Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive1127

• WP:OR concerns on Deliberative democracy (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs): May 9, 2023[30] I have extensively discussed this with the user on their talk page and won’t rehash it all, but to summarize: User:Superb Owl
  modified a fully cited sentence based on their own uncited reading of a Google n-gram viewer. Without a citation there was no way to validate the user’s work. Their use of the n-gram viewer to overrule a citation was clearly "analysis or synthesis of published material that serves to reach or imply a conclusion not stated by the sources." By itself, not a huge problem but emblematic of ongoing problems.

• WP:CITE, WP:OR and WP:NPOV concerns on Supreme Court of the United States (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs): February 6, 2023. Magidin and Drmies extensively discussed it with Superb Owl[31] and in the talk page for Supreme Court (see all seven discussion topics with the same users at [32]), as well in the edit history for Supreme Court (too numerous to diff). I won’t rehash it all but it appears that it reached a disruptive level around whether “democratic backsliding” should be a leading criticism (see below), in addition to many other concerns where User:Superb Owl was not responsive to constructive criticism.

• WP:OR and WP:NPOV concerns on Citizens' assembly (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs). Without citation, user added[33] the cost of a citizens’ assembly as an “advantage” based seemingly on personal belief.

• WP:NPOV (?) concerns on
  US Democracy (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs): on February 6, 2023, User:Superb Owl created[34] a redirect from “US Democracy” to Democratic backsliding in the United States (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs
  ). This is obviously not the correct redirect target, but it matches the user’s interest in “democratic backsliding”.

• WP:AGF concerns on Supreme Court of the United States (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs): on February 4, 2023, User: Superb Owl accuses[36] User:Goodone121
  of “Silencing speech” for removing his edits, reverts Goodone121, then later reverts Drdpw and Magidin’s removals of the same content.

• WP:3RR concerns on Supreme Court of the United States (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs): around January 30 to 31, 2023. The user adds[37] arguably unrelated criticism re “democratic backsliding”. It is removed by at least 2 editors and reinstated repeatedly[38][39][40][41][42] by User: Superb Owl
  .

• WP:NPOV concerns on Student activism (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs). User asserts[43]
  without citation that “Student activism is famous for its bravery, especially when in the opposition to autocratic regimes.” Nearest cite is to a memorial for a particular activist, not any overall study of activism. The edit is not uniquely objectionable, but emblematic of continued insertion of personal opinion without citation.

Thanks for the thorough review and pointers, @49ersBelongInSanFrancisco. Here's some additional context in case it's helpful:

- While my first edits came in 2016, I only started editing significantly in the past six months. Based on the state of some of the articles I was reading I probably took too many cues as to what was ok and what wasn't. I realize that I should sit down and read the instruction manuals more carefully before assembling words on the site but did not realize I might have made mistakes that would upset someone so much that wouldn't get prevented along the way by looking at templates inserted on pages I was reading and editing or noted by patient and kind experienced editors. On the other hand, when editors have come across as very angry (especially on politically-themed articles) or did not explain reversions well it can be hard to know how genuine the feedback is or if it's designed to gaslight.

- I did not have as solid of a grasp of the line between minor and non-minor and will incorporate that standard going forward. That's really helpful and I appreciate you bringing that to my attention.

- re: Supreme Court disputes, while a couple of the regulars you mention seemed quick to anger and appeared less than welcoming of center-left sources and viewpoints, they did teach me about WP:Voice and I have learned from them and the page seems to be in a good place with no ongoing disputes.

- re: Citizens' Assemblies, I was not done making edits to that page when that first change you referenced was made, one of the next changes was to rename the 'advantage' section 'opportunities', since advantages/disadvantages often are not clearcut but just has the potential to be depending on execution. I've made this improvement to other articles as well and added in-line templates to each sentence while tracking down the sources I read.

- As far as US Democracy redirect, I don't disagree with your choice of landing page but it seems like the previous choice was reasonable to create and then direct it to a page focused on the quality of our democracy in the US and instead of one primarily about the Republican institutions we have today

- As far as the Senate sentence, it seemed pretty self-explanatory but I understand why a source is really desirable. Again, I wish someone had flagged that instead of deleting it right away but in the future will be sure to cite one in the first place if that point about the added importance of the legitimacy of the Senate and how it carries over into the judiciary is reintroduced in the article.

- The student activism sentence merely summarizes the rest of the paragraph with 6 other citations. I can see however why a summarizing source or three would be better. I can and will be more thorough with my citations going forward.

I really do appreciate the time you've taken to make me a better editor - thanks again and am always grateful for anyone else's thoughts as well. Superb Owl (talk) 08:08, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Admin attention may be required at the article New Democracy (Greece). Elections are approaching in Greece (they are set for the next week) and we have been witnessing a surge of POV-pushing disruption incidents aiming at whitewashing the country's ruling political party which both the international and local media have criticized its anti-democratic tendencies. I will appreciate if the admins keep an eye on the article for the next couple of weeks. Thank you.--- ❖ SilentResident ❖ ^{(talk ✉ | contribs ✎)} 12:49, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Hmm, I'd have to agree with the IP that that final sentence getting edit warred over is not a great summary of the article, however. Unless I'm looking cross-eyed or missing some context, there's a section in the body listing good and bad things about his presidency, but then the sentence summarising the criticism is included again verbatim in the lead, while the praise is left out completely. --Licks-rocks (talk) 13:01, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

@

WP:IDONTLIKEIT

.

