Revision as of 14:44, 3 April 2012

• recent changes
• purge this page
• view or discuss this template

Currently, there are no requests for arbitration.

No cases have recently been closed (view all closed cases).

Requests for clarification

Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification/Header

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abortion

Initiated by SarekOfVulcan (talk) at 14:44, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• SarekOfVulcan (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)

Statement by your name

An article was recently tagged as being under the community 1RR restriction on abortion-related articles. After some discussion, I realized that it was no longer clear that the community restriction was in effect. Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abortion#Discretionary sanctions states that "This authorization supersedes the earlier authorization of discretionary sanctions in this topic area by the community." However, the community authorization was in two parts -- the 1RR authorization, and the discretionary sanctions. On WP:GS, the whole thing is listed as superceded, but I'm not sure that was what was intended. Thanks. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:44, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Statement by other user

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Abortion article titles 2

Initiated by —chaos5023 (talk) at 17:59, 30 March 2012 (UTC) (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• No real "involvement", interpretive question

Statement by chaos5023

One of the options we wound up adding to the RFC, Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Abortion article titles#Arguments and policies regarding merging and refactoring into Abortion debate and Abortion debate in RegionName, could use some contextual clarification in two regards:

1. Is it regarded by ArbCom as a valid outcome for the RFC, in that it calls for a merge of the two articles under consideration rather than specifying names for them as initially requested?

2. In the event that the RFC were resolved in favor of this option, would the binding effect of the RFC upon relevant article titles be seen by ArbCom as indicating that we may or may not create new articles titled Pro-choice movement and Pro-life movement, scoped to coverage of the US political movements that use those names?

Thanks! —chaos5023 (talk) 17:59, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

Request for clarification: WP:ARB911

Initiated by The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) at 17:16, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• The Blade of the Northern Lights (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) (initiator)

Statement by The Blade of the Northern Lights

I've been involved at AE recently as an administrator, and I was looking over the current request concerning MONGO because no one seemed to want to touch it. The Devil's Advocate left me a message here indicating I may be considered involved in this dispute. I have occasionally popped in at the September 11th attacks and 9/11 conspiracy theories articles to help tamp down some of the trolling that inevitably goes on there, but I haven't been really involved in the content there (although I did help with one very minor content addition in September 2010 which has nothing to do with conspiracy theories). The edit in question is this, which (as I stated on my talkpage) I remember making because having "conspiracy theories" and "alternative theories" in the same sentence there seemed redundant and unnecessarily verbose. However, I would like to be certain about what, if any, involvement this constitutes; given there's an active AE thread now, I would like to hear back as soon as possible. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 17:16, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

My goodness, I had completely forgotten about those. If those were August 2011, I might feel more inclined to consider myself involved, but 1 1/2 years (that didn't really involve anyone who's at AE now) is a bit vaguer (as is evidenced by not even remembering those, it's safe to say they didn't influence my comments, and they wouldn't now because I was still a fairly new user at the time), so other input would be nice. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 18:32, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

OK, I think I've gotten the feedback I need. Sorry for creating a mess of things, I'm still learning to navigate the labyrinth of arbitration pages. Anyone can shut this down as they desire. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 23:22, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by The Devil's Advocate

Given Blade's comment about September 2010 I looked at the revision history of the talk page around that time and found this additional diff suggesting involvement. I think that one is a little more clearly pointing to involvement. Also, I should note the current AE case concerns edits on the 9/11 article in general, so the various disputes Blade got involved with on the article talk page at that time would have relevance to the question of involvement.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 17:51, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

To Blade's response the wording from WP:INVOLVED says: "Involvement is generally construed very broadly by the community, to include . . . disputes on topics, regardless of the . . . age . . . of the dispute." My understanding is that the general idea is that admins should not get involved in cases where they may have a bias towards one position or another. How, when, and where someone edits is just the simplest gauge, though I think it is generally expected that an admin not get involved in a dispute where they have a strong opinion about the subject even if there is no history of editing in the area of the dispute.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 20:31, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by DHeyward

(Redacted) --DHeyward (talk) 20:15, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your views, but I removed your statement: the issue in question here is the involvement of an administrator, not the subject of the enforcement request. If you have a complaint about TDA you should pursue it in the proper venues - and not by derailing a tangentially-related thread. AGK 23:10, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by other user

