[WikiEN-l] Broken dispute resolution mechanisms (was Reithy is a problem)

While I don't know the details of this particular case, I think it does raise the issue of a larger problem on Wikipedia that I've mentioned before. For a while now schemes for "freezing" pages in various stable states have been bandied about on this list. In my opinion one of the reasons this is becoming an issue is because Wikipedia's dispute resolution mechanisms are broken, to the extent that editors who repeatedly and deliberatly violate Wikipedia rules (e.g. regarding NPOV, personal attacks, civility, etc.) operate with near impunity. Unless they unambiguously commit outright vandalism, for which they can be blocked, little or nothing is done about them. Request for Comment is a useless quagmire; partisans on each side of the issue line up their votes, and nothing is accomplished. Requests for mediation take weeks or months, with mixed results at best. However, the worst issue is requests for arbitration. The arbitration process is the only one which actually has any "teeth"; yet it is almost completely disfunctional. Again, not commenting on the merits of the cases, the Avala, Lance6wins, and Rex071404 cases have dragged out for 4 months or more now. The three month old Cantus vs. Guanaco case is still in the Evidence stage! Many other cases are two or three months old, with every indication that they are in for more months of little or no action. "Justice delayed is justice denied." Frankly, Wikipedia has plenty of trolls on it who would, under any functional system, have been hard banned within a couple of weeks of their arrival. As it is, though, Arbcom only manages to ban, what, two or three users a year? Sysops and bureaucrats have commented to me privately that they ignore all of these mechanisms, since they are almost completely useless. The ultimate outcome is that good editors, not wanting to get into fights, avoid the articles being trolled, and eventually abandon the project. When the administrators of the project have no faith in its processes, and when good editors are being driven away, then these processes need to be fixed. Jay.