Anyways, this "negative" information they seek to remove, was added not to mud the party's public image, but because it is too important to bury at the end of the article, it is about the party's stances and policies for which it drew global attention and criticism, and whose outcomes have consequences to the lives of the people and this is how it is done for the political parties elsewhere in Wikipedia, such as Golden Dawn (Greece), Fidesz or Justice and Development Party (Turkey) and by no means can be removed. --- ❖ SilentResident ❖ ^{(talk ✉ | contribs ✎)} 13:48, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm not doubting that the IP is here to push their own POV, to be clear. I just noticed that that sentence is not a very balanced reflection of the alinea it originated from. I'll take a look at it later to see if I can tweak it a bit --Licks-rocks (talk) 13:53, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Not an admin but I've added it to my watchlist - I have experienced significant disruption in the Greek politics area (specifically around far-right parties) so I'm unsurprised more is taking place. — Czello ^(music) 13:01, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

@Czello: Thank you. --- ❖ SilentResident ❖ ^{(talk ✉ | contribs ✎)} 13:49, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

 Comment: The disruption continued, and this left me no option but to request an increase in the article page protection level.

For those unfamiliar with politics in Greece: this sudden surge of political disruption on the article, these days, coincides with the reports in the local media that the ruling political party is carrying a whitewashing campaign aiming at improving the party's public image ahead of the upcoming elections: [46] [47] [48], which is why it has me worried and brought it to the ANI. --- ❖ SilentResident ❖ ^{(talk ✉ | contribs ✎)} 20:42, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

yikes. Good to know! --Licks-rocks (talk) 13:51, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I've spent a couple of hours picking through several hundred edits by SuspiciousReality70 (talk · contribs). In a few cases they represent minor upgrades, but mostly they accomplish something else that requires real initiative: make articles already compromised by promotional tone even worse. Every edit is accompanied by the meaningless and deceptive summary, "Fixed one part so that it fits the tone/style of wikipedia." Please feel free to cherry pick any half dozen edits and see. It's left to administrative discretion whether a block is appropriate now, but I submit the disruption merits sanctions. Thanks, 76.119.253.82 (talk) 18:23, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

• Incidentally, I was thinking the same thing: [49]. 76.119.253.82 (talk) 18:31, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

On the one hand, I agree. On the other hand, the pattern of topics chosen is seemingly random and in many cases uncommercial, and the edits are coming in small but very rapid bursts. It makes me wonder: could this be a good-faith editor who thinks running text through an AI to rewrite it is a good idea? —David Eppstein (talk) 18:37, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

I would say the evidence supports that theory, and this seems to be their entire contribution history. I would block per

WP:CIR, and I think it would be a good idea for us to write up a guideline on this in short order. Was it just yesterday there was an editor blocked for doing this, and they also used an AI to compose their unblock request? This is getting out of hand quickly. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits

) 18:47, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

The common thread is choice of articles that have been tagged for unencyclopedic or advertising tone. They then go into a (usually) unsourced passage and the bloviation commences, along with the edit summary telling us the part has been 'fixed'. 76.119.253.82 (talk) 19:14, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

The "Suggested edits" feature for newcomers surprisingly causes newcomers to do what they are being asked to do, independently of their capability to do so.

Want to create an article? Add some unnecessary wikilinks and try to copyedit text others have failed to write correctly first. And yes, this is indeed better than bad article creations, but it causes maintenance too. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 19:25, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Have left them a talkpage message urging them to step away from the AI and edit articles directly. Agree with DavidEppstein that they're likely acting in good faith but their additions are usually worse than the original text. If they persist without engaging with anyone's concerns, they will reach disruptive editing territory.

And as a side note, it continues to be horrifying how many articles are just puff pieces lifted from company websites. If SuspiciousReality70 has done any good work it's that their contributions page provides a "to do" list of articles in need of major rewrites.-- Euryalus (talk) 02:45, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and reverted some of the "copyedits" that made the articles affected more promotional. Considering this editor is acting in good faith in my opinion, I would propose a warning followed by some length of block if they continue the poor copyedits. (Non-administrator comment) JML1148 (Talk | Contribs) 03:36, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Well, their copyediting targets are a (probably completely random) subset of Category:All articles with a promotional tone, so we do have that list already. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 08:31, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

This category has a backlog that requires the attention of willing editors. This notice will hide itself when this category has fewer than 10000 items. I don't know how much good that list is doing. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 15:40, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

