On 5/28/07, Daniel R. Tobias dan@tobias.name wrote:
Another thing in the subject of the BADSITES controversy, take a look at this Request for Adminship:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/Gracenotes
(not to be confused with [[User:Grace Note]], a totally separate person, and one who actually is one of the opposers in the above nomination; interestingly, though "Grace" is usually a girl's name, they're both guys, which shows you can never reliably infer gender from usernames)
This user has been the subject of a massive piling-on of oppose votes, most of them coming simply because he refuses to take a totally politically correct position favoring the draconian, zero- tolerance policy on removing links to so-called "attack sites".
Despite (or maybe because of) this, he's also got more support votes than any other current RfA (it's currently 161 to 60, meaning that 101 more people support him than oppose him), but this might not be a high enough percentage to satisfy whoever closes the RfA (is there a set percentage, or is it just up to a subjective value judgment like most other debate-closing on Wikipedia?)
There are some people in the Support column who are notable for saying that they oppose him on the attack-sites issue but still don't consider it a "litmus test" that bars their support for him (after all, having administrator's tools has little or no connection with one's beliefs or actions regarding attack-site links... adding, dropping, restoring, and edit-warring over such links does not require admin powers). However, a bunch of others seem to be single- issue voters determined to torpedo any prospective admin who doesn't toe the line entirely.
Is it just Wikipedia Review that is the issue in this RFA or are there other attack sites relevant to this RFA. I think there could be good reasons to link to it in a discussion for example an RFA if doing so can make something clear like a candidate's point of view. Of course care should used, but not linking them at all for any reason at all is not productive.
Mgm