Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Bluemarine

Statement by Lawrence Cohen
Please accept this case. It is not a content dispute. This user (User:Bluemarine/User:Mattsanchez) has frequently violated WP:COI with his work on his own article, as seen here. 294 of his total 1535 edits are to Matt Sanchez, as recently as today, 5 January 2008. He may or may not have been endless baited by "homosexual" editors, as some have stated, but there no excuse for rampant homophobia and bigoted statements, which are forbidden under NPA. As I said on ANI, would this have been tolerated even 1/10th as long if he had complained about Blacks, Jews, or other groups editing his article? There is a Request For Comments on him located here. Please read that. There are currently multiple ANI threads related to this individual as of 5 January 2008 (permanent links, thank you Jehochman), here (longest and most detailed), here, and here. An older thread on this can be found here from January 2. More evidence of abusive bigotry can be found here. Lawrence Cohen 04:58, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Horologium
I also would request that ArbCom consider this case, although my reasons differ from those of Allstarecho and Lawrence Cohen. It is apparent that both Sanchez and his detractors are at fault in this case; Sanchez's attitude towards other editors (particularly LGBT and left-of-center editors) is appalling, and needs to be addressed, but the repeated attempts to add BLP-violation material into his article (which, unfortunately, is coming from the same LGBT and left-of-center editors) despite dozens of warnings (spread out through the 11 pages of talk archives on a 10-month old article), the parade of single-purpose accounts attacking Sanchez, and repeated links to a site dedicated to destroying Sanchez personally (run by an indefinitely blocked editor, the site also specifically attacks two Wikipedia admins by name) are issues that need to be addressed as well.

Right now, there is an issue of undue weight, since a small group of editors stripped out almost all of the information that does not relate to Sanchez's porn career. This article is billed as a biography, but right now, it is little more than a retelling of a rather salacious story, nothing more. If it is a biography, some of the recently deleted material needs to be restored, or the article needs to be retitled and reorganized as "Matt Sanchez Controversy" or something similar.

Regardless of the disposition of this case, Sanchez needs to be topic-banned from editing his article or related articles (such as Scott Thomas Beauchamp), and some of his persistent detractors need to find other topics on Wikipedia as well; two of the editors listed as involved parties have fewer than 10% of their edits on Wikipedia on articles that do not relate to Sanchez.

Regarding Mr. Cohen's insinuation that there is an element of homophobia behind Sanchez's limited block history, it needs to be pointed out that one of the reasons Sanchez has been given some latitude is the libelous behavior exhibited by other editors on an article about him, which is quite different than ordinary, garden-variety personal attacks.

Regarding Allstarecho's assertion about the timeline, at the time that Sanchez requested an unblock (13:38, 5 January 2008), the article was at this revision, which is arguably libelous, and section 1.3 is the likely reason behind the OTRS lock. That section was repeatedly added by one editor, and repeatedly reverted by an administrator. It was removed two minutes later by another admin, but Sanchez had already made the legal threat, which needs to be retracted by Sanchez before this case can effectively proceed.

Horologium  (talk) 06:12, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Elonka
Though I haven't edited the Matt Sanchez article recently, I was very involved with it in mid-2007, and worked very hard to try and come up with a consensus rewrite. I am disappointed to see that the article remains unstable, and do agree that ArbCom intervention is needed. The core of the dispute is that Matt Sanchez, a right-wing blogger/columnist, also has a well-documented history as an actor in gay pornographic films, which has led to multiple accusations against him being made in the blogosphere, some of which accusations, such as that he was also a prostitute, were publicized enough that they were picked up in major media. Sanchez himself has made some public but ambiguous statements about whether or not the allegations were true.

The wrangling over the Wikipedia article basically hinges on how much space should be given to the prostitution allegations, or whether they should be listed at all, per WP:BLP. Some editors believe that it is blatantly obvious that Sanchez was a prostitute, and that the article should include information about it. Others believe that this obviousness is only evident through connecting the dots in violation of WP:NOR, and the information should be minimized. Others believe that the prostitution allegations shouldn't be mentioned at all, per BLP. The situation is made further complex by the fact that Sanchez himself continues to try and edit the article, and generates personal attacks and homophobic slurs on the talkpage. Some of these attacks can be seen as understandable, considering the attacks that are being generated on Sanchez himself, both on- and off-wiki. Other comments and actions by Sanchez, in my opinion, have been far past anything that I could consider acceptable or justified. My own feeling is that ArbCom should implement a strict civility and revert parole on the article and its talkpage, with rapid blocks issued to anyone (including Sanchez) who resorts to personal attacks or edit-warring. --Elonka 05:49, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Durova
This situation needs arbitration. I first noticed it three months ago when I responded to a content RFC and discovered that a user conduct RFC had also been running for a month. Formal dispute resolution has not helped this situation. Previous RFAR statements have already described Matt Sanchez's conduct; I make no excuse for it. I informed him of the legitimate ways to address BLP issues and offered mentorship. I even offered to nominate the article for deletion per WP:NOT and WP:BLP. He preferred to continue the dispute. I can also affirm that he has been getting trolled by throwaway accounts of people who know a few things about Wikipedia. Here are a couple of examples of attacks to his userpage. I urge the committee to accept this request and examine the conduct of all parties.  Durova Charge! 06:59, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Coredesat
The conduct of users on both sides of this issue has been appalling; per Durova's evidence, Sanchez has been trolled in the past, but Sanchez's own attitude toward resolving disputes on the article on him is quite incivil (with blatant personal attacks against various users). I had blocked him indefinitely earlier after noticing multiple threads on WP:ANI about his behavior (1, 2, 3), a failed RFC, numerous warnings, and a few blocks, including one for legal threats. I was hesitant to shorten the block at first, but after looking into the history of the situation and in light of recent WP:BLP violations that had been re-inserted into the article after Sanchez was blocked, I asked WJBscribe to reduce the block length to one week pending an arbitration case. I urge the Committee to accept this case to examine Sanchez's conduct, as well as that of others involved in the dispute (which went beyond a simple content dispute long ago). If this case is accepted before the block has expired, I have no problem with unblocking him so he can participate.

Note to clerks: Bluemarine is no longer indefinitely blocked; when I agreed to WJBscribe reducing Bluemarine's block length, I asked him to leave Mattsanchez blocked to avoid sockpuppet abuse. --Coredesat 07:23, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Matt Sanchez/Bluemarine at Talk:Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy
I didn't see a place to post that Sanchez/Bluemarine's continual COI, self-promotion and use of socks on Talk:Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy should be given a hearing as well. I wish to avoid dealing with him direct so remain anonymous so do with this whatever you feel is correct. 71.139.2.52 (talk) 13:02, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Benjiboi
I believe the RfC has plenty of evidence and also suggest that those investigating consider reviewing both Matt's contributions as well as Bluemarine's. I've found almost all of his work to by overly POV and POINTY towards those he doesn't agree with. I used to think he could be a good resource and editor here but I doubt that now. I also share the concern that if he has a biography then there should be a way for him to correct any mistakes, however, his M.O. seems to be to remove anything unflattering and adding items which don't seem to be supported. I personally have taken breaks from that article in particular and wikipedia in general because I found Matt's attacks on me personally and against all editors who disagree with him (lumped together by him as homosexuals) as extremely uncivil and off-putting. I made a good faith effort to encourage Matt to cool off but that lasted all of a few hours until he would pepper the entire talk page with comments which, IMHO, seemed to be a concerted effort to distract and disperse any who didn't agree with his version, which seemed to be almost everyone. At the same time arguing against items he didn't agree with, often by also disparaging the contributors, which he had been warned repeatedly not to do, Matt would introduce blog listings or other dubious items that he felt should be included. In hindsight I wished I had seen the talk pages of Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy where the atmosphere was a bit less chaotic and no-nonsense. I feel like Matt played us all and did it well, now it's time for him to take a break. He should also accept that he had a career as a gay porn star and escort and even if he regrets it now, it helped propel him onto the national radar and (the revelation of his porn past) seems to be the height of his notoriety as of yet. I feel bad that Pwok or others may have attacked him for their own reasons related to his notoriety but disagree that that justifies him attacking others repeatedly after many warnings. I also don't think it justifies him gaming the system to stall his article being vetted and improved and I fully expect him, at this point, to roadblock in anyway the updating of his article to reflect wikipedia's standards. Quite a few editors have been extremely patient with Matt and I think that patience has worn too thin at this point. Someday he could potentially still be a great editor but for wikipedia's sake I hope he takes some time off and focus on his other writings. Benjiboi 05:59, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Bluemarine has been unblocked
In order to allow Bluemarine to participate in this case, the account has been unblocked and strongly warned to refrain from editing any other pages at this time. If anybody notices the user editing outside the case pages, please leave a note either here or at Clerks Noticeboard and either myself or another clerk will take deal with it. John Vandenberg (talk) 07:10, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Wjhonson
Having been involved with this article for some time, I am not convinced that Matt Sanchez *can* become a neutral editor on his article or any. He is an extremely aggressive editor. I have felt for some time that he has been treated with kid gloves and I have no idea why. We certainly would not let Ann Coulter remove negative things from her own article and we shouldn't in this case either. Matt however is too involved to be able to leave it. He has demonstrated that a sufficient number of times already. So this issue is unlikely to go away unless he is indef-blocked. IMHO. Wjhonson (talk) 08:28, 8 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Interesting that Matt has now responded on-page and states again that he is "going to upload the second interview". We heard that months ago, but it's irrelevant anyway.  Just to refresh everyone on the details that his page *should* have contained (I admit I'm a bit anal) you can see my article "Matt Sanchez" on http://www.countyhistorian.com. Still the most popular page on my site, amazingly enough. Wjhonson (talk) 10:00, 10 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Would ArbCom also take into account that aggressive admins have been blocking discussion on the Matt Sanchez talk page where we've been having an actual productive dialog on some of these issues? In addition I've now been threatened by two seperate admins Quadell‎ and Shell Kinney‎ with my own supposed BLP violations which I completely dispute both that I have and second that their claims are even covered under BLP in the first place.  I've asked both admins to include themselves here.  This is turning into another force-circus with whoever has *power* trying to silence everyone else.  Thank you. Wjhonson (talk) 01:50, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Outside comment from Walton
I haven't been involved with this case at all, but looking at the diffs provided to show why Coredesat blocked Bluemarine, I don't see that any of them merited a block. This and this are expressions of opinion, not attacks. It would be inappropriate to attack other individual editors with anti-gay epithets; however, WP:NPA does not prohibit criticism of homosexuals as a group or of gay rights activism. Opposition to homosexual practices, or to the gay rights political agenda, are perfectly legitimate political standpoints, and I dislike the political correctness which prohibits any public criticism of homosexuality or of any minority group, while allowing (and indeed encouraging) criticism of the US government, Christianity, conservatism and the military. As I wasn't involved with the case and haven't fully reviewed the background to it, I wouldn't go so far as to state that the block was inappropriate; however, the stated reasons for the block are certainly inadequate. I can't escape the impression that Matt Sanchez has been an unfortunate victim of Wikipedia's inherent liberal bias.