ToBeFree has hit the problem on the head: a newcomer is likely to end up at somewhere like [50] which calmly categorises copy-editing as "Easy", and suggests it for newcomers. Copy-editing is hard. You will meet sentences that are grammatically wrong but also ambiguous, which means either finding a way to correct the grammar while retaining exactly the same ambiguity, or (better) going back to sources to find out which meaning is correct. Copy-editing requires nuance; non-native-level speakers will often correct "He does eat fish on Fridays" to "He eats fish on Fridays", because at their level it is most likely that "he does" is an error. But in the context, it is likely to be a deliberate emphasis, asserting a contradiction of a (possibly-implicit) expectation or statement that he doesn't/shouldn't. It was bad enough when copy-editing WP was a practice-ground for language students, but AI brings a real risk of superficially reasonable copy-editing that's completely unaware of its effects on the underlying meaning. In addition to sorting out SuspiciousReality, we should get rid of every suggestion that newcomers gravitate into copy-editing. Finding references, a "medium" activity in that list, is far more useful, and much safer. Elemimele (talk) 08:41, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I am in agreement. As someone who did copy-editing frequently in the past, anyone who doesn't have a proficient grasp of the English language will likely do the reverse of what is intended. Small, obvious grammar and/or spelling mistakes are easy, but most of the pages tagged for some form of copyedit likely need major changes or re-writes, which new or non-native editors would struggle with. I would be in favour of replacing the copyedit section of the "suggested edits" section with categorisation and move the "Copy editing" section in Wikipedia:Task Center to intermediate editors, although I think there would be a need to be an RfC to gain consensus. JML1148 (Talk | Contribs) 08:52, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Would be very dangerous for BLPs. Newbs might not understand why Obama isn't categorized under "Left-wing politics" (not a category for BLPs, not a defining label, original research), or why Trump isn't categorized as "Fascism" or "Patriotism" (depending on their views), and so on and so forth. Those two are protected, but most BLPs aren't, and it's a minefield best avoided.

I agree with Elemimele. Sourcing is something newbs might get wrong, but it should still be the first thing they learn, and the risk of harm is low — DFlhb (talk) 09:08, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

That's a good point; swapping sourcing and copyedits is probably the most low-risk option. That being said, if I or another editor was to raise an RfC, I would have no idea where the RfC would be hosted, or how someone can even make this change. JML1148 (Talk | Contribs) 09:32, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Generally the discussion would be at WP:Village pump (proposals), or if it's only to change the one page then it would be at the applicable talk page. For what it's worth, I'll support any measure if it has a good chance of teaching better sourcing practices early on. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 15:47, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for your comment. If potentially a few more editors say they would support it, I will raise an RfC on this topic. JML1148 (Talk | Contribs) 07:02, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and boldly reorganized

WP:TASKS to list fact-checking first and to include a disclaimer that copy-editing requires high English proficiency, if not Wikipedia proficiency per-se. Copy editing is still listed under "beginner", but it's now listed after reference and categorization work. _signed, Rosguill ^talk

15:54, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) I've expanded on that and mentioned that they should be familiar with

WP:MOS, as even people with proficient English may not be aware of the conventions used on here. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝

 ) 17:42, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Well if our goal is to stop 'em dead in their tracks, telling them to begin by familiarizing themselves with MOS should certainly do the trick. EEng 19:09, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

If it means less work to follow up on afterwards, so be it. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 19:32, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I completely agree. XAM2175 ^(T) 10:17, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes to pretty much all the above. They have left a roadmap for overtly promotional articles to clean up. More broadly, agreed that it's not too soon to draft guidelines on dealing with AI, though I don't know what that would look like or if they'd be enforceable. And yes to making it more difficult, not easier, for new editors to bombard the site with inept copy edits. Prior to this report, I came across a wave of edits by newly registered accounts, cross-pollinating multiple articles, primarily adding wikilinks. They tend to be indiscriminate in their application; I suspect most don't use English as their native language. I think it dovetails with this discussion. 76.119.253.82 (talk) 16:20, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I was a professional copy editor for many years, so (at the risk of invoking Muphry's law) I'm very familiar with the amount of nuance it requires. But I don't agree with this at all. Newcomers to Wikipedia are just newcomers to Wikipedia. They're not necessarily newcomers to copy editing, nor to the English language. This is most likely why adding references is considered "medium" and copy editing "easy" -- to add references, you must be familiar with Wikipedia's sourcing policies and its markup syntax, and you'll probably have to do some additional editing or writing to incorporate them. But copy editing doesn't require any Wikipedia-specific knowledge. The skills are on entirely different axes. Gnomingstuff (talk) 05:35, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

The reason I am in support of this change is not because sourcing is easier (it isn't), it's because teaching newcomers to source earlier is fantastic, as so many reverts I do in vandalism-fighting is good faith editors adding unsourced information, and because an unreliable or bare source is likely to do less harm then what some editors do with copyediting; make the article worse because they don't understand

WP:MOS or don't speak English as a native language. JML1148 (Talk | Contribs

) 07:05, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

@Gnomingstuff:, I have no problem with a newcomer deciding to copy-edit, assuming they have the competence to do it. I'm just saying it's a really bad idea to announce from the roof-tops that copy-editing is a safe and trivial task for newcomers. That just encourages people with iffy language-skills and little idea what they're doing to think that nothing can go wrong. I don't want to discourage the thoughtful, new copy-editor; I want to discourage the idea that everyone and his dog should wade into Wikipedia armed with Grammarly or ChatGPT and start shuffling words willy-nilly. At the very least, the advice pages should suggest that copy-editing might appeal to the newcomer with native-level language skills, good attention to detail, and a willingness to check facts.

