On Feb 19, 2008 12:01 PM, Raphael Wegmann wegmann@psi.co.at wrote:
On Tue, Feb 19, 2008 at 10:05:41AM -0500, Wily D wrote:
The "Good guys" are interested in writing an encyclopaedia, just don't mistake the "No censorship at all costs, rub it in the Muslims' faces and lamblast everything else you don't like about their religion/religion in general" crowd as the good guys. There is a short list somewhere, however.
For what it's worth, very few editors are blocked at Muhammad, which is probably good, but definitely a result of heavy protection & various other measures. That said, feel free to look at any time in the history with no protection - you'll see that it's a complete, probably unresolvable mess.
Depends on what you mean by mess?
The admin who protected the page, did so because editors removed the images. I can't see that reason in WP:PROT, but then the protection is understandable, when you read said admins comments on the Talk page. Understandable - yes, but still a violation of WP:PROT. Edit-wars can be dealt with 3RR blocks. IMHO there is no reason to protect the page. How about hardening the 3RR for Muhammad images? Let's say only 1 revert in 24hrs?
Accusing any group of "vandalism" and using admin powers to strengthen your own side in this content dispute is certainly not the way to go.
WP:PROT says Indefinite semi-protection may be used for:
* Pages subject to heavy and persistent vandalism, such as the George W. Bush article. * Biographies subject to persistent violation of the biographies of living persons or neutral point of view policies. or two other irrevelant reasons. The page is subject to indef semi-protection because of persistant vandalism (which is gets by the bucketload) and as a response to regular bouts of edit warring (and not only over images, but all hosts of other things to), and this is also specifically allowed by WP:PROT for an article with an active edit war. Protecting pages is far better than handing out stacks of 3RR blocks, but it's also far less inflammatory. This is really the primary concern. Rather than blocking trolls, just removing trolling keeps things more civil.
Two party edit wars can be dealt with by 3RR blocks. 3RR blocks (or generic edit warring blocks) are not an appropriate response to edit wars of 30+ participants. The media attention of late seems to make a lof of editors unfamiliar with the situation think that resolving it is urgent, as if there's some quick solution. There's not. This article needs to be addressed with a long view.
So far as I can tell, nobody who doesn't engage in vandalism is seriously accused of it, and admin powers are not being used to favour any one side (certainly I've been accused to using my admin powers to favour both sides, so I may not be an unbiased observer). There certainly are non-vandal/trolls arguing for the images removal, just as there are vandals & trolls inserting images and the like. By-and-large, editors who behave civilly and don't edit war are free to try and improve the article, editors who don't aren't. This isn't unusual. Like anywhere else, article versions obtained after long, hard discussions lasting many months and resulting in stability aren't easily rewritten without discussion. This isn't unusual.
The "no images" crowd is not the only group that shows up there with an axe or ten to grind. Externally co-ordinated groups have been a problem there before, and doubtlessly will be again. Not only Islamic groups, but (for instance) one trying to insert the word "paedophile" as much as possible into every article that mentions Muhammad.
There's a difference. Adding "paedophile" is certainly not a good-faith effort and the editor can be blocked for vandalism. Removing a Muhammad image is certainly not vandalism, because those who do, consider it to be an improvement of this article.
-- Raphael
Those who're adding paedophile certainly did consider it an improvement to the article, because like (most of) those removing the image, they're not particularly concerned with encyclopaedic value or neutral point of view.
Always, a gentle hand is needed. Cheers WilyD