Private Manning arbitration

[Hex]

A. Two extremely minor Wikipedians (one with fewer than 100 total edits) are banned from editing or discussing Transexuality broadly defined for their dumb statements.

B. .......As is one conservative drama queen and one disruptive POV warrior interested in "German and English politics and LGBT issues."

Well, that was certainly a productive use of the committee's and the community's time...

I know, right?

[Tarc]

Well, that was certainly a productive use of the committee's and the community's time...

Well, what it did show is that a carefully-constructed, non-aggressive argument that amounts to "I don't like transgendered people or their choices" is acceptable discourse in the Wikipedia.

Wonder what'd happen if someone did that on purpose to make a point?

[Cla68]

I assume that if the US Army, which owns Manning for the next 35 years or so, allows him to legally change his name then his WP article will be renamed without too much fuss.

[Randy from Boise]

I assume that if the US Army, which owns Manning for the next 35 years or so, allows him to legally change his name then his WP article will be renamed without too much fuss.

The article will be renamed in about 2 days. It's running about 9-to-1 in favor of the change, last I checked. There really isn't a policy-based reason to oppose at this point, in my estimation.

RfB

P.S. Okay, I'm bad at math: 109-to-25, and counting.

[Cla68]

I assume that if the US Army, which owns Manning for the next 35 years or so, allows him to legally change his name then his WP article will be renamed without too much fuss.

The article will be renamed in about 2 days. It's running about 9-to-1 in favor of the change, last I checked. There really isn't a policy-based reason to oppose at this point, in my estimation.

RfB

P.S. Okay, I'm bad at math: 109-to-25, and counting.

Oh, ok. I guess it really didn't turn out to be such a big deal. Too bad WP hasn't figured out yet how to deal with activists trying to use the site for advocacy which, IMO, is why the first move dispute went south.

[The Devil's Advocate]

Naughty Gerard! Naughty! No cookies for you!

[EricBarbour]

David Gerard desysopped

14) For his misuse of the administrator tools, David Gerard (talk · contribs)'s administrative privileges are revoked.

Support:

This is necessary because David is still adamant that he did nothing wrong, which does not instill me with any confidence that something like this won't happen again. Salvio Let's talk about it! 20:57, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk) 18:30, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Oppose:

Disproportionate and excessive, even assuming a finding of misconduct. Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:11, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
Per the related finding. Kirill [talk] 21:12, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
Just no. NW (Talk) 17:49, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
Excessive. WormTT(talk) 10:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Per my colleagues, this would be excessive as a remedy. David's actions were clearly ill-considered, but I do not think they demand a desysopping. AGK [•] 20:23, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Though I supported the related finding, the actions were taken in good faith to uphold BLP, which mitigates things enough here for me to oppose this remedy. Carcharoth (talk) 00:50, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Still a bunch of pussies.

[Zoloft]

Two cartoon characters topic-banned.

Wascally Wabbit.

Gotta catch 'em all!

[lilburne]

Untitled23.jpg

[Randy from Boise]

Does anyone know why all of Nuclear Warfare's votes have been indented at the 11th hour on the Proposed Decision page?

link

RfB

[Randy from Boise]

David Gerard desysopped

14) For his misuse of the administrator tools, David Gerard (talk · contribs)'s administrative privileges are revoked.

Support:

This is necessary because David is still adamant that he did nothing wrong, which does not instill me with any confidence that something like this won't happen again. Salvio Let's talk about it! 20:57, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk) 18:30, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Oppose:

Disproportionate and excessive, even assuming a finding of misconduct. Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:11, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
Per the related finding. Kirill [talk] 21:12, 29 September 2013 (UTC)
Just no. NW (Talk) 17:49, 30 September 2013 (UTC)
Excessive. WormTT(talk) 10:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Per my colleagues, this would be excessive as a remedy. David's actions were clearly ill-considered, but I do not think they demand a desysopping. AGK [•] 20:23, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
Though I supported the related finding, the actions were taken in good faith to uphold BLP, which mitigates things enough here for me to oppose this remedy. Carcharoth (talk) 00:50, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

Still a bunch of pussies.

