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Special report

Did Fram harass other editors?

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By Smallbones


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  • I am not sure I have seen Fram harass anyone, but I do recall the name from an incident were a user was warned about banging on about the use of gender neutral pronouns, whilst Fram was not (even though he was making very similar, in fact more or less the same, points).Slatersteven (talk) 09:49, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Please add the long form of the shortcuts, so people, who don't work often on enWP can understand the post better. Thanks.--JTCEPB (talk) 16:06, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yannow, is it appropriate for The Signpost to be a platform for such a "did this user break the rules" discussion? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 16:21, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Two editors did not feel that he harassed them." You really thought it OK to write that, and to include it a Signpost piece? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 16:22, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    • With the eleven total editors being referred to in the short paragraph immediately above that one it should be obvious that it means "Two of the eleven". I should note that Fram and I had extensive discussions on this article and he never mentioned that as a problem, and he had several chances to respond to the article (e.g. the green box immediately above). Smallbones(smalltalk) 16:57, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why would anyone ever come forward to say "I'm being harassed" on this site, ever? The only thing that happens is that people get dragged before the court of public opinion and told that everything they feel and experience is invalid because User:Joe_From_RandoFuck doesn't think it's harassment, and then someone is going to write a news article about you to ensure your name continues down this path.
    If the English Wikipedia hopes to retain any sense of autonomy, it needs to seriously - seriously - start looking at how it deals with harassment, and that maybe needs to begin with a) taking the default position of believing victims instead of the accused, and b) not treating social problems like technical problems. --Jorm (talk) 16:27, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    What is a problem? I feel I was being harassed, in particular, by Fram. As a result of this harassment I had to resign the tools and eventually to stop editing because I did not feel safe. Then I resumed editing, and, when I asked for the tools back, the same group of people (to be fair, not including Fram) opposed claiming I resigned under a cloud.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:00, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    In the current dispute I am clearly not on the WMF side though, and I am glad to see Fram mentioned me as one of the editors they would think of as impartial and being trusted.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:06, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    @Ymblanter: just to be clear, are you saying that you were harassed by Fram? If so would you give a bit more detail. As far as I can tell, everybody around here respects you, and it would be great to know more of your experience. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:44, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    I am not sure everybody around here respects me, and I am not willing to dig the diffs, but I believe it started with Fram being unhappy with my crat activity on Wikidata (I approved a bot which eventually started doing smth else than I approved it for, and this smth showed up as spam here, which I was not even aware of). They started an arb case against me which eventually was rejected but because it took a long time for the arbs to decline I had to resign from the arbitration election committee where I was elected to. Essentially, at some point I was labeled as a part of the "wikidata crowd" (never mind that I have 140K contributions here), and in many cases I responded not in the most optimal way. One episode included Fram interpreting my reply to another user in a way I totally did not mean it to be. I asked them to retract, they said they know better. I went to ANI and got a consensus that Fram knows better. There were such episodes essentially every week for several months in the end of 2017 and beginning 2018, and somebody would from time to time remark that they are surprised I am not yet indefinitely blocked, not to say I am an admin, this must have been a mistake. Then I resigned the tools. Again, there were many users participating (and I remember all of them, though some have been blocked, and some apologized, and some considerably changed the behavior), and my response was often substandard, but probably without Fram the whole thing would go differently. Having said this, I believe that Fram's behavior considerably improved in 2018-19, and now I would probably not join an ArbCom case against them. (In 2018, I made a statement which was removed as a clerk action because the arbs apparently thought it had no relation to Fram's behavior). I also realize that many people see my behavior completely differently and in a pretty negative way. Since I got the tools back, I try to totally avoid all Wikidata discussions here, I am just doing my job.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:07, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Ymblanter Thanks for that, I'm sorry that things get so rough around here. I've seen you around many places here and always though you are one of the nicest people around (in a let's-get-down-to-business way). We hear so much about having a toxic environment around here. Hearing about it helps everybody. I'd like to do a new article on the more general topic of the "toxic environment". If anybody has ideas on where's the best place to start (other than ANI!), please let me know. Smallbones(smalltalk) 18:50, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks. Concerning the discussion place, there will be an RfC on civility/harassment. I actually believe it must be a series of well-prepared RfCs, with the first one probably more like free discussion identifying relevant questions. Then the question of the toxic environment would perfectly fit there. But now everything is with the arbs, I do not know what they decide and who will be in charge.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:13, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Just as a note, I said that "We've butted heads in the past". I think if Fram had headbutted me I would feel quite differently about whether he'd harassed me... GorillaWarfare (talk) 16:53, 30 June 2019‎ (UTC)[reply]
