On Fri, Nov 25, 2005 at 01:42:56AM +1100, Mark Gallagher wrote:

I'm kinda shocked how few "I've been blocked!" messages we receive that *don't* follow the above instructions.

(Warning -- Long message. Serious issue, too.)

Folks might want to look into this one a little more closely. Ed Poor made what seem to me like thinly-veiled threats on the AfD in question -- threats to block people who disagree with him:

"Only an someone pushing an anti-Creationist POV would want to censor this sort of information. Pushing any POV is grounds for a block. I think you already know this; but if you don't, I'm telling you now - officially - as an Admin."

To me, Poor's words come across as an accusation that Schroeder was trying to "censor" the article by nominating it for deletion and arguing for its deletion. Poor seems to claim that any person who argues for the article's deletion is trying to "censor" it, and should for that reason be blocked.

I am one of the majority who have argued for the article's deletion on the AfD page. So I consider this a threat which includes me personally. Poor's expressed view classes me as "someone pushing an anti-Creationist POV" since I want the article deleted; and therefore, calls for me to be blocked. This threat doubled when I discovered that Poor had actually blocked Schroeder; and redoubled when I found out that this blocking was connected with Poor's out-of-process removal of an AfD nomination.

Moreover, Poor's phrasing sounds to me like bullying: "I'm an admin, so I can block you if you cross me -- and that goes for the rest of you, too." (After all, Poor made his threat on the AfD page itself; if he meant it to apply to only Schroeder, he could have used Schroeder's user talk page.)

Wikipedia can't work right if admins are permitted to use their powers to "resolve" POV controversies or personal squabbles to which they are themselves parties. Poor, the creator of the article in question, should have been disallowed from several of the actions that he took, most notably including blocking a person with whom he was involved in a substantive dispute. If Schroeder's conduct was abusive, then Poor could have asked on WP:AN/I (or several other forums) for an uninvolved administrator to block him.

(I'm not saying administrators shouldn't use their powers at all in articles where they edit. For instance, rolling back simple vandalism or blocking a repeat vandal should always be encouraged. But what we have here is a POV dispute: Schroeder and Poor disagree on a matter of substance, which led them into interpersonal conflict. This leaves Poor in no position to judge Schroeder's conduct fairly.)

The AfD nomination in question has significant precedent. On (IIRC) at least two previous occasions, Ed Poor has created articles which were nominated for deletion as "POV forks" of evolution-related articles, and which were subsequently deleted by consensus.

Poor's persistence in this issue has not taken the literal form of re-creating deleted articles. However, consensus has been against him in the past on evolution-related articles, and the present AfD discussions on [[Evolutionary materialism]] and [[Unguided evolution]] show the same is still true.

Moreover, the creation of POV forks is considered unacceptable in both policy and consensus. The past AfD decisions against Poor's articles mean that he should have expected these articles to be nominated for deletion and adjudged to be POV forks. So in the present situation, Poor seems to be in the position of using administrative power to defend a *known unacceptable* action ... by attacking an editor whose own actions (the AfD nominations) are right now in the process of being adjudged correct!

The current (unfiltered) standings on the AfD nominations for Ed Poor's new articles are:

[[Evolutionary materialism]]: Delete: 14 Keep: 3 Redirect: 1 Total: 18 Delete percentage: 77.8% Delete/Keep ratio: 4.67 times more Deletes than Keeps

[[Unguided evolution]]: Delete: 24 Keep: 8 Total: 32 Delete percentage: 75.0% Delete/Keep ratio: 3 times more Deletes than Keeps

This seems to me to indicate that Poor's judgments in -- * creating the articles, * unlisting an AfD nomination, * threatening to block the nominator and supporters, and * following up on that threat by blocking the nominator -- were solidly and fundamentally against editorial consensus.

As such, I suggest that Ed Poor should no longer act as an administrator with regards to any article that deals with evolution, or with regards to editor conduct on articles or discussions dealing with evolution. His own conduct is far outside what the community accepts. This means that he is unable to do the job of an administrator -- to protect and enforce the community's decisions -- in this subject area.

On Fri, Nov 25, 2005 at 10:31:49AM +0100, grm_wnr wrote:

Karl A. Krueger wrote:

...

Folks might want to look into this one a little more closely. Ed Poor made what seem to me like thinly-veiled threats on the AfD in question -- threats to block people who disagree with him:

"Only an someone pushing an anti-Creationist POV would want to censor this sort of information. Pushing any POV is grounds for a block. I think you already know this; but if you don't, I'm telling you now - officially - as an Admin."

Funny, the blocking policy doesn't mention POV pushing.

Hmm. That *is* interesting. So let me see if I have the fact pattern correct:

* An administrator is involved in a POV dispute with another editor. * The administrator, it turns out, is on the non-consensus side of that dispute -- and has been repeatedly in the past. * The administrator accuses the other editor of POV-pushing, and threatens to block him (or anyone) on that grounds. * POV-pushing isn't actually legitimate grounds for a block. * The administrator goes on to block the other editor anyway.

And now it seems that Joshua Schroeder has left the project. That's really unfortunate. It gives me the impression that an administrator acting deliberately against consensus was able to use administrative powers and threats thereof to drive off an editor who was acting in accord with consensus. Or, in other words, Schroeder was in the right; Poor was in the wrong; but since Poor is an administrator, Schroeder was driven out.

It's unfortunate that some folks in the past have been very eager to call out "rogue admin!" when an administrator does something they don't like. Spurious accusations in the past have left Wikipedia ill-prepared to deal with what's looking more and more like a real, live case of a rogue administrator.