While editing one's own article is discouraged under WP:COI, it is not prohibited, nor should it be. Indeed, I would say that the spirit (if not the letter) of BLP permits people to correct inaccurate or misleading information in articles about themselves. This demonstrates a bona fide concern with factual inaccuracies in the article. As I said, I do not know whether his editing has been tendentious enough to merit a block. But neither Allstarecho nor anyone else has presented evidence to that effect. The assertion that he is trying to whitewash his own past may be true, but again, it has not been backed up by any evidence.

I'm not criticising the blocking admin, and I also accept that when Sanchez made a legal threat, it was legitimate to block him per WP:NLT. I will, however, be conducting an independent review into this case and will be offering my considered opinion to the Committee, together with relevant evidence. WaltonOne 12:28, 8 January 2008 (UTC)


 * (Note concerning the above: Per my discussion with Lawrence Cohen below, and the evidence he has presented, I am satisfied that the block was not made for political reasons, and that there were legitimate grounds for treating Matt Sanchez's comments as violations of WP:NPA, since he has made comments attacking the sexuality of individual editors with whom he has been in conflict. I presently reserve judgment as to whether the block applied was appropriate and proportionate in all the circumstances.) WaltonOne 16:45, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Response to Walton's statement
Unfortunately, Walton misinterprets or accidentally has misrepresented why Sanchez was blocked by Coredesat. See this thread, where he actually says why he blocked him originally. I also specifically was the one that called his being indefinitely blocked, after I saw the horrible history (documented here) of hateful language this person was spewing on-wiki. Oppositional language such as this towards minority groups is strictly prohibited at any and all times on Wikipedia per:
 * NPA
 * Racial, sexual, homophobic, ageist, religious, political, ethnic, or other epithets (such as against people with disabilities) directed against another contributor. Disagreement over what constitutes a religion, race, sexual preference, or ethnicity is not a legitimate excuse.
 * Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views — regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream or not.

Sanchez is guilty of both. See my evidence section.


 *  Wikipedia:HARASS
 * "Not all personal attacks are harassment, but when an editor engages in repeated personal attacks on a particular editor or group of editors, that's another matter."

Emphasis mine on the harassment link. Per my evidence Sanchez has been making hateful comments for a year on Wikipedia. Walton says that "Opposition to homosexual practices" are "perfectly legitimate political standpoints", and I'll point out that so is Racial segregation based on some long running politicians like Strom Thurmond. As I said elsewhere, people are free to practice whatever hateful activities towards minorities they want--racism, bigotry, go burn a cross, I personally don't care--but repeatedly expressing that nonsense on Wikipedia towards a minority is unacceptable. As I also said, if Sanchez were making all these statements about another group besides homosexuals would this issue have even lasted this long? Had he been saying things like, "I won't let the Jews edit my article because of the kike agenda" or "I won't let the Mexicans edit my article because of their wetback agenda," instead of "I won't let the Gays edit my article because of their faggot agenda," would we even be debating this? He'd have been out the door on his butt ages ago.

Sanchez as I read it was blocked for an endless history of using hateful, bigoted and discriminatory language towards minorities. He doesn't need to hit one big NPA Violation Home Run in his Wikipedia game. The combined weight of his NPA singles has earned him what it has. Lawrence Cohen 14:53, 8 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Reviewing the diffs you presented on the Evidence page, I agree that some of those crossed the line into attacks on individual homosexual editors and thus were unacceptable under NPA, and accordingly I concur that the block issued was, in all the circumstances, probably justified (although I haven't yet had time to investigate the history of the case in full).
 * What I want to make clear here, though, is that expressing one's dislike of a particular political standpoint - in this case, gay rights activism - is not an NPA violation. Similarly, we should not block a Wikipedian who argued that racial segregation was a good idea, just because their views are outside the "acceptable" mainstream. However, we certainly would - and should - block a Wikipedian who attacked individual Jewish or ethnic minority editors with racist comments, and likewise I concur that it was appropriate to block Matt Sanchez (though probably not indefinitely) for making some of the comments you noted on the Evidence page, since he made disparaging comments about specific editors' sexuality.
 * Like I said, I'm not being critical of any of the admins involved in this case. I just think we should ensure that when we block people for NPA, it is for actual violations of NPA (i.e. direct attacks on other editors), not for expressing a viewpoint that the majority of Wikipedians dislike or find offensive (although as I said, I agree with you that many of the diffs on the Evidence page were undoubtedly violations of NPA). I also think, considering the gravity of this situation, and the fact that this case might well end up with a ban being imposed on Sanchez, that he should have the benefit of representation/advocacy from an experienced Wikipedia editor, to ensure that the ArbCom proceedings are fair and balanced, and I am happy to take on this role. I realise we don't have lawyers on Wikipedia, and I don't intend to defend him unconditionally, but I think that a balance of opinions is needed here. WaltonOne 15:09, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Agreed on all points and your offer sounds like a good idea, if he'd be wise enough to take it and the AC had no problem with it. I just wanted to make sure that everyone realized he was really banned for the whole history of abuse, not for political reasons. People can be as contrary as they like from socially responsible viewpoints and positions, just so long as they don't start attacking people or groups. Lawrence Cohen  16:03, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Request to amend a prior case: Bluemarine (Matt Sanchez)
List of any users involved or affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
 * (initiator)
 * (Matt Sanchez)

Statement by Nick
Matt Sanchez was recently banned for a period of one year, however he was today (06 Feb 2008) caught editing whilst using a self identifying sockpuppet, apparently with the express purpose of dealing with the article we hold on him, and in particular, a photo which could facilitate identity theft, according to Matt.

Blocking the account and saying the user is banned doesn't make this problem go away however, Wikipedia has an article on the editor in question and it must comply with all the policies that are applicable to the page, WP:BLP, WP:V, WP:NPOV etc. It is not unreasonable for this user to expect that he can communicate with Wikipedia and ensure that the article is compliant with our policies.

In an ideal world, such communication would be through the OTRS system, however there are numerous backlogs and even in an ideal world, OTRS often takes time to deal with tickets, so problems often go unresolved for a few hours. This being the case, there really needs to be an appropriate clause in Matt's ban here which permits him to comment on the article on-wiki, in order that any changes can be made, as necessary. The article in question is reasonably popular, with around 200 edits last month (January), and it's an article that does tend to require protection occasionally, there are edit wars over the article and it does tend to stray from complying with our policies on occasion.

I'm hoping that the Committee will look at permitting Matt the ability to edit, perhaps just his talk page, and we could then transclude that onto a subpage of the article's talk page, in order that his concerns can be addressed and acted upon if necessary. Nick (talk) 17:48, 7 February 2008 (UTC)


 * (Following comment by Thatcher):

I know normally OTRS would be the way to go, and I've asked that in future he's nudged towards us, but there's pretty big backlogs at the moment we're trying to deal with, it could be a while before we get to his message, he knows how to edit Wikipedia, surely we can ask that he raises concerns on-wiki so that they may be addressed. I'm not talking about genuine editing privileges, simply the ability to comment on his own biography as necessary. Nick (talk) 10:28, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Wjhonson
I just want to point out, as if we don't all know, that Matt has plenty of blogspace and several private emails in case he wants to comment on his article.Wjhonson (talk) 18:29, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes
(Following comment by Sam Blacketer):

We also don't know who that is, anyone could have registered that username. Regardless of the provocation, Sanchez' behavior was pretty foul, and while rehabilitation is not impossible, it is certainly too soon. It will be important to demonstrate (for example) that he can work civilly and productively with the OTRS volunteers. Thatcher 20:08, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

has started a similar discussion at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee. As far as I know, the Bluemarine account is compromised/hacked/doing-very-strange-things, so unprotecting that talk page is not useful until that has been addressed. John Vandenberg (talk) 10:56, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrator views and discussion
The arbitration case has only just closed and I think it is a bit too soon to go changing the finding. Matt Sanchez had his editing privileges withdrawn because he misused them in attacking other users, and there is no indication so far that he has undergone an epiphany. In any case, of his three known accounts, only one has its talk page protected, so he is able to use the others to communicate. With OTRS, the simpler factual corrections are normally the quickest to be made. Sam Blacketer (talk) 19:28, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

User:Benjiboi: appeal of topic ban on Matt Sanchez
See AE noticeboard thread and topic-ban appeal

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
 * (initiator)
 * , (topic-banning admin) notification
 * (editor central in AE threads) notification

Statement by Benjiboi
I request a complete lift and reversal of the indefinite topic ban against me on Matt Sanchez. I'm quite disappointed at having to take this step to clear my name and worked to avoid having to take this step and indicated so during the AE discussion. I'm surprised that my contributions to Wikipedia was treated in this manner and the same assuming of good faith we extend to all others seemed to evaporate towards me despite my obvious attempts to communicate civilly and directly. I feel the blocking admin may have been personally invested in driving me away from the article by their involvement in numerous OTRS tickets from banned user Bluemarine (who is one of Matt Sanchez's accounts) and making edits on Sanchez's behalf. I appreciate the work that OTRS volunteers do and that they are trying to work with someone who earned a community RfC and Arbcom ban for voluminous and personal attacks amongst other issues. However, despite Sanchez's assertions that I, and others, are a part of a "radical left-leaning fringe that is the LGBT is hell bent on venting frustrations through the article", many editors, including admins and LGBT editors, worked to follow policy and work with Sanchez and tried to look past his personal attacks and unique style of writing accusatory statements. When information and verifiable statements at odds with Sanchez's views were presented he routinely would fill up the talk page sometimes contradicting himself. It's understandable for someone to want their biography to only show them in the best possible light but topic-banning editors because the subject of the article doesn't like their tone doesn't seem like a inspiring direction for the project and in Sanchez's case the list of user's he's found problematic would quickly add up.