        • @GorillaWarfare: sorry about that. I hope we're not going to either headbutt or butt heads at In the media over mentioning Breitbart. All the best. Smallbones(smalltalk) 17:27, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • By golly, it would seem there is enough evidence available to start a (first) ArbCom case about Fram. Which, of course, has exactly nothing to do with WMF's procedural end run power play, the principle behind it, and the precedent it sets... Carrite (talk) 17:02, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes they are ultimately separate issues, but speculation about the evidence which led to Fram's ban has been widespread. So I think this article is useful in that it does shed some light on the scope of evidence that may have been presented to T&S, because while I haven't followed the wider debate closely, much of the discussion seems to have focused on one possible complainant when it appears from this piece that there were several. Gatoclass (talk) 17:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Fram has elsewhere posted an extensive reply to the anonymous accusation that he posted a sexually harassing link. He says the Signpost would not link to his reply for certain reasons. Be that as it may, we should keep in mind that Fram is currently banned from responding to these anonymous accusations over here. I would be very upset if I were in the position of the Signpost posting serious accusations against me which I was not allowed to reply to. Haukur (talk) 19:59, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Fram has had lots of chances to respond and told me to go ahead with the story yesterday. Perhaps he likes the attention, I don't know why, but he was very cooperative with the investigation. There are some pretty strict rules (both for journalists and for Wikipedians) that I have to follow, and lots of people are watching the articles. If anybody sees me breaking a Wikipedia rule, please do let me know. So there are things I can't put into articles and things I can't link to. Smallbones(smalltalk) 20:15, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Well, one thing you can do as a journalist is to verify accusations you get from your sources before printing them anonymously. The source says "Fram repeatedly posted a link to this depiction". Have you confirmed to your satisfaction that this is a fair description of the event in question which gives your readers an accurate impression of the incident? It seems to me, from a brief investigation, that it paints an utterly misleading picture. Haukur (talk) 20:31, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • This article is eye-opening. One thing that I absolutely hated about the early discussion of the Fram ban was the targeting of one former editor, both on- and especially off-wiki, labeling them and their edits as the problem and subjecting them to unreasonable scrutiny. Despite some folks' suspicions, we don't know the specific editor who reported Fram to T&S and, after reading this article, it looks like there was more than one editor who complained. I think one can see this and at the same time, deplore WMF's inept handling of this issue with the larger English Wikipedia community and their lack of responsiveness.
I sometimes saw blunt and harsh behavior from Fram but I do not think I saw what I considered harassment. But, you know, none of us see everything that happens, even if we spend time going through someone's edit history. From the time I've spent on ANI, it's extremely rare for one diff or two to convincingly display a personal attack that the majority of editors will acknowledge is a personal attack. Unless a person uses specific words that everyone agrees are crossing the line, many editors commonly justify rude behavior by looking at the reputation and contributions of the accuser and the accused and basing their judgment on those factors, not on the behavior that is involved in the complaint. And if the harassed is an IP or newbie? There is a zero to slim chance that they will be defended against an experienced editor. Out comes the boomerang. That's just the pervasive bias that runs throughout Wikipedia and I don't foresee that changing any time soon. And it's why I advise newbie/IP editors never to come to ANI with their complaints because that action will most likely backfire on them. Liz Read! Talk! 20:41, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • How were the eleven editors chosen? Did they approach the Signpost to make a comment, or did the Signpost approach them based on comments made at WP:FRAM and other pages? Are the editors the Signpost spoke to a representative, random sample of a editors who interacted with Fram? Ca2james (talk) 21:28, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Seconding this query. I'm a female editor who has interacted with Fram and was not approached to comment. Espresso Addict (talk) 22:42, 30 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Smallbones: - I posted this in the newsroom talk, and didn’t get a reply to my latest post. Could you state how many of your sources (1) went to ArbCom only (2) went to T&S only and (3) went to both? This has ramifications when you keep it vague versus specific. Let's say, there were 4 editors who went to T&S, and 1 to both ArbCom and T&S. One can conclude that it seems that T&S is the much preferred route for editors to take (maybe even that community processes have failed to inspire confidence). Let's look at it the other way, there are 4 editors who went to ArbCom, and 1 to both ArbCom T&S - then someone might question with so many editors going to ArbCom, why was there further scrutiny warranted? starship.paint (talk) 00:12, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    • No I cannot be specific slicing and dicing the respondents into various groups 1) because of promises of anonymity and 2) because it is a very diverse group that gave me information in different ways using words like "I approached ...", "I reported ...", "(a or b) knew about". I decided to group them into one big box rather than interrogate them about their exact meaning and put them all into different little boxes, which would possibly threaten their anonymity. I certainly can't say anything about their individual motivations to go to either ArbCom or T&S because I didn't ask and I don't remember if