Fram blocked by User:WMFOffice for 1 year

[MrErnie]

WJBscribe has just resigned. It is incomprehensible to me how the WMF can remain silent, outside a few token non-statements, during this entire ordeal. In times of crisis, wouldn't most company leaders step in a make a statement? Is there such little care about the community within the WMF?

[Jans Hammer]

On 26 February 2007, the enwiki community granted admin right to Fram (talk · contribs). There has never been a resolution of the enwiki community, nor of its Arbitration Committee, to remove those rights. On 10 June 2019, they were removed unilaterally by WMFOffice (talk · contribs). That action has not, in accordance with prior precedent, been referred to the enwiki ArbCom. There has been no public statement, despite two weeks having been elapsed, from WMF to state that ArbCom is for some reason unsuited to reviewing Fram's status as an administrator. There has not even been a clear statement that private off-wiki actions by Fram were considered by WMF as part of their decision to enact sanctions. In the intervening period, enwiki ArbCom has not found that Fram's onwiki actions justify removal of admin permissions. Nor has a community process reached that view and endorsed WMF's actions. It seems to me that we have now been more than patient with WMF, the Board and (for that matter) with ArbCom, to which I self-referred my earlier actions on 13 June 2019. Fram has asked two very simple questions. They are questions that as a matter of basic fairness ought to have been answered regardless of whether anyone believes Fram to be guilty or innocent of (as yet unspecified) misconduct. They have not been answered. Those questions, and those raised by members of this community, have been met with obfuscation and delay. In light of the absence of any serious attempt by WMF to engage in discussions with the enwiki community since this incident occurred, I have therefore restored Fram's community-granted admin rights. WJBscribe (talk) 23:49, 25 June 2019 (UTC)


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia ... _contribs)
He needs to be recalled urgently as per his recall terms

Someone needs to buy him a beer.

He's gone - resigned before being pushed.

[Midsize Jake]

Is there such little care about the community within the WMF?

Why is that even a question?

I think there's a reasonable argument to be made that the WMF people have, probably by accident, managed to stumble and bumble their way into a strategic masterstroke that might allow them to finally achieve what they've wanted for the better part of a decade - that being the self-removal of a large chunk of the white-male-dominated "community" admin/editor hierarchy. And hey, good for them, because there's also a reasonable argument to be made that a lot of those guys really do need to go.

If that actually happens (and I'm not saying it's at all likely), they're going to create a lot of enemies, and they'll probably even trigger the much-predicted, much-anticipated Attrition Phase of the WP life-cycle in the process - the English WP life-cycle, that is. But from their perspective, all of these people are completely expendable, they have a TON of money saved up, and the "encyclopedia" is essentially written already. They've settled into a comfortable routine of jetting all over the world, promoting their "movement" and weaseling their way into all the major-player tech industry BS they can get their claws into. Good times!

What's left, other than fixing their PR problems, which this might be a Big First Step in doing?

[Ryuichi]

I half wonder if this is supposed to be that exchange on WT:NPA that's currently hatted (wherein Fram uses a certain word that should be IRL career-ending). But that makes no goddamn sense given the person with whom Fram was arguing and the fact that Fram is not blocked on Commons.

It would be naïve to think that it was not a factor. But, it is also unlikely to be the only factor, and it does not necessarily follow that anyone directly involved made a complaint.

[eagle]

We have gotten to the point that Laura Hale and her lover's names are not to be mentioned when discussing the Fram Affair:

As I'm sure I did say before, assuming we come to the conclusion or find out somehow this had little to do with the L editor, whatever the faults of the WMF, we as a community also need to consider how we behaved in our treatment of the L editor and those associated with them after this blew up.

and

Nil Einne, what exactly did the community do wrong with regard to the L and R editors? Just would like to hear your view.

It is similar to using the euphemism "N-word" instead of the word itself.

