Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Noleander

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Unabridged Statement by Slrubenstein

I did not seek the normal avenues of dispute resolution, because I did not perceive this as a dispute between me and Noleander. At least, it is not a dispute in the narrow sense that usually operates at Wikipedia. Personally, I have no problem with Noleander. I do not think she has been incivil to me. She never attacked me personaly. Moreover, we have never been involved in an editing dispute. If I have ever reverted her, I do not remember. If she has ever reverted me, I do not remember.

I went to AN/I to propose a community ban; Slim Virgin proposed instead a topic ban, which I supported. I supported a ban because I perceived a pattern of behavior that I believe should be unacceptable at Wikipedia. The pattern of behavior is anti-Semitic. It has taken the form of creating what I consider anti-Semitic articles about Jews.

I do not believe that anyone would contest that there has been a pattern of behavior. This is evidenced by four differnt AN/I threads. I initiated the first on 18 October 2009, after Noleander created the article "Controversies related to prevalence of Jews in leadership roles in Hollywood."[1] I think it is appropriate for Wikipedia to have articles about anti-Semitism, and if Noleander wished to call attention to anti-Semitic slurs against Jews in relation to Hollywood, she could have added appropriate content to the article on anti-Semitism. But in my view this article was not "about" anti-Semitism or allegqtions of anti-Semitism, it was a thinly disguised pretext to bring out the anti-Semitic slur of Jews controlling the media. This thread is relatively short, and the issue was resolved the next day by moving it to AfD, resulting in (1) the name of the article being changed to "Jews and Hollywood" and then the article being replaced by a redirect to the American Jews article.[2]

Further information: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive571 § user:Noleander and antisemitism-related articles

On 22 October 2009 Peter Cohen reopened the threat at AN/I, pointing out that Noleander had plagiarized from Radio Islam. This initiated a much longer thread that lasted through 24 October; I participated extensively, and of people commenting here Ncmvocalist and Tryptofish commented. As with the most recent AN/I thread, participants fell into two groups: those who considered the article anti-Semitic, and consider anti-Semitism to be a behavior deserving specific attention, and those who consider anti-Semitism to be a belief or intention that is not a concern of Wikipedia, and who instead discussed problems in the article that could be fixed through better writing.

Further information: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive572 § User:Noleander

On 12 Fedbruary 2010 Jayjg initiated the next thread on Noleander, writing "It appears, as was evident in the previous AN/I discussion, that Oleander edits Wikipedia primarily for two reasons; to include negative information about Mormons and Jews. In the past he focused more on Mormons; since the last AN/I discussion however, he has focused more on Jews. Even when the information he provides is arguably relevant, it has to be extensively edited to conform with policy (e.g. [57], [58]). While his pretense is that he is only attempting to debunk antisemitic canards, his actions indicate that he is actually attempting to promote them." This time the discussion continued until 16 February. Slim Virgin proposed a resolution:

Noleander writes above that his interest lies in adding criticism of religions, so perhaps he could put people's minds at rest by focusing on that clearly from now on—on religion, rather than ethnicity, and using good sources that offer a critique of religion. SlimVirgin TALK contribs 22:56, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm amenable to SlimVirgin's suggestion. My primary interest is ensuring that the "downsides" of religions are documented in this encyclopedia (in a neutral, balanced way), and I'm willing to focus on that area. Good sourcing is always a priority for me, but I can redouble my efforts in that regard. --Noleander (talk) 00:27, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, that would probably resolve the issue, particularly if the criticism is spread around different religions or focuses on the general concept. SlimVirgin TALK contribs 00:29, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Then perhaps that's the end of this, if everyone agrees...? Equazcion (talk) 04:29, 16 Feb 2010 (UTC)

although some editors were unsatisfied:

I think Noleander's pattern of edits are well described by the WP:DE and WP:TE. It seems to continue despite Tbdsy's warning. I have given him another, quite a stern warning and intend to block if the behavior does not change. Slimvirgin's proposal seem to be a good way to break the pattern there are probably hundreds other ways it is up to Noleander's but if his behavior would not change he should be blocked per WP:DE Alex Bakharev (talk) 07:03, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Further information: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive597 § Noleander redux

The next thread was opened by Noleander on 12 April 2010, when he complained that another editor had been removing material he had added to the article Criticism of Judaism. A relatively short discussion followed, and the thread ended 13 April with this comment:

I'm beginning to think that it may make sense to ban Noleander from all religion related articles. While his problems have been primarily involving articles about Judaism, it isn't the only one which has been treated to his POV pushing. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:23, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

but no action taken. I did not participate in this discussion.