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• I don't think questions of involvement need necessarily come to the committee first, even on AE-related matters. I think arbitration is a good alternative if a first approximation by the community is inconclusive, although in such cases the simpler alternative is to pass the torch on to another admin if a substantial minority agree with the person complaining of involvement. Jclemens (talk) 17:32, 23 March 2012 (UTC)
• I agree with Jclemens. We do not usually make a binding decision about administrator involvement in the first instance, and these comments should certainly not be construed as such, but it would be less problematic if TBOTNL would allow another administrator to make a decision - in this request, at least. For future reference, if I were pressed, I would probably say you are involved for the purposes of arbitration enforcement, not least because the threshold for such "involvement" is very low. AGK 23:07, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Abortion article titles

Initiated by —chaos5023 (talk) at 16:05, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• No real "involvement", procedural question

Statement by chaos5023

In the resolution generating this RFC, a "community vote" with opinions presented was called for. It is not completely clear to participants whether this means an actual vote, as in numeric results tallied and considered binding, or the usual Misplaced Pages WP:NOTVOTE. Please let us know which is desired. Further, if ArbCom has any feedback on the advisability of the currently open proposal to use Borda count as a vote resolution mechanic, should voting actually be called for, that would be very helpful.

Thanks for the feedback. Getting the input of the closing admins seems like an excellent idea. :) Thanks! —chaos5023 (talk) 23:06, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Awaiting other statements, but I think in cases where we've specified that three uninvolved admins close an RfC, the closing team has more credibility to discount or assign less weight to opinions at odd with pillars or policy, without such relative weighting being derided as a "supervote". After all, we don't need three uninvolved admins to count votes--ScottyWong's bots could do that in our sleep. :-) Jclemens (talk) 17:35, 23 March 2012 (UTC)
• The discussion is within the community's remit now, but clearly our views will carry some weight in the event of ambiguity so I am happy to clarify. Polling using a preferential voting system like Borda count would, I think, be the best system: the point of the poll is to allow a decisive decision about the proposals made in the discussion, so a straight-vote is clearly not what is needed. The three closing administrators would be well-placed to make a final decision, because it is they who will need to interpret the results of the vote; I suggest you notify them about this request for clarification, and allow them to opine in a statement at their first convenience. AGK 22:58, 23 March 2012 (UTC)
• I agree with the above comments that this is a question for the closing admins and/or those involved in the RfC. SilkTork 09:38, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abortion

Initiated by Timrollpickering (talk) at 20:05, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• No specific users so far; this is about scope

Statement by Timrollpickering

Is the process for settling the abortion article names binding upon the names of related categories? A good faith renaming of Category:Pro-life movement was recently proposed but withdrawn due to the ongoing RFC. There is uncertainty about whether or not the names chosen for the articles will be binding upon related categories and as one of the regular CFD closers it would be helpful to have clarity on this before it come up again. In my view it is generally undesirable to have the most contentious article naming debates refought at CFD, especially if the option of "go and get the article renamed instead" is unavailable.

Statement by other user

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• I'm not terribly experienced in categorical convention, but I would tentatively say that the outcome of the naming discussion will be binding on directly associated categories (for obvious reasons). AGK 01:24, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
• Categories generally follow the name of the main article if possible. There would need to be a good reason for a category name to depart from that of the main article. While there is nothing explicit in either the ArbCom wording, nor the RfC wording that would include the relevant categories, it would be implicit, and those familiar with the procedures at Categories for discussion would follow the renaming of the articles. If it is felt, however, that to avoid any potential future disruption, that the related category names should also be included in the binding RfC, then it is worth bringing that up at the RfC, which is a community discussion, not an ArbCom one. SilkTork 00:51, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
• I endorse both my colleagues' above statements. Jclemens (talk) 17:28, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for clarification: WP:ARBPIA

Initiated by Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 at 10:47, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Seb az86556

This request for clarification is rather short and straightforward; a discussion about whether or not Jesus is part of the Palestinian people has spilled over to the page about Jesus. For future reference and to avoid misunderstandings: Is discussing and editing "Jesus as a Palestinian" within the scope of the case? Should it be? Thank you.