When is it appropriate to protect the identity of a person claiming "harassment", and I ask this as someone who has been harassed on-wiki and off-wiki. It seems to me that the elected members of the WMF Board and the Executive Director of the WMF are public figures, who are subject to public scrutiny and discussion. The elected chair of the WMF Board also plays an important spokesperson role beyond the other board members. When Lila Tretikov was Executive Director, her significant other Wil Sinclair was a vocal member of WO as well as founding his own website for off-wiki commentary. People argued that Wil's statements and actions should not reflect upon Lila. However, the potential for pillow-talk gave Wil greater influence and visibility than most newbe WP editors. The same is true here, and Laura Hale's misconduct creates an appearance of impropriety that the WMF Board cannot ignore. That situation warrants public scrutiny, notwithstanding that it would otherwise be none of the community's business who WMF Board members or Executive Director love.

There is also the problem of how can the WMF set up protective structures that guard against manipulative people gaming the system. Early on in Laura Hale's editing career, she was challenged for problematic editing, and an admin told the user enforcing the rules to back off because Ms. Hale worked for the WMF. The user objecting to Hale's edits then complained to the WMF, although it turned out that Ms. Hale did not in fact work for the WMF at the time. Ms. Hale then made repeated complaints that the user "complained to my employer". It is very hypocritical for Ms. Hale on the one hand to attack users who complain to the WMF about her harassment, while on the other hand demanding confidential treatment of her complaints to the WMF against volunteers trying to enforce important copyright policies.

[Vigilant]

It's interesting how obstinate the WMF is on this occasion.

It reminds me of the Mo:leMan and VisualEditor.

They'd rather burn it all down and be king of the ashes than explain themselves.
The mark of small minds.

[Vigilant]

On a related note, Jehochman (T-C-L) is an odious little toadie.

[MrErnie]

On a related note, Jehochman (T-C-L) is an odious little toadie.

I don't think whatever he found would lead to any true closure. It seems several editors and administrators must have seen those same diffs and concluded there wasn't anything ban-worthy there. I wonder if ArbCom will now take these diffs and enact a token block on Fram, concurrent with the existing WMF ban, and say "there now it's justified" by these secret diffs.

[Vigilant]

On a related note, Jehochman (T-C-L) is an odious little toadie.

I don't think whatever he found would lead to any true closure. It seems several editors and administrators must have seen those same diffs and concluded there wasn't anything ban-worthy there. I wonder if ArbCom will now take these diffs and enact a token block on Fram, concurrent with the existing WMF ban, and say "there now it's justified" by these secret diffs.

Yeah,

That sounds about right.
Nauseatingly right.

Become a body of sycophants to the WMF but be pretending to be the resistance all the while straddling the fence and sealing their souls to the unholy for a few ephemeral hats.

The Unseelie Court consists of the darkly-inclined fairies. Unlike the Seelie Court, no offense is necessary to bring down their assaults.[7] As a group (or "host"), they appear at night and assault travelers, often carrying them through the air, beating them, and forcing them to commit such acts as shooting at cattle.[citation needed] In Scotland they were seen as closely allied with witches.[8] Like the beings of the Seelie Court who are not always benevolent, neither are the fairies of the Unseelie Court always malevolent. Most Unseelies can become fond of a particular human if they are viewed as respectful, and would choose to make them something of a pet. Some of the most common characters in the Unseelie Court are bogies, bogles, boggarts, abbey lubbers and buttery spirits.[9][Note 1] The division into "Seelie" and "Unseelie" spirits was roughly equivalent to the division of Elves in Norse mythology into "light" and "dark" distinctions.[12]

[mendaliv]

I think if we're going to use euphemisms for those individuals, rather than "R" and "L" we could use "Dexter" and "Sinister".

[CoffeeCrumbs]

I think if we're going to use euphemisms for those individuals, rather than "R" and "L" we could use "Dexter" and "Sinister".

"Let's call them Laura H. No, that's too easy, L. Hale."

[Poetlister]

This seems to have quite a lot of layers to it and I haven't looked at the whole story yet.

But if the controversy here is just that a user was banned out of nowhere, without any public explanation, I don't know why this is controversial in and of itself. Many users have been banned "out of the blue" for reasons the WMF refuses to disclose publicly. It seems like the problem here isn't just that there was no reason given for the ban (again, this utter lack of transparency has been par for the course for WMF for years now), but a combination of the lack of a reason, the weirdly specific (en.wp only) and short-term (1 year) nature of the ban, the fact that people really respect and appreciate Fram's many years of work on en.wp, and the fact that the banning policy was changed shortly before the ban in such a way as to make the ban possible when it would not have been. Is that the gist of the story here?