In short, the article exists because his notability is as a former gay porn star who became a marine and then the poster-child for US social conservatives thus placing Sanchez in the center of several current American culture wars including issues of gays in the military. (As referenced by the Military Times as a "don't ask, don't tell" issue) I personally don't care about his sexuality or expression thereof, I do care about presenting sexuality issues correctly and as factually as possible. In addition, I felt I was helping Sanchez avoid abusing Wikipedia for self-promotion and personal gain by insisting that claims be reliably sourced.

The other reason his case received national attention was that it was revealed he also was a "gay" escort (an escort for men who have sex with men) who mostly advertised in gay male magazines with Sanchez stating he was an escort (prostitute) on the internationally broadcast Fox News Channel Hannity & Colmes show. Sanchez stated (in the Arbcom case and elsewhere on wiki) that he later retracted his statements but no proof of that retraction seems to have ever been presented to balance out his earlier statements. I have regularly and consistently stressed than anything about his escort work has to be well sourced and neutral. I believe he is now being coached how to self-publish retractions on his blog. I can certainly see why Sanchez wouldn't want anyone around who was basically saying we print what's verifiable not just what you'd like. It wasn't until Sanchez's Arbcom ban and the related AfD during his Arbcom case that the circular talk page dynamic seemed to disappear. In fairness, he may have also been targeted by SPAs but that's not a license to abuse those you disagree with. Once Sanchez was banned I worked to clean up the talk page, archives and keep the discussion constructive and as focussed as possible in a collaborative fashion. (See January's archive for instance.) Even when folks disagreed we mostly stayed constructive and tried to find workable solutions. My contributions were mostly constructive and it would we a stretch to paint me as simply trying to disrupt or otherwise compromise Wikipedia's policies.

JzG (Guy), in what I feel was a somewhat condescending, impatient, confrontational and personal manner, bordering on uncivil, IMHO, rather than simply warning me in any manner suggested instead I be topic-banned without giving me any notice I had breached policy or was heading in a bad direction. When I responded to all the stated concerns he repeated that this ban was really no big deal. When I sought guidance I was told I should take my case to JzG (Guy) directly to see what it would take to have the ban lifted. He deleted the request only stating " Discussion at AE board" in the edit summary. Later JzG (Guy) admitted he was unwilling to budge on the issue. I sent two email to the Arbcom elist per Arbitration Committee stating I write with a bit of a heavy heart as this, to me, is the last way I would have wanted to be introduced to all of you. Sadly I'm hitting a bit of a roadblock and would like some guidance or assistance in addressing my ban. Rather than rehashing the whole affair I feel I've addressed the concerns raised and had asked (nicely) for this to be lifted. The admin has been rather unsupportive and their userpage has an ominous posting about not causing them stress so I'm unclear what my options are and feel if this ban is to stay over my head I'll likely just pack it all in instead. All help appreciated. I got no response.

Finally, I believe it states, "[E]ditors are expected to make mistakes, suffer occasional lapses of judgement...in well-meaning furtherance of the project's goals." If I've overstepped a line or indeed violated some policy then please point it out, perhaps a warning would have served the purpose of ensuring the "tone" of edits remained civil and constructive. I wish it had been considered and attempted, instead I have been shown what I consider to be disrespect and a leap of bad faith. Banje boi 13:01, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Timeline prior to topic-ban
4 March Amongst other editprotected requests, a request was made by Durova to remove wording that could have been reworded instead; within that request was that the reference was to content hosted at YouTube. There didn't seem to be an emphasis or effort to improve the wording to clarify that the gay escort didn't refer to Sanchez, just to remove it altogether. This request was later struck by the same editor who later filed the AE request that started all this. Durova struck the request as it was pointed out they were mistaken and that it wasn't YouTube after all.

21 March (19:56, 21 March 2008) JzG (Guy) edits Sanchez article removing (rather than rewording) problem phrase (it has since been re-added and reworded). And removing a source rather than correctly attributing to the original source.

(22:50, 21 March 2008) JzG (Guy) opens ArbCom case amendment to allow Bluemarine (Matt Sanchez) to comment on the Matt Sanchez talk page as "over a dozen" OTRS tickets (averaging two per week) since Sanchez's 7 Feb Arbcom ban. He also alleges that the protected article has been edited with an a agenda and other editors should be monitored. The request is withdrawn as Sanchez again evades his ban. Although arguably incomplete some of his socks have been tagged and others have been logged into the Arbcom case.

22 March (09:10, 22 March 2008) Durova first posts to the talk page regarding YouTube as source concern; they state they are making "one last effort" but no previous efforts to bring up sourcing in the article seem to be evident. They also don't suggest, even as an option, to source to the original publisher. Nothing seems to suggest that anyone would have opposed fixing the sourcing and, in fact, it has since been done.

(23:03, 22 March 2008) |Arbitration Durova files noticeboard AE request to remove Youtube links and "potentially defamatory claims that reference them be removed from the article". When asked why posting to the AE board they respond, "Two editors consistently oppose, and are filling up the talk page AE thread with irrelevant comments that give passersby the mistaken impression that this is a content dispute. But this isn't a content issue; copyright is bright line policy. I am on the verge of filing a separate AE thread against one of those editors for tendentiousness, incivility, and disruption." I feel however that this was presented as we need to remove all YouTube citations and this, IMHO, was the first that this was brought up. Also they painted me as "filling up the talk page AE thread with irrelevant comments that give passersby the mistaken impression that this is a content dispute". Instead of approaching the issue as we need to fix this sourcing it was, IMHO, presented as this needs to also be removed. After months of Sanchez's thwarting progress it was quite frustrating to be accused of the very same thing. Subsequently the refs have been amended to the original publishers as I would have readily agreed had it been presented as such. I was also not given any indication that I was in any way violating BLP (or any policy), nor was I notified in any way that I was being discussed on an Admin board. Note: the links have been updated to the original source and no "potentially defamatory claims" from those sources seem to have been found although many other items that show the subject in a less than flattering light have been removed or reworked.

23 March '(11:19, 23 March 2008) Admin JzG (Guy) proposes myself and another editor be topic-banned "for consistent failure to follow WP:BLP". No notice was given to me or any indication that I was being considered for a ban or that I had violated any policy.

Statement by JzG
The Arbitration Committee is well aware, I think, of the long-term issues of accuracy and neutrality in. Sanchez, aka, is banned and therefore restricted to using OTRS to request changes to the article. This has resulted in an absolute barrage of email, much of it related to edits made by Benjiboi and (now indefinitely blocked for other reasons).

The reason I advocated a topic ban was that Sanchez complained specifically about Benjiboi's edits and their neutrality, and because Sanchez vehemently denies the "escort" characterisation which Benjiboi is so determined to include. A situation with a banned article subject, WP:BLP concerns, what appears to be selective reporting in the outside world, and obsession with including problematic content, is pretty close to impossible to manage.

I said right up front that I don't consider this a black mark against Benjiboi, we just don't need the hassle of tens of emails a day from an extremely agitated subject. We've had well over a hundred emails in total.

Some OTRS tickets related to this:


 * (most of the emails merged here)

I know this is going to sound like Morton's Fork, but the main reason I am so strongly opposed to Benjiboi editing that article, is that he is so very determined to do so. We do not need obsessive editors on WP:BLP articles. This was not my call alone, but it's true that not many were involved. Durova was one, and she also has long experience of the Sanchez article.

If article probation is to mean anything at all, then it must surely mean that people dealing with a sensitive article (and an angry subject) can request others to leave it alone, and expect to have that request stick. In this case, requesting did not work, so we had a topic ban, and now this. What is so very very important about the Sanchez article that Benjiboi must be allowed to contribute despite the subject's clear preference otherwise?

Note to Jpgordon
Matt Sanchez has made many requests, and a decent proportion of them have been rejected as mere interpretations of weight. The "escort" business is only one of a number of contentious issues, most of which have now been settled. Sanchez has never had a right of veto over the content and I've several times told him "no" in no uncertain terms. This is not about Benjiboi's advocacy of one particular edit, either, it's about a long-standing pattern of advocacy on that article, and yes, any editor who showed such a pattern of edits would cause the same problem, because the pattern of edits and talk page comments reveals an agenda, and Wikipedia (especially Wikipedia biographies) is not the place to pursue an agenda. Guy (Help!) 18:59, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Comments by others and discussion on above


