Stevertigo wrote:
Toby Bartels wrote:
But I haven't been able to edit the talk page yet. It may change further depending on JiL's responses to attempts to convince him to choose a new name volunatarily; but I haven't been able to read his responses yet.)
What do his responses have to do with your opinion on the merits of the name?
Well, considering that it's /his/ name, the things that he has to say about it are going to have an impact on my opinion. But what in the world makes you think that the only issue here is whether I like the name? If /that/ were the only basis for the vote, then I'd have voted to keep it a long time ago, and I wouldn't pay any attention to the arguments that the name is offensive, or "inflammatory", or "make[s] a statement". 'Cause I like the name.
I would agree with those who caution that the issue should be separate from behaviour. Tim pointed this particularly important bug out to me.
Tim pointed out -- quite rightly -- that it's irrelevant whether JiL makes good edits to gay-related articles, or whether he's an old problem user in disguise. That's because we're setting precedent here, hence policy, and this will apply to everybody, not just to old trolls. But this doesn't mean -- in fact, quite the opposite -- that the related matters of /policy/ are irrelevant. My attempt to talk to JiL directly -- which nobody else did! -- is an attempt to influence the precedent, hence the policy.
Part of maintaining a consistent policy is abstaining from the sideissues -- Just vote on the merits of the name, dagummit thats it.
No, dagummit!!! JiL's individual name isn't very important. OTOH, whether it becomes acceptable Wikipedia practice to greet new users (and the next JiL may be a new user) with "You're going to have to change your name." is a big deal. That is the sort of "sideissues" that I'm concerned with -- that is really the /only/ issue.
The real problem issue I see is with the tacit deferment of action on these matters to developers-- like Tim, who's mostly used his conversion script for non-inflammatory changes, and seems a little tender about just getting it over with. This shouldnt be a big deal -- ideally we want people to agree to a change, but barring that, its a conflict between the consensus and the ego of one person.
What "consensus" are you talking about? THERE IS NO CONSENSUS TO FORCE A NAME CHANGE! (At least not when you wrote that; I'm not sure how things stand now since Wikipedia is down. And Drolsi accepted a voluntary change anyway, so now I'm /really/ not sure how the page looks! ^_^) It's not as if all of the past discussion has been about whether or not to follow consensus; it's about whether to force a name change or not. What makes you think that you've convinced everybody already?
Are sysops *not to enforce a nay vote on a username, always defering to a developer? This puts developers in a bind, because in order for them to make a decision they seem to think they need to get involved. They dont-- they just need to do the bidding of the community.
No, sysops are not to enforce a name change, because we /can't/ -- that's a practical matter. Maybe a good thing (since sysops like you often see consensus when it isn't there), or a bad thing (since Tim was feeling more pressure than he should), but that's a fact of life, for now.
-- Toby