I think there are two issues here. Most blocks are either of people nobody has heard of or people who obviously deserve it. Fram is clearly neither, so the block looks weird. Secondly, Fram is an admin, so this is an intrusion by the WMF into the privileges of the EN-WP community. Also, the WMF poured petrol on this by desysopping the admin who unblocked Fram.

[mendaliv]

layers

Yes, one of the many ways in which Wikipedia kerfuffles are like onions.

[Guido den Broeder]

On a related note, Jehochman (T-C-L) is an odious little toadie.

I don't think whatever he found would lead to any true closure. It seems several editors and administrators must have seen those same diffs and concluded there wasn't anything ban-worthy there. I wonder if ArbCom will now take these diffs and enact a token block on Fram, concurrent with the existing WMF ban, and say "there now it's justified" by these secret diffs.

If so, these editors and admins are part of the problem.

Apart from that, my guess is that he found the oversighted / redacted edits.

[Randy from Boise]

It's interesting how obstinate the WMF is on this occasion.

German engineering!!! Absentee boss! Weak board! Jimmy Wales!

The twerp at the head of the misnamed T&S was too much even for De-WP during the Super Protect fiasco, which makes my head swim.

That incident cost them 10% of their very active editors and I'm sure that will be a similar outcome at En-WP when the smoke clears.

How many people left because of the Frams and Eric Corbetts of the world again???

RfB

[mendaliv]

I doubt it. He'd probably just say it's revdel'd if it was and most people would accept that (I don't think jeh is an oversighter). He's made noises now that what he has is produced by some tool; I'm guessing an editor interaction tool. This says to me there is no smoking-gun diff or anything like that, but some evidence that jeh will argue shows a pattern of conduct indicating harassment. What bothers me about this is that this going to be far less conclusive or convincing than he'd let on in his initial posts. Clear and conclusive evidence of harassment is a single diff or a series of less than ten diffs; something that a jury would lap up. This sounds more like something you'd need an expert to explain.

[Alex Shih]

We discussed the issue on IRC. Primefac (talk) 15:22, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
It would have been better to keep things onwiki. –xenotalk 15:29, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I've always liked xeno, and this is exactly the kind of transparency needed instead of being obsessed over unnecessary secrecy and needless bureaucracy which is now dominating the culture.

[Randy from Boise]

I think there's a reasonable argument to be made that the WMF people have, probably by accident, managed to stumble and bumble their way into a strategic masterstroke that might allow them to finally achieve what they've wanted for the better part of a decade - that being the self-removal of a large chunk of the white-male-dominated "community" admin/editor hierarchy. And hey, good for them, because there's also a reasonable argument to be made that a lot of those guys really do need to go.

They're too incompetent to come up with complex strategies. What they are going to do is (literally) decimate the already thin-and-dwindling corps of active front-line administrators, which is really the one existential threat that WP faces. But then again, what better excuse for doubling the payroll and going (cough cough) PROFESSIONAL with site maintenance? That's really what bureaucrats love, expansions of their fief. More employees = bigger executive salaries.

RfB

[Alex Shih]

WJBscribe has just resigned. It is incomprehensible to me how the WMF can remain silent, outside a few token non-statements, during this entire ordeal. In times of crisis, wouldn't most company leaders step in a make a statement? Is there such little care about the community within the WMF?

I am actually happy for WJBscribe, because he did the right thing in every instance despite of some dumb, false and drama-mongering accusations from nasty personalities. Will is genuinely a good person with a good heart, and believes in the original spirit of Wikipedia, which to me is the openness and collaborative spirit, which has now been lost (both the WMF and the "self-governing body"). It's not worthwhile.

[Notbutforthesalt]

First time poster, long time reader.

Has BU Rob13 always been this completely insufferable or is this a new thing?

[Vigilant]

I doubt it. He'd probably just say it's revdel'd if it was and most people would accept that (I don't think jeh is an oversighter). He's made noises now that what he has is produced by some tool; I'm guessing an editor interaction tool. This says to me there is no smoking-gun diff or anything like that, but some evidence that jeh will argue shows a pattern of conduct indicating harassment. What bothers me about this is that this going to be far less conclusive or convincing than he'd let on in his initial posts. Clear and conclusive evidence of harassment is a single diff or a series of less than ten diffs; something that a jury would lap up. This sounds more like something you'd need an expert to explain.