 * Comment: The subject has been banned from Wikipedia for his homophobic attacks on gay editors, including Benjiboi. Via the subject's year long ban from Wikipedia, the subject has no rights to an article about him, just as Ann Coulter has no rights to the article about her. Benji is one of the best editors I've seen on Wikipedia. Characterizing him as obsessed with the Sanchez article is absurd. His contibs history proves that. If he's obsessed with anything, it would be Wikipedia in general and not poor little ole Matt Sanchez. Benji works on many articles at once. Just a look at his talk page right now shows "notes to self" all over it referencing the many articles he's working on. - &#10032; ALLSTAR &#10032; echo 15:16, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Sanchez's ludicrous and defamatory attacks on gays has no bearing on who gets to edit the Matt Sanchez article. Mr. Sanchez, to be indelicate, can shove his bigoted views up his own ass. There is obsessive behavior (the history is demonstrated and incontrovertible) coming from multiple sides here. To be as un-PC as possible: It's odd that most of the "pushing" to include negative material comes from self-admitted homosexual editors. The whole thing has a tit-for-tat retaliatory feel, and we don't need that shit. Before anyone screams "Oh my God, Lawrence hates the LGBTers," my best friend went from Mr. to Ms., and I love her still, one of my best friends in the world is as gay as people can possibly be, and I was the one that assembled the bulk of the evidence displaying the absurd homophobic attacks here by Sanchez. However, "Wikipedia" doesn't need an evangelical war of The Gays Vs. Sanchez and Sanchez Vs. The Gays. His article is so heavily watched now that any attempts to whitewash or scrub the article of his sourced and factual history of performing in gay pornography, and doing some gay escort work (both points which seem to be points of contention) won't happen. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 15:28, 21 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Reply to JzG's statement. While I appreciate the position OTRS volunteers are put in I seem to be getting punished for Sanchez (yet again) gaming the system. I'm not an OTRS volunteer and have no access to the emails linked above so have no clue what Sanchez wrote but all my contributions are quite evident in the article and talk page history. I may be wrong here but I don't recall anyone, ever, asking me not to edit there prior to this surprise ban. No one politely asided me to indicate that sadly Wikipedia does topic-ban editors primarily because the subject prefers them not to. I'm also not "determined" or "obsessed" to include anything that isn't true and reliably sourced. As I've stated a few times in the AE threads I have no problem following policies and if I made an error simply (civilly) point it out.
 * Over a hundred emails in two months? Doesn't that seem to indicate that just maybe, yet again, Sanchez is the primary source of this drama and, yet again, instead of dealing with him firmly to set boundaries the frustration is applied elsewhere. A variance was being created for Sanchez so he could edit on the talk page but was dropped because he wasn't willing or able to refrain from again evading his ban. If this situation is "close to impossible to manage" it's not by my doing and I'm more than willing to abide by policies and, in fact, have frequently taken bios to the BLP board as well as assisted other bios listed there. The same courtesy shown to obvious vandals didn't seem to be extended to myself. This ban was stated as dealing with reliable sourcing on the AE board and had it been presented as such in the first place on the talk page as "we need to correct these sources to the original sources" I don't think anyone would have disagreed. Banje boi  17:06, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Punished? I don't think so.  There are over two million articles you can edit without causing problems of apparent militant advocacy and upsetting the subject. You're not banned from Wikipedia, you are free to edit on any subject you like except Matt Sanchez, who is, it must be said, an incredibly minor figure. Guy (Help!) 18:52, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Of course, the key part is that this is the encyclopedia "anyone can edit".. including any article so that argument is moot. - &#10032; ALLSTAR &#10032; echo 18:57, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * You think? Even banned and blocked and topic banned and WP:COI editors? Guy (Help!) 12:04, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
 * The point is that I think it's punishment and a black mark against myself even if you do not, and I have not been blocked or otherwise banned. You seem to put a lot of weight on what Sanchez, a community banned and blocked (and COI) editor who continues to evade bans even this week, while dismissing my concerns as really not a big deal. Banje boi  23:11, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Very little, actually, but I do put a good deal of weight on what article subjects in general have to say, at least to the point of ensuring that we don't actively piss them off and make more enemies. Your tireless advocacy of the strongly disputed and not obviously important "escort" factoid, which has no significant secondary sources, is one example of why I don't think you should be editing this particular biography; I don't feel you are sufficiently dispassionate about the subject. Guy (Help!) 17:47, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Completely agree that BLP subjects should be given due consideration and they are considered experts on themselves. In this case, it's hardly my contributions that have "pissed him off" or put him on a path of being an enemy. The campaign against POV and fringe warriors is basically commendable but I resent being painted as such. I just happen to consistently advocate for civility and RS's which Sanchez didn't care for unless it was to his favor. If he didn't like something it was a barrage of invective and complaints, most of it groundless. My "tireless advocacy" was little more than simply ensuring that due process of vetting "the strongly disputed and not obviously important "escort" factoid" to see what, if anything, should be included and how. Since you seem convinced that I was somehow invested in the escorting point of information you may wish to also note that it was a source of debate long before I ever showed up and even after I had be banned and all previous discussion archived away. Again, personally, I don't care that much, I never did and still don't. I was slow to edit the article and when I did I also went slowly and worked toward consensus as a general rule. This whole AE incident started as a sourcing concern and those were corrected, and would have been trouble-free had they been clearly presented as such in the first place. To me, it sounds like he's been sequestered to OTRS tickets and is now abusing that avenue in a similar fashion (volume).
 * If I "tirelessly advocated" for anything it was to stop the nonsense both from Sanchez and from those making attacks against him. I have sought consensus on how to deal with the escorting material and never advocated for including unless it was solid. What I objected to was silencing the debate on the basis we don't talk about something the subject doesn't like. During this process here I again noted that we have statements he had done escorting but as of yet there doesn't seem to be anything presented in reliable sources that he denies it, if he's self-published something usable then presenting it on the talk page would probably be helpful. I don't want my ban lifted so I can edit that article but because I feel it was wrong in the first place. <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  21:37, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment by GRBerry
The original WP:AE report that triggered the topic ban by JzG is archived here. (I closed this report.) The follow-up discussion of Benjiboi's protest is archived here. 14:06, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment by Lawrence
Having been involved with this for a long time myself I have to agree with Guy's assessment, unfortunately. All the regulars on Matt Sanchez should find some other pages to work on. <font color="#800080">Lawrence Cohen § t/e 15:22, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment by Durova
It is disappointing to see gaps in Benjiboi's presentation. Actually we had substantial discussion about YouTube hostings prior to 22 March. The problems there were contributory copyright infringement, as laid forth in COPYRIGHT. WP:V, WP:RS, and WP:BLP were also relevant. The article was sourcing negative information about a living subject to copyvio hostings at YouTube. I would have had no problem with citing such material to a legitimate hosting or a transcript, but linking to copyright infringements places WMF at risk of a lawsuit. Per BLP, negative text in the article that had no legitimate citation needed to be removed, at least temporarily, until a legitimate hosting or a show transcript could be found.

I first raised these issues on 29 February:
 * Durova:  Videos can be edited and digitally altered in misleading ways, so a video hosted on a blog isn't reliable either. That goes for YouTube too, which is a point I hadn't raised yet. I'm not taking any partisan position here. Count the number of Blogspot and YouTube links I've removed in my last thousand edits. Or double check with the noticeboard.

Benjiboi is aware of that statement; he replied an hour later. I responded again.

The next day he continued the thread as follows:
 * Benjiboi: ''Disagree completely. The world was agreed to be flat at one point as well, now we have better information that just maybe that isn't accurate. New media sources continue to evolve and wikipedia continues to keep up with those changes, sometimes successfully. I again assert that both the video of Sanchez doing what he says he does and the content which no one seems to dispute can be used and if semantics is an issue address those concerns. Dismissing something out of hand doesn't make for better articles.

With that statement, Benjiboi was dismissing the Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry precedent on contributory copyright infringement as semantics, which is a hypothesis that would really be better to test on his own website where he bears the consequences, than on WMF's website where the Foundation bears the consequences. He is also attempting to lecture me about new media. Although I was tempted to reply with a link to my dozens of featured picture credits, instead I just referred him to a noticeboard for third party feedback:


 * Durova: ''You are welcome to take advantage of this full protection to see whether the volunteers at WP:BLPN confirm your proposal regarding sources.

His reply was sarcastic:
 * Benjiboi: ''Lovely. How special of you to make suggestions for my volunteering.

Again on March 4 I mentioned the YouTube problem at another thread. Here is a link to that thread, which gives a good picture of how difficult even the simplest changes had become: Talk:Matt_Sanchez/Archive_18. Another relevant thread, immediately before the WP:AE request: Talk:Matt_Sanchez/Archive_18. It was partly due to the difficulty of getting even bright line policy edits implemented that, after waiting nearly a full month to settle obvious BLP and copyright issues that ought to have been handled immediately, I resorted to AE for an edit request.

Also, contrary to Benjiboi's assertions, I did offer alternative citation options. It wasn't my responsibility to spell out these things and I was somewhat concerned that this would appear patronizing, but I wanted to be perfectly fair:


 * Durova: Now to state this for clarity: there are other ways besides YouTube to cite a major news broadcast. It's been nearly a full month since I first raised this point about YouTube in late February so I hope the editors who wish to retain the underlying information have been at work obtaining official transcripts of the relevant broadcasts.

Overall, Benjiboi's participation has had several tendentious traits. I'll supply examples of the others if requested, but this presentation is already long:
 * Emphasizing the article subject's career in pornography.
 * Asserting that the article subject is or was a male escort; in other words, a prostitute.
 * Downplaying the subject's military career.
 * Downplaying the subject's journalism career.

I wish to draw the Committee's attention to Benjiboi's insistence, even here on this page, upon claiming that Matt Sanchez was an escort. Per David Shankbone's actions at Michael Lucas (director), that highly damaging assertion is to be made with particular caution even when the sources are impeccable. At Matt Sanchez it was being sourced in article text to non-notable blogs. Benjiboi fiercely defended that practice. We had several exchanges about it. Here's one example:


 * Durova: (I had already given examples of what sorts of blog citations would be acceptable, and why the particular one under discussion was not). Benjiboi, blogs as sources are a settled matter; I remove inappropriate blog citations all the time. That's unacceptable per both WP:RS and WP:BLP. If you have any doubts about my good faith and fairness, please take your doubts to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard.


 * Benjiboi:"blogs as sources are a settled matter" umm hardly. Just because many blogs are less than reliable certainly some are fine. Just wondering are you disputing any of the information as true? If so perhaps you could simply remove the ref that so distresses this strict interpretation as all blogs are bad thinking. Did you notice that the post in question is a video of - Sanchez conducting an interview? Please. The reality police are calling.

