ballard believes he satisfies WP:No original research because someone else in his family did the research and he transcribed its contents to Wikifamilies.

The family tree in question is highly problematic. Over one period of 144 years it records only a single event. In another part it asserts a royal grant of nobility 31 years after the law discontinued the basis for the claim. These are only two of the most serious among its many shortcomings. Yet Mr. Ballard treats it as gospel and expects the world to do the same. This is highly personal to him. He named one of his own children after Joan of Arc. He responds rudely to any doubt of its reliability.

Switisweti and I have offered to accept whatever views Mr. Ballard may draw from this document that he can verify through mainstream sources. Mr. Ballard's abundant conclusions are idiosyncratic. We have outlined the basics of historic method and historiography. We have explained university guest reading policies and interlibrary loans. We have named leading sources from the first half of the century that may have guided his late relative's research. We have even given him links to French genealogists. One treads lightly on such subjects so as not to appear condescending. It hardly matters: Mr. Ballard ignores our leads, reads few of our citations, and concedes nothing.

Switisweti and I have delayed progress on the article for weeks in attempts to reach a working compromise. Banned user Allen Williamson no longer interferes but his destructive edits remain pending agreement among the current editors. Any relationship with Mr. Ballard has degraded. I use these terms with care: Mr. Ballard's position constitutes pseudohistory and pseudoscience.

Ten days ago I posted a list of suggested changes to the main article. Switisweti supports the proposal while Mr. Ballard ignores it. Today Mr. Ballard unilaterally edited the article through his sockpuppet Dzonatas for spurious and possibly malicious reasons. Switisweti and I are at wit's end and it's finally showing on talk. How do experienced Wikipedians proceed? Durova 06:23, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Update
We seem to have broken the deadlock and the article is much improved. I'd like to solicit Admin's help for one continuing problem. Switisweti and I are convinced that AWilliamson is still damaging the article via anonymous IP addresses. These range from aggressive POV edits to outright vandalism. Durova 20:28, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Stabilization
We've had almost no input from our mediator since the start of mediation. However, things have stabilized for the last 2 1/2 weeks and the editors seem to agree the article is better now. I'm new to Wikipedia and unsure how this process reaches closure. Could an active mediator help to wrap this up? Durova 03:45, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Sorry that Ive been away. Ive been monitoring the progress on this page though, and as Ive said before was primarily looking for any active issues debates. The Awilliamson issue was submitted to the Arbcom weeks ago, in the midst of a change in process. Sometimes bans get enforced later than we ask them, and we dont really recieve any feedback. "Closure" is rarely a discernable state for any article on Wikipedia. Whats left is simply relative calm, which may or may not hold for a long time. The article may go through a hundred new edits in this "calm" state, or it will be the nexus for more controversy. Certainly, if the issue is vandalism, then there is no controversy other than to revert it and take new measures to enforce a proper state for the article. Some mediations are hands on, but it seemed like you and a couple others were quite in control of the situation, IMHO. Regards, -Ste|vertigo 10:27, 10 December 2005 (UTC)