anybody told me. You have to remember that many or all of these people have been traumatized and exposing them to public haranguing of the details of their harassment or even giving folks here the opportunity to better identify them is not ethical and no investigation of harassment would ever be possible if you demand such detail from them (or me). I sure you understand why I can't give more specific answers and won't answer more questions along this line. Smallbones(smalltalk) 01:03, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I was on arb com during the 2016 and 2018 cases. In 2016, I did not vote on the issue of whether or not to accept the case. I actually did want to accept the case, but I was the only one, and--I am ashamed to admit--I was not willing to be a minority of one on the matter, especially as I had been a minority of one in numerous committee discussions. In 2018, I had come to realize how important it was to record a dissent in such circumstances, and I voted to accept--the only vote to accept. My basic position then and now was that it is important to take action at even individual instances of rudeness, which is the beginning of the continuum than leads to harassment; the failure to do so encourages the person concerned to continue and leads to an atmosphere where such things are tolerated. I do not mean that we should take strong action -- a one day block is the sort of thing that I have in mind. But we should do it every time, consistently and predictably, and we should do it promptly. The purpose of sanctions at WP is not to punish, but to prevent--to try to make clear to the individual that they should not continue, and make clear to others that they should not do similarly. Occasionally there may be no way to prevent repetition except a long term block, but it is a failure of community process when it gets to that point. Our actual practice on arb com seems to have been not to take action until it is inescapable, and our actual practice on ani seems to be to make every instance a big deal, with results that are unpredictable. This is a system that encourages those prone to harassment to try to see how much they can get away with, because of the very unlikely chance that they might actually be banned.
How we should do this is a much more difficult question, and I am not implying that I think arb com as presently constituted is necessarily the way to do it. But perhaps the worst way is actions by individuals not answerable to the community, operating in secret , and not accepting the possibility of appeal. It's the exactly wrong direction. I can understand my colleagues on arb com not wanting to get involved; I cannot understand those in the WMF who thought their method would be an improvement--I can only assume they found themselves so frustrated by the current situation that they lost all sense of proportion. DGG ( talk ) 03:01, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Why does the conclusion say "Eleven" when the main report says "nine out of eleven" and "two didn't feel harrassed"? (paraphrasing) Usedtobecool ✉️ ✨ 03:34, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
      • Ok, different sets. Total editors referred to in the article other than Fram 9 + 2 + 2 =13.
  • 9 respondents did feel harassed or saw harassment by Fram
  • 2 respondents didn't feel that way or see it that way
  • 2 were not respondents, but folks in prior disputes recorded on Wiki who did feel or see harassment.

So 9+2 = 11 who felt or saw harassment is one set of 11 and 9 + 2 = 11 the number of respondents is the other set of 11.

Smallbones(smalltalk) 04:33, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]

  • Unto my experience, the sad truth of this matter is that "harassment" is a subjective term. One person's "harassment" on here is another person's "source your material" or "don't add copyrighted material" or "adhere to policy" disclaimers. As long as its subjective - and lets be honest, since everyone is unique it will always be subjective - both sides of any harassment claim will simultaneously always be right and wrong. Not that we can't take some action to prevent it, but dealing with subjectivity of this nature is by default a grey area on here. TomStar81 (Talk) 06:37, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Unto my experience, including 2 years of working actively on text copyright issues, including one without the bit, I've been accused of racist motives, being a rules lawyer, doxxed and threatened, but I was never accused of harassment, nor has, to my awareness, any of the more prolific text copyvio cleanup volunteers who did it far longer than me ever been (Dianaa, MER-C, Justlettersandnumbers, Moonriddengirl...). Mind you, I was one of the drafters behind WP:CCI, a systematic examination of a user's total contributions. So harassment may be a subjective term, but it's entirely possible to ask users to refrain from adding copyrighted material without it being raised. This is a false dichotomy. The vast majority of admins, including those who perform difficult blocks, don't display the behaviour described in this article, and I find it pretty insulting to insinuate that what is described here is par for the course for normal exercise of administrative duties, carried out in our name. MLauba (Talk) 07:01, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Then I withdraw the comment and will refrain from posting on this matter in future. Sorry to have wasted your time. TomStar81 (Talk) 07:33, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would be extremely interested in the number of threads raised at AN and ANI which claim harassment, over, say, the past two years, because we need some sort of baseline for what is about to happen... You see, what is clear now, from the way T&S have fucked this case up beyond any possible recognition, is that every administrator is likely going to be repeatedly accused of harassment by any users who they warn or sanction for breaking our policies and guidelines. T&S have likely ushered in an era where generally vacuous allegations will become nothing more than a means to win various content disputes or to avoid editing sanctions. The desperately sad thing about this is that any new user reporting system will drown under these fake reports, and we risk witnessing the genuine, infrequent but significant and serious harassment issues that do occur going unnoticed and unresolved as everybody who is given a well deserved bollocking for repeatedly uploading copyright violations or frequently making BLP violations squeals harassment. Nick (talk) 07:40, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Agree