Shade of the !! (T-C-L) debacle.

[mendaliv]

First time poster, long time reader.

Has BU Rob13 always been this completely insufferable or is this a new thing?

I honestly have no idea. I will say that the few times I recall interacting with him previously have been unpleasant. My evaluation is of someone who fancies himself as well-informed on law or public policy but has neither the education nor qualifications for it.

At least I pray he doesn't have a law degree. Nobody should be so clueless when it comes to procedure and jurisprudence. Nobody.

[Guido den Broeder]

Hello, Jimmy. I've been researching this matter and have found publicly available material, on wiki, that would be sufficient to start an arbitration case about Fram and possibly another administrator. I don't know if the incidents I'm looking at may be the same ones investigated by WMF, but it seems likely that they are. My request is that Fram be unblocked to participate in a case and that ArbCom handles this the way they normally would. They can decide whether to handle the case publicly or in-camera. Better late than not at all, I think. Either ArbCom will confirm the WMF findings and sanction, or recommend that they be altered. WMF would, I hope, take ArbCom's findings as sound advice and consider any recommended modification. I am also concerned that WMF may not have dug as deeply as we would, and might have missed other players, such as that second administrator, who may need to be warned to change their approach. Do you this approach might help calm the drama and prevent further losses? Jehochman Talk 15:25, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Apparently unaware that ArbCom already declined the case.

[Notbutforthesalt]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk ... 6#Question

So Jehochman is going to Fae for advice... now this makes sense.

[mendaliv]

Imagine honestly thinking that WMF’s internal review process is adequate to prevent abuse. Hilarious.

[Poetlister]

We discussed the issue on IRC. Primefac (talk) 15:22, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
It would have been better to keep things onwiki. –xenotalk 15:29, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I've always liked xeno, and this is exactly the kind of transparency needed instead of being obsessed over unnecessary secrecy and needless bureaucracy which is now dominating the culture.

There are a few high-calibre people about, not enough of course, but maybe enough to give some hope.

[Midsize Jake]

So Jehochman is going to Fae for advice... now this makes sense.

I don't like saying "I told you so," but if Mr. Hochman's motivation really is in fact to extend the drama, get attention, and make other users forget about his own heinous misdeeds while waving "secret evidence" around, who better than Mr. Fae to give advice on that?

Also, welcome to Wikipediocracy and all that stuff.

[Giraffe Stapler]

Has BU Rob13 always been this completely insufferable or is this a new thing?

I honestly have no idea. I will say that the few times I recall interacting with him previously have been unpleasant. My evaluation is of someone who fancies himself as well-informed on law or public policy but has neither the education nor qualifications for it.

At least I pray he doesn't have a law degree. Nobody should be so clueless when it comes to procedure and jurisprudence. Nobody.

"JD Candidate at University of Chicago Law School" according to his LinkedIn page.

[mendaliv]

Has BU Rob13 always been this completely insufferable or is this a new thing?

I honestly have no idea. I will say that the few times I recall interacting with him previously have been unpleasant. My evaluation is of someone who fancies himself as well-informed on law or public policy but has neither the education nor qualifications for it.

At least I pray he doesn't have a law degree. Nobody should be so clueless when it comes to procedure and jurisprudence. Nobody.

"JD Candidate at University of Chicago Law School" according to his LinkedIn page.

Well, good for him. That’s a very good law school. Hopefully he actually pursues a career outside of Wikipedia if he’s successful there.

[CoffeeCrumbs]

Has BU Rob13 always been this completely insufferable or is this a new thing?

I honestly have no idea. I will say that the few times I recall interacting with him previously have been unpleasant. My evaluation is of someone who fancies himself as well-informed on law or public policy but has neither the education nor qualifications for it.

At least I pray he doesn't have a law degree. Nobody should be so clueless when it comes to procedure and jurisprudence. Nobody.

"JD Candidate at University of Chicago Law School" according to his LinkedIn page.

Well, good for him. That’s a very good law school. Hopefully he actually pursues a career outside of Wikipedia if he’s successful there.