At WP:AE I was on the fence about Benjiboi's topic ban and afterward I even offered to open a thread myself to lift his ban after one month if no further problems arose. Here is the latest repetition of that offer, where on April 20 I offered to open the request three days early. Instead of replying he opened this request, where ne makes no mention of these overtures, misrepresents my involvement, and either does not recognize or does not understand the underlying policy and copyright issues at stake. That looks, unfortunately, like a preview of what to expect if his topic ban is lifted. Although I would like to support his return, his presentation renews my concerns.

One further statement for the record. I absolutely do not endorse Matt Sanchez's statements about gay people or the particular insults he has directed at some of the people who edited this article. That was one of the reasons I supported Mr. Sanchez's siteban. Privately, I strongly endorse LGBT rights (straight but not narrow). When I put on my Wikipedian hat I set personal politics on a shelf and apply dry policy analysis. I have answered content RFCs for Michael Moore, Matt Sanchez and Michael Lucas (director) on exactly the same neutral basis. <font face="Verdana"> Durova Charge! 18:13, 21 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Response to Durova's comments. I'm sorry if you felt I was purposely misleading in any way. Firstly, I included you as your actions started the whole AE thread thus my ban. I didn't mean to imply that was your intent. To answer your assertion that there are "gaps", the querty content issue was focussed on blogs as reliable sources not on YouTube as a reliable source. The answer in both cases should be to source to the original broadcaster rather than the site simply hosting the content. In the discussion, in fairness, YouTube was mentioned so could be seen as where the issue arose. To my point the content didn't seem to be presented as "this sourcing needs to be corrected" as much as "this content has to be deleted". I wouldn't have added the querty blog except that it seemed terribly non-controversial to state that the Sanchez had conducted a video interview as a vlogger and here is that vlog. I still disagree that all blogs and vlogs are considered unreliable and will decline to entangle myself in copyright discussions. I also felt the suggestion that I should shop the idea of was this a reliable source around as faulty as the concensus was that the content wasn't needed and if it wasn't considered a reliable source then forum-shopping seemed innappropriate to me. I felt your statement at that time was being sarcastic towards me and I responded in kind, that was a mistake. Also, just to clarify I have no website(s) where I engage in any wikipedia activity nor do I have any interest in Sanchez past the content of the article on this site.
 * I do want to point out that your "offer alternative citation options" came twenty minutes after you started the AE thread. This might be simple misunderstandings on a heated talk page but if your attempt was to correct the sourcing it wasn't clear to me so I apologize.
 * As for your highlights of my "tendentious traits" in regards to that article his notability, as far as reliable sourcing is concerned, is tied to his past porn career, this isn't a porn bio so shouldn't look like one but for those looking for that information we should cover it appropriately and with balance. This is tied directly to his military and journalism careers. We have plenty of sources for the adult entertainment career but talk page concensus is that he is likely no longer in the military with the only reason we don't state so is we have no reliable source stating that he no longer is. As for his journalism, I don't believe I've ever downplayed his journalism career and as is evident from the querty blog and other content (including Sanchez's vlog channel on YouTube) I was trying to add more information. I don't recall doing anything but trying to stick with wikipedia standards on whether he should be called a war-blogger or whatever was most appropriate and similar discussions continued after I was banned. I even listed the blog posts added to the article as examples of his work so that interested editors could try to find some representative quotes to use.
 * As for his escorting I really don't care that much if he did or didn't. He said he did, the incident that made him nationally known certainly said he did and there were lengthy discussions on primary vs secondary sources. The issue seemed far from settled but you've "boldly" archived all of it so until the next person brings it up or a new source covers it it can be anywhere else but on his article. Your links about "Benjiboi's insistence, even here on this page, upon claiming that Matt Sanchez was an escort. ... At Matt Sanchez it was being sourced in article text to non-notable blogs. Benjiboi fiercely defended that practice.  We had several exchanges about it.  Here's one example:" is completely off-base. First that is the qwerty blog thread about Sanchez being a vlogger interviewing someone else who was an escort not anything having to do with Sanchez himself escorting; also the thrust of adding that content was to help anchor him as covering the CPAC convention as a vlogger as well as that he had been corresponding with the interviewee while Sanchez was in the war zones, none of it seemed controversial to me. Secondly, when the escorting topics were brought up, I worked toward talkpage consensus on what information to add about the escorting as well as what wording. We never had consensus and I opposed adding anything to the article until there was some agreement.
 * Finally, as to your offers to help lift my ban I thanked you for your support, period. I have been working on my above statement ever since the second AE thread closed and this route was presented as the only way for me to overturn an admin topic ban. This has caused me more stress than any of the on-wiki homophobia I've dealt with and I only was able to finish it today, apologies if my timing isn't to your liking but I decided months ago to take a break from my volunteering here whenever I was feeling stressed and getting banned from any article without any heads up that I was on thin ice has made me reconsider if my time has been worth it. <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  20:18, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Lots of ground is covered there, so with space in mind I'll target this reply to just a few points. There was a concern among some editors that tangential mentions of other people's escort work were being abused per Coatrack with ambiguous syntax to suggest that Mr. Sanchez was also an escort.  At BLP articles, citation of blogs other than the subject's own is a delicate matter under the best of circumstances, and this was being handled very indelicately under adverse circumstances.  If you thought my tone was sarcastic I wish you had brought the concern to my attention rather than engage in tit-for-tat.  It has never been my intention to give offense, and those replies left me at a loss for what else to do.  I hoped that had just been a bad day for you so I waited several weeks to pursue the matter seriously again, but obviously this kind of issue can't wait forever.  If you can't trust me and won't seek third opinions, where else can I go?  Most straight men wouldn't touch this topic with a ten inch pole.


 * Part of the problem when editorial discussion becomes too contentious is that outside opinions are harder to obtain. Here's one candid statement from earlier this month:
 * Cleo123: ''As an outsider, here in response to the notice at WP:BLPN - I, too, support the phrasing created by Durova and Abecedare. Insistence on the bizarre and inadequately sourced phraseology "embedded blogger" strikes me as an attempt to diminish sourced professional accomplishments, which is POV. Wow! I can't believe something so obvious and clear cut as the man's profession is the subject of such heated debate. Quick! Get me off of this page! LOL! Never! Never to return! LOL! You all have my sympathies!May the Wiki force be with you!


 * Lastly, I do not endorse JzG's assertion that Mr. Sanchez's personal opinions about who should or shouldn't edit the article ought to have any bearing. It doesn't matter to me (or, I hope, to the Committee) what any individual editor's sexual orientation is.  What does matter is whether someone's contributions are productive and consistent with policy. <font face="Verdana"> Durova  Charge! 22:36, 21 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Coatrack concerns are certainly valid, I wish it had been brought up in advance on the talk page as other had been simply as "the article states _____" but per coatrack we should reword to _____ so to remain more NPOV. That's how we've been able to clean up a lot of other problems there. Frankly, I thought Sanchez's interviewing another blogger, on the anniversary and at the same event of Sanchez's national fame (the CPAC convention/awards), who had gone through nearly identical experience as Sanchez (conservative voice being outed as a gay adult entertainer) could have made for a good compare/contrast launching point. As for editor's being straight or any gender or sexuality it really didn't cross my mind and rarely does. I realize most people have more traditional heterosexist and gender binary ideas (people are "either strait or gay" and either "male or female") so I rarely get into those areas unless the discussion seems to be of value.
 * I think I covered that I had no issues with his writing/blogging/journalism career being covered, whatever career title policies stated it be termed. Pretty consistently I've advocated letting reliable sources speak for themselves as a way to stop the SPA abuse and other nonsense. I also felt we were knee deep in experienced editors lately so someone would come up with a way to deem what was most appropriate, I was certainly in no rush. As was evident from discussions like Sanchez is not a writer, I wasn't terribly bothered one way or another but moved to simply keep it accurate, organized and move on. He's a writer, yes, move on. Right below that section is Work as an escort, where my take on the whole escorting/prostitution issue is pretty evident to lean on what reliable sources state and presenting the information neutrally. Also it's fairly evident that this was an issue that many editors besides myself also felt wasn't resolved but others can judge for themselves. <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  05:43, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you for those replies. I agree that Matt Sanchez is no saint and negative information has a place in the article.  My concern is that it be properly sourced and overall balanced.  This page has been a battleground far too long; I'd like to see it on the same footing as any other BLP. <font face="Verdana"> Durova  Charge! 10:05, 22 April 2008 (UTC)
 * No prob. I agree that it needs a lot of work still, I waited a while before I did much until I could suss out what we actually had to work with (trying to see the content through all the drama). When I started I did more simple things like adding sections and infobox. I've also learned to look for the overall arch on bios as well and Sanchez seems to be media person of sorts, an actor, editorializer and now doing reporting/commentaries on blogs, vlogs and apparently overseas TV. I liken him to other political commentators and think his views should be expressed with some quotes so he "speaks" for himself. To me the answer was almost never to delete content to achieve balance but add content like expanding the military and Columbia sections so the stuff Sanchez deems negative (adult entertainer) isn't lost but minimized as a part of a past career. I've said before that if he just let others build the article it would be so much better. <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  18:46, 22 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment. Cleo123's comment above used to illustrate how difficult it was to solicit outside opinions when "editorial discussion becomes too contentious" should be seen in context. All talkpage contributions from myself had been archived away prior to that comment. This perhaps would support that the topic itself is controversial with or without my involvement. <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  18:54, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment by Rushdittobot
Benjiboi wrote: "Although I can see how you might piece together the above timeline it's not one I've ever seen. Instead most of the accounts I've read have been more along the lines that his former clients or at least those who claimed to be his former clients blew the whistle to the bloggers."

Former Matt Sanchez clients have made statements? Where?

