Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Malleus Fatuorum/Evidence

Should editors who made strong contributions be blocked for incivility?
Here Dr. Blofeld seems to state that users who have made strong contributions to the project shouldn't be blocked for incivility "unless its racial or religious abuse and something very seriously threatening"

According to Malleus's block log, it seems that unblocking admins such as Moni3 concur that blocking good contributors with a pattern of incivility to punish their incivility isn't an effective solution.

Malleus: You really are a waste of space Chillum. How on Earth can you block people? Crazy. TenOfAllTrades: Blocked for 24 hours. Moni3: Unblocked. Ineffective block.

I've read comments from other editors, saying that blocking isn't effective in preventing recidivism so it shouldn't be used.

Should editors like Malleus be blocked for incivility? Or does it do nothing to prevent further incivility while distracting them from contributing to the encyclopedia. --ScWizard (talk) 23:26, 28 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Personally I don't think blocking these editors does any good. It won't change their behavior, it stops them from editing the encyclopedia and creates unnecessary drama. To stop folks like Malleus from being uncivil, a mentorship or trout or something is a better solution. The only 100% sure way to stop these people from being uncivil would be to ban them from wikipedia, but that would just hurt the encyclopedia and all for the benefit of a few people with exceptionally thin skin. --ScWizard (talk) 23:36, 28 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment: While I sympathize with the question, I really wonder whether an RfC is the best way to go here. I believe the evidence of previous history is probably the better way to go to determine such matters, and I tend to think that there is, to some degree or another, evidence for both sides in this discussion. The ArbCom is actually the group who should decide this, probably on a case by case basis, and it looks to me like they have agreed to do so. I do not envy them this task in any way, shape, or form, but am extremely grateful to them for having the courage to take the issue headon. John Carter (talk) 01:21, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I've read from several editors that the core problem here is wikipedia's policy, as written in WP:CIVIL, of "block[s] for major incivility" which includes personnel attacks (for instance "you really are a waste of space Chillum"). Now what I want to know is, how many editors think blocks on productive editors for personal attacks is ineffective and counterproductive? Is it a lunatic fringe or a significant faction? If the problem here is core wikipedia policy then we need to work as a community to change it before the arbitration committee enforces that policy as written and sanctions Malleus in such a way that would prevent him from contributing to the encyclopedia. --ScWizard (talk) 02:52, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Block him for a while. Not to long, 24 hours or so, just long enough so that he only insults users when it's worth it. Then we should all forget this ever happened and get back to writing articles asap. 84.106.26.81 (talk) 11:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your comment --ScWizard (talk) 19:45, 29 December 2011 (UTC)