I'm not a lawyer, but I come from a family of lawyers and if he thinks *Wikipedia* is an "unsafe" environment, he's going to be eaten alive in the legal world. There's no panic room full of puppies and stuffed animals off the side of the courtroom.

[Vigilant]

Nope. My findings are based on the user interaction tools that show Fram hounding one or more editors. Following them around after being asked not to by other editors and admins. Repeatedly the interaction is Fram showing up after the target. The target never follows Fram. The analysis is pretty data intensive and time consuming. Jehochman Talk 23:00, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I've got a secret tool that shows secret evidence that I can't show you cuz it's secret.

A secret tool from this tool...
https://www.hochmanconsultants.com/abou ... n-hochman/

Hochman’s consulting practice consists of SEO and SEM audits, SEO training and recruiting, and expert witness testimony. He is familiar with most programming languages. Aside from consulting work, Hochman is an active member of Rotary and volunteers as a Wikipedia administrator.

What relevant experience does this cowpat have in writing data mining applications or in data correlation?

This'll turn out well.

A brief cosplay of Hochmann's involvement in WP:FRAM included below

[mendaliv]

Nope. My findings are based on the user interaction tools that show Fram hounding one or more editors. Following them around after being asked not to by other editors and admins. Repeatedly the interaction is Fram showing up after the target. The target never follows Fram. The analysis is pretty data intensive and time consuming.

In other words there is no smoking-gun diffs as previously intimated. We have something that probably would require expert witness analysis. Holy crap.

What's more, I don't see Jehochman making clear that he's found harassment in the ToU sense as opposed to the on-wiki sense of "hounding." Remember, we allow people to just unilaterally declare that someone is no longer welcome on their user talk pages, and often hold those declarations to be binding. Just posting on someone's user talk page after being told to keep away isn't per se harassment in the legal sense. Ridiculous.

I'm becoming more convinced that one of the key diffs is actually this one: diff. I can completely see WMF wanting to act directly and short-circuit ArbCom because of what happened a previous time someone prominent used a slur (that time against women) on-wiki.

[Kumioko]

WJBscribe has just resigned. It is incomprehensible to me how the WMF can remain silent, outside a few token non-statements, during this entire ordeal. In times of crisis, wouldn't most company leaders step in a make a statement? Is there such little care about the community within the WMF?

I am actually happy for WJBscribe, because he did the right thing in every instance despite of some dumb, false and drama-mongering accusations from nasty personalities. Will is genuinely a good person with a good heart, and believes in the original spirit of Wikipedia, which to me is the openness and collaborative spirit, which has now been lost (both the WMF and the "self-governing body"). It's not worthwhile.

The old Wikipedia has been gone for some time now and what we are seeing now is an almost complete implosion of the dynamic between the WMF, the community and the admins/functionaries on the site. None of the 3 trusts the other 2 groups and what we are seeing with Frammageddon has been coming for a while. I really feel like this is going to be a critical moment on the eventual downfall of Wikipedia and we may well be looking back on it like MySpace in the next few years.

[tarantino]

I'm becoming more convinced that one of the key diffs is actually this one: diff. I can completely see WMF wanting to act directly and short-circuit ArbCom because of what happened a previous time someone prominent used a slur (that time against women) on-wiki.

Ding ding ding, we have a winner!

[mendaliv]

Also, the time differential is right. Recall that the "timeline guidelines" for most office actions is 4 weeks (the exceptions being child protection, which is 24 hours, and DMCA, which is 7 business days).

That diff is from 8 May. Fram was office actioned on 10 June.

4 weeks and 5 days.

[LynnWysong]

I'm becoming more convinced that one of the key diffs is actually this one: diff. I can completely see WMF wanting to act directly and short-circuit ArbCom because of what happened a previous time someone prominent used a slur (that time against women) on-wiki.

Ding ding ding, we have a winner!

Uggghhh. Yes, if he's not American, he probably doesn't realize you can't use that word even in a neutral context. Not that I agree that we should be so sensitive that reading Huckleberry Finn out loud is going to have severe social implications but that is the world we live in.

[Vigilant]

Well, now the WMF is just being niggardly.

[Vigilant]

Someone should tell Jehochman to either pony up his evidence or stfu.