My own take is that Salvio redeemed himself for voting to take the case in the first place by at least making the effort. We now have a pretty good read for those who believe that Extremism in the Defense of House POV is No Vice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9buEI8SgwU

RfB

[The Joy]

Does anyone know why all of Nuclear Warfare's votes have been indented at the 11th hour on the Proposed Decision page?

link

RfB

He resigned as an arbitrator and, thus, his votes are discounted. It's strange. Usually, arbs finish cases they have already voted on before they leave.

[Vigilant]

Does anyone know why all of Nuclear Warfare's votes have been indented at the 11th hour on the Proposed Decision page?

link

RfB

He resigned as an arbitrator and, thus, his votes are discounted. It's strange. Usually, arbs finish cases they have already voted on before they leave.

I wonder if that's the scent of ragequit I detect on the wind.

[Zoloft]

Does anyone know why all of Nuclear Warfare's votes have been indented at the 11th hour on the Proposed Decision page?

link

RfB

He resigned as an arbitrator and, thus, his votes are discounted. It's strange. Usually, arbs finish cases they have already voted on before they leave.

I wonder if that's the scent of ragequit I detect on the wind.

Perhaps NuclearWarfare is on the road to Damascus?

[Randy from Boise]

Does anyone know why all of Nuclear Warfare's votes have been indented at the 11th hour on the Proposed Decision page?

link

RfB

He resigned as an arbitrator and, thus, his votes are discounted. It's strange. Usually, arbs finish cases they have already voted on before they leave.

I wonder if that's the scent of ragequit I detect on the wind.

That would be my take.

NukeEmAll was, along with Kirill, one of the hardliners in favor of whacking Faction B while protecting every action of Faction A. The bland result that only produced one significant pelt, that of of Baseball Bugs — who, let's face it, could be barbecued three times a year for various drama transgressions if one were so motivated — at the cost of one of Faction A's chief grenade-lobbers had to be.................. frustrating.

The violin music swells at the loss of an intrepid warrior,

RfB

NukeEm was terse with his departure message:

When I was elected to the Committee at the end of last year, I had every intention of filling out my term. I am no longer able to do so, and thus am resigning as an Arbitrator, CheckUser, and Oversighter. NW (Talk) 9:09 am, 3 October 2013, last Thursday (2 days ago) (UTC−7)

link

[Wer900]

Why did corrupt T. Canens abstain on David Gerard's desysopping?

[Zoloft]

Why did corrupt T. Canens abstain on David Gerard's desysopping?

'Corrupt' is a bit much.

[EricBarbour]

Why did corrupt T. Canens abstain on David Gerard's desysopping?

'Corrupt' is a bit much.

Yeah, we can't prove he edited Wikipedia for the Chinese government. It's just, you know, a suspicion and suchlike.

[Vigilant]

So there are only two options shown with David Gerard.
14) Desysop
14.1) Admonish

Why isn't there a middle ground?

14.2) David Gerard is indefinitely topic-banned from all pages relating to any transgender topic or individual, broadly construed.

Pretty sure it's easy to show that he planned this and was involved.
Pretty sure to show that he warred to keep things his way.

Take the problematic area out of his jurisdiction.


Probably too sane.
Besides, by admonishing him, you make yourselves look weak and ineffectual, so truth in advertising wins a round.

[Randy from Boise]

The "Admonish" popped up at the 11th hour with six instant signatures.

Putting on my Kremlinologist hat, I suggest that it was possibly discussion of this that was beyond the pale for an overwrought and frustrated Nuclear Warfare. He went into full Cartman mode — "screw you guys, I'm going home," typed up a short resignation, and indented all his votes.

There's no reason for a truly time-pressed individual to go back and strike out votes like he did. The 1.5 milliion bytes of blather had been slathered and not read (NW was pretty explicit that he stopped reading the proposed remedies page). The secret debate of the Arbs had already been done, the votes already made. A couple days from the finish line and all the work on the case already done (assuming you can call it work and assuming you can call it a case) — there is zero reason for this sort of behavior on NW's part outside of a hissyfit over the way the outcome was going.