@JML1148: On sourcing, I'd agree. It's just as hard to do, but it's relatively safe, because a bad source is obvious to everyone and can easily be removed. A changed meaning, whose edit is buried somewhere in a page history, is a much more pernicious problem. Elemimele (talk) 08:24, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it's knowledge and understanding of both English language and Wikipedia policy that make the difference. I encountered a copy-edit recently that had "corrected" the revenues of the see of Glasgow to the revenues of the sea of Glasgow, evidently unaware that the sentence referred to an Episcopal see. Many of their other contributions included sweeping ENGVAR changes. Going back only a little further, we have this list of highlights from another editor: User talk:Studious Scrutinizer § Concerns. XAM2175 ^(T) 13:12, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

@

WP:CIRCULAR citation), and thus adds false information to the article. That might not be caught for years, if ever, since if it looks OK on the page, it's unlikely anyone's going to recheck the source -- especially if it's offline, in a different language, etc. But if a good-faith editor poorly copy edits an article, that will be fairly obvious (as evidenced by this thread). Gnomingstuff (talk

) 15:40, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree 100% with Gnomingstuff. Basically any part of Wikipedia editing is hard in some sense, but copy-editing is clearly less hard than most other things, and in particular is much, much less hard than adding sources. --JBL (talk) 20:11, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

"[M]uch, much less hard" looks like an obvious overstatement to me, which leaves me wondering how much value there is in trying to generalize the difficulty of certain categories of task to this level. I'm a person who adds sources to articles with some regularity, usually remembers how the sfn and harv family templates interface with ref tags, knows how to fill out appropriate citation template parameters, etc., but if I had been tasked with rewriting for non-promotional tone the same set of articles this poor editor's chatbot was, I envision myself giving up in despair without rewriting a single paragraph, my soul a bit dimmer for the experience.

Not all copy-editing is equally difficult, not all sourcing is equally difficult, not all editors have the same skillsets. Even if their mediawiki skills are assumed to be negligible, people have varying degrees of fluency in the language, varying technical skills in programming or markup related areas, varying familiarity with conducting research beyond first page of google results, etc. Honestly it might make sense to have new editors self-grade on their strengths in three or four fields and assign difficulties to tasks based on their own assessments of themselves rather than apply a one-size-fits-all hierarchy, whatever consensus here might determine that should be. Folly Mox (talk) 03:30, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

For information, I posted a comment at the Mediawiki site I originally mentioned, and received an extensive reply at [51]. Some of it relates to things that admins at individual wikipedias can do to influence how newcomer tasks are selected and presented, and it also gives information about what the wikimedia team have planned for the future. Elemimele (talk) 05:48, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

@Folly Mox: How to properly format a reference is moderately complicated but by itself is only one very small part of why finding references is not a beginner task. Here is a typical beginner approach to finding a reference for an uncited sentence: put the sentence into Google, find a reasonably well-written article on the subject that supports the claim as one of the top ten hits, and use that webpage as the reference. The only problem: the page they found is probably a Wikipedia mirror, or some other source that has copied its content directly from us. This is only one possible failure mode among many. Finding and adding references intersects with lots and lots of content policies and guidelines (OR, RS, MEDRS, BLP, ...) that even experienced editors moving from one area to another in the encyclopedia struggle with -- formatting references is just the tip of the iceberg. JBL (talk) 18:29, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Of course that is true for citing certain kinds of content and untrue for others (in the topic areas I work in, for example, I never run into BLP or MEDRS). If a new editor has any published nonfiction books on their shelf, or one or two textbooks lying around from undergrad, there's already tons of stuff they can add references about without ever learning how to distinguish a good google result from a problematic one. I think this conversation is evidence that thinking of broad classes of task without any finer granularity than the change to the edited article is a fraught method. Folly Mox (talk) 19:35, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I read the AI-assisted unblock request Ivanvector mentions above (or a different one?); it would be comical if it weren't so worrying. The user in that instance denies they used any tool, but, well, I don't believe them. I now understand the principal talent of AI when it comes to writing is using more words, like stretching a piece of elastic. To return to SuspiciousReality70, they should definitely be blocked if they continue perpetrating elastic-stretching like this. They haven't edited since being taken to ANI, whether or not ANI is the reason they stopped; I'll try to keep an eye out for re-emergence. Thank you for drawing attention to this user, 76.119.253.82. Bishonen | tålk 16:53, 11 May 2023 (UTC).

