Anyone, whether directly involved or not, may add evidence to this page. Create your own section and do not edit in anybody else's section. Please limit your main evidence to a maximum 1000 words and 100 diffs and keep responses to other evidence as short as possible. A short, concise presentation will be more effective; posting evidence longer than 1000 words will not help you make your point. Over-long evidence that is not exceptionally easy to understand (like tables) will be trimmed to size or, in extreme cases, simply removed by the Clerks without warning - this could result in your important points being lost, so don't let it happen. Stay focused on the issues raised in the initial statements and on diffs which illustrate relevant behavior.
It is extremely important that you use the prescribed format. Submitted evidence should include a link to the actual page diff in question, or to a short page section; links to the page itself are insufficient. Never link to a page history, an editor's contributions, or a log for all actions of an editor (as those will have changed by the time people click on your links), although a link to a log for a specific article or a specific block log can be useful. Please make sure any page section links are permanent. See simple diff and link guide.
This page is not for general discussion - for that, see the talk page. If you think another editor's evidence is a misrepresentation of the facts, cite the evidence and explain how it is incorrect within your own section. Please do not try to re-factor the page or remove evidence presented by others. If something is put in the wrong place, leave it for the Arbitrators or Clerks to move.
Arbitrators may analyze evidence and other assertions at /Workshop. /Workshop provides for comment by parties and others as well as Arbitrators. After arriving at proposed principles, findings of fact or remedies, Arbitrators vote at /Proposed decision. Only Arbitrators may edit /Proposed decision.
Evidence presented by Fowler&fowler
I will be adding material here as and when I find the time.
Dab's edits to Afrocentrism were improvements
I read the article Afrocentrism for the first time today and looked at some of its editing history. The article was very poorly written when Dab made his first edit. Let us examine just the lead sentence and a brief exchange between Dab and user:deeceevoice to understand the nature of the changes. Contending that "Afrocentrism" is an ideology rather than (academic) approach to the study of history, Dab changed (the previous version) to this:
Afrocentricity or Afrocentrism is a controversial ideology which stresses the distinctive identity and contributions of African cultures to world history.
This edit was challenged by user:deeceevoice, and starting with this edit (with edit summary "not an ideology"), the sentence was changed to:
Afrocentricity, or Afrocentrism, is a controversial approach to the study of history which stresses the distinctive identity and contributions of African cultures to world history.
and still later (by user:deeceevoice) to the following version (with edit summary: "rev wholly unexplained block reverts by Dbachman. if Eurocentrism is merely 'ethnocentric,' then so is Afrocentrism") :
Afrocentricity, or Afrocentrism, is a controversial, ethnocentric approach to the study of history which stresses the distinctive identity and contributions of African cultures to world history.
Finally, the sentences were changed back by Dab to the following version (with edit summary: "sure, it is ethnocentric. But it has nothing to do with the "study of history", it's a cultural movement.")
Afrocentricity or Afrocentrism is an ethnocentric cultural movement which stresses the distinctive identity and contributions of African cultures to world history.
Let us now examine how another tertiary source, Encyclopaedia Britannica describes Afrocentrism. In his signed article on "Afrocentrism," Gerald Early starts with this lead sentence:
Afrocentrism, also called Africentrism, (is a) cultural and political movement whose mainly African American adherents regard themselves and all other blacks as syncretic Africans and believe that their worldview should positively reflect traditional African values.
Clearly Early regards it as a cultural and political movement, therefore more an ideology or cultural movement (Dab's versions) than an (academic) approach to the study of history (user:deeceevoice's version). (Under construction.)
user:futurebird's presentation is one-sided
In her statement above, user:futurebird gives this example of Dab's effort to "shame" deeceevoice, remarks that she/he later saw fit to remove from the talk page discussion, deeming them to be a personal attack. She/he failed to mention (let alone censure or delete) deeceevoice's remarks immediately before Dab's (to bait him) and immediately after (to rub it in): for example:
- these ("time to put up or shut up"), or
- these ("Gee, looks like someone's getting a little twitchy/bitchy when called to account. ;p") (with edit summary, "bitchiness, ad hominem attack. so-ooo unbecoming! tsk, tsk, tsk"), or
- and these ("latest hissy fit").