Further information: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive608 § Deleting content in Criticism of Judaism without prior discussion

As I said, I think everyone will agree that there is a pattern; Noleander has said that he is concerned to publicize criticisms of religion, and in principle I see no problem with this.

I think the basic questions are few:

1. Is anti-Semitism a belief, or an action? Obviously it can be both but I want to be clear that I am not at all concerned with anti-Semitic belief. For all I know, I may have collaborated with many anti-Semites working on one article or another. I do not know the real identity of other editors, I do not know what kind of people they are like outside of Wikipedia, and frankly I do not care what they believe. What I do care about are the articles we write. When I accused Noleander of anti-Semitic editing, I was refering to a behavior, to the articles he has created.
2. Are the articles Noleander has created (and some to which he has added controversial content) anti-Semitic, or are they just poorly written articles? This is a major point of contention, and many of the people who opposed the proposed ban claimed that Noleander's most recent article, Jews and Money (renamed Economic history of the Jews) to be a well-sourced article on a notable topic.
3. Is this a systemic problem, or an isolated incident? I do not believe anyone should be banned (or topic banned) unless there is a pattern of unacceptable behavior. As I said, even Noleander agrees that there is a pattern of behavior (articles critical of Judaism). If these articles are acceptable, then the pattern is acceptable. So everything really hinges on the second question.

There are three simple reasons why I consider the articles anti-Semitic.

1. They are by and large not about Judaism, the religion, but about Jews - individual people, and the collective i.e. the Jewish race (or People etc.)
2. The articles are neither well-sourced, nor do they use sources well. This was made clear by many people who have supported a topic ban, or who have supported the deletion of the article. The list of sources may appear impressive to a non-expert. Noleander cites books that sound relevant, but that were written by journalists, or by hobbyists, or by historians whose work is dated and no longer considered by other historians to be authoritative. More importantly, sources are used poorly. Noleander often provides summaries that flat-our misrepresent the author's views. Or she will provide a view that the source is challenging or rejecting, without providing the critique; the author of the work cited is thus presented as holding a view he or she actually criticizes. Finally, Noleander quotes selectively, and the selections are taken out of context. This is common in most if not all articles Noleander creates - to the point where, on this basis alone, one could reasonably characterize Noleander as a disruptive editor. One reason that Noleander has evaded this charge has been by creating articles. By creating articles, she avoids coming into conflict with editors who have put serious work into existing editors.
3. The effect of selective quotes, taken out of context, and other misrepresentations of the views of the authors of the sources is not random. The effect is to highlight slurs against Jews, or the facts that anti-Semites (e.g. the anonymous authors of Protocals of the Elders of Zion, or Henry Ford) regularly select in constructing their sterotypes of Jews. Simply put: Noleander systematically misrepresents sources in order to present anti-Semitic canards as facts.

The effect of promoting anti-Semitic views through encyclopedia articles, in my view, goes beyond simple violations of core content policies (NPOV, V, NOR). Certainly, every paragraph of Economic history of the Jews does violate NPOV and NOR. But if that is all that they did, it would just be another crappy article. As many supporters of Noleander have pointed out, Wikipedia is full of crappy articles, and being the on-line encyclopedia anyone can edit, we hope that over time crappy articles will be turned into good ones. The thing is, I don't think many of our editors are experts on the economic history of the Jews, or Jewish history, or economic history, and I do not think most editors have the time to research a whole new literature in order to spot -let alone fix - the errors in the article. In the meantime, people who come to Wikipedia not to edit but to learn, will read this article and, seeing all the citations - many to apparently Jewish authors - will assume it is a minimally reliable article.

And from this article they will learn that Jews historically have been drawn to money-lending, profit, and materialism, and are less moral than Christians.

The effect of this article, like so many other articles Noleander has created, is not to provide an account of all significant views from reliable sources on a particular topic, in a way that will add to the reader's understanding of the world. The effect is to perpetuate racist stereotypes about Jews.

Because Wikipedia is edited by a mass of individuals, it has come up with good policies against personal attacks, and mechanisms for resolving personal disputes. But we have never found a good way to deal with impersonal attacks, attacks against whole classes of humans rather than individual editors.

Nevertheless, if Wikipedia is one thing, it is an encyclopedia. An encyclopedia is nothing, if it is not a means to add to people's knowledge. If we tolerate a series of articles whose purpose is to educate people only in ignorance and hatred, whether in the form of contempt or resentment or any of its other guises, then we discredit the whole project. And we undermine whatever trust we ask people to have in us.