Like Gerard even cares about an "admonishment."

Anyway, that will make 9 seats to fill on the next ArbCom. I'll bet $5 they can't get 9 candidates who pass the 50% threshold.

RfB

[Vigilant]

I laughed out loud.

Given David has not demonstrated a pattern of misuse of his tools, it is improbable that he will misuse his page protection tools in future – making a restriction unnecessary. However, if circumstances do arise wherein David misused his tools, he will have been given his WP:ROPE and should expect to come out in that case not with a protection restriction but with a desysopping. We must not underestimate the effect of an admonishment, which essentially constitutes a final warning. Regards, AGK [•] 22:52, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

What a moron.

[Vigilant]

This is rich!

Per Newyorkbrad's comment here, we need to be sure that all the editors named in this decision are aware of it and have had a chance to respond. I had earlier said the following on the arbitration mailing list (at 21:47 UTC on 5 October 2013). "We appear to be voting to sanction people who have not edited since the edits in question, and who are thus not aware of the case and have not had a chance to say anything in their defence". Since then, I've looked through the contributions of the accounts named in this decision, and four accounts (Daniel32708/Imprimaturcr, Casy Penk/Resoru, Cjarbo2, and IFreedom1212) haven't edited since August or early September, which is before the proposed decision was posted. Obviously we can't hold up the case until they turn up, but it should be noted that they were not present during voting. Until wording to that effect is added, I am moving to oppose or abstain on findings and remedies related to those editors. Carcharoth (talk) 01:37, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

I would rather we worked on available evidence and would remove anything should they request clarification. I would certainly take into account the fact that a person was not present during a case in a clarification request, but am not willing to allow people to just duck out to avoid sanctions. WormTT(talk) 07:50, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Because that's never happened here, amiright?

[Hersch]

That's the Marines, not the Army. The USMC takes pride (usually) in holding its officers to a high standard. The US Army is not necessarily known for the being the same way.

What an outrageous thing to say. There's cross-service rivalry joking and snickering within the ranks, fair enough, but any decent serviceperson knows not to make broadbrush swipes at another branch for record and on the Internet. If you are associated with the Marine Corps in some way, Cla68, you are not doing it any favors.

Manning may be the Army's problem. But whether classified disclosal or grossly offensive crime of whatever nature, the next one could come from any branch. And that is how it's always been.

This gal makes a convincing argument that regardless of with which branch they are affiliated, US servicemen have a legal obligation to report war crimes. The presumption in the military is that servicemen are required to make these reports to the military chain of command. Manning attempted to do this and was rebuffed. Under the circumstances, I think it is reasonable to say that Manning fulfilled his obligation under military rules in going public with the information, whether to the letter or to the spirit of the rules. Additionally, all US servicemen must "solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same..." That latter clause might be subject to legalistic interpretation, but my own take is that it required Manning to do what he (or she) did.

Section 499 of the Army Field Manual states, "Every violation of the law of war is a war crime." The law of war is contained in the Geneva Conventions.

Article 85 of the First Protocol to the Geneva Conventions describes making the civilian population or individual civilians the object of attack as a grave breach. The firing on and killing of civilians shown in the "Collateral Murder" video violated this provision of Geneva.

Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions requires that the wounded be collected and cared for. Article 17 of the First Protocol states that the civilian population "shall be permitted, even on their own initiative, to collect and care for the wounded." That article also says, "No one shall be harmed . . . for such humanitarian acts." The firing on rescuers portrayed in the "Collateral Murder" video violates these provisions of Geneva.

Finally, Section 27-10 of the Army Field Manual states that "maltreatment of dead bodies" is a war crime. When the Army jeep drove over the dead body, it violated this provision.

Enshrined in the US Army Subject Schedule No. 27-1 is "the obligation to report all violations of the law of war."