Why was these examples not presented? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 19:46, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
{Write your assertion here}
Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.
Evidence presented by Ramdrake
User Dbachmann has violated several core behavior policies of Wikipedia
This is taken verbatim from the Dbachmann RfC (3), and I think it factually sums up the problematic behaviors which I have observed Dbachmann having, while on the other hand claiming that he was doing this in order to ensure the respect of Wikipedia's core policies, claim which I'm still having problems explaining properly. I can add more if more is needed.
- 13:56 (Talk:Afrocentrism)
- 15:33(User_talk:Dbachmann)(comparing the edits of another editor to the actions of Willy on Wheels)
- 12:44 (Race_of_ancient_Egyptians) (edit summary: "page full of trolling")
WP:3RR (or just edit warring)
(another, stopped at 3 RV because the article was protected)
- 1-19:15 (Race_of_ancient_Egyptians)
- 2-12:44 (Race_of_ancient_Egyptians)
- 3-13:42 (Race_of_ancient_Egyptians)
Other problematic behavior:
- Insists his position is right, but does not back it up with sources
- From this diff (User_talk:Dbachmann) says: I reverted blatant trolling... Really blatant POV which obviously violates NPOV by "simply declaring either side of the dispute right and the other wrong", may be treated like vandalism and reverted. then goes on to say to justify his own reversion of the work of another editor he disagrees with (Talk:Afrocentrism), with the sole justification that it is "flawed (from) beginning to end", without any other explanation, in essence simply decalring his side of the dispute as "right" and the other as "wrong".
- Condescending attitude
- From this diff (User_talk:Dbachmann) suggesting that a long-time user (Deeceevoice) leave Wikipedia.
- Blatant disregard for Wikipedia rules, in this case speciically WP:3RR
- From this diff (User_talk:Dbachmann), says that edit-warring is necessary.
- Seemingly holding others accountable to a higher standard than he is, when after trying to justify edit warring, he has this to say about other people who edit-war:
- From this diff (User_talk:Dbachmann) "What we need to do is build up enough pressure until somebody can be bothered to enforce policy." (ie. ban/block users who he is reverting) "I would love to do that, but I am afraid my constant anti-trolling efforts have given me a reputation of "incivility" (the standard cry of frustrated pov-pushers) that would make it difficult to appear on the scene as the badass admin acting as the redeeming scourge." (He subsequently asked another admin to do it for him here.)
--Ramdrake 21:55, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
{Write your assertion here}
Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.
Evidence presented by User:futurebird
Lack of civility
Dbachmann comes across as as rude to some users regardless of the quality of their contributions, or how polite they are to him.
- This seems to happen without provocation.
- "Intelligently argued neofascist pov-pushing is just the same to me as dumbly argued Afrocentrist pov-pushing (see below)," This was in reference to my request for civility on his talk page.2007-11-14 16:32:55
- "If you should wish to resume encyclopedic editing, I'll still be here." (directed at me, becuse of the RfC) 2007-11-27 19:50:20
- "Intelligent debate is not possible at present."2007-11-16 18:47:16
- "If this isn't "flawed editing", I am afraid you must live in some parallel universe editing some parallel encyclopedia project, and this confusion is just due to dimensional flux or something. Really. If I am going to invest time in this "debate" try to show a little bit of inclination to display cognitive activity."2007-11-14 13:53:58
- When he dislikes something he seems makes it well known by using excessively pejorative language that is insulting from, even his earliest edits. There are less inflammatory ways to open the same debate and make the same criticisms.
- 2007-11-05 21:37:54 "WP:FRINGE: the article needs to state up front that this is about a racialist ideology, not an academic hypothesis." This is only half true. I think the current state of the article attests to that.
- 11:36, November 6, 2007 Here he calls the critique of Eurocentrism "conspiracy theory," in fact, it is very popular critique of history.
- November 6, 2007 If you don't want to write from "the 18th century Age of Reason" world view, leave the wikipedia, directed at me.
- I tried to explain but it continues: "futurebird, "Afrocentric work" isn't pseudoscholarship. It's non-scholarship." "Projection of this notion into historical times is either pseudo-history (if claiming to be academic), or just ethnocentric fantasy." November 6, 2007
- All of this is before Deeceevoice said anything, This is directed at me, Ramdrake, Jeeny and other users on the talk page.