Some people have suggested that we use this as a "teaching moment," to encourage Noleander to learn more about Jews. I appreciate this suggestion since it at least admits that there is something really wrong here. But Wikipedia is not a chat room, it is not a rehabilitation center. We ask a lot from our editors, to donate lots of time to research and write the world's largest on-line encyclopedia. That is a big enough task. It is not for us to try to re-educate anti-Semites. As I said from the beginning, I am not interested in what my fellow editors believe, only in their acts. Noleanders acts reveal a pattern of misrepresentation of sources that has one end, the perpetuation of anti-Semitic stereotypes of Jews.

If this does not justify a topic ban, I really have no idea what could possibly justify a topic ban. If we do not enforce a topic ban on Noleander, we might as well revoke all topic bans we have ever imposed on others. Slrubenstein | Talk 19:21, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Mathsci

The community has become so factionalised by the issues raised by Noleander's pattern of editing that an ArbCom case seems to be the only way to resolve the problems. From my own perspective, based on the latest article he has launched on wikipedia, Noleander has been involved in thinly veiled civil POV-pushing, where he has edited tendentiously. misrepresenting sources. I carried out a preliminary analysis of just one sentence of his article here and found that he had wholly misrepresented a source. When the opinions of theorists of the Third Reich are presented in a matter-of-fact way and Noleander goes out of his way to draw his newly produced article to the attention of an editor Jayjg with whom he has been in conflict about similar articles, something is wrong. Noleander must be aware of the offensive way in which he has written his article (since every time he produces such an article, it elicits a similar response). Given his awareness that he has produced an article which contains little more than an extensive catalogue of anitisemitic canards and racial stereotypes, his freely offered invitation to any critic to help him improve the article takes on a sinister air. Noleander cannot be unaware that he has misrepresented sources—his air of baffled innocence is disingenuous.Mathsci (talk) 06:19, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Anthonyhcole

The claim has been made that Noleander, a civil and genial editor, edits tendentiously in the direction of making Jews look bad. Examples have been offered in the most recent ANI thread [3] and in several previous threads, listed at the top of the most recent ANI thread. Those ANI threads relate, mostly, to articles authored by Noleander and subsequently deleted, so non-admins can't examine much of the evidence discussed in those threads. Noleander has also been accused of consistently misrepresenting sources, in line with this purported tendency. No editor claims, or appears, to have done a thorough review of Noleander's history - most examples of his behaviour seem to have been stumbled upon or arisen out of the examination of Noleander's contentious new articles. On the face of it, we have an anti-Semitic, anti-Judaic editor, but someone with access to the deleted articles needs to review the existing evidence. If the evidence summarised at the end of the last ANI thread [4] is found to be sound, a review of Noleander's editing outside the articles addressed at the ANI threads needs to be conducted. If it is found that Noleander is habitually editing tendentiously, and habitually misrepresenting sources, I believe a twelve month topic ban on the areas he's misbehaving in would not be disproportionate. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 06:22, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

RFC/U might be a more appropriate place to review this editor's editing pattern, if the arbitrators believe more evidence is needed. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 10:10, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved Ncmvocalist

No issues with ArbCom taking this; in fact, I suppose there isn't much choice but to take it given that the primary allegation by the involved parties is TE and non-neutral SPA in regards to Noleander.

My only issue is that some of the same parties keep turning up at ANI and other noticeboards (eg; Slrubenstein, Jayjg, etc) expecting the Community to do things their way without really paying any regard to the purpose of WP:DR, other standard processes, or even the feedback they were given; that would need to be addressed in some form in this case.

If it's clear enough, the Community will impose a measure without needing a RfC/U. But we want people to go through RfC/U if it is not as "clear". The evidence can be presented in a more coherent form if they present it in the RfC/U format, while the needless distractions which turn up at ANI can be put to a stop due to the rules of RfC/U (especially that of formatting). When enough of the Community don't see the "obvious" and clearly say "try something else - like RfC/U" - it becomes important to change the approach; it's inappropriate to ignore that feedback and continue to insist that everyone vote as if a topic ban discussion is a poll. In addition to that, we can see bickering, badgering, repeated allegations that things are "clear" and aren't being read, and that it is someone else's responsibility to file a RfC/U even though it was those users who were asking the Community to step in. One of the troubling allegations of bias was dealt with at WQA, but even after an apology, it seemed an involved party I named above did not seem interested in resolving the dispute amicably and voluntarily. Instead, he produced a wall of text while a participant from the R&I case again unhelpfully brought up a separate dispute/sanction/user.