[Tarc]

Not as terribly interesting of an experiment as I thought it'd be, but

User:Tarc/Manning statement (T-H-L)

Pretending to be a conservative is perhaps the simplest thing in the world; just be outraged by everything you find disagreeable. But after awhile it gets terribly boring.

The only one I'd offer an apology to here really is Hex, who was right to call out my comments from the beginning.

Well done, good sir.

PS: You have no idea how nauseating it was to use that avatar for a month. Back to HST.

[The Joy]

Not as terribly interesting of an experiment as I thought it'd be, but

User:Tarc/Manning statement (T-H-L)

Pretending to be a conservative is perhaps the simplest thing in the world; just be outraged by everything you find disagreeable. But after awhile it gets terribly boring.

The only one I'd offer an apology to here really is Hex, who was right to call out my comments from the beginning.

Well done, good sir.

PS: You have no idea how nauseating it was to use that avatar for a month. Back to HST.

So, you pulled a Mrs. Doubtfire (T-H-L) or Yentl (T-H-L)?

[Vigilant]

Well played...dick.

[Tarc]

Well played...dick.

It should have been fairly obvious given my stance on the Obama articles over the years, plus the way I chewed out user "Obiwankenobi" there for being a misogynist twit in the Sarah Jane Brown (T-H-L) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (T-H-L) rename discussions.

Who gives a fuck what Manning chooses to be? It's none of my business, and certainly none of yours.

[Mancunium]

Not as terribly interesting of an experiment as I thought it'd be, but

User:Tarc/Manning statement (T-H-L)

Pretending to be a conservative is perhaps the simplest thing in the world; just be outraged by everything you find disagreeable. But after awhile it gets terribly boring.

The only one I'd offer an apology to here really is Hex, who was right to call out my comments from the beginning.

Well done, good sir.

PS: You have no idea how nauseating it was to use that avatar for a month. Back to HST.

[Vigilant]

Well played...dick.

It should have been fairly obvious given my stance on the Obama articles over the years, plus the way I chewed out user "Obiwankenobi" there for being a misogynist twit in the Sarah Jane Brown (T-H-L) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (T-H-L) rename discussions.

Who gives a fuck what Manning chooses to be? It's none of my business, and certainly none of yours.

I don't run DD on random ass people I'm talking to.
Perhaps I need to be less trusting...

[Zoloft]

I just looked at the West avatar and winced. Trolling accomplished.

[The Devil's Advocate]

Pretending to be a conservative is perhaps the simplest thing in the world; just be outraged by everything you find disagreeable.

So, basically, you just took different positions and otherwise acted normal.

[Tarc]

Well played...dick.

It should have been fairly obvious given my stance on the Obama articles over the years, plus the way I chewed out user "Obiwankenobi" there for being a misogynist twit in the Sarah Jane Brown (T-H-L) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (T-H-L) rename discussions.

Who gives a fuck what Manning chooses to be? It's none of my business, and certainly none of yours.

I don't run DD on random ass people I'm talking to.
Perhaps I need to be less trusting...

Oh Vigilant, I still love you though..in a thoroughly platonic, Jack Tripper sorta way, of course.

This was just a minor point-making exercise, in the ballpark of the BLP breaching experiment, nothing more.

[Vigilant]

Well played...dick.

It should have been fairly obvious given my stance on the Obama articles over the years, plus the way I chewed out user "Obiwankenobi" there for being a misogynist twit in the Sarah Jane Brown (T-H-L) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (T-H-L) rename discussions.

Who gives a fuck what Manning chooses to be? It's none of my business, and certainly none of yours.

I don't run DD on random ass people I'm talking to.
Perhaps I need to be less trusting...

Oh Vigilant, I still love you though..in a thoroughly platonic, Jack Tripper sorta way, of course.

This was just a minor point-making exercise, in the ballpark of the BLP breaching experiment, nothing more.

Whew!

I thought we were gonna do the whole nasty divorce thing.
Who would get Zoloft?

[Cla68]

Who gives a fuck what Manning chooses to be? It's none of my business, and certainly none of yours.