with Nick. I once told an administrator that their actions towards me were demoralizing and and offensive, and the response was Generally speaking, I am profoundly disinterested in your feelings. I'll be reporting such comments to T&S in the future, as the WMF seem to want to move us to a Twitter or Facebook like communication and interaction platform. The encyclopedic content now plays second fiddle to user interactions. Mr Ernie (talk) 08:53, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • I can remember when I started out, back in the days when you could easily upload any old shit you found on the internet, being repeatedly shouted at for uploading copyright violations. I learned quickly, but it was incredibly demoralising, I do remember that. I do try and leave customised, friendly messages for users when I can to make it less demoralising. I think part of figuring out a proper answer to this whole mess will be to de-personalise things like warnings and sanctions for copyright violations or BLP violations - moving away from administrators leaving warnings and having educational content for copyright violations or generating citations included within the editing interface, so it becomes "Wikipedia helping you work out this problem" rather than "that cunt Nick is stopping me from uploading files AGAIN". Nick (talk) 10:19, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Mr Ernie Did the admin's response restore your morale? Did it somehow make you a better editor, to be told that you could stuff your feelings? Did that reply improve the encyclopedia in any way? Or, with the benefit of hindsight, would an interaction such as Nick describes striving for produced the same effect in terms of influencing what you do without the offensive and demoralizing aspect? Is Nick's more thoughtful approach to user interactions detrimental to the quality of the encyclopedic content being produced? MLauba (Talk) 10:30, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Obviously there was a better way to handle the communication with me, but that wasn't my point. My point is that it should not be considered harassment to correct someone's mistakes or prevent them from making more. We are starting to blur the lines between encyclopedia building and social media, with regards to interactions. Is harassment a problem? Of course, and we need to tackle it, but not everything is harassment just because someone thinks so. Mr Ernie (talk) 11:13, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Exactly, and I don't believe there's any evidence that the definition of what constitutes harassment has changed since early June. MLauba (Talk) 12:20, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Nick - T&S look at years of post history of both the complainant and the person accused of harassment. They don't only look at the complaint without any context. Wikipedia has tolerated abusive harassment for far too long and the WMF action is welcome. DanBCDanBC (talk) 10:55, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Are you still beating your wife? This is one of the most crass examples of trial by media I've seen. Fram has no opportunity to defend himself or explain his actions in specific examples, many of which have been stripped of all context and background. A more despicable use of a Spotlight article I can ever remember seeing. - SchroCat (talk) 10:48, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Fram has no opportunity to defend himself or explain his actions in specific examples is simply not correct. The article makes it clear that discussion with Fram was repeatedly contacted and engaged in discussion with each claim made against him. See Smallbones' comment at ANI (diff): OK, what people don't seem to realize is that Fram was given several chances to respond to this quote and didn't. He had the opportunity to respond to other quotes and to the whole article and did, as you can see in the article He cooperated very nicely with the investigation. Referring to the same quote that most people are talking about here he emailed me "No, feel free to post it (with that line removed as it was confusing, thanks)," where "that line" was a previous response where I thought that he had misread the quote so had informed him of it again. Fram's given me permission to post most of his emails, but there are a couple of exceptions. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 10:59, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    I'm going to call horseshit on that. You have selected any responses, rather than allow full, clear and public explanation and examination. This is a trashy piece of nonsense I'd expect to see in the Daily Mail, rather than Signpost. It should NOT have been published. It breaches BLP on all the major policy points, and brings into question the decision-making process involved in allowing it to be written in the first place. - SchroCat (talk) 11:36, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't know if you've ever been harassed but some of the more flavourful ingredients in the experience include intense shame, fear and self-hatred. If you expect a harassed person to sign up for "public explanation and examination" then you will not receive any reports of harassment. This unreasonable burden on victims is a large contributing factor to Wikipedia's high rate of experienced users retiring, low newbie retention rate and toxic community. Our only methods of dealing with an unblockable are going to ANI to let the peanut gallery victim blame you, or going to Arbcom so that they can deny you a trial. The WMF are grossly incorrect to not allow Fram to know who his accuser was, but ArbCom were incorrect to deny the accusers a fair and safe trial. But back to the Signpost article: Fram was given many chances to respond to the article and did so. We are not in a position to investigate whether BLP has been followed because we haven't seen the private emails in question, but my presumption is that Smallbones is a responsible journalist who verified that the anonymous editor's statements were reasonable and reliable. The community is near-unanimous that WMF's actions were grossly wrong but that does not answer the question, "Should Fram be banned?" In order to answer that question, it would be a huge betrayal of justice to deny victims a voice, particularly given the severity of the harassment alleged and the sensitivity of (in particular) the sexual harassment claim. I don't think anybody's first choice of a method of resolution would be a Signpost article but due to the reckless and irresponsible behaviour demonstrated by both the WMF and Arbcom, that seems to be what we're left with, and the matter of getting to the truth is quite time-sensitive given that a large part of the community is deliberately tearing itself apart. The (alleged) victims consented to the article being published publicly and Fram also knew what he was entering into by having a continued dialogue with Smallbones. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 12:29, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Get off your soapbox and stop preaching to me. This isn't about harassment, per se, this is about Signpost breaching WP:BLPTALK. There needs to be some method of reporting harassment that can be done discreetly, but hanging anyone out to dry, as this shoddy piece of rubbish does, is unacceptable. WP:BLP is a policy. It needs to be followed everywhere; WP:BLPTALK clarifies that very point. Signpost is acting like the Daily Mail or National Enquirer with this dross. It shouldn't. The writers are not Bernstein and Woodward, Ben Bradlee is not steering the path of rights and wrongs. What you are doing to Fram with this article, essentially, is harassment. It's one-sided opinionated, unbalanced trial by media. I'm delighted you're up for stopping harassment, but by harassing another editor is not the way to deal with it. - SchroCat (talk) 12:37, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    It's absolutely about harassment. If the procedures we have aren't working then the community need to be informed of this so that we can establish new channels or improved methods of dealing with communication. If you grant me the assumption that WMF and Arbcom aren't working as they should, can you tell me what you would propose as a first step to identifying that problem? Personally I think a Signpost article is a very sensible solution, but any solution requires allusion to specific examples of situations where claims have been made against editors and those claims haven't been investigated. As for BLP, I'm unclear what exactly you're claiming is a violation of BLPTALK. The article contains nothing written in the Signpost's voice that I can see Fram disputing. The quotes made are genuine things said by editors. Fram was genuinely responding to each accusation where the article says he is. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 12:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    "Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced and not related to making content choices should be removed, deleted, or oversighted, as appropriate". I think that's quite clearly what we have here. As do several others. To deal with harassment you need a proper process, fully thought through and with sensible oversight, not crap on a page of a second rate internal newsletter. Now it's been deleted for a while, it's up to ArbCom to come to a decision on whether the ill-thought through rubbish should have been posted or not. - SchroCat (talk) 12:59, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Oddly, Fram doesn't appear to agree with that take on it [1]. Black Kite (talk) 12:09, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Both the content of those comments and their very existence demonstrate that Fram did in fact have two types of opportunities to defend himself, firstly through discussion with Smallbones, and secondly through public posts on meta such as that. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 12:29, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    WP:BLPTALK and Gamaliel and others. Enjoy ArbCom. - SchroCat (talk) 12:37, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    Really? "Smallbones making baseless accusations" and "I don't like the kind of backstabbing you are practising here" seems to be rather clear on the point. But let's go round in circles arguing the minutiae, ignoring WP:BLPTALK and pretending Gamaliel and others didn't happen... - SchroCat (talk) 12:13, 1 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • My issue is with deletion of a sourced article done by Wikipedia's "newspaper of record." Now if this was unsourced (which I can't say either way, given that it's been deleted) that is a different kettle of fish. However, if it was sourced, and it was only deleted anyway, that seems highly problematic to me. Transparency in such things matters, both from those who banned Fram, as well as from those who are defending Fram. Hallward's Ghost (Kevin) (My talkpage) 13:34, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1. The sourcing was dubious at best (anonymous "accusations"?) 2. Signpost isn't a newspaper, let alone a "newspaper of record". It's a semi-internal newsletter that has to fall in line with the extant policies, including WP:BLP. - SchroCat (talk) 14:00, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    1. From the discussion above, it sounds like multiple people were anonymous sources for the story. You may not like anonymous sources, but that's not nothing. 2. For better or worse (and it sounds like you view it as the latter) the Signpost absolutely is akin to the "newspaper of record" for the Wikipedia community. And it's a bad look for the community to delete an article in such an organ. That said, it is also a "bad look" for the WMF to circumvent the community to ban an administrator for a year without even consulting Arbcom--which the Signpost also did a good job of highlighting, so it's not as if they're somehow not being evenhanded in their reporting. Hallward's Ghost (Kevin) (My talkpage) 16:12, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
1. Did you read the article while it was still live?
2. Just repeating the statement with bits in bold doesn't make something true. I'm looking for anywhere that claims Signpost is a newspaper of record, and I can't find anything. Please note Newspaper of record actually means something: please don't cheapen the language by claiming something that isn't. - SchroCat (talk) 17:24, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
1. No. I thought I made that fairly clear in my first post. 2. Stop being tendentious. Of course there's no place that literally uses the words "newspaper of record" in relation to the Signpost. You know very well I'm referring to the practical purpose it serves, given that there's no other journalistic endeavor here on Wikipedia that covers the project the way the Signpost does. Hallward's Ghost (Kevin) (My talkpage) 21:02, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
1. I find it interesting you're passing judgement on the sourcing without having read it. It was an attack piece about the level of the Daily Mail. It breached WP:BLP.
