The lengths that Arbcom is going to in order not to answer some of
the most basic questions about Prioryman, their involvement with his return and his editing of the RFC is quite astonishing. Risker makes a strange case for Prioryman not being party to The one case I doubt anyone was suggesting he be a party to.
QUOTE
Prioryman did not comment at the request for arbitration in any way, so it is inappropriate to say that he participated in an Arbcom case. He participated (perhaps inappropriately) in an RFC/U, which is a dispute resolution process the Committee does not monitor and over which it has no jurisdiction. I would object to Prioryman being named a party in the Cirt/Jayen case ... Risker (talk) 22:41, 24 July 2011 (UTC)
Cool Hand Luke apparently doesn't know that Motion 1 divided the case into two separate cases - (a) and (b).
QUOTE
It was suggested elsewhere. What do you mean by "motion (b)" anyway? Cool Hand Luke 00:08, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
When Jayen very astutely points out that obscuring Chris' Wikipedia identity couldn't possibly help him with off-wiki harassment Roger Davies gives what appears to be a truly bizarre answer.
QUOTE
Don't you think it's unwise to be so emphatic about the origin or nature of threats you know nothing about? And, no, this isn't an invitation for a speculation-fest, it's a general observation (IMG:
smilys0b23ax56/default/wink.gif) Roger Davies talk 07:07, 25 July 2011 (UTC)
The only possible scenario I can think of here is that someone has threatened Chris not to participate in Wikipedia at all, either directly or that such a threat exists indirectly. If that is the case, then I feel the same way about this as I felt about what the Arbcom did for Cirt. If Chris' editing of Wikipedia, as with Cirt's, was putting him in so much danger off-wiki that the committee feels that it is appropriate to betray the trust of the community by obscuring his identity
then it is surely completely irresponsible to enable Chris to continue editing Wikipedia in the first place. This is particularly the case since, as many editors including Will Beback (surprisingly) have pointed out, it is nearly impossible for editors to return in this manner and not have their former identity discovered at some point or another. If such editors are in such grave danger off-wiki this would mean the committee is allowing them to get into even greater danger by sneaking around until such time they are caught.
Of course, I highly doubt that this is what is actually going on. I do not think the danger is so grave. It is more likely that there was some minimal harassment, and they they worried that Chris would get harassed again, after his return for doing the same things he did back then. So they they tried to disconnect him from his former identity to protect him from future harassers. That scenario, becomes particularly troubling since Chris also received a get out of jail free card for his past transgressions by vanishing during an Arbitration case he was part of. In the end, whether the Arbs are conscious of this or not, they are basically protecting a user with a particular POV, from the type of anger and resentment that his style of POV pushing inevitably causes. They are also saying to the entire community that it is OK to disrupt the project and not suffer consequences if you are ChrisO or Cirt, who's POV pushing is apparently
of the right kind.
I also think this situation brings up the very detrimental effects that having no humility whatsoever causes to community processes on Wikipedia. There is rarely any humility on Wikipedia when someone has been exposed for doing something wrong or stupid, and this is particularly true of people in positions of power. That fact, as opposed to calculated manipulation, probably sits at the heart of the reaction we're seeing from the Arbs. It is clear that they have done something wrong here, but they will never admit it out of a sheer lack of humility. Instead they'll wikilawyer and make nonsensical arguments to diffuse the situation. I think this feature of Wiki culture is probably also ubiquitous other internet social venues, and I think an Achilles heal to them all as well.
Moderator's note: Several off-topic posts were moved to this thread, which requires you to be a registered member before you can viciously assault yourself by reading it.
And now we have an RFC, and what's more, an ArbCom case