Statement by other user

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• I would say yes, because the only reason to make this kind of edit is to push one side of the Israeli/Palestinian argument. It's not a term of scholarship. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:45, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
• The dispute centres around whether Jesus of Nazareth was peregre (from abroad, an administrative term about Roman citizenship). I would therefore say that, unless the dimensions of the dispute change to be related to Arab/Israel, discretionary sanctions will not apply. The situation would also change if contributors who are active on "ARBPIA articles" become involved. However, for now I am inclined to say the dispute is not subject to arbitration enforcement. AGK 01:22, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
• The nationality of Jesus is a pertinent and appropriate discussion, and there are sources which describe Jesus as a Palestinian Jew. When sources say "Jesus was a Palestinian Jew", are they meaning "Jesus was a Jew and was one of the Palestinian people", or are they meaning "Jesus was a Jew who lived in Palestine"? Some scholarly research into the matter to present an understanding to the general reader would be helpful. Suppressing appropriate discussion of this matter, or engaging in edit warring would not be appropriate, and as the issues relate to WP:ARBPIA, then the sanctions from that could be applied to ensure that an open and neutral approach to the matter is allowed to unfold. I note that the editor who prompted this clarification request, has already been blocked under the WP:ARBPIA sanctions for edit warring, so it may be that this clarification is no longer needed. That use of the WP:ARBPIA sanctions seems appropriate as it appears that the user was using the debate around this "Jesus was a Palestinian Jew" question in order to make a political point. SilkTork 09:37, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
• Per SilkTork. Jclemens (talk) 17:37, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for clarification: WP:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2

Initiated by — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. at 22:10, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

List of any users involved or directly affected, and confirmation that all are aware of the request:

• This is a request for general clarification, not addressing (at this time) any specific editors. I am consequently not notifying any individual users, but will post a notice about this request at Talk:Van cat.

Statement by SMcCandlish

I would like clarification that the WP:Arbitration Committee/Discretionary sanctions#Affected areas update to WP:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2, as enumerated on the former page under "Pages relating to Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts (Armenia-Azerbaijan 2)", applies to topics that are not explicitly and obviously "Armenia-related" on their face but which are nonetheless subject to vitriolic ethnic/racial editwarring and soapboxing/battlegrounding in contravention of our neutral point of view policy, because of their tangential connections to tensions and disputes between Armenians and neighboring cultures. In particular, I note that a {{Warning}} template has been applied to Talk:Armenian Genocide with the following text: "Under the discretionary sanctions imposed at Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2, this article has been placed on a one-revert rule. Any editor who makes more than one revert (and this revert must be discussed on the talk page) in a 24-hour period will be blocked. Please edit cooperatively, and seek consensus and compromise rather than edit-war."

I seek explicit clarification whether this applies only to that article, or also to other related articles, should the need arise. I raise this question in particular about the article Van cat, especially (as of the article structure right now) the lead, the infobox, and the section Van cat#Naming controversy, recently merged in from Van cat naming controversy, a highly contentious article used for PoV-pushing of all sorts, pro/anti-Armenian, -Turk, and -Kurd. I would like to apply the same Talk:Armenian Genocide warning to Talk:Van cat only if/when necessary; my interpretation of the the ArbCom cases with regard to Armenia-related topics suggests that would be permissible. A housecat article seems an unlikely place for this sort of ethnic feud, and it's been quiet lately in the wake of two ArbCom cases about Armenia-related edit-wars, which involved blocks that put a damper on some participants for a while, but I have no doubt that the issue will come up again. It's an article about a variety of cat that is claimed as a major cultural symbol by all three ethnicities, so it will be targeted for PoV-pushing in the future, guaranteed. I would like to know whether the "1RR" imposed by ArbCom on "Armenia... and related disputes" can be extended to this article when the tooth-gnashing inevitably begins again. I have no political stake in the question; in this, I'm just a WP:CATS editor trying to reduce racialist "noise" in a cat article that's been repeatedly hijacked for WP:GREATWRONGS purposes. The related article Turkish Van has seen some of this too, but but I think the split-off of Van cat and the subsequent merger of Van cat naming controversy into Van cat will "concentrate the fire" on that article when the "its OUR cat!" issue pops up again. Nonetheless, should the need arise, I include the article Turkish Van and potentially also Turkish Angora, and any results of splits, mergers or PoV-forks of any of these articles, and any cat-related sections in other relevant articles (e.g. Turkey, Armenia, Lake Van, etc.), in this request for clarification. I'm posting this because other cases are clearer. E.g. Template:ARBPIA says "All articles related to the Arab-Israeli conflict broadly construed are under WP:1RR", but the equivalent for Armenia disputes does not include such "broadly construed" language. PS: Count this as a "vote" for more consistent enforcement and remedies wording. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 22:10, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