Thank you, Bishonen. I'd be surprised if we hear from them again. The specific case points to a much larger and troubling future issue. 76.119.253.82 (talk) 17:02, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

That's a different one. I didn't link to the one I was referring to because I didn't want to call anyone out, but of course now I can't find it. It was a fairly new user, I recall, not a 12-year-old account. But I agree their first two unblock requests were at least not written by the editor, the language is completely different. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:17, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

It was a request that was brought up at Wikipedia talk:Appealing a block#ChatGPT unblock requests?. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 19:22, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Greeting!. I would like to report a user Vipz for violating Wikipedia's rules. It all started on February 28, 2023, when ip changed what it says in the sources [[52]]. I tried to return it to the original and correct what is written in the source, but user Vipz does not allow it, it persistently returns to something that is not written in the source. Then I added three more verified sources that say the same thing and the administrator Daniel Case protected the page, which is fine. After that, the user Vipz used the protected page and deleted my sources [[53]], because he knows that I cannot restore them, because they are protected. In all sources it says "Croatian" not "Serbo-Croatian" which you can check here [[54]], [[55]], [[56]], [[57]]. We even tried talking on the talk page, but it ignores what it says in the sources [[58]]. These were the last changes to the page [[59]].I hope that someone will fix the page and write correctly what is written in the sources. Thank you 93.138.3.122 (talk) 10:50, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

You haven't notified Vipz. I've done that here: User talk:Vipz#WP:ANI. Nythar (💬-🍀) 10:53, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks a lot, I didn't know how to do that93.138.3.122 (talk) 10:56, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

This appears to be a content dispute, not a behavioral issue (though I advise the IP to tone down the rhetoric on the talk page). There's a

WP:CTOP restrictions, requiring higher than normal standards in conduct. Thebiguglyalien (talk

) 14:16, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for replying. Serbian language, Croatian language , Bosnian language , and Montenegrin language are different languages. In communist Yugoslavia, the communists called all these languages Serbo-Croatian, unfortunately the communists did not recognize these other languages. Before the formation of Yugoslavia, Croats had their own name, Serbs had their own name for their language. The name Serbo-Croatian was created in Yugoslavia, it did not exist before. When Yugoslavia fell apart and independent states were created, everyone again took their own language name as it was before Yugoslavia. User Vipz is an activist who advocates for reunification of the Serbo-Croatian language and Yugoslavia again as far as I understand from his main page [[60]] but that has nothing to do with today's situation when there are independent countries that again have their own language. User Vipz he does not acknowledge the sources because he thinks it is still Yugoslavia and is an activist who advocates for reunification of the Serbo-Croatian language.93.138.3.122 (talk) 14:54, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Nationalist ranting here won't get you very far. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 22:25, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Good grief. Use of the term is nearly two hundred years old; it was coined when Karl Marx was six years old, and the premise of a united language is featured in the 1911 Britannica. That teeth-gnashing nationalists can't stand the concept that their dialect might be the same basic language as that country's may be so (and is also addressed in the main article), but that doesn't change basic fact. Ravenswing 23:08, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Precisely how fellow Wikipedians put it above (thank you @Ravenswing). I'm open about my political views on my userpage—yes, I stand against the mindless linguistic purism and separatism that fuels segregation such as that of "Two schools under one roof"—but the fact that Serbo-Croatian is a single language is a purely linguistic one. It is reflected by the fact that the only place I posted an invite to join Talk:Kajkavian discussion on is Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Languages. –Vipz (talk) 04:24, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian is a technical terms, a sort of leftover from the 19th C. It has been argued I don't know how many times that this "language" never existed, anymore than Urdu-Hindi or Czecho-Slovak. As it is, it is an "ideological language" without history, presence & future. It is still used, in varying degrees, in some ISO standards, especially Ethnologue- which has nothing "scientific" about it (it's just a Christian missionary organization). Serbo-Croatian could be left in Wikipedia pages as a historical phase in Croatian and Serbian languages; also, as a testament how linguistics simply doesn't deal with questions whether various forms of language are separate languages or varieties of a language. Linguists like Kloss and Clyne did not elaborate closely on the issue, but anyone who has read their works can come to the conclusion: languages who may be highly mutually intelligible, but belong to different national-historical cultures are different languages. Peter Rehder's book on Slavic languages treats Serbo-Croatian as an ideological phase which brought Croatian and Serbian languages- real "entities"- closer, but never succeeded to unify them. Wikipedia pages on Croatian, Serbian and Serbo-Croatian are a disgrace & should be completely rewritten if English Wikipedia intends to keep any authority on the issue.In fact, it repeats Greater Serbian nonsensical claims, because Croatian Štokavian heritage until the 19th C- which is 95% of Štokavian written corpus for more than 5 centuries -is conspicuously absent from the Croatian language page. So, we come to the bizarre information that the 1st Croatian grammar, Kašić's, from 1604., belongs to the history of Serbo-Croatian- a complete absurdity. So, Croatian Štokavian dialect heritage from the 12th C on is forced out of the Croatian language page & "transferred" to the Serbo-Croatian page, where more than 80% of sources are Croatian. Are you saying that Serbo-Croatian is "actually" Croatian & that Serbian & Bosnian are, so to speak, Croatian for dummies? Another issue is a commissary-style of discussion with constant ideological labels of "nationalists". Well- anyone who, from the vantage point of Yugoslav failed experiment (a totalitarian state) calls others "nationalists"- why would that be bad, anyway?- is promoting the remnants of Yugoslav nationalism, which was & remained a sort of Fascist ideology (Yugoslav "race", Dinaric barbarogenius, hatred of the "decadent" West, mass ethnic cleansing of Albanians etc.). Though- I think it's all a waste of time. If common sense is not enough- from the 1995-2000 no book was translated from "Serbo-Croatian"; no grammar was written for Serbo-Croatian; even ludicrous name games testify about it: is it Serbo-Croatian, Croato-Serbian, or bcs, or bcsm? Where is a single language in the world with an alphabet soup for a name & with no native speakers of that alphabet language which doesn't possess a single text in its corpus? This all is laughable ... Mir Harven (talk) 21:46, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