Well, the point of the whole incident was that Wikipedia needed to decide what the article's name is after Manning's statement about changing his/her name. The initial process to do so turned into a fiasco and showed that WP's administration can't handle something that should be consistent and routine. If WP had an effective process established, it shouldn't have mattered what the personal agendas were by the participants.

[Vigilant]

The thing that bugs me most about this is that Manning isn't going down in history for a sex change.

He burned his life and career to bring war crimes out in the open.
That his wikipedia epitaph might be about gender trivializes everything he's sacrificed on the alter of pointless propaganda by the likes of David Gerard.

[EricBarbour]

He burned his life and career to bring war crimes out in the open.
That his wikipedia epitaph might be about gender trivializes everything he's sacrificed on the alter of pointless propaganda by the likes of David Gerard.

You have a knack for boiling the Wiki-shittery down to simple language. Keep it up, lad.

[Hersch]

The thing that bugs me most about this is that Manning isn't going down in history for a sex change.

He burned his life and career to bring war crimes out in the open.
That his wikipedia epitaph might be about gender trivializes everything he's sacrificed on the alter of pointless propaganda by the likes of David Gerard.

[Vigilant]

The thing that bugs me most about this is that Manning isn't going down in history for a sex change.

He burned his life and career to bring war crimes out in the open.
That his wikipedia epitaph might be about gender trivializes everything he's sacrificed on the alter of pointless propaganda by the likes of David Gerard.

The end times must be upon us.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/0 ... 60063.html

[Mancunium]

The belief that the universe will soon end is the pathetic fallacy of people who know that their own existence will soon end.

[Hex]

Not as terribly interesting of an experiment as I thought it'd be, but

User:Tarc/Manning statement (T-H-L)

Pretending to be a conservative is perhaps the simplest thing in the world; just be outraged by everything you find disagreeable. But after awhile it gets terribly boring.

Bloody hell.

I'm in awe. That was an amazing performance, well done!

The only one I'd offer an apology to here really is Hex, who was right to call out my comments from the beginning.

Well done, good sir.

Aw, thanks. You know, I found the character you were being quite bewildering, because up until that point you'd struck me as a very reasonable guy. It felt like I'd suddenly had the rug pulled out from under me. I'm really glad that it was an act.

Going back through the threads here and reading your comments in the light of this revelation is pretty entertaining.

Hex is the kind of person who protests Nativity displays on public property; like many liberal/atheist types, he's jealous because his circle of friends can't count 3 wise men and a virgin among them.

PS: You have no idea how nauseating it was to use that avatar for a month. Back to HST.

[Cla68]

I remember from debate or speech class being asked your position on something then being assigned to advocate for the other side. Since your feelings aren't as attached to your position, in some ways it was easier to be clear minded and logical.

[Triptych]

This gal makes a convincing argument that regardless of with which branch they are affiliated, US servicemen have a legal obligation to report war crimes. The presumption in the military is that servicemen are required to make these reports to the military chain of command. Manning attempted to do this and was rebuffed. Under the circumstances, I think it is reasonable to say that Manning fulfilled his obligation under military rules in going public with the information, whether to the letter or to the spirit of the rules. Additionally, all US servicemen must "solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same..." That latter clause might be subject to legalistic interpretation, but my own take is that it required Manning to do what he (or she) did.

Section 499 of the Army Field Manual states, "Every violation of the law of war is a war crime." The law of war is contained in the Geneva Conventions.

Article 85 of the First Protocol to the Geneva Conventions describes making the civilian population or individual civilians the object of attack as a grave breach. The firing on and killing of civilians shown in the "Collateral Murder" video violated this provision of Geneva.

Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions requires that the wounded be collected and cared for. Article 17 of the First Protocol states that the civilian population "shall be permitted, even on their own initiative, to collect and care for the wounded." That article also says, "No one shall be harmed . . . for such humanitarian acts." The firing on rescuers portrayed in the "Collateral Murder" video violates these provisions of Geneva.

Finally, Section 27-10 of the Army Field Manual states that "maltreatment of dead bodies" is a war crime. When the Army jeep drove over the dead body, it violated this provision.