• @Elen of the Roads: Re: "Ergo, if an editor makes edits to the cat article pushing an ethnic/national POV they can be warned under the discretionary sanction, and if they have already been warned, can be blocked as an enforcement." – That's what I thought. I'm about 80% done preparing and WP:AN/I (or maybe WP:AE would be better in this case) and concomitant WP:SSI case about this, but holding out some hope that further discussion with the user in question will render that unnecessary. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 21:21, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

• @All: I consider this question resolved. Any pro-this or anti-that ethnicity POV-pushing that arises at the articles in question clearly is within the scope of WP:ARBAA2, since the relevant geographic area is historically Armenian. That the articles are also connected to Turkey, but Turkey wasn't specifically mentioned by ARBAA2 is incidental and irrelevant and doesn't constitute a loophole. The warning template I asked about, however, isn't appropriate at the article talk pages I asked about, because they're about cats, not regional politics, so they'd be a bit off-topic and WP:BEANSish. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 21:21, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Exactly, so please moderate your edit warring on the Van Cat article - continue and you risk being subject to AA2 sanctions. Meowy 04:08, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by EdJohnston

• Arbcom can of course make their own answer to this question, but I think there is no blanket 1RR restriction on the AA articles currently. (The 1RR at Armenian genocide was just for that article and it was imposed by User:Moreschi in 2008). It is my understanding that article-based restrictions such as 1RR can be imposed by any administrator under the provisions of WP:AC/DS, once it's been decided that the editing of the article falls in the domain of an appropriate Arbcom case. The discretionary sanctions are more quarrel-based than geography-based, so if somebody started an edit war on the nationality of the Van cat (Turkish versus Armenian, for example) that should fall under WP:ARBAA2. Nationalist warring involving Armenia on other cat-related articles should also fall under ARBAA2, but it would be wise for administrators only to impose a 1RR on specific articles where a problem appeared to exist and where an article 1RR was a better solution than individual editor sanctions.

• In answer to the point about ARBPIA: there is presently a blanket 1RR restriction on those articles due to a community consensus in fall 2010. Arbcom did not issue a blanket 1RR remedy on I/P articles in either WP:ARBPIA or WP:ARBPIA2.

• As to whether ARBAA2 can be broadly construed: See this edit from October 2011 in which the Committee authorized discretionary sanctions for "Topics related to Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts, broadly interpreted..", which ought to cover it.
• Extension of an existing remedy to a novel area might fall under item 3 of WP:AC/DS, which suggests "Best practice includes seeking additional input prior to applying a novel sanction or when a reasonable, uninvolved editor may question whether the sanction is within the scope of the relevant case". I assume they mean a discussion at the community level. This would suggest that an admin should go to WP:AE or some other appropriate noticeboard if they believe that AA restrictions are needed on cat articles. EdJohnston (talk) 17:08, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Okay. I am here requesting an answer to the "question whether the sanction is within the scope of the relevant case" for WP:AE purposes. Even just since I posted here, the Van cat article in question has been subject to "Kurdistan does not exist" edits by a pro-Armenian editor under editing sanctions imposed in WP:ARBAA2 (and blocked more than once for violating them). I'm getting the impression that the 1RR notice would not apply to this article, so I'm curious what I should do next other than keep reverting like some edit-warrior every time these anti-Kurd edits are made. The editor making them is not a vandal; highly controversial and blocked many times, but actually does make constructive edits like the recent overhaul of Turkish Van. And this is just the one editor; there are at least two others who have made massively (pro- and anti-Turk, respectively) POV-pushing changes to the now-merged Van cat naming controversy piece who I'm sure will show up any day now at Van cat. I have zero opinion on or interest in Turkey vs. Armenia vs. Kurdistan disputes (and know very little about them). I just want the Van cat and related articles to be accurate and not be used as a venue for pushing ethnic antagonism crap. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 22:34, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