I've said it before and I'll say it again; I'm more than willing to give a lot of slack for users who are having difficulty with tendentious editing, probably more so than a lot of others. But the moment they cannot be receptive to what they are being told by uninvolved users (even those uninvolved users who agree that their concern may be justified), then we need to consider whether they should continue working in such contentious areas. If they continue and don't take a break for a period of time, I suspect we'll just end up as an editorial version of a burned out administrator (which isn't really helpful in the long run). Ncmvocalist (talk) 06:38, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved Viriditas

I would like to ask the committee to consider a long-term perspective with this case. Instead of taking a simple punitive approach, the committee is in a unique position and has an unprecedented opportunity to shape and enact a proactive solution that the community at large can apply on a smaller scale when dealing with dispute resolution in the future. For example, consider the following: we have an editor who has shown great interest in contributing to controversial articles about a certain ethnic group. Instead of enacting an outright topic ban in this matter, why not consider the "Willie Nelson" approach?[5] Noleander's interest in Judaica could conceivably be shaped and molded, such that it would improve his own understanding of this particular ethnic group and help improve Wikipedia's coverage of the subject. Consider for a moment the sheer scope of this task: WikiProject Judaism has 8,269 articles tagged under its scope; WikiProject Jewish history has 1,628; WikiProject Israel has 10,857. Is it conceivable that the committee could look at this situation from an altogether different perspective, and enact a creative probation of sorts, that acknowledges the interests of Noleander and seeks to set him on the right path rather than merely punishing him? I'm sure many are saying, are you out of your mind? You, Viriditas, want us to let an accused antisemite write about Judaism-related topics? Have you finally lost it? In reply, I say: would it not be more constructive to ask Noleander to prove himself by taking a set of uncontroversial Judaica-related articles and bringing them, to let's say, good article or featured status, instead of banning him outright? It is generally acknowledged that Wikipedia is not therapy, but do we not as human beings have a responsibility to improve not just ourselves, but to help others improve, or at the very least, give them an opportunity to contribute to their own self-improvement? Clearly, Noleander is interested in Judaism. Why not let him continue to pursue his interests in less controversial articles, and allow him to prove that he is worthy of the task at hand? To quote Anne Frank: "People will always follow a good example; be the one to set a good example, then it won't be long before the others follow..." Viriditas (talk) 07:31, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Re: John Vandenberg—I would be happy to help with proposals. Viriditas (talk) 02:30, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Re: Maunus—Ideally, an RfC would have presented mentoring solutions. Why wasn't one ever started after all this time? Using the noticeboards to bypass DR isn't best practice. Viriditas (talk) 02:30, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Re: Slrubenstein—How can you possibly relate to your fellow human beings as colleagues and collaborators without making an effort to understand their positions, their beliefs, and their POV? You and others say that Noleander perpetuates anti-Semitic stereotypes of Jews. Was he reverted? Was the BRD proces followed? Did a discussion take place on the talk page? What about an RfC? What happened to all of the mechanisms we have in place to insure NPOV? Is Noleander a super user who is exempt from the same processes and procedures that bind us all to DR? Viriditas (talk) 02:30, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved Griswaldo

I agree with Ncmvocalist and urge the Arbcom to also look at the manner in which certain editors have insisted on only using AN/I to deal with this and similar issues that are much more productively brought through dispute resolution. Issues like this are too complex to be dealt with at AN/I and inevitably lead to more friction and don't solve a thing. I don't mean to insult anyone, but I suspect at the very least some amount of laziness is involved here. If editors can light a fire at AN/I they can then sit back and hope others will do their work for them. Those fires ought to be discouraged. Regarding the central focus of the arbitration, I also urge Arbcom to accept a scope that goes well beyond Noleander's editing of Judaism related entries. As the AN/I thread made clear, the first half of Noleander's career was dominated by criticism of Mormonism. If there is a limited scope regarding what Noleander has been editing, then I hope that scope includes all ethnic/religious related topics.Griswaldo (talk) 12:26, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Comment by Tarc

Scope;

• WP:ARBPIA
• WP:ARBPIA2
• Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Allegations of apartheid
• WP:CAMERA
• Dozens of XfDs, AN/Is, AE, RSN, BLPN
• This

This is not about one editor, one article, or one AN/I, this is about a general miasma that ArbCom has had to wade into time and time and time again. Save your successors the same old grief and headaches. Look through those cases and see the same names yelling for sanctions against the same names. The scope is this; can editors of a shared cultural/ideological/whatever the grouping may be, band together to oppose article work, creation, edits, deletes, keeps that oppose their personal points of view? Can editors create content that is critical of a particular subject and avoid being labeled as a critic or hater of that subject? Tarc (talk) 14:17, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

• Facepalm Then call the overall dispute area "Judeo-Muslim" or "Jewish-Arab". Denying that this has nothing to do with the general topic area is silly. Tarc (talk) 15:17, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Comment by Volunteer Marek

Just a quick one. What in the world does this have to do with Israel-Palestinian issues? Nothing, unless I'm completely missing something, and there is absolutely no good reason to try and hitch a ride on those previous ArbCom cases. Don't let this this one spill over - it's messy enough as it is.Volunteer Marek (talk) 14:35, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't see what this has to do with Muslims or Arabs either.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:19, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement of uninvolved 75.57.242.120

Meh on whether an RFC before arbitration is worthwhile. I'm presuming it will end up with arbcom either way. Topic ban pending outcome of arbitration is probably advisable given the acrimony flying right now.