Enshrined in the US Army Subject Schedule No. 27-1 is "the obligation to report all violations of the law of war."

It's an okay article, and it's always useful to remind servicemembers of their responsibilities, which include being aware of regulations prohibiting obeying unlawful orders, and generally of the international Geneva Conventions principles on the laws of war, which say things like you can't desecrate corpses by urinating on them etc., you can't torture prisoners, you can't attack those who are clearly non-combatants and so forth.

My problem with Pvt. Manning is that he didn't just specifically release the video of the helicopter attack in Bagdad where they killed those innocents, and similarly specific stuff like that, he did a huge indiscriminate data leak of the classified State Department cables and so forth. He didn't even read that stuff. Does it potentially endanger our (the U.S.') spies around the world ferreting out intelligence on terror attacks and WMDs and so forth? Sure it does. It seems to me Manning makes this emotional decision that his own government is the enemy, and so he's going to use his access to strike at that, and I also recall reading a bit where he smirks that he was able to walk out of those classified facilities with the CD-Rs in his pockets because nobody checked him. Right, because they trusted him.

I'd differentiate Manning from Edward Snowden who's been much, much more discriminating in what he released, the NSA mass surveillance programs and such, where the U.S. is spying on its own citizens and he's able to cogently explain why he anguished about it and why he did it.

Of course both of these guys are oath-breakers, they swore verbally and signed papers never to disclose that stuff. I tried to think of how a conscientious leaker could get around that. I think the only way is to publicly abrogate the oath. "My conscience no longer allows me to ... and I thus declare myself no longer bound." Neither Manning nor Snowden did that, except impliedly. I would say one has to do it pointedly and publicly and perhaps even before he or she ever leaks anything. Oh, it's not going to get you off the hook when they arrest you, but it's an answer to those who regard you as a base oath-breaker.

On the other hand, this Wikipedia sideshow regarding Manning's gender identity is just a record-breaking festival for Wikipedia's drama set. It's less about Manning than it is about them, in my view. The GLBT crusaders have their great cause to advocate and then you get the requisite supposedly villainous remarks ("can I decide to become an African-American tomorrow morning?") and admittedly worse remarks from the other side. Of course the Arbcom spectacle where it is actually making charges (and convictions) of hate speech. It was transparent a politically activist thing from the beginning, where Morwen or whoever instantly changed the name and gender pronouns, and then there's certain progressive media outlets celebrating where "Wikipedia beat the mainstream press on gender identification rights for Manning." You can't just change your name by saying so. There's a legal process. Sure, you can say "I wish to be known as "Chelsea."" It would be appropriate to write in the article "on such and such date, Manning announced a wish to be known as Chelsea," but not that "Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning, December 17, 1987)" bull that starts the article now. When the legal name change is complete, then sure. The gender pronoun question is trickier. As a gesture of sensitivity towards the gender identification question, should "he" and "him" and "his" be instantly switched out for "she" and "her" and "hers" throughout the article? I don't know, did I read there was existing guideline or official "manual of style" on the point? Go by that, and then debate it out at those pages.

[Mason]

Not as terribly interesting of an experiment as I thought it'd be, but

User:Tarc/Manning statement (T-H-L)

Pretending to be a conservative is perhaps the simplest thing in the world; just be outraged by everything you find disagreeable. But after awhile it gets terribly boring.

Bloody hell.

I'm in awe. That was an amazing performance, well done!

He's our very own Spagett!

[Tarc]

Going back through the threads here and reading your comments in the light of this revelation is pretty entertaining.

Hex is the kind of person who protests Nativity displays on public property; like many liberal/atheist types, he's jealous because his circle of friends can't count 3 wise men and a virgin among them.

See, stuff like that should've at least been suspicious, that's a quote from Buddy Cianci, the old mayor of Providence, RI. Unix nerds may even recognize it as a possible output of fortune -o.

[Triptych]

Why did corrupt T. Canens abstain on David Gerard's desysopping?

'Corrupt' is a bit much.

