I don't really want to write about this, but feel I ought to as it hasn't been mentioned on the list yet: before 172 protected [[Catholicism]] he had protected [[New Imperialism]], a page he is very definitely involved with, and also protected [[Talk:New Imperialism]]. I unprotected both as soon as I became aware of this and told 172 that protecting pages one is involved in is a Bad Thing, and that protecting talk pages is almost never right (I acknowledge I may not have been a model of politeness in how I put this, but I don't think I was actually rude - still, I should have been more restrained, I admit). As far as I know, he then left them unprotected.
The reason for 172 protecting [[New Imperialism]], as far as I can tell (and I hope he'll correct me if I'm wrong about any of this), was that User:Pizza Puzzle had edited it. 172 suspects Pizza Puzzle is the banned user formerly known as Lir, and protected both the article to stop him editing it. The edits which Pizza Puzzle had made to the article were very minor and not bad in any obvious way, certainly not the sort of thing that would warrant protecting a page: adding a few links, moving a paragraph or two, a little light rewriting. 172 expressed the opinion that Pizza Puzzle's edits to the page would at first be legitimate, but would gradually take over the page and turn it into an incoherent mess. My view is that unless 172 has psychic abilities and can see in to the future, he cannot know this will happen, and that preemptively protecting pages is in any case a bad idea on the whole. His opinion on who Pizza Puzzle is seems irrelevant to me (and Pizza Puzzle has in any case been quite a good contributor of late, whoever he may be).
The reason for 172 protecting the talk page remains a mystery, at least to me. I've asked him why he did it, but haven't received a reply.
Also (this a little off-topic, but possibly of interest) ,172 put a lot of discussion on [[Talk:New Imperialism]] into an archive. The talk was all of one day old, and concerned a matter still very much unresolved. The talk page was not an unmanageable length and I saw no reason to archive it (though plenty of reasons not to). I therefore moved the discussion back to the main talk page. 172 archived it again. Somebody else unarchived it. 172 archived it again. And so on, resulting in possibly the most ridiculous edit war I've yet witnessed.
On the whole I would favour being lenient on the question of whether to revoke sysop rights, but in this case I don't disagree with 172's sysop status being revoked (though I do think Erik should have brought the matter to the list or to some other forum first). I just hope 172 will agree to be more reluctant to use his sysop rights in future and his non-sysopness can be temporary.
Sorry to go on at such length.
Lee (Camembert) Wikikarma: lots of fiddles to [[Music]]
PS - I don't subscribe to the list any more (I read it on the web) - that's why it's taken me a while to write about this.