(shrugs) Yes, we get that there are many people with nationalist axes to grind; welcome to the Balkans, right? As it happens, there are many eminent linguists, writers, scholars and others who disagree with you. Perhaps you will forgive us for accepting their expert opinion on the matter over yours. Ravenswing 22:01, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

There is not a single "eminent linguist" which would agree with that failed farce, as I commented:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Declaration_on_the_Common_Language#Extremely_biased_article These "eminent linguists" are mostly journalists, actors of a Yugoslav nationalist provenance, plus an anti-Croatian third rate language ideologue Snježana Kordić who didn't write anything worthwhile on the Croatian or Serbian language matters- just a bunch of commissary-type denunciations. And even if they had agreed- that wouldn't matter a whit. The name & identity of a language are more important than a pamphlet concocted by a small cohort of paid amateurs & ideological Yugoslav apologists of a vanished totalitarianism. Mir Harven (talk) 22:37, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

No, this name was coined by Austrian & German philologists in the early 19th, when they tried to ascertain "what belongs to whom". Carefully watch the videos in English:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dp-2eM9S6i8, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rhPZryNp-M and, if you know Croatian: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDONIhqHokU, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovDb0YPidPU Mir Harven (talk) Mir Harven (talk) 23:07, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian and Croatian are not mutually exclusive concepts. And there are no universal standards of what constitutes a language or a dialect. In the end, if there is a predominant consensus among Croatians to consider Kajkavian as a Croatian dialect, then its fair to highlight that in the definition in the lede of the article. If you have references, including SFRY era references, how Kajkavian would be a Serbo-Croatian dialect, that can be reflected in the article. The issue is not to promote absolute 'truths' but that the article provides a balanced view and representation of the article subject. As per the sources disputed, I'd suggest skipping https://www.akademijaoxford.com/en/croatian-language-courses.php which isn't really an authoritative WP:RS. --Soman (talk) 22:06, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Just to note that the relevant consensus is not among Croatians, but among subject experts. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:21, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

WP:VEXBYSTERANG User:Mir Harven

2A00:23C7:2B13:9001:C848:8392:A271:1332 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Example diff [61] They're not actively editing right this second, but I thought it would be good to get some admin eyes on this in case they think immediate action is needed or if this is a known LTA. Squeakachu (talk) 22:02, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Their contributions go back several months on the /64 range. See Special:Contributions/2A00:23C7:2B13:9001:0:0:0:0/64. I can't make heads or tails of what they're trying to say, but their reference here to "Jewish mafia bosses" is concerning. Aoi (青い) (talk) 22:14, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I blocked the /64 range for three months. I have no idea if it's an LTA, but they've been editing like this for a very long time and the range has never been blocked until now.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:15, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Wasn't there a blocked user who used to go on about how Einstein was/wasn't Jewish? Is it possibly related? X750. Spin a yarn? _{Articles I've screwed over?} 22:36, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

This one's got a pretty distinctive style. Having reviewed and reverted a lot of their talkpage ramblings, I think they could have just as well been blocked for crimes against language. Acroterion (talk) 02:06, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Context

Then, Arkenstrone's versions on both articles were revdeleted for copyright violation, part of which was due to me

Accusations

The user has portrayed my behaviour as disruption or vandalism without any basis, thus violating Wikipedia:No personal attacks ("Accusations about personal behavior that lack evidence. Serious accusations require serious evidence, usually in the form of diffs and links"). They have also consistently characterised my removal of their POV as "gutting" the articles. This is the the user's last remark to me that made me write this ANI, and I have updated the writing with DatGuy's recent acceptation of e-mailing the copyrighted material.

• The user gave me bogus warnings, also stating they reverted my reversion of my disruptive edits. I asked the user to stop their baseless accusations, otherwise I would go to ANI. To which they responded by giving me more bogus warnings. They have also attacked me on 3 admins' talk pages.