Benjiboi is the only person to describe Sanchez as a vlogger. What does that mean? And does he have a source? I haven't found one anywhere. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rushdittobot (talk • contribs) 03:50, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Response to Rushdittobot. It doesn't matter where those former clients, or more precisely those who claimed to be former clients made any statements unless it's in a reliable source that we can use. I've yet to see any usable content of that nature but if it interests you take it to the article's talk page, I imagine you'll get the same answer. On YouTube Matt has his own vlogging channel. A vlogger is a blogger who also does video blogs, hardly a controversial term but if it just seems off-base then, again, take it to that talk page, this forum is not to make cases for or against article content. I will assume good faith that you just happenned along that talkpage thread on Thatcher's talkpage and naturally decided that you should comment here. Sadly, the experience with that article has been socks both for and against Sanchez and this seems to be along those lines. <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  11:10, 24 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment. is actually  who has been indef blocked for proxy-editing for banned/blocked user  (Matt Sanchez).  <u style="text-decoration:none;font-family: papyrus;color:#CC00CC">Banje <u style="font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:#8000FF">boi  18:48, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment by Neil
Re jpgordon's statement below: ..with Benji crossed off and the new editor's name written in crayon... That's a rather incivil, unfair and inappropriate comment from a sitting Arbitrator. Would appreciate that being excised. <u style="text-decoration:none;font:100% cursive;color:#060">Neıl <u style="text-decoration:none;color:#060">☎  12:16, 24 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, it's a pretty fair assessment, as Sanchez has moved on to his next targets, with the same shopworn allegations. Aleta and I have apparently been identified as "enemies" in the most recent OTRS complaint by a Sanchez proxy. Sanchez appears to be determined to dictate how his Wikipedia biography is written, with persistent attempts to whitewash well-sourced but inconvenient facts, and to emphasize non-notable current activities. I continue to support omitting the more contentious discussions of his alleged escorting career (it's not particularly well-sourced, and the only sources that discuss his repeated denials are not considered reliable, presenting an undue weight/coatrack concern), but I don't support turning the article into a public-relations stunt for Sanchez either.


 * I've argued for the deletion of this article at Articles for deletion/Matt Sanchez (3rd nomination), but consensus was not on my side. Perhaps my suggestion of a focus change on the article should be reconsidered, although I don't think that I (or any of the other regular editors of the article) should be involved in its development. <font color="DarkSlateGray">Horologium  (talk) 13:24, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

 * This area is used for notes by non-recused Clerks.

Arbitrator views and discussion

 * The whole point of an article probation is to reduce the thrashing and tsuris associated with heated topics. It's not the faithless editors who have to worry about article probation; they get taken care of in other fashions. Good editors, however, can also cause problems, sometimes by their very presence. That their intentions are good, and that their history is sterling, does not alter the fact that their work on specific articles can be disruptive (or can be part of a cycle that leads to disruption.) My initial inclination is to let the ban stand; it's not a "black mark" against Benji, but rather a recognition that his presence on that article is causing more problems than it is worth. On the other hand, if another editor were to come to the article, and do the same sort of work Benji's been doing, Mr Sanchez' stream of OTRS requests would resume, with Benji crossed off and the new editor's name written in crayon. So this isn't about Benji, but about the material itself, which either belongs or does not belong in the article, regardless of Mr Sanchez' feelings. This means the only question for Benji is, "can you continue the edit the article while respecting our BLP, NPOV, V, etc requirements?" As far as OTRS is concerned, if Mr Sanchez' requests are valid, they should be respected; if not, they should be politely declined the first time, and ignored after that; he certainly doesn't get to dictate who edits the article about him. I can't imagine this is the first time someone has been persistent trying to get their way via OTRS; what's the usual way of dealing with repeat complainants? --jpgordon&#8711;&#8710;&#8711;&#8710; 16:27, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Proposed motions and voting
<div class="boilerplate metadata" style="background-color: #edeaff; padding: 0 10px 0 10px; border: 1px solid #8779DD;">
 * The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page.  No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Request to amend prior case: Bluemarine


List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
 * (initiator)
 * 
 * 
 * 
 * 

Statement by Durova
Bluemarine was banned for one year by the Arbitration Committee as a result of the case. Requesting that the Committee consider a very limited return to editing for the sole purpose of improving access to Wikipedia articles for people with disabilities.

Bluemarine (Matt Sanchez) is an editor in good standing at Wikimedia Commons and has been contributing useful material. Of particular interest is his voice recording work such as Image:Weimar.ogg - a reading of part of the Weimar Republic article. Recordings such as this one make Wikipedia more available to people who have vision impairments. Mr. Sanchez has an excellent voice and the site could use more contributions of this sort.

Given his history, this is not something to consider lightly. So I propose a very limited unblock for handicapped access purposes only, with myself as his mentor. Mr. Sanchez would be permitted to place encyclopedic audio files at articles unrelated to his previous conflicts. He may format audio file templates and caption those audio files and may edit his own user space. That is all. LGBT issues, broadly defined, would be off limits.

During the early part of Mr. Sanchez's siteban he did sock and was aggressive toward other editors he had been in conflict with. So it's understandable if they have concerns or even outright opposition to this proposal. I have instructed him to refrain from responding if any conflict resumes. "Make it my problem," I told him. He agreed. When I found out he was socking earlier this year and asked him to stop, he pledged to. There has been no problem in that regard since April 1. So with a bit less than four months remaining on the clock for his ArbCom ban, I think this is a reasonable proposal. Hoping others agree. <font face="Verdana"> Durova Charge! 06:08, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
 * At the suggestion of an editor I'll make this clear: yes, Bluemarine would remain prohibited from his own biography article. <font face="Verdana"> Durova Charge! 22:38, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
 * To AniMate, preventing a resumption of old problems is a very high priority. The problems occurred primarily at one article and over one topic.  Bluemarine will remain under a very tight restriction--unable to go to that article or anything like it, unable to edit in a normal sense, and unable to interact with other editors except at his own user talk.  If you see loopholes in that, please articulate what they are so I may modify this proposal and close them.  Respectfully, <font face="Verdana"> Durova  Charge! 00:29, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
 * To the clerks, Bluemarine's computer got hacked during the arbitration case. He's recovered his passwords and to the best of my knowledge there's been no further problem. <font face="Verdana"> Durova  Charge! 23:16, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Email control and identity confirmed. <font face="Verdana"> Durova Charge! 03:49, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Jehochman
I think most requests to lift bans on condition of strict mentorship should be approved on a trial basis. At the first instance of trouble, the ban can be reinstated. I recommend that any uninvolved administrator be allowed to reinstate the ban if necessary, and the editor should be resticted from going anywhere near the areas where they formerly caused disruption. It is far better to have troubled users on the path to return under close supervision than have them sock puppeting or causing disruption through off site means. Jehochman2 (talk) 16:28, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Statement by AniMate
I'm opposed to this motion. Bluemarine wasn't banned for his article contributions. He was banned for rampant incivilty and homophobic personal attacks. Looking through his contributions, there are a total of 9 edits to any talk pages at Wikimedia Commons, and those are from February. Unfortunately, Duova's request does nothing to address the concerns about his behavior.--<font face="papyrus" color="Black">A <font face="papyrus" color="Green">ni <font face="papyrus" color="Black">Mate 23:34, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Horologium
I am strongly opposed to this motion. I was the only editor who provided diffs at the RFA which documented the harassment of Sanchez (and it was a rather extensive collection), so it's fair to say that I'm not opposing due to personal animus. (Discounting the personal attacks by Sanchez after I started blocking his socks after the ban went into effect.) However, I feel that he is not suited to working collaboratively, which is essential here. His contributions to commons are by their nature non-collaborative; they improve the project but do not require interaction with other editors.

In addition to his attacks on LGBT editors and his harassment of other editors through sockpuppets, he has demonstrated poor judgement; after being unblocked to participate in the arbitration case, he made a beeline towards Waterboarding, which at the time was heading toward an an arbitration case of its own. This was after he had been explicitly instructed that the only pages he was to edit were his user pages and the arbitration case pages. He proved unable to comply with the guidelines then, and there is no indication that he will be able to do so now. I have had misgivings about dealing with the issue when the ban was set to expire; I really don't think we should move it forward. <font color="DarkSlateGray">Horologium  (talk) 11:10, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Statement by Thatcher
Some of the particulars might be deduced by inspecting the checkuser and oversight logs. I recall that the Bluemarine account made a post that made a number of inflammatory and possibly libelous comments about Matt Sanchez. I ran a checkuser and found that those comments were posted from a very different IP than the one that had been previously used, and it was an IP that was linked to other harassment of Sanchez. I think the comments themselves were later oversighted. There were one or more individuals who hacked into Sanchez' email account (he talks about this on his blog) and he either used the same password for wikipedia or the hackers reset the password using the email feature. I have no opinion on allowing Sanchez to contribute as such, but great care and diligence should be taken to ensure that the real and only Matt Sanchez has control of the account. Thatcher 23:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Clerk notes

 * According to Bluemarine's user talk, the account has been compromised - has this issue been resolved?--Tznkai (talk) 22:19, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Waiting for user:Thatcher's update and/or clarification. -- <font size="2px" face="Verdana"><font color="DarkSlateBlue">FayssalF  - <font style="background: gold">Wiki me up®  22:35, 9 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Given Thatcher's statement (which describes something that I don't recall from the case), it might be useful to know if the Commons Bluemarine represents an SUL account that is unified with the en.wp account. I forget how to check that. <strong style="color:#228B22;">Avruch <strong style="color:#228B22;"> T 23:16, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
 * And indeed, according to this, the account is unified (so if the en.wp account is compromised, so are they all). <strong style="color:#228B22;">Avruch <strong style="color:#228B22;"> T 23:22, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
 * On hold pending additional confirmation of Bluemarine's identity.--Tznkai (talk) 02:53, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Arbitrator views and discussion

 * The arrangement proposed by Durova seems acceptable; so long as he stays well away from the topics and users around which the previous conflict revolved, I see no reason why Bluemarine cannot be permitted to do some useful wiki-gnoming. Kirill (prof) 16:48, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Awaiting more comments, but at first review the idea seems reasonable. FloNight&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; 17:48, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree, and offer a motion. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:36, 7 December 2008 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Request to amend prior case: Requests for arbitration/Bluemarine
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
 * (initiator)

Statement by Durova
On 23 March 2008 Benjiboi was topic banned from the Matt Sanchez per discretionary sanctions at arbitration enforcement. Overall, Benjiboi's history as a Wikipedian editor has been a good one. It can feel like a scarlet letter to a longstanding editor to be under arbitration restriction. He's been under the ban from the article and its talk page for over a year, has not evaded the restriction, and he'll probably be more constructive if he decides to edit there again. If problems resume the restriction can be reinstated, of course.