I've spent several hours looking at diffs and I don't see overwhelming evidence that Noleander is an anti-Semite. She appears to be more of an equal-opportunity secular activist, editing tendentiously against the Jewish religion but not especially against the associated ethnic group. For example, one of the criticisms she added of Jewish theology is that the story of Noah's Ark might not be literally true.[6] She is recently concentrating on Judaism but previously concentrated on Mormonism. She has also edited articles critical of Islam, Christianity, Buddhism, and maybe a few more, plus several about atheism that I haven't looked at. (Nothing about the FSM so maybe she is a believer in secret). I have made a list of all her mainspace edits grouped by article here (400k bytes) and you can see that her most heavily edited article is Criticism of the Latter Day Saint movement. Overall I would say she is editing with an agenda ("My perception is that Wikipedia is censored in regards to some topics that reflect negatively on Jews, and I'm attempting to reverse that censorship"), she has shown substandard editing judgment at times, she engages in synth, and she can be careless with sources, but I don't have convincing reasons to think she is a racist. Not that her matters--her editing presents real problems to the project in my opinion.

I'd also like to call arbcom's attention to this ongoing AfD about Economic history of the Jews, a new article that Noleander originally called "Jews and money", and the very divided response that the AfD is getting. I think the afd shows there is a conflict between differing schools of policy and process underneath all this, which arbcom might be able to help with. I've taken mercy on you and cut this post down from a much longer draft, but the basic questions are:

1. Should articles related to ethnic stereotypes and discrimination that are constant undercurrents of ongoing ubiquitous real-world conflict be treated the same way as articles about Star Trek, or are our expectations towards them closer to the rigorous standards of BLP's? (I say "rigorous") and
2. Jews and money, like many of Noleander's articles, was written in article user space complete with sources, then plopped into article space in one big edit (130k in this case). And the question is whether that (for a contentious subject) departs from established wiki-process and presents a fait accompli to other editors and also leads to less reliability of the article (since it doesn't have continuous quality control like a wiki-developed article with many hands involved at every stage). I made some more comments about this issue in the AfD.

If anyone (hah) wants the "long" version of this post I can upload it to my user talk. 75.57.242.120 (talk) 12:15, 29 March 2011 (UTC). Copied from the clerks' noticeboard by clerk Alexandr Dmitri (talk) 16:51, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I made a minor correction, per this edit request. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 18:57, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement of uninvolved Tryptofish

Some of the Committee members have asked for opinions about the advisability of accepting this case without a prior RfC/U, and I would support the Committee accepting it, for the reasons already stated by several members of the Committee as of this time. Discussion at AN/I was about the preferability of RfC/U over AN/I, rather than over arbitration, and I think the community would actually like to see DR in general made less of an epic process, so some resolution here would be helpful.

I would also like to make it clear that this really has nothing to do with Israel-Palestine, an entirely different area of dispute. It is about the alleged representation of religious stereotypes.

Most importantly, I would like to urge the Committee to be thoughtful about determining the scope of this case. As proposed, the focus is too narrow. As with many cases, the Committee will need to examine carefully, not only Noleander's conduct, but also the conduct of those who, repeatedly, bring charges against Noleander. In so doing, the Committee will need to be rigorous in distinguishing between content that some users may find offensive, and disruptive conduct. These are two different things, although it is all too easy to react emotionally to disturbing material and jump to the conclusion that there was disruptive conduct. I believe that there was a lot of that conclusion-jumping at AN/I. The Committee will need to examine not only whether the creation of content in which Noleander has engaged is out-of-policy, but also to examine whether Noleander's responses to the concerns of other editors, once that content appeared, was out-of-policy, as well as whether the ways in which other editors have sought to disagree with that content was out-of-policy. Unless all of that gets examined, there is the risk of an outcome that says: "we don't like you, so we are not going to let you edit here." --Tryptofish (talk) 18:10, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Maunus