• At User talk:Diannaa#The Poem of the Man-God: This editor's approach by removing large portions of the article because he doesn't like the sources, is extremely disruptive; the other editor removed large portions of the article because he doesn't agree that the sources presenting important information are good sources. This is disruptive; this user disruptively gutted large portions of the article.

• At User talk:Bbb23#Assistance for Disruptive Edits: they state I have a long history of WP:3RR, WP:DISRUPT, and WP:VANDALIZE, and they ask that I be blocked for serial disruptive edits and vandalism: this is not true, I have never been blocked for vandalism and my removal is not disruptive nor vandalism.

• At User talk:DatGuy/Archives/2023/April#Access to copy of deleted revision?: I didn't give the normal editing process a chance to function, me asking Diannaa to check for copyvio is a sort of gaming of the editing process, and I have been attempting to confuse, conflate, and game the editing process.

Sidenote unrelated to me: Arkenstrone has also characterised Diannaa's refusal of handing their revdeleted versions as well beyond your purview and veering dangerously close to a form of soft-censorship and micro-management of the editing process based on your own personal views and opinions. Veverve (talk) 17:07, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

The admins involved in this discussion already came to a resolution. User talk:DatGuy/Archives/2023/April#Access to copy of deleted revision? Arkenstrone (talk) 17:32, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

This is a completely different issue, as DatGuy has told you at the very talk page you link. Veverve (talk) 17:40, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

If Arkenstrone had stuck to the subject of getting back their content, that would have been great. But they personalized the conflict with Veverve and specifically sought out admins who'd sanctioned Veverve in the past. Me included. I'll leave it to y'all to decide what to make of this. -- Deepfriedokra (talk) 02:41, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

You are missing some important facts. Allow me to correct the record.

• Bbb23 was the first admin I contacted after Diannaa, asking him for 1) a copy of the deleted revision and 2) to assist, and possibly block Veverve since he was repeating past disruptive behaviour for which he was blocked multiple times previously (by gutting articles due to what he considered unreliable sources and edit warring). That's not how things are done. You bring it up on the talk page, and if a source is indeed low quality, then tag the sourced text with "citation needed" or similar, and give other editors a chance to provide better sources. That's good-faith.
• Bbb23 didn't want to have anything to do with it. So I respected his wish not to get involved and left it at that. Afterwards, I decided to focus on just getting access to the deleted revision and not confuse things with conduct issues. I made no mention of Veverve, on any other admin's talk page, including DatGuy's or yours.
• It was Veverve that decided to make his presence known on DatGuy's talk page. Only then did I respond to his confused and deflecting statements, and provided the facts of his past bad behaviour, which was happening once again. I wasn't going to mention his past behaviour in that thread, deciding instead to give the editing process a chance to function, and see what happens.
• Only after DatGuy [64] recommended to introduce material from the deleted revision with copyvio corrections + source improvement (slowly), did Veverve choose to file this frivolous ANI. I would advise Veverve to consider
  WP:BOOMERANG. Arkenstrone (talk
  ) 05:58, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Baseless accusations?

Patterns of questionable conduct: 1) gutting articles

WP:BOOMERANG

.

1. Edit Warring: [65] Block: [66]

=> "You have been blocked from editing from certain pages (Russian fascism (ideology)) for a period of 1 week for EDIT WARRING."

2. Edit Warring [67] Block: [68]

=> "You are currently edit-warring across a wide swath of liturgical calendar-related articles. You are fighting multiple editors who disagree with your unilateral decision to gut all of these articles of their usefulness. Could you please cease and desist the edit-wars, firstly, and secondly, consider that your decision goes against consensus and that you should permit others to hold contrary opinions about this?"

=> "You have been blocked from editing for a period of 1 week for edit warring."

3. Edit Warring & Block: [69]

=> "You have been blocked from editing for a period of 2 weeks for edit warring in the same articles immediately after your previous block ended."

4. Block Extension: [70]

=> "I have extended your block by two weeks and revoked your talk page access. Pinging other editors to argue with them and berate them while you are blocked is not acceptable. Please read WP:UTRS for your unblock options."

5. Edit Warring & Block: [71]

=> "You have been blocked from editing for a period of 1 month for edit warring and violating the three-revert rule, as you did at Heresy in the Catholic Church."

6. Arbitration Enforcement Sanction: [72]

=> "The following sanction now applies to you: You are indefinitely topic banned from all subject that relate to "Russia", including discussion or any article that is related to Russia in any way, broadly construed. You have been sanctioned [73]"

7. Disruptve Edits: [74]

=> in progress Arkenstrone (talk) 06:22, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

You appear to have completely missed the point. And you double-down on calling my edits Disruptve Edits (using your own warnings as proofs), accusing me of having vandalised (which I never did, you do not appear to understand the meaning of this term on WP), and baselessly state that I was repeating past disruptive behaviour for which he was blocked multiple times previously (by gutting articles due to what he considered unreliable sources and edit warring). I never denied receiving blocks or being topic-banned. That none of the three admins to which you mentioned my behaviour were willing to sanction me should have made you realise your accusations were baseless.