Posting as the editor who started the AE thread that resulted in his restriction; let's give this a second chance. <font face="Verdana"> Durova Charge! 16:30, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
 * The Committee is welcome to structure Benjiboi's return as it sees fit and Benjiboi is welcome to seek mentorship, supervision, or some other arrangement. <font face="Verdana"> Durova Charge! 19:23, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
 * To Risker: a banner has been at the top of Benjiboi's user talk page for about the last year:
 * I have been page banned, seen here, unjustly and without due process - no warning, no dialog whatsoever - by an admin who has a history of such conduct. Efforts to clear my reputation (not all from me) are here, here, here and here. Hopefully this breach in practice will ultimately lead to a clearer and more just policy in how bans are to be enacted.
 * In specific reply to the offer to open the current motion he answered:
 * Of course. I'd would also like to see Wikipedia:Banning policy cleared up a bit but feel being banned at the same time would be seen as conflicted in some way so have stayed clear to avoid the appearance of somehow gaming policies. -- Banjeboi 18:36, 5 June 2009 (UTC)
 * He previously appealed his topic ban to the Committee and to Jimbo. From the start I felt that his sanction was a pretty close call. It wasn't what I was originally seeking upon opening the AE thread, and have been on the fence about whether to support its continuance or initiate a request for its end.  He probably felt he'd run out of appeals, but an unsolicited motion of support from the editor whose complaint had triggered a sanction sometimes tips the balance. <font face="Verdana"> Durova  Charge! 20:13, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Benjiboi

 * Note: apologies in advance for the length here, this has been a bit painful so I'm attempting to proactively address concerns.

As indicated by Durova I had rather given up hope on this and since appeals were met with "what, again" feedback I felt it was best just to leave it until someone else felt it was time to revisit the issue. My hope is to clear this off my name, even if availble to admins to still see, as it has been the most stress I have faced here and seems only to serve to shame me in some way when I feel the ban could have been prevented in the first place. I appealed immediately and my inexperience in wikilawyering showed. Although there are exceptions I think Banning policy should be similar structured to blocking policies in at least that dialog preceeds banning so an editor can look to adjusting thier approach and striking unhelpful comments, etc. Also giving editors, especially experienced editors, indefinite bans with little hope of removing them if the admin isn't open to the idea also seems out of step with the spirit of AGF. I was instead bundled with another editor who I often disagreed with who was certainly causing disruption there. As Durova states this was perhaps borderline, but IMHO, no ban was needed. I feel this is a bit of an exceptional case because the subject themselves had been the source of many problems and my ban was tied to their direct statements to get me and other "homosexual" (and much more colourful termed) editors away from it as is evident in the talkpage archives, the main case and, apparently, in OTRS communications. The article and talkpage were battlegrounds prior to my involvement and was tied to the very poor conduct of the subject of the article who seemed to feel volume outweighed policies. They may have been baited and trolled but even after that had been largely addressed the attacks from them continued. Prior to my ban I had worked to clean-up the talkpage and the article and much of my efforts are what you see there presently. Especially keeping the talkpage clear to discuss issues and resolve concerns. I felt the ban was unneeded and dialog would have negated the need for a ban, at least in my case. I do, and did, apologize for my part in how I conducted a sourcing dispute (YouTube videos that should have been properly attributed to the original source), poor use of blogs, and sarcastic comments, a sign of frustration but unhelpful none the less. I still feel BLP issues need to be discussed on talkpages and have been in many similar discussions; this is not activism (of which I was accused) but follwing reliable sourcing and BLP policies. Given an instant replay I would have taken Durova's advice and looked to clarification at RSN board on how to handle the subject's own statements regarding their sexuality and sexual practices. I would have also worked to clean-up the sourcing issues which didn't need deleting but certainly weren't helped by simply reverting either. Many editors felt discussion was being suppressed because the subject of the article was complaining vigorously about ... well, everything. After the subject's community and arbcom bans they apparently barraged OTRS with complaints including specifically naming me as I was among the few remaining editors on the talkpage who openly disagreed with some, but not all, of their many wishes and concerns. Frankly, it seemed like the decision to uphold the ban against me was along the lines of "we'll give the subject this one but that's it". I've worked on many articles including BLPs since this unfortunate period and certainly would not take the same approach. I'm unconvinced that anyone needs to monitor my involvement there as I intend to avoid the subject and the article is well watched and also remains under arb enforcement. '''I also have real life concerns for my safety so am unlikely to be involved there at all. If ameniable I would also like to have my involvement on the arb case oversighted or otherwise masked so I am of less interest to anyone there.''' I do however do wikignoming bits on a volume of articles as well as trouble-shooting on LGBT-related articles so also don't want to be pilorized for even touching the article. -- <u style="font-size:14px; font-family: cursive;color:#8000FF">Banj<font color="#FF4400">e <u style="font-size:14px;font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:deeppink">b<font color="#CC0000">oi 23:40, 6 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Response to Risker: Thank you for your kind words. To address "sexual orientation is rarely the reason for notability of BLP subjects, and should be accorded only due weight" I tend to fully agree with you. In the case of this BLP subject there was heavy dispute that their notability was directly tied to their sexuality and sexual activities. My efforts were to resolve that to end the circular arguing, that there was acrimony and socking, personal attacks etc only made the situation more of a battleground. In hindsight I'm glad I pushed for the discussion to take place however I would have worked more on the sourcing angles in light of due weight issues. -- <u style="font-size:14px; font-family: cursive;color:#8000FF">Banj<font color="#FF4400">e <u style="font-size:14px;font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:deeppink">b<font color="#CC0000">oi  22:44, 8 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Response to Cool Hand Luke: There are two main reasons for lifting this besides the personal angst to myself, by most accounts a productive Wikipedian. It could have been avoided in the first place with civil dialog and it was made permanent by an admin who apparently prides themself on using a hammer and perhaps sees editors in more stark contrasting terms when people can and do change. I'm glad I was involved there as I learned a lot up to and including my page-ban and my unfortaunate introduction to Arbcom. This has also enforced my belief that we get better editors by civilly discussing issues and helping them do the same. This has coloured my exprerience to be much more compassionate when editors fly off the track for whatever reasons. Our goal should be to help them amend and improve not shame and punish. If I'm asked to help there again I'm more likely to offer drafts and let others decide what is worth using, I have some real life issues about my association with this. -- <u style="font-size:14px; font-family: cursive;color:#8000FF">Banj<font color="#FF4400">e <u style="font-size:14px;font-family: Zapfino, sans-serif;color:deeppink">b<font color="#CC0000">oi  22:44, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Arbitrator views and discussion

 * Durova: I have no problems with lifting the sanction if you'll take responsibility for keeping an eye on the article and notifying us if Benjiboi starts violating BLP again. Kirill [talk] [pf] 16:59, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I'd like to hear from Benjiboi on what he considers to be the best situation here. If he does not view this as an issue, then I am not inclined to make any changes in the current situation. If he *does* consider it an issue, then I am unclear why he did not post this request for amendment himself. Risker (talk) 19:54, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Response to Durova: The links you provided demonstrate that Benjiboi himself last initiated a request that the ban be lifted in April 2008, just about a month after it was imposed. The other two requests (to the Committee and to Jimbo) were initiated by another editor, in September 2008. The Committee's door is open for him to make the request himself, or to propose alternative terms or probationary status; however, I fully expect an editor who wants an amendment to an action taken on behalf of this Committee to clearly articulate for him or herself exactly why that amendment should be made. Support (and concerns) from other editors is of course welcome. I understand that you have reasons not to wish to monitor the situation personally; however, with no alternative proposed, I cannot see this going forward. Risker (talk) 20:30, 6 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Response to Benjiboi: Thank you for coming to the table. I have, incidental to any matters before the Committee, had the opportunity to observe your work in the project, and more particularly your development as an editor, and your increased understanding of the importance of nuance in editing BLPs in particular; however, I'd urge you to reflect on the fact that sexual orientation is rarely the reason for notability of BLP subjects, and should be accorded only due weight, similar to the passing mention of significant others in the articles of "straight" subjects. Given your changes in practice over the ensuing year-plus, and your intention to avoid this particular article, I am willing to lift the topic ban. I do, however, expect you to take advantage of the many resources available to you when proposing to include non-standard reference sources. Risker (talk) 00:07, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Motion initiated. Risker (talk) 17:13, 7 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Recuse due to being a clerk on the case. John Vandenberg (chat) 05:40, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Based on Benjiboi's comments and other non-controversial work on BLPs, I agree that we can lift the ban by motion. Benjiboi, I take you at your word that you are planning to stay away from the article. "I'm unconvinced that anyone needs to monitor my involvement there as I intend to avoid the subject and the article is well watched and also remains under arb enforcement." As you have indicated, I don't think that it will be wise for you to resume editing the article. FloNight&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; 15:38, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Additionally, the some case pages can be courtesy blanked or redacted. Benjiboi, contact ArbCom by email at <arbcom-l@lists.wikimedia.org> to discuss what you have in mind in the way of redacting. FloNight&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; 22:46, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Motions
For this request, there are 14 active Arbitrators, minus 1 who is recused, so 7 is a majority.

Topic ban rescinded
The topic ban placed on in relation to Requests for arbitration/Bluemarine is rescinded.