I arrived at the topic through the ANi thread. Looking at the Jews and Money article and Noleander's previous contributions to Judaism related articles I became convinced that wikipedia as an encyclopedia stands to gain by disallowing Noleander to edit in that topic area, but has nothing to loose. I believe that articles about criticism of religous and ethnic groups may be notable, but that they should only be written with the greatest care. Editors working on these topics should be able to exercise the utmost care in the use of sources and the only the best judgment in relation to neutrality and balance, and who never fall prone simply to repeat stereotypes or broad generalizations. Noleander has not lived up to these requirement as I believe ample evidence has shown, and when on several occasions he has been made aware that other editors found faults with his handling of the delicate topic matter he has politely agreed and continued to do the same thing. This is not a stable situation and if allowed to continue it will create extra work for the editors who will have to follow Noleander's edits and detect and neutralize POV problems, and in cases where it goes unnoticed for too long it threatens to compomise the integrity of wikipedia as a site where one can find neutral information even about sensitive topics. On the question of whether Noleander has edited antisemitically I refrain from answering because there are also other possible explanations of his problematic editing, lack of WP:COMPETENCE being one and a misguided aim to right great wrongs being another. It is however clear to me that we have nothing to lose by topic banning him from this contentious area and a lot to gain. ·Maunus·ƛ· 19:19, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Re Tarc: I have not to my recollection had prior disputes with any involved party here, I have not been a party to any Israel/Palestine related disputes and honestly I think that it is a fallacy to think that any problems with anti-semitic editing has to do with that topic - Antisemitism and opposition to it has been around a lot longer than the state of Israel and it also affects right wing and left wing and zionist and antizionist Jews alike. It is very possible to be against antisemitism and nonetheless have a neutral or even pro-palestinian stance regarding the Israel/Palestine question. Throwing everyone who opposes tendentious or antisemtitic editing into the anti-palestine/pro-israel camp is itself an instance of unwarranted stereotyping. In this case it is furthermore simply wrong, as there have been provided unquestionable evidence of probloematic edits by Noleander and this evidence alone is enough to convince other editors that there is a problem without them being previously biased for or against his person. Adress the arguments and the evidence, provide counter evidence. But don't try to write this off as an extension of another unrelated dispute in which you apparently have a stake.·Maunus·ƛ· 19:26, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Re Viriditas: Who should undertake this mentoring of Noleander? Do you volunteer or are you suggesting that someoneelse do that large amount of work? I sure wouldn't want to make myself responsible for having to check every last one of his copious edits to detect subtle misrepresentations of sources. ·Maunus·ƛ· 19:28, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Re Viriditas2: Ok, I was just checking, so you are just saying someone else ought to volunteer to mentor him. ·Maunus·ƛ· 11:49, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved LessHeard vanU

As it seems likely that this case is going to be accepted, I should like to present one other aspect that I feel should be covered; when a concern is presented to ANI or some other avenue of dispute resolution there should be an effort to acknowledge those concerns rather than to aver a "right" to aggravate a section of the community to continue acting in the complained of manner, and further cause disruption by insisting that the concerns are those of a minority of the project who have a cultural, religious or other affiliation to the subject matter, and may be thus ignored. LessHeard vanU (talk) 20:48, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Tijfo098

I wonder why this could not be solved at WP:AE. Clear-cut cases of long-term tendentious editing in this area were solved successfully there in the past, on both sides of the anti-this-or-that bias. Since ArbCom is going to accept this, I strongly urge the Arbs to examine the behavior of all parties involved. 08:23, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by ScottyBerg

I expressed no opinion on Noleander at the AN/I, but was appalled by the article she created. Seeing the history laid out above, I now see the serious concerns raised by other editors and support this arbitration case. I'm nonplussed by the blase statement made by Noleander. ScottyBerg (talk) 14:39, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Statement by uninvolved Vecrumba

I did read through the primary article in question. Unfortunately, this is the sort of thing one sees all the time in name-your-group bashing:

1. once a negative stereotype is enunciated by a recognizable or reputable source, one can quote it and cite it for encyclopedic content
2. there is a fine difference, exploited regularly on Wikipedia by those ultimately advocating against some group, between quoting and citing for encyclopedic content versus quoting and citing as encyclopedic content

And so, the moral violation is quoting negative statements regarding Jews—or any identifiable religious or ethnic or racial group—communicating those as (historical) statements of fact by individuals versus statements by individuals appropriately positioned as reflecting their personal or institutional prejudices or simply the mores of the time. At the surface, it's written following all the rules. But in its form and organization and essence it is rampant anti-Semitism clothed in a mantle of ("reputable") encyclopedic citations.