That you decided to make it personnal and continued to baselessly accuse me once I intervened on DatGuy's talk page, or on whatever page, is not a defence at all: it only proves you have trouble working on a community project. And as I said, I had decided to start this ANI once you confirmed that you were clearly unwilling to give me the time of the day.

You admitted you decided to ask specific admins that sanctionned me in your admin shopping. Veverve (talk) 13:24, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

• (comment so that it does not get archived before an admin has fixed the problem) Veverve (talk) 13:14, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

  I'm not an expert, but I would recommend an interaction ban between the two editors. QuicoleJR (talk) 19:17, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

After discussion with other invovled parties, and with their mild to strong support, I come here to request an intervention of sorts at Talk:Charles III.

• insisting on keeping a current version (12345
  )

• repeating the same argument (123), despite edits taking the argument into account (1234 56
  )

• disregarding other editors' questions or requests for explanations concerning edits or objections to edits (cmt., no resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., no resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., no resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., resp. | cmt., cmt, resp. | cmt., resp.
  )

• deflecting to irrelevant discussions on different topics (123) despite explanations of the lack of connection ([75]1234) and with non-sequitur (12)

• moving the goalposts (resp., cmt., resp. | resp., cmt., cmt., resp.)

• the sole clear and to-the-point response from the main antagonist amounting to "
  I don't like it" ([76]
  )

• mischaracterizations of other editors' actions to make them seem unreasonable and improper (1234
  )

• cherry-picking only RfCs as valid (1234567891011
  ), willfully ignoring the validity of BRD,

• trying to scuttle dispute resolution (123)

• continually insisting on waiting for other editors' input (123456) and on a need to convince other editors (1)

• edit warring by reverting (1234567) without engaging at talk beyond two comments to accuse editors of bad faith (12
  ) and two non-sequiturs (linked above)

• gaslighting (12345
  )

• and a and a personal attack, just to round things out.

I understand that my understanding of policy isn't perfect and that the above is my personal assessment of the situation. It seems to align with others' take on the problem; however, I realize this will nonetheless differ from how other others view the state of affairs. Additionally, I'm aware that not all, if any, of those involved, including myself, have been saints; I don't expect to be cannonized as St Mies of Wikipedia any time soon. I accept that, by posting this, I'm opening my own words and actions up for scrutiny and I accept whatever consequenses may come. A final resolution to the dispute is the primary objective above all others. Someone has volunteered to do a GA review of the article beginning at the end of the week (13 May) and we'd like to have the article meeting basics like

I note that 3O and DRN was declined, but what's the reason an RfC hasn't been requested if the discussion has reached an impasse? That seems like the most straightforward solution. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 00:17, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

There 'is' an RFC ongoing, concerning the "Accession and Coronation" sub-section lead :) GoodDay (talk) 00:55, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

*There is a fundamentally misleading RfC ongoing concerning the "Accession and coronation" section. --

MIESIANIACAL

00:59, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

We disagree, which is allowed on the 'pedia. GoodDay (talk) 01:01, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

That is a straw man; one that once again foundationally misunderstands the disagreement. I said nothing about what is and isn't allowed on "the 'pedia". I said the RfC you started fundamentally misrepresents the dispute over the "Accession and coronation" section of the article and is therefore pointless and a cause of confusion. But, you may well be starting to show here, in real time, what one of the main impediments to resolving the dispute has been. --

MIESIANIACAL

01:09, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

The RFC doesn't misrepresent the dispute-in-question. We're dealing with a content dispute & nothing more. Administrator @

WP:CIVIL. I hope you'll follow Tamzin's advice. GoodDay (talk

) 01:17, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

This is all that needs said about the RfC you opened: [77][78][79]. As to the rest: consider carefully whether or not you really want to start making personal pot-shots by dragging up past interactions with admins. --

MIESIANIACAL

01:33, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

At Charles III's talkpage & your own talkpage, I've been attacked several times & other editors advised you (concerning your talkpage) to stop. Now, please let others give their input 'here'. GoodDay (talk) 01:41, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Everyone's free to look at my history and logs as they are to look at yours. --

MIESIANIACAL

02:03, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Including your G2bambino contribs & posts? That's good to know. GoodDay (talk) 02:07, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

It says right on my userpage that that's my old account; 15 years ago. --

MIESIANIACAL

02:26, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

• @
  Miesianiacal: I sampled a dozen or so diffs in your report and don't see anything egregious, or necessarily matching your characterization of the edits. An RFC on the lede sentence is already ongoing; why not let it reach a conclusion? And maintaining the status quo is routine when a topic is under discussion; in this case the argument for doing so is particularly strong given that there is currently considerable support at the RFC for the existing language. I realize that lengthy discussions can be frustrating but in this case the frustration may have been worsened by the highly optimistic expectations (as Robert McClenon too observed) that all the disputes would be settled and GA review complete by the time of the coronation. Even the current goal of starting the GA review by the end of the week seems implausible since RFC often run for a month. I'd suggest just stepping back a bit and letting the arguments play out. Abecedare (talk
  ) 00:23, 9 May 2023 (UTC)