2. I'm not being tendentious at all. This is a newsletter, not a newspaper. It's not run by journalists or professionals who understand journalistic ethics, practice or standards. In the past I've run a publication with a circulation of a few thousand, and I know what a newsletter looks and feels like: Signpost is that and nothing more. - SchroCat (talk) 22:03, 3 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
1. No, I'm not. I'm commenting on how the sourcing is described in the above discussion. I couldn't actually read the article because it was, you know, deleted. 2. For better or worse (and you clearly think it's for worse), the Signpost is the only journalistic (or journalistic-adjacent, if you prefer) endeavor covering Wikipedia from the inside. And deleting an article like this (instead of, say, blanking it, for example) is not a good look. (Note: My comments here are not in support of the ludicrous, norm-shattering unilateral ban that T&S placed on Fram's account. I do not support that. I just also do not support what happened to this article.) Hallward's Ghost (Kevin) (My talkpage) 18:58, 4 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
1. Before you try and pass judgement next time, prehaps you should try and do so from a position of knowledge. Everyone else in the thread had read the article before commenting. (It was a BLP violation, and, as you may know, such infringemets cannot stand - that is one of our main policies.
2. It's not even close to journalism (except in the manner of a Daily Mail or National Enquirer opinion piece. The opinions of a very small group of WP editors is not journalism - it's only their opinion. You may not like it being deleted, but if people breach WP:BLP, then they shouldn't run trash pieces on fellow editors based on uninvestigated half-truths and innuendo. If you can't see what is wrong with that, then I doubt I'll be able to persuade you otherwise. - SchroCat (talk) 19:49, 4 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • @Hallward's Ghost: I've not seen anyone dispute that Smallbones' quotes were genuine quotes he received from email communications, so yes, in the sense you mean the article was sourced, and there were 13 different sources. SchroCat is being rather disingenuous by fighting to delete the article and then attacking people from having not read it, particularly by dancing around points you make that are factually correct ("it sounds like multiple people were anonymous sources for the story"). BLP does not apply to pages that aren't hosted on Wikipedia so I can safely tell you that this Slate article links to an archive of the Signpost article, if you want to take SchroCat up on their suggestion, Before you try and pass judgement next time, prehaps you should try and do so from a position of knowledge. You might also be interested in leaving a statement at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Disputed Signpost article, a potential Arbcom case about the Signpost article and its deletion. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 15:57, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • "SchroCat is being rather disingenuous by fighting to delete the article and then attacking people from having not read it". Nice. And untruthful too. I'm not fighting to delete the article: it's already been deleted. I'm not attacking anyone: I'm questioning why someone has commented without having read the crappy unbalanced attack piece in the first place. Nice bit of soft canvassing, by the way. - SchroCat (talk) 16:46, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you for the ping, and for the link. I'll take a look at the Slate article, and will consider writing up a statement for that case. However it doesn't seem Arbcom is willing to step in, so perhaps it's a moot point now? As for SchroCat, given his last reply, I agree with your assessment of disingenuity, and will no longer be replying in that conversation. Hallward's Ghost (Kevin) (My talkpage) 16:32, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • No, despite your slur, disagreeing with you is not "being disingenuous", despite the opportunity for a cheap shot. - SchroCat (talk) 16:46, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Wow. Just read that article, and it was quite fair. Smallbones included extensive quotes from Fram in replying to those who felt harassed. It wasn't one-sided, and I have no idea how it was ever considered a BLP violation. While I disagree with the WMF foundation's 1-year block, deleting that article seems like a fairly obvious attempt to obscure the very real issues that Fram has (had) as an administrator. Hallward's Ghost (Kevin) (My talkpage) 16:43, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • PMSL! Yeah, sounds like you've "investigated" the background, context and events as deeply as Smallbones. If I say "I saw Editor X harass someone", then it be readily believed? Of course not (unless the reader is exceptionally gullible). None of those accusations (including two from anonymous sources) had a single diff by way of evidence. Yeah: if you can'tsee where unproven accusations (incuding from unnamed sources) does not breach BLP, you have no place writing anything of note on an encyclopaedia. - SchroCat (talk) 16:46, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • The anonymous sources have clearly provided evidence to Smallbones but diffs would immediately reveal their identities. It is basic human decency to let a victim of sexual harassment, or even an alleged victim of sexual harassment, maintain anonymity for their own mental wellbeing. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 21:35, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1. It is not clear what they have done at all. 2. You are ignoring the accusations from the named editors who neglected to provide diffs (or if they did, they were not published). Such important claims need evidence. I am in no way defending Fram in this thread: ArbCom will be taking this up shortly as the appropriate venue. The irregular newsletter, published by amateurs with no background or training in identifying or investigating harassment is in no way the place to try and hold a kangaroo court. - SchroCat (talk) 05:39, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The Signpost is not a place to publish anonymous defamatory/inflammatory claims (regardless of how true they might be) and the article had multiple egregious violations of WP:BLPTALK. Giving Fram an opportunity to reply does not in any way alleviate those BLP violations. WP:BLPTALK applies to it just like it applies to every other place on Wikipedia. These would not have be tolerated in userspace, they would not have be tolerated in The Bugle or any other newsletter on Wikipedia. The Signpost isn't exempt from our policies for as long as it remains published (or distributed) on Wikipedia. While I don't doubt this was published in good faith, it is yet another example of astoundingly poor judgment from Signpost EiCs. Kudos to Jehochman for enforcing our policies, even when they are unpopular. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:37, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Where is the place then? Arbcom have refused to investigate the charges and WMF can't take action without causing half of the userbase to retire. Other avenues have failed. Our bureaucratic and deeply ineffective structures for dealing with harassment have failed to do anything to help the toxic and disgraceful atmosphere found on Wikipedia; there's no existing body of authority we have that is effective at taking a stance against harassment or that can do anything to help the waves of editors who are driven away by the abuse they face here. ANI, Arbcom and the WMF cannot be trusted; it's time to spread word out about the problem and time for the community to take a new approach. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 21:35, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Arbcom have refused to investigate the charges" is obviously false, they are investigating them right now in fact. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:48, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • have refused, not are refusing. A subtle point I should have made clearer. They've declined cases and ignored private confidences about Fram in the past. This is part of their consistent pussyfooting around issues of harassment. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 22:02, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • And given that we are not privy to what they received, we can't judge whether or not declined to take on the cases was the right call or not. It's not because someone complains that there is merit to the complain. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:14, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • But that's completely the point of the Signpost article! We are privy to it. The anonymous sources said what they reported to Arbcom, and Fram corroborated that the incidents happened but took issue with the specifics of some of the cases. The article quoted a person who in no uncertain terms said that they reported a serious sexual harassment allegation to Arbcom, and they just shrugged and ignored it. I cannot trust a body which declined this without further investigation to take a tough stance on harassment. I think anyone who can has been too heavily desensitised by the hostile, aggressive and unempathetic culture of the nastier side of this website's community. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 22:24, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
That someone didn't get their way does not make publishing anonymous allegation any less of a WP:BLPTALK violation, or any more acceptable. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:28, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
This isn't a relevant response to someone saying "sexual harassment allegations are not being taken seriously on this website". This isn't a relevant response to someone saying "Arbcom cannot be trusted and here is evidence of why". It's absolutely callous to call a person who has spoken out about their declining mental health when editing this website "someone who didn't get their way" and to dismiss their story without further thought. Answer this point blank: do you think that if an editor is accused of sexual harassment by another editor acting in good faith then that should be investigated? If your answer is yes then you should be outraged that Arbcom did not do so in the past when presented with the opportunity to. If your answer is no then I don't know how to begin to convince somebody of why sexual harassment is bad. And note that you can substitute "sexual harassment" with "multiple accounts of different instances of harassment" if you prefer. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 22:56, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Bilorv, you might wish to note that an arbitrator has already noted that the one alleging such grave stuff is mis-remembering the details. That's as close as she can get, w/o (outright) branding that as a falsification and an attempt at stoking up drama (which it is).
The allegations are easily recognizable to anyone, who was there during those times and the issue had been brought to general attention, earlier. The frivolousness of the allegations is the very reason, that nobody was bothered.