I'd concur with it. But granted, "corrupt" is nuanced vocabulary that has alternate definitions. There's other words that are easier, like "theft" or "lie" and so forth. You say something like that, and you don't have to expound on it much really, you just just have to point to it. What "corrupt" is though is a word that suggests things like abuse of position, deliberate misleading, disingenuity, even cynicism of motive. Canens is all of those things. You look at the recent experience with Ironholds and Kiefer Wolfowitz, he constructs this reality where official Wikipedia IRC is some private off-site thing of marginal relevance, trumpets Worm's exaggerated list of Kiefer's on-wiki trangressions while downplaying those of Ironhold's which are worse (I mean deliberately logging out to vandalize your target's userpage as an IP?!) and ignoring that Ironholds clearly, vulgarly, and violently provoked his and Kiefer's clash that precipitated the whole Arbcom case? Why's Canens do that? Because his view administrators as a superior class, which is of course his self-superiority. You can go back a little further in his elaborate policy explanation of his checkuser gangbang stalking of Malleus Fatuorum, he's pointing uncritically to particular text that is essentially unlimited "editing project space" as justification for "sockpuppet investigations" however and whenever any admin chooses to do them. He knows the text is overbroad and shouldn't be there, smugly pretends its fine and self-justifies with it. There's plenty more. The guy is entirely disingenuous. If he can twist some words he'll do it. He doesn't aspire to lead as an arb, he aspires to control. He's a defective and deceptive personality, knowingly gets away with whatever he can when he can. Unlikely to be held to account because he's clever and good at doing what he does. So, "corrupt?" I'm with Wer900.

[Randy from Boise]

On the other hand, this Wikipedia sideshow regarding Manning's gender identity is just a record-breaking festival for Wikipedia's drama set. It's less about Manning than it is about them, in my view. The GLBT crusaders have their great cause to advocate and then you get the requisite supposedly villainous remarks ("can I decide to become an African-American tomorrow morning?") and admittedly worse remarks from the other side. Of course the Arbcom spectacle where it is actually making charges (and convictions) of hate speech. It was transparent a politically activist thing from the beginning, where Morwen or whoever instantly changed the name and gender pronouns, and then there's certain progressive media outlets celebrating where "Wikipedia beat the mainstream press on gender identification rights for Manning." You can't just change your name by saying so. There's a legal process. Sure, you can say "I wish to be known as "Chelsea."" It would be appropriate to write in the article "on such and such date, Manning announced a wish to be known as Chelsea," but not that "Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning, December 17, 1987)" bull that starts the article now. When the legal name change is complete, then sure. The gender pronoun question is trickier. As a gesture of sensitivity towards the gender identification question, should "he" and "him" and "his" be instantly switched out for "she" and "her" and "hers" throughout the article? I don't know, did I read there was existing guideline or official "manual of style" on the point? Go by that, and then debate it out at those pages.

RfB

P.S. I don't agree with the last two lines, since the MOS has been made into a political document on this matter for one and I don't like the MOS to start with for two, but beyond that...

[Randy from Boise]

Going back through the threads here and reading your comments in the light of this revelation is pretty entertaining.

Hex is the kind of person who protests Nativity displays on public property; like many liberal/atheist types, he's jealous because his circle of friends can't count 3 wise men and a virgin among them.

See, stuff like that should've at least been suspicious, that's a quote from Buddy Cianci, the old mayor of Providence, RI. Unix nerds may even recognize it as a possible output of fortune -o.

And I was just about ready to compliment your wit.

RfB

[Hex]

You can't just change your name by saying so. There's a legal process.

You clearly haven't been paying enough attention, because the inaccuracy of this claim has been pointed out several times on Wikipediocracy alone.

[Zoloft]

You can't just change your name by saying so. There's a legal process.

You clearly haven't been paying enough attention, because the inaccuracy of this claim has been pointed out several times on Wikipediocracy alone.

We're not litigating this issue here, folks. Comment about the madness on Wikipedia, don't infect this site as well.

[Hex]

Sorry, I have no desire to stir a can of worms after the dead horse has bolted.