SMcCandlish, please stop assuming bad faith. I gave an explanation for the removal of Kurdistan in the edit summary, and I have given one in the article's talk page. A cat breed cannot be said to have its origin in an entity that did not exist in any shape or form at the time of that origin. If you can argue against that, then just do it in the talk page. it is a content issue, not some sort of "pro-Armenian" edit issue. I've long past bothering what admins think of me because my opinion of them can't get lower. However, my otherwise rather good opinion of you suffers when I see you making an inaccurate "I'm a pro-Armenian editor" claim. I'm actually just about the only person on Misplaced Pages you could trust to make a neutral edit in any Armenian-Turkish-Azeri related article. Meowy 03:55, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Except that you aren't. You're very consistently pushing an anti-Kurd viewpoint, and you've been blocked again and again and again over several years, and sometimes for an entire year, for Armenia-related editwarring, and busted for sockpuppetry to push more such edits. I don't understand why you can't leave that topic area alone. Just walk away and pick a different topic to edit on, where you can actually remain neutral. I'm not assuming bad faith. I'm observing that you have a four-year history of no-remorse ethno-political editwarring in many, many articles that touch on sensitive topics with regard to the Near East, especially the region where Turks, Azerbaijanis, Armenians and Kurds rub shoulders, and have been blocked more times than I can count for violating editing restrictions with regard to those articles. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 21:05, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

And if you dig out an old edit I made somewhere in that article or the Turkish Van one, I remember saying "cats don't have an ethnicity"! :) Meowy 04:04, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Straw man. No one has advanced any such claim about cats, which would be beyond moronic. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 21:05, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

The original remedy covered "all articles which relate to the region of Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iran and the ethnic and historical issues related to that area". Now this was replaced by Standard discretionary sanctions, which cover "topics related to Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts, broadly interpreted". In my understanding, broadly interpreted "topics related to Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts" are the same as "articles which relate to the region of Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iran and the ethnic and historical issues related to that area". Am I getting it right? Grandmaster 10:43, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

The definition "all articles which relate to the region of Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iran and the ethnic and historical issues related to that area" was coined by administrators post AA2, and is a good example of "mission-creep" (let's add "Turkey", let's add "Iran", etc.). The definition that now replaces it actually returns it closer to its original definition. Meowy 04:01, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

AGK, thanks for clarification. But then it would mean that in an article like Van cat, which is generally about a cat, albeit from a certain area, if problematic edits are related to an ethnic conflict, then they are covered by AA remedies, but if edit warring or POV pushing is related to something else, like say length of the claws or color of the fur, then that is covered by general rules. If it so, then whenever edit warring about AA topics spills over to an article that have no direct relation to AA issues, AA related problematic edits will be covered by this particular remedy, and anything else will be not. Is that right, or I'm missing the point again? But then it still leaves open the question whether the topics and subjects related to Turkey and Iran are also covered by this remedy, or they are only covered when Turkey and Iran related topics relate also to Armenia and Azerbaijan. Grandmaster 15:24, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

That's an interesting side issue, I suppose, but not relevant to the question I raised; Van cat (formerly Van kedisi and the PoV-fork Van cat naming controversy and Turkish Van are clearly within the scope of WP:ARBAA2, to the extent that ethno-political editwarring arises there, because the relevant geographic area, within the present-day political border of Turkey, was historically part of Armenia, and the editing in question is directly related to Armenian vs. other ethnic disputes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SMcCandlish (talk • contribs) 21:05, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

I agree that Van cat is within the scope of AA, but it is just one instance of problematic editing in AA area. I feel that AA related remedies may need to be revisited in light of what is going on Nagorno-Karabakh and some other articles. The WP:AE request is left without action for about 1 month now: I think the community has very little interest to what is going on in AA articles, and the issue may need to be raised to a higher level. Grandmaster 23:52, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by other user

Leave this section for others to add additional statements

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Ed is correct that discretionary sanctions apply to edits, not articles. Such a scope is by design: when general sanctions like article probation were used in the past, we had a distracting volume of dispute about whether tangentially-related articles (like Van cat) were the subject of oversight by arbitration enforcement administrators. The answer to this clarification therefore seems to be that any edits which relate to "Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts, broadly interpreted" will be open to enforcement—and everything else will not. If I have omitted an answer to any additional line of enquiry, please say so here and I will try to follow up promptly. AGK 22:45, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

• Grandmaster: No, it means topics or subjects (as written). This means that any edit within the scope of the dispute are subject to enforcement. The point is that the sanctions do not apply to whole articles, because then there is the capacity for wikilawyering that, when the dispute spills over to "unrelated" articles, enforcement cannot take place. AGK 01:12, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