- Criticism is important, even essential, but in any case, there is no need for the extreme uncompromising strident seeming position. He cites one source that, based on what seems to be his original interpretation of that source, supported the idea, but mostly he seems to just give strident closed directions.
- In The Arbcom comments he calls my requests for civility requests for "political correctness," which is not something I ever said.
- After the RfC had opened he followed me to a new article I was working on: "can we turn this back into a disambiguation page please? ... If 10% of the energy wasted in bickering on Talk:Afrocentrism went into constructive work on topics of African studies, Wikipedia coverage of the field would be several classes better than it is. thanks" Implying that what editors are doing at the Afrocentrism article is "wasted energy" at a time when the article was improving rapidly. 17:08, November 21, 2007
- In fairness, when he followed me to my new article on Encyclopedia Africana he edits showed improvement, and were mostly on target.
- He criticised deeceevoice based on a Arbcom ruling over a year old. Deeceevoice never made it that personal. 14:06, November 14, 2007
- He seems to reject attempts at compromise, apology and mediation:
- [1] here he refuses a scheme aimed at resolving edit-warring on the Afrocentrism page.
- [2] here he is being warned his comments have been taken off the page for being uncivil.
- He is asked to apologize,[3] but responds in a way that JJJamal felt was dismissive.(see: [4])
- He is asked to participate in WP:CEM, but says it would be better handled on his user page.[5]
Evidence presented by Dbachmann
Since no case against me is stated, I see no call to defend myself. Futurebird is esentially letting the world know she doesn't like how I "come across". Duly noted.
Now, for the benefit of people wishing to review this regardless:
- here is my block log. I am not aware of any controversy there.
- here is my exchange with futurebird, where, I argue, I show almost excessive civility and patience, certainly more than can be expected of any editor under WP:NOT#SOCIALNET.
- WP:CIVIL and filibustering: "Civility" doesn't mean falling over yourself with terms of endearment. It means addressing challenges with some decorum even if you happen to think the other party is misbehaving. And it is ostensibly incivil to waste the time of dozens of other editors with unsubstantial bickering over trifles. Or if not incivil, it certainly violates WP:ENC, which is the only reason I am even here.
- regarding Bakasuprman (talk · contribs) and his merry team of nationalist trolls jumping into the fray at the RfC, I hope it is sufficient to point to this statement to establish beyond doubt my own position regarding ethnic or nationalist pov-pushing, and allegations of "ethnic contempt", and by extension the position of those who wish to see my influence removed. I do hope the arbcom will consider putting an end to this sort of harassment. My talkpage is still semi-protected, and I have been being intermittently harrassed for fully two years (sometimes creatively, sometimes less so). I accept that my patrolling of nationalist topics will expose me to hostility, and I have no problem with that. But I expect the community to stand up for me when the nationalist and ethnic supremacist editors, frustrated by not getting their desired article revisions to stick, gang up against me.
- since we are all already wasting time here, I would like to suggest we try to make it worthwhile and actually achieve something of benefit. Thus, I suggest this case be renamed to Afrocentrism, and the arbcom look into the entire history of the sad mess that is Talk:Race of ancient Egyptians. If the arbcom can do some good here, it is recognizing the interminal trolling and pov-pushing that has been going on there since 2005, and which my involvement was designed to address. This article is a disgrace for Wikipedia, and it will not make progress unless the arbcom imposes special restrictions on users that try to derail an editing process strictly following Wikipedia policy of "report neutrally on academic discourse, period".
dab (𒁳) 09:21, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
{Write your assertion here}
Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.
Evidence presented by {your user name}
before using the last evidence template, please make a copy for the next person
{Write your assertion here}
Place argument and diffs which support your assertion; for example, your first assertion might be "So-and-so engages in edit warring", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits to specific articles which show So-and-so engaging in edit warring.
{Write your assertion here}
Place argument and diffs which support the second assertion; for example, your second assertion might be "So-and-so makes personal attacks", which should be the title of this section. Here you would show specific edits where So-and-so made personal attacks.