My personal experience has been that whether conscious or not, whether intentional or not, this is not behavior that bends to coaching or mentoring. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 16:44, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Noleander

Initiated by Tijfo098 (talk) at 13:20, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

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

• Tijfo098 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (initiator)

Statement by Tijfo098

I find the discretionary sanctions passed in this case quite muddy. Do they apply for instance to someone who persistently edits with, say, anti-Palestinian or anti-Serbian bias? I can think of a number of users who don't break 1RR and similar technical rules (like outright misusing sources) but edit in this fashion overall, by adding solely negative information about some peoples. Assuming my impression is correct, may I bring them to WP:AE under the discretionary sanctioned passed in this case? 13:35, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Casliber, did you change your mind since the vote? Or was the remedy poorly worded? The discretionary sanction/remedy linked says "its terms are applicable to other disputes similar to those arising in this current case." It seems to me that NYB's thought experiment, although not part of the decision itself, is how that remedy is to be interpreted, at least by him. 14:43, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Also, Casliber, what do you mean by "opening the floodgate"? Do you think there are many editors like Noleander active, but editing in different anti-people-X areas? 17:23, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Tryptofish, Noleander has been indef topic banned as a separate remedy in the case, so I doubt the discretionary sanctions were meant for him alone (the 2nd / discretionary remedy doesn't contain such wording or even name Noleander), but who knows... 16:37, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Ok, thanks for the clarification. 03:48, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Tryptofish

I had thought that the decision was clear and settled, but seeing Casliber's comment below makes me feel a need to come back with a question. It seems clear to me that the Noleander case was about articles pertaining to Judaism and the Jewish people, so the discretionary sanctions do not automatically extend to other religions or peoples, as Casliber says. However, Casliber's answer sounds to me like the sanctions might only apply to Noleander, individually, and not to other editors who might engage in the kinds of conduct addressed in the sanction, in content pertaining to to Judaism and the Jewish people. If so, that does not make sense to me. Noleander is topic banned from that subject area, so surely the sanctions apply to other editors. Furthermore, it seemed clear to me during the case that the purpose of the discretionary sanctions was to address conduct by editors other than Noleander, that did not rise to the level of requiring ArbCom sanctions in this case, but which was nonetheless recognized as being unhelpful. Could the Committee please clarify that? Thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 16:10, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

@Newyorkbrad: Sorry, but now I'm even more confused. That no new discretionary sanctions were adopted in the case: yes, I understand that. That the "thought experiment" was not anything official: yes, of course, I understand that too. Remedy 2 explains how the decision in the earlier case applies here: yes, I understand that too, insofar as it goes. But the question that all three editors are asking here has not been answered. Remedy 2 draws readers' attention to the earlier case, and quotes a passage from it. In the earlier case, the quoted passage is followed immediately by the following:

"To enforce the foregoing, Standard discretionary sanctions are authorized for any editor making any edit relating to the area of conflict anywhere on Wikipedia."

It would appear on the face of it that the Committee was declaring that editors, other than Noleander, who make edits "relating to the area of conflict", can potentially be brought to Arbitration Enforcement in relation to the Noleander case. It now sounds as though both Casliber and Newyorkbrad are saying that this is not so. Three editors here are asking if users, other than Noleander, who make edits "relating to Judaism, the Jewish people, Jewish history or culture, or individual Jewish persons identified as such, broadly but reasonably construed," or perhaps even in other subject areas, are subject to Arbitration Enforcement as a result of this case. When Roger Davies proposed the remedy (please see his vote at the Proposed Decision), he seemed to be saying so. Please understand that the community appears not to understand what the Committee intended in this regard. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:39, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Thank you to the Arbs for clearing that up. Roger's explanation makes very good sense to me, and fully answers any questions that I had. Agreeing with what Griswaldo said, it occurs to me that some of the confusion arises from placing that part of the decision in the Remedies section, as opposed to Principles or Findings of fact, because it implied that this was a description of actions to be taken as a result of this ruling, when it now appears that it was actually a reminder of something that already exists. (I will also point out that I am disappointed that the actual remedies do not really address the kinds of conduct that occurred in response to Noleander's edits, but I accept that the Committee's decision was a fair one, and leaves those matters, should they occur again, to the existing dispute resolution process.) Thanks again, --Tryptofish (talk) 18:38, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Griswaldo

I too am confused by Calisber's response. I was under the impression that Arbitration Enforcement of discretionary sanctions was available as a remedy once someone was notified by an admin that their edits in a certain area fall under the purview of an arbitration case. Is that not correct? Thanks for any clarification.Griswaldo (talk) 19:59, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks to the arbs for their clarifications. It makes sense to me now, but perhaps the confusion is a good indication that the manner in which people were bing reminded about other descritionary sanctions wasn't completely clear. Maybe it will be done differently in the future to avoid confusion. Thanks again.Griswaldo (talk) 12:08, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf

Roger and Brad, are you saying that discretionary sanctions may not be imposed anywhere on the authority of the Noleander case, but they could be imposed for most examples of racist editing, if the racism is regarding or alluding to the intelligence or other human attributes (specifically including kindness, typical behaviour and/or impartiality, but presumably excluding things like height, physical strength and similar non-personality attributes) of the denigrated race on the authority of the Race and intelligence case? If so,

• Can you confirm that this is the case regardless of what race or nationality the editor(s) in question disparage (i.e. it would apply equally to someone denigrating Arabs, Jews, Serbs and Namibians)?
• Where should clarification be sought if one is in doubt whether the racism in question falls within the included intersections of race and interlligence/personality or not
• If discretionary sanctions are applied due to editor(s) making comments that are both within the scope and without the scope noted above, what should the course of action be if the editor(s) (a) ceased making the within-scope accusations but not the without-scope ones; or (b) continued to make both sorts of problem editsStandard dispute resolution? RfC? AE? Requests to ammend the Race and intelligence case? A new arbitration request? Thryduulf (talk) 08:40, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Thank you all, particularly Roger, as I'm now happy I understand everything. Thryduulf (talk) 19:25, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• The sanctions as such under AE refer to this case (i.e. Noleander). Other editors whose actions had not otherwise been scrutinised to date should pass through the standard procedures and noticeboards, which could include Wikipedia:Content noticeboard, Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Geopolitical ethnic and religious conflicts, Wikipedia:No original research/Noticeboard, before moving to such venues as Wikipedia:Requests for comment. Otherwise we'd be opening a veritable floodgate...(although then again if it did act as a strong deterrent...) . Anyway, this is my impression of how it would work, others may have a different idea. Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:58, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
• No discretionary sanctions were adopted in the Noleander case; the only actual sanction (remedy 1) was the topic-ban against Noleander himself or herself. Remedy 2 is a reminder that recently, the Committee voted to expand the scope of the topic-area subject to discretionary sanctions in the Race and intelligence case, to now include "the intersection of race/ethnicity and human abilities and behaviour, broadly construed." Editors may refer to the discussion of that motion for some background of why it was adopted (basically, to curb extensive wikilawyering that had ensued from the original remedy in the case); the expanded sanction addresses issues that I consider separate from, though somewhat related to, those we addressed in Noleander. (See my vote comments on the proposed decision page in Noleander.) Finally, my "thought experiment" on the workshop talkpage was an attempt by me individually to follow up on some of the dialog on the workshop proposals; it was intended to frame some issues for thoughtful discussion rather than to conclusively resolve them, it was not reviewed or commented on by any of the other arbitrators, and it does not form any part of the decision in the case. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:15, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
• Per my colleagues. Noleander does not itself authorise discretionary sanctions but does draw attention to another case which authorises discretionary sanctions for edits which may be characterised as essentially racist. An anti-Palestinian and anti-Serbian bias would only be covered if the edits sought to link human conduct to racial characteristics. This typically arises when sweeping generalisations are applied to races/ethinc groups.
  Crude examples: "Because Blue people are thieves, they looted and plundered after the battle in 1358", which ignores the fact that it was standard practice in 1358 for all armies to loot and plunder after battles. "Saladin was admired by the Crusaders because he was a good and honourable man for an Arab": which (apart from the Arab/Kurd controversy) strongly implies that as a ethnic group Arabs are neither good nor honourable (remarkably this comes from a 1930s history textbook). "Because you are Blue, it's typical that you run to support other Blue people, no matter whether they're right or wrong": which implies that Blue people place kinship above intellectual honesty.  Roger Davies ^talk 06:54, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

@ Thryduulf

1. It applies regardless of race/ethnicity but not to nationality. (Namibian looks like a nationality not a race/ethnicity.)
2. Arbitration enforcement ("AE") is the best venue.
3. AE would cover the in-scope ones. The out-of-scope stuff needs to go through the usual dispute resolution venues that Casliber has talked about.

I hope this helps,  Roger Davies ^talk 09:05, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

• Discretionary sanctions were not adopted in the Noleander case. The discretionary sanctions you've mentioned are from the Race and intelligence case. These discretionary sanctions can be applied to editors who repeatedly or seriously fail to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process in regard to the intersection of race/ethnicity and human abilities and behaviour, broadly construed. In general, editors who are anti-Palestinian, or anti-Serbian wouldn't be covered by these discretionary sanctions, however such editors probably could be sanctioned under WP:ARBPIA or WP:DIGWUREN. I notice that Roger has listed some examples that would be sanctionable under the Race and intelligence discretionary sanctions, and I agree with his analysis. PhilKnight (talk) 11:30, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

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