[mendaliv]

I think his stuff is a bunch of disorganized statistical witchcraft. The diff I found is a smoking gun. It literally took five or ten minutes to find it.

[MrErnie]

I think his stuff is a bunch of disorganized statistical witchcraft. The diff I found is a smoking gun. It literally took five or ten minutes to find it.

Jehochman's evidence goes back to 2016 he states. He says he found multiple instances of Fram, and perhaps a second administrator, following an editor to other pages, but to do what isn't clear. Correcting sloppy mistakes shouldn't be considered harassment. I think you're correct that the smoking gun is what Iridescent identified at the very start of all this -

The only dispute I can see Fram involved in in the last couple of months was Wikipedia talk:No personal attacks#Harassment, mocking or otherwise disrespecting someone on the basis of gender identification and pronoun preference, and frankly if the WMF banned everyone Fae made accusations against we'd have about three editors left. (Plus, if they were genuinely looking for a mechanism to get rid of editors the WMF didn't like but whom the community refused to ban, it beggars belief their fancy WP:OFFICE laser cannon wouldn't be fired squarely at Eric Corbett.) ‑ Iridescent 21:44, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

WBG brought up a good point that "FWIW, I do not agree that his fallout with with Fæ is relevant to the ban; if it was so, Guy Macon and User:SMcCandlish would have ended perma-banned by now." I find it interesting that both of those editors have been completely silent about the WP:FRAM situation. I wonder if they got WMF warnings too? Guy has been extremely outspoken against the WMF in the past and surely would relish the opportunity to get a few more licks in. He's been editing continuously throughout the saga. SMC made a couple edits on June 11 and 12, but's been silent since.

[mendaliv]

WBG brought up a good point that "FWIW, I do not agree that his fallout with with Fæ is relevant to the ban; if it was so, Guy Macon and User:SMcCandlish would have ended perma-banned by now." I find it interesting that both of those editors have been completely silent about the WP:FRAM situation. I wonder if they got WMF warnings too? Guy has been extremely outspoken against the WMF in the past and surely would relish the opportunity to get a few more licks in. He's been editing continuously throughout the saga. SMC made a couple edits on June 11 and 12, but's been silent since.

My thought thus far has been Fae didn't complain about Fram but someone else did due to his use of that slur. I mean, once you actually see that word, it's open season; virtually anybody could have credibly reported Fram and gotten action out of it. And Fae was an early participant at WP:FRAM; strikes me as the opposite of someone that felt victimized by Fram.

As to the point about Corbett, my theory is that T&S, for whatever reason, are refraining from retroactive action; c-gate was in, what, 2014? Back then weren't they called SuSa? I don't think Corbett has been quite as easy a target since then.

Alternatively, Fram might be the Samuel Chase to Corbett's John Marshall (Chase was the first SCOTUS justice to be impeached but wasn't removed from office; the impeachment was blatantly political and is now believed to be effectively a preliminary move by the Jefferson administration-aligned House to move on Chief Justice Marshall, who was a much harder target. Jefferson, the story goes, would have pushed for an impeachment of Marshall had Chase been removed from office, or otherwise intimidated the Marshall Court into backing down)

[MrErnie]

To follow up my last post, I've now seen that SMC is on a wiki-break, seemingly as a result from his AE sanction. His comment is somewhat relevant to the Fram situation:

As of 2019-06-12 , SMcCandlish is Away.
Due to on-wiki hounding, and "blame the victim" punishment for being harassed, I won't be actively participating or editing until 23 October 2019 (or sooner if the bogus sanction against me is lifted). I may respond briefly to important things if people e-mail me directly about them, but I have ping notifications turned off.

[mendaliv]

Aw. I'd actually started to warm up to SMcC despite really not being a fan of his for a long while.

[mendaliv]

Decline. Exactly what WTT said. MJL, you're on the right track breaking this whole mess down into three areas, but I think this secret-evidence subplot can be wrapped up all on its own. We can't accept a case based on evidence we haven't seen, and we can't do anything useful about a case of this description anyway given the rest of the unresolved issues. Also, this is not Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests for Opinions about the Word in That One Diff.

Well at least that shuts down (maybe) the "oh, I don't use that word myself, but that descriptive use is totally not a problem guys" comments.

