[WikiEN-l] Request for a ban

[Geoff Burling]

On Sat, 17 Jan 2004, Sascha Noyes wrote:

> Hi. I'm not happy that it had to come to this. Mr-Natural-health has
> repeatedly been warned numerous times about not making personal attacks on
> other wikipedians. I am requesting a ban for this user on the grounds that he
> is not abating with said attacks.
>
> I have documented clear violations of basic wikipedia policies by this user on
> http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Snoyes/sandbox
>
I've taken a look at these, & while MNH's behavor is not exemplary, I don't
see any smoking gun that justifies banning.

Two of the people MNH has exchanged barbs with -- RK & Adam -- haven't
been models of restraint themselves, making a few attacks on MNH themselves.
His response to Teresa Knox does appear unjustified, though, & I would like
better proof that he was the person acting from those IP addresses.

[snip]

> (...) At another time he has made
> an implicit threat to RK on his talk page by stating "The German Nazi from
> New York. I am proud of my German heritage, how about you?".

I'm not clear how identifying one's home location is a threat. And having
read quite a few emails on this mailling list from RK where he accuses
people of being a Nazi for disagreeing with him, I read this as a sardonic
descriptioin.

> all documented at the above url. My question: are we only paying lip service
> to the policy of not making personal attacks (and implicit threats), or shall
> this policy be enforced?
>
> As an endnote, it must be stated that MNH has not just personally [attacked]
> RK, but numerous others as well.
>
I've seen a fair number of people called "kooks", "zanies", etc. here on
Wikipedia, & I was unaware that was not approved behavior. (After reading
Sacha's article, I followed the link to find a forum on Meta from a few
months ago about this very matter, which I somehow missed.) If a contributor
to Wiki can get banned for certain behavior, then these terms should be
made clear somewhere on Wiki, & not merely discussed on Yet Another Meta
Page.

Geoff

Geoff