The alleger may feel otherwise but continuing to forum-shop is disruptive and indeed, reverse-harassment. ∯WBGconverse 06:11, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
@Winged Blades of Godric: Relevant though this is, you'll note that it wasn't the only case reported to Arbcom and turned down, and one of the cases that Arbcom turned down was serious enough for WMF employees to decide to ban Fram for a year. Now that doesn't mean the ban was right (and it certainly wasn't made and enforced in the right way) but by god it means the situation was serious enough for Arbcom to investigate. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 09:58, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Bilorv, who told you that :- one of the cases that Arbcom turned down was serious enough for WMF employees to decide to ban Fram for a year? What led you to so-confidently determine one of the declined case about Fram, as the causal agent behind his ban? How do you disprove that the ban did not stem from any edit/action, that we might have missed in entirety or say, from something which might have made it to ANI but not to ArbCom or say Fram's long-term cumulative behaviour? ∯WBGconverse 15:06, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
There's no point in replying to each of these Gish gallop of questions individually, because each of them misses the thrust of my argument. If the WMF ban was a result of long-term cumulative behaviour then that's still something Arbcom should have investigated, as several cases were brought to them. I don't want to here about the lawyering pedantry of Arbcom's case filing rules or how no case without the exact same wording as those sent to WMF was brought before Arbcom. My point is that here's a case of serious and repeated allegations of harassment and Arbcom did not investigate it; thus, it cannot be trusted to deal with issues of harassment. You'd be better engaging your critical thinking faculties if you tried to look for more steel and less straw, and responded to the high level points I'm making rather than making cheap shots at my wording. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 15:36, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The point can very well be that someone thought Fram need to be pulled down but knew very well, that he was the one who (actually) ought be faulted, shall someone dig fair and deep. So, they bypassed ArbCom and forumshopped leveraging T&S. If you are free to assume, so am I. ArbCom did not investigate it, because they were determined to be not worth it, per ongoing community standards and that T&S have acted, does not in any manner, justify the worth, retrospectively either. Your arguments continue to make zero sense (you started off with sexual harassment and when pointed out of its falsity, quickly changed it to yet another wrong assumption) and piecewise bad arguments don't ever make a minimally good argument in totality, much less a high level one. Bye, ∯WBGconverse 16:39, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Amusing as your edit summary personal attacks on my intelligence are, they're hardly convincing. I moved away from the sexual harassment allegation because, as I said right from the first comment I mentioned it in, there are 10 other harassment allegations which also need to be taken seriously, and "debunking" one of the 11 cases does nothing to discredit my overall argument. What you assume disregards the broader context of Wikipedia's well-known hostile climate of harassment and bad behaviour, and assumes that 11 individual accusations of harassment are without merit, whereas I am simply assuming that one of them had enough merit to warrant an investigation—not necessarily even any action, but simply giving some of the people who feel they have been harassed a fair opportunity to put forwards their case. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 11:16, 8 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Again, Wikipedia has a policy against making such accusations. See WP:BLPTALK. They can either go to ANI and show proof of harassment, go to ARBCOM, go to literally any newspaper they want (as in actual newspapers, not bound by Wikipedia policy), or to the police. The Signpost isn't the place to publish anonymous, potentially libelous accusations and litigate them. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:26, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
As for whether or not I "should be outraged that Arbcom did not do so in the past when presented", that very much depend on what ARBCOM saw and had for evidence. You presume guilt as if irrefutable proof was provided and ignored. I presume the evidence was either lacking or insufficient. Neither of us know. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:31, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, go to ANI, very funny, but what would you suggest in seriousness? ANI is a toxic cesspool filled with harassers and people with popcorn waiting to laugh at you; it's no place for resolving harassment, and in fact one cannot go to Arbcom until ANI has already been tried. The police is an even funnier suggestion; they refuse to investigate actual death threats made by trolls who have found out your address, as Wikipedians should well know. They would do nothing but laugh if a Wikipedian told them they'd been experiencing harassment. And now that you've failed to suggest an avenue at which someone could get a harasser to stop their harassment, we're getting back to the point that you've been ignoring this whole time: ANI, Arbcom and the WMF cannot be trusted; it's time to spread word out about the problem and time for the community to take a new approach. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 09:58, 6 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Consider that if you have issues trusting "ANI, Arbcom and the WMF", you might find your time is better spent elsewhere than on Wikipedia. One thing Wikipedia clearly isn't for is publishing anonymous and unsubstantiated accusations. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:17, 8 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I'm interested in contributing to articles, unlike many of the busybody admins we have. I notice you are too, which makes this a very odd suggestion; surely you didn't join Wikipedia because you thought that its bureaucracy was excellently-designed. I see the point of this project as collecting the sum of all human knowledge, and to that end ANI, Arbcom and the WMF are all able to be reformed or replaced if they aren't effective in furthering this goal. — Bilorv (he/him) (talk) 17:06, 8 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • So if it's not appropriate for the Signpost to publicly share anonymous accusations against Fram, why is everyone saying the WMF has to? Or do people feel like the WMF also needs to out the accuser(s), and thereby subject them to even more harassment? Kaldari (talk) 21:47, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Kaldari: why is everyone saying the WMF has to not everyone is saying that. Most are saying disclose it to ARBCOM, and they now have. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:50, 5 July 2019 (UTC)[reply]


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