[Boing! said Zebedee]

I'm becoming more convinced that one of the key diffs is actually this one: diff. I can completely see WMF wanting to act directly and short-circuit ArbCom because of what happened a previous time someone prominent used a slur (that time against women) on-wiki.

Ding ding ding, we have a winner!

Uggghhh. Yes, if he's not American, he probably doesn't realize you can't use that word even in a neutral context. Not that I agree that we should be so sensitive that reading Huckleberry Finn out loud is going to have severe social implications but that is the world we live in.

But surely that would only be the case had the WMF forced American cultural values on the rest of the English-speaking world? ... Oh, hang on, you might have a point.

[Poetlister]

I think you're correct that the smoking gun is what Iridescent identified at the very start of all this -

The only dispute I can see Fram involved in in the last couple of months was Wikipedia talk:No personal attacks#Harassment, mocking or otherwise disrespecting someone on the basis of gender identification and pronoun preference, and frankly if the WMF banned everyone Fae made accusations against we'd have about three editors left. (Plus, if they were genuinely looking for a mechanism to get rid of editors the WMF didn't like but whom the community refused to ban, it beggars belief their fancy WP:OFFICE laser cannon wouldn't be fired squarely at Eric Corbett.) ‑ Iridescent 21:44, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Is there any evidence that Fae has enough influence at WMF to get Fram blocked? And for a year for that offence?

[mendaliv]

I think you're correct that the smoking gun is what Iridescent identified at the very start of all this -

The only dispute I can see Fram involved in in the last couple of months was Wikipedia talk:No personal attacks#Harassment, mocking or otherwise disrespecting someone on the basis of gender identification and pronoun preference, and frankly if the WMF banned everyone Fae made accusations against we'd have about three editors left. (Plus, if they were genuinely looking for a mechanism to get rid of editors the WMF didn't like but whom the community refused to ban, it beggars belief their fancy WP:OFFICE laser cannon wouldn't be fired squarely at Eric Corbett.) ‑ Iridescent 21:44, 10 June 2019 (UTC)

Is there any evidence that Fae has enough influence at WMF to get Fram blocked? And for a year for that offence?

Well, I honestly don’t think Fae is the complainant. Thinking of just how offensive what Fram said was (in case it’s not clear, what he said is completely unacceptable in the U.S., even if he wasn’t calling Fae that slur), I think any person that saw that and took offense could have reported it. If I’d seen it I’d have wanted to take Fram to ANI. So I don’t think it’s impossible that it got reported by a passerby. Particularly given the subject matter of the conversation (pronoun choices and insisting on singular they instead of the gendered pronoun with which you do identify), I’m sure there were people who read it who would think first of T&S.

Like I get that there are shades of Corbett’s old dispute here, but I’d advise against taking the analogy too far. The word Corbett used and the word Fram used are qualitatively different in how they’re treated in the U.S. Uttering it even descriptively (at least as a non-black person) is just unacceptable. Least of all in what’s supposed to be a collegial environment.

[Randy from Boise]

As to the point about Corbett, my theory is that T&S, for whatever reason, are refraining from retroactive action; c-gate was in, what, 2014? Back then weren't they called SuSa? I don't think Corbett has been quite as easy a target since then.)

Horsefeathers!

linkhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Elizabeth_Mallet[/link]

RfB

[Boing! said Zebedee]

Thinking of just how offensive what Fram said was (in case it’s not clear, what he said is completely unacceptable in the U.S., even if he wasn’t calling Fae that slur), ...

Is it really the case that in America you can't even *say* the word, not even when talking about hypothetical examples of its usage? I'm genuinely surprised (and I suspect Fram would be too). But even then, I can't see how saying the word when not directed at anyone could be seen as harassment.

[mendaliv]

As to the point about Corbett, my theory is that T&S, for whatever reason, are refraining from retroactive action; c-gate was in, what, 2014? Back then weren't they called SuSa? I don't think Corbett has been quite as easy a target since then.)

Horsefeathers!

linkhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Elizabeth_Mallet[/link]

RfB

In some ways that lends credence to the other possibility: That the FramBan is the beta test of the CorbettBan. It's been exactly four weeks since that exchange, which is how long T&S's turnaround on normal complaints is supposed to be. I guess we'll see.