 * Support:
 * I do not see a need for specific mentoring on this issue, and Benjiboi has stated he intends to stay away from the relevant article. Risker (talk) 17:13, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * FloNight&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; 17:31, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Support but per Kirill, if Durova keeps an eye on this situation. <span style="font-family:Verdana,sans-serif"> — <b style="color:#060;">Rlevse</b> • Talk  • 18:37, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Kirill [talk] [pf] 21:26, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * --Vassyana (talk) 03:04, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
 * If he's staying away, why is this even necessary? I'm honestly skeptical about the scarlet letter theory of sanctions, but I'm not opposed to rescinding it. Cool Hand Luke 03:19, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Per Kirill and CHL.  Roger Davies  talk 03:21, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Okay so long as an eye is kept on it. Wizardman  18:57, 10 June 2009 (UTC)
 * With the reminder that using this as an opportunity to return to problematic editing will be viewed very dimly indeed. &mdash; Coren (talk) 18:26, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Oppose:


 * Abstain:


 * Recuse:
 * As above. John Vandenberg (chat) 03:33, 8 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Motion enacted Tiptoety  talk 18:58, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Bluemarine
List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:
 * (initiator)
 * (notification)
 * , mentor of Bluemarine (notification)

Statement by Sandstein
In Requests for arbitration/Bluemarine, on 1 February 2008, the Committee decided upon the following remedy: "Bluemarine is banned from editing Wikipedia for a period of one year to run concurrently with the existing indefinite community ban."

On 10 December 2008, the Committee passed the following amendment to that case (permalink):
 * "Limited unblock with conditions:This committee's decision in this case and the preexisting community ban of are modified solely to the extent that Bluemarine is unblocked for the limited purpose of his making contributions related to increasing the accessibility of Wikipedia to users with handicapping conditions. This includes uploading encyclopedic audio files, formatting audio file templates, and captioning those audio files, as well as editing his userpage and talkpage, all under the mentorship of . Except as expressly provided in this motion, the ban on editing by Bluemarine remains in effect. If Bluemarine violates the terms of his limited unblock, or makes any comment reasonably regarded as harassing or a personal attack, he may be reblocked for an appropriate period of time by any uninvolved administrator. If Bluemarine complies with these conditions for a period of 60 days, a request for further modification of his ban may be submitted.
 * Passed 7 to 0, 09:51, 10 December 2008 (UTC)."

Yesterday, I blocked Bluemarine for a week following a report at WP:ANI that he had violated these restrictions. The block has since been contested at the ANI thread by Durova and one reviewing admin,, who unlike me believe the restriction(s) on Bluemarine are no longer in effect. As of this writing, there is also an open unblock request at User talk:Bluemarine.

I ask the Committee to clarify: Thanks,  Sandstein   05:18, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
 * 1) whether the community ban of Bluemarine as referred to in the remedy and amendment remains in effect,
 * 2) whether the conditional lifting of this ban and the restrictions on Bluemarine's editing as specified in the amendment also remain in effect.

Statement by Allstarecho
I'd just like to clarify that Matt Sanchez, aka User:Bluemarine, was under a community ban before his Arbcom ban. His 1-year Arbcom ban did expire in February of this year, which would have been before the 60-day stipulation to end. 60-days would have put him under Arbcom ban until March when the initial 1-year ban expired in February. So technically, there is nothing Arbcom can, or needs to, rule on here as Arbcom's jurisdiction ended in February by the original Arbcom ban or in March by the Arbcom 60-day stipulation - depending on how you interpret the Arbcom ban. What is left to do is for the community to decide whether or not to lift his community ban, which again, he was placed under before his Arbcom ban.

This is all brought about because he made 6 edits yesterday while still under community ban, after having been informed he was still under the community ban back in May when he made edits. In May he was told by Durova not to edit anywhere but his talk page until the matter was resolved. Unfortunately, it went stale and was never resolved then but as he wasn't informed that it was resolved, he should have asked on his talk page what the status was.

As I have agreed with Durova in recent past discussions with her, I support the lifting of his community ban with the stipulations that he is banned from editing his related BLP article or article talk page as well as the same for the Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy article. In addition, as also agreed with Durova in recent past discussions with her, based on Sanchez's history of vile personal attacks towards other editors, should he lodge any personal attacks, he shall be immediately and indefinitely blocked again. - ALLST✰R ▼ echo wuz here  07:35, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Jpgordon
Just a slight correction -- at this point I have no idea what the status of ArbCom's restricted unblocking is. It's not clear from the language whether the committee intended it to outlive the committee's original sanctions. A reasonable person could interpret it either way. --jpgordon:==( o ) 15:21, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Durova
Recommend remanding this to the community. Bluemarine's arbitration ban has expired. The community could clarify his status and/or impose new restrictions on its own. <font face="Verdana"> Durova 284 15:54, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
 * With respect extended toward Newyorkbrad's comment, the basic structure of a new editing restriction is something the community should be able to handle quite well. In about May I made such a proposal (basically a topic ban from his old areas of conflict).  There was a socking concern that got raised, which turned out to be a nonissue, but investigation delayed discussion so the proposal didn't achieve consensus (mainly because the noticeboard was fast-moving).  Shortly afterward Bluemarine went away on business and has had limited Internet access since then.  That's the only reason a second proposal hasn't already gone to the community. <font face="Verdana"> Durova  285 01:42, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Although nobody formally closed the discussion, it appears the community has decided upon a topic ban. Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive555 <font face="Verdana"> Durova 293 18:25, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Statment by Lar
This user is not worth the trouble, in my view. Their past history is filled with disputes with all and sundry. The word "collegial" is not, in my view, in their vocabulary. Recommend putting or keeping a complete ban in place. Else we'll be here again soon enough. ++Lar: t/c 09:33, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Sam Blacketer
I was drafting arbitrator on the original case. I also voted to support the amending motion in December, and remember thinking when doing so that it would be good to progressively lift Bluemarine's editing ban in the period leading up to the end of the year ban when he would be free to edit. Obviously any community sanction is administered separately. Sam Blacketer (talk) 21:22, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Statement by ChildofMidnight
I suggest that Bluemarine be unbanned along with a stipulation that on the Matt Sanchez article and maybe a few other closely related articles he limit his contributions to the talk pages (per standard COI type concerns). I also think a mentor would be helpful. ChildofMidnight (talk) 18:56, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Per wp:ani there seems to be a good consensus in favor of revising and updating Bluemarine's statud to the following edit restrictions: Is a more formal vote needed or can we move forward with this as agreed to and supported by his mentor, myself, Allstarecho, and other editors who made comments in the discussion? The only concern was whether Arbcom approval of some sort was needed, but my understanding is that you want the community to make the determination.
 * Bluemarine is banned from the Matt Sanchez and Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy article pages.
 * He is prohibited from editing LGBT article topics and related talk pages, broadly construed.
 * Bluemarine is encouraged to edit subjects that are not controversial or of personal and emotional investment so as to avoid dispute and confrontations and to gain experience editing Wikipedia collaboratively. As the community is extending good faith, please return it by limiting yourself to the one account and remember that personal attacks will not be tolerated. If Bluemarine violates the terms of this restriction he may be reblocked for an appropriate increment of time at the discretion of an administrator.

Statement by Will Beback
I sugges that the ArbCom give some statement on this editor's status, at least on an interim basis, while a final decision is made. At the moment no one is sure what his status is. <font color="#595454">Will Beback  <font color="#C0C0C0">talk    01:13, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Tarc
Looking at the history of this, it would appear that this user has exhausted the community's patience. Clearly an agenda-driven editor whose goals here appear to be completely contrary to a collaborative editing project, at least in politically-oriented articles. Short of an outright ban, a topic ban would be the only other option. Tarc (talk) 01:52, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Statement by other Jac16888
I was not aware of this arbcom issue, nor am I involved in anyway, but it should probably be noted that I have just blocked bluemarine for 72 hours for this personal attack, --<font color="Blue">Jac <font color="Green">16888 Talk 13:52, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Arbitrator views and discussion

 * My view is that we should cut to the chase, and decide what editing restrictions, if any are needed for the editor. Once that is enacted, then the past sanctions do not matter. FloNight&#9829;&#9829;&#9829; 15:36, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
 * As it stands there are no more active arbitration remedies, but the community ban remains in effect (the original decision deliberately did not override that). Bluemarine can now either appeal the ban to the community, or appeal it to us. --bainer (talk) 02:58, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Per Bainer, with preference the community handle this. <span style="font-family:Verdana,sans-serif"> — <b style="color:#060;">Rlevse</b> • Talk  • 12:15, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * On an initial look, I agree with bainer's comment. I do want to look at this more closely though, so may return to this at some point. Carcharoth (talk) 14:00, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * On a closer examination (and following the recent request for arbitration), the community now appear to be handling this, but I share Risker's concerns. Bluemarine needs to disengage from the areas he is topic banned from, and diversify his editing. I've reviewed his editing history, and a vast number of his edits are to the talk page of one article. There may well be good reasons for that, but there are other ways (off-wiki and through intermediaries) to address such concerns other than using an account almost exclusively for a single purpose. Carcharoth (talk) 15:39, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree that the best path forward is to figure out what restrictions, if any, are needed going forward, rather than to focus on which past ones technically are still in effect or not. I'm not sure, however, that I agree with the preference expressed above that the community debate the restrictions, since there are sensitive BLP and other issues involved that might best not be addressed on-wiki. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:59, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Per Stephen Bain. Should Bluemarine wish to appeal his community ban, he can appeal either to the community or directly to the Arbitration Committee. I do take note of Bluemarine's talk page, and remain concerned that Bluemarine's main purpose at Wikipedia is to directly influence a single biographical page; this is something that Bluemarine will need to address in any ban appeal. Risker (talk) 12:07, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I take note of the current discussion here, where it appears that an administrator has advised Bluemarine that his community ban is lifted (with restrictions), but Bluemarine was subsequently reblocked for personal attacks as mentioned above. While I do not object to the community deciding to lift the ban, I remain concerned about this user, and hope that his behaviour is carefully monitored by several editors/administrators, particularly in view of the activities of recent days. Risker (talk) 20:01, 4 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Recuse. John Vandenberg (chat) 14:02, 2 August 2009 (UTC)
 * For the time being, I believe the community can discuss and coordinate with the mentor all the details of any restriction or deal. -- <font size="2px" face="Verdana"><font color="DarkSlateBlue">FayssalF  - <font style="background: gold">Wiki me up®  08:45, 3 August 2009 (UTC)