• As Anthony says, it's content/editing that's the dividing line, not necessarily articles. I do agree being more consistent in our verbiage would make intents clearer, and is worth considering for future cases. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs 15:37, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
• Ergo, if an editor makes edits to the cat article pushing an ethnic/national POV they can be warned under the discretionary sanction, and if they have already been warned, can be blocked as an enforcement. Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:41, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for clarification: Misplaced Pages:ARBAA2

Initiated by Gatoclass (talk) at 07:29, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Gatoclass

Although I do not usually adjudicate disputes at WP:AE, I decided to assist on the recently filed Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Nagorno-Karabakh_article. Since I have had no prior involvement in Azerbaijan-Armenian articles, I assumed I was entitled to participate. However, I have experienced a growing unease about my participation in this case, based on the fact that I have had some involvement (albeit long ago) on East European articles (which I believe are covered by WP:DIGWUREN). While most sources appear to place Azerbaijan and Armenia in Western Asia, some seem to place these countries in Eastern/Southeastern Europe, in which case, ARBAA2 might be considered a subset of WP:DIGWUREN. On the other hand, it appears that DIGWUREN is concerned mostly with disputes between Russians and other East Europeans, while ARBAA2 concerns a national dispute between Azerbaijanis and Armenians. ARBAA2 contains no reference to DIGWUREN that I can see, but nonetheless, I think this issue needs clarification. A quick response would be greatly appreciated since the AE case concerned is still active. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 07:29, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Is there some reason this request cannot be closed at this point? I did request a prompt response, but it is still open well over a week after being filed. I would like to see the request closed before returning to the case which prompted it. Thanks, Gatoclass (talk) 07:31, 18 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by other user

Shall Gatoclass' comments in on the recently filed AE request Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Nagorno-Karabakh_article be removed since the community believes that his participation in this and similar cases is objectionable? Dehr (talk) 02:40, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Statement by Brewcrewer

I may have come across this too late, as five members of ARBCOM have already shared their thoughts, but nevertheless I feel obliged to point out something ARBCOM may be overlooking. NYB states that Gatoclass may be construing "involved" greater then necessary as pertaining to EE in general. He is probably right, but he and Gatoclass are overlooking the involvement in Arab-Israel related articles, and how his involvement in A-I disputes may effect his involvement in EE disputes.

In addition to regular content disputes at A-I related articles, Gatoclass frequently comments at AE threads concerning editors involved with the Arab-Israel conflict (almost always favoring one side of the general dispute). More pertinently, he files AE reports on other editors involved with the Arab-Israel conflict and has had reports filed against him by editors involved with the Arab-Israel conflict (he was sort of blocked once for edit warring, FWTW).

If Gatoclass never found himself at AE in connection with the Arab-Israel conflict there would be no problem. However as Gatoclass is frequently a participant, the potential for conflict is clear. Gatoclass shouldn't be making determinations together with the same few admins that are arbitrating his disputes in another forum.

To put in a legal framework, a judge sitting on a panel cannot practice before the panel even on matters unrelated to their panel for which they sit together. I am not aware of any editors faced with this similar conflict so I don't know if this came up before. I would like to hear ARBCOM's position on this. Thanks, --brewcrewer (yada, yada) 19:57, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).

Arbitrator views and discussion

• Putting aside the geographical definitions question for a moment, I wonder if the requester might be construing "involvement" more broadly than is necessary. An administrator who is active or who has been involved in editing disputes in a topic-area should avoid AE work in that topic, but that raises the question of defining the topic. In the case of Eastern Europe, I can imagine that some people might be involved in disputes involving that whole part of the world, and hence would stay away from administrator work covering any of Eastern Europe, broadly defined. On the other hand, if I were active in editing Lithuania, I wouldn't feel myself disqualified from helping out in a dispute about Slovakia or Montenegro. Or, for that matter, about Armenia and Azerbaijan. The question is whether the administrator might either actually have, or might reasonably be perceived as having, relevant bias or history that would make it unfair for him or her to help resolve the dispute. In the context of this request it sounds to me like there is probably not a problem. Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:28, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
• Agree with Brad's comment above. In other words, I wouldn't consider you to be involved. PhilKnight (talk) 16:04, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
• Appreciate the autocontemplative nature of the request, but I think NYB has nailed it above. Jclemens (talk) 02:55, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
• NYB has this one nailed. Courcelles 15:25, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
• Chiming in to agree with Brad. I don't think there's an issue with the case outlined above. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs 15:35, 14 March 2012 (UTC)