Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Prem Rawat/Evidence

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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.

Contents


[edit] Evidence presented by User:Jossi

[edit] Backround on my involvement

  • Jossi (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves • rights)
  • I declared my affiliation: on September 1, 2004, a few months after my first edit to Wikipedia.
  • I made a further disclosure, User:Jossi/Disclosure, on October 2006.
  • As of March 16 2008, I have performed a total of 61,987 contributions to Wikipedia, of which 22,721 in article namespace, and 11,563 in article talk namespace.
  • In the course of my participation in this aticle over the years I have provided the vast majority of scholarly sources for the article (with the exception of scholarly sources in other languages than English and a few others), including works by Gordon J. Melton, John Bowker, Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi, E. Fahlbusch, J. M. Lochman, Charles Lippy, Ron Geaves, Rosemary Goring, Jeffrey K. Hadden, Stephen J. Hunt, Raymond Lee, Keneth Lee, James R. Lewis, Meredith McGuire, Tim Miller, Spencer Palmer, William Pryor, Lucy Dupertius, and other non-scholarly authors such as David V. Barrett, Sophia Collier, Andrea Cagan, and others, providing full cites for other editors to evaluate at Talk:Prem_Rawat/scholars. I have also contributed a number of WP:SELFPUB sources for editors' evaluation.
  • In the last year (since March 16, 2007) I made a total of 64 edits to the Prem Rawat article, of which 47 edits where minor edits, such as correcting cite formatting, or adding refs; 6 edits where removal of obvious vandalism; and two of the remaining 11 edits performed in these 12 months were adding well-sourced criticism found in scholarly sources: diff, and diff, in response to a GA review performed by User:Vassyana circa March 2007.
  • Despite these minimal edits over the last 12 months, after receiving community feedback, I declared my intent to limit myself to talk page discussions only - (February 10, 2008.)
  • During the same time I engaged in vigorous debates in talk page, providing sources when requested, and assisted editors on ways to improve the article, while encouraging them to be respectful to each other and avoid misusing the talk page for off-topic comments, soapboxing and other obvious disruption.
  • On February 18, 2008 I proposed mediation as next step of dispute resolution, which was supported by User:Will Beback, but there were no takers. [1]
  • On March 4, 2008, upon a proposal made by User:Will Beback and myself, the article was placed on community-enforced 1RR and disruption probation. This helped for a while, only to be later ignored (See AN/I reports: 1,2, 3).
  • During 2007, I worked alongside other editors on the article Lord of the Universe (documentary) (a satirical documentary highly critical of Prem Rawat), which attained GA status on December 1, 2007.
  • I have informed all editors, when needed, to respect Wikipedia's behavioral policies, such as WP:CIVILITY, to avoid soapboxing or using talk pages as a discussion forum, as well as encouraging editors to avoid edit-warring and to look for ways to find common ground and workable compromises. I issued warnings to editors, regardless of affiliation or declared or undeclared POVs, for example asking Momento to re-consider his editing behavior, warning PatW for making personal attacks, as I would have done in any other article I have come across in which such disruption was made evident.
  • Despite unsubstantiated claims, I have never used or misused my admin privileges or exerted "administrator influence" (whatever that means) in this or any other related or unrelated articles. My contributions to talk page have been exclusively within my privileges as an editor amongst other editors on equal terms.
  • My comments in the different noticeboards which I actively monitor and participate, such as WP:V/N, WP:BLP/N, WP:AN, WP:AN/I, WP:WQA, and WP:AN/3RR have been consistent, regardless if these comments were related to the subject of this arbitration, or not, or to involved editors or not.

Having said all this, I know I am not without fault, and acknowledge that I may have erred from time to time. I would hope that these faults would be assessed in the context of some intense personal attacks and misleading claims made against me and the subject of the article, on and off-wiki.

I consider myself a private person, and as such, I am unwilling to disclose any personal information besides what I have already disclosed. Given the speculation on and off-wiki about my involvement with the subject of this case, I will be willing to consider disclosing, in chambers, additional information to the ArbCom, if the ArbCom sees this as necessary and upon their request only.

[edit] Requesting community input

Requests for community input include several WP:RFCs and reviews:

[edit] User:PatW has misused talk pages, user pages, and engaged in personal attacks

PatW (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) has been warned numerous times for personal attacks, and talk page disruption.

  • Despite the warnings, PatW continues misusing talk page discussions with long diatribes, baiting editors, expressing personal opinions about the subject of the article and its editors, etc.
  • PatW has made a total of 1,084 edits to Wikipedia since his first edit on April 2006, of which only 22 edits are in article namespace. All other edits are to talk pages and exclusively about the subject of this case.

[edit] Some examples of recent personal attacks

Per Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive383#User:PatW

[edit] Some examples of WP:NOT#SOAP and WP:NOT#FORUM violations

[edit] User:Francis Schonken has injected himself in the dispute, disrupted editing, and sabotaged the community enforced article probation

Francis Schonken (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) has tried to cast himself as a "neutral editor", but has failed to assist editors in the content dispute. Rather than offer help he seems to have decided to take it upon himself to "fix" the article. Being bold is a good thing sometimes, but dismissing other editors as "POV pushers" is unhelpful, as it is edit-warring with them. Evidence follows.

[edit] Background
  • Francis Schonken re-started editing the article after more than a year of not editing, reverting to his last edit at the time. His last edit January 19, 2007 - his February 8, 2008 reversion. Despite the obvious disruption, I welcomed his participation, and encouraged him to work alongside others: [5], and [6].
  • Several editors, (involved editors and others as well) alerted him of the mistake he was making in deleting hundreds of contributions and losing many sources and material. He reverted back to to the old version twice first revert - Feb 8, 0:52, second revert - Feb 8 12:32, desisting after other non-involved editors convinced him to stop. The article was protected on Feb 9 due to the edit-warring.
  • On Feb 12, Francis again reverted to the same old version diff, only to be reverted by User:Sarcasticidealist, and uninvolved editor, with a edit summary of reverting a very unhelpful step in the consensus process diff
  • Since returning to edit the article (Feb 8, 2008), Francis made 128 edits to Prem Rawat, 22 marked as minor edits. From the remaining 106 edits, 19 were reversions of other editors' contributions. diff. He reverted edits by Momento (7 reverts), Janice Rowe (2 reverts), Rainer P. (1 revert), and Louise.Po (1 revert)

[edit] Francis Schonken sabotaged the community-enforced 1RR probation
  • Francis Schonken objected to the 1RR probation proposal [7], on the grounds that it it bends good guidance in all sort of directions in order to give POV-pushers an unjustifiable advantage.
  • Diff of 1RR probation notice
  • After the probation was implemented, he dismissed the probation on grounds of "wikilawyering" and "confusing wording"
  1. First 1RR parole violation AN/I Report
  2. Second 1RR parole violation AN/I report, which he dismissed with claims that the ANI report was "belligerent filibustering", and calls to impose restrictions on me'][8]:
    • 23:18, March 15, 2008 ((Undid revision 198499325 by Momento (talk) this is not what Hunt says)
    • 23:04, March 15, 2008 (Undid revision 198509229 by Momento (talk) not covered by the sources here; is covered in the section with other sources)
  • The 1RR probation wording was unambiguous (my highlight): Editors violating 1RR (one revert per editor per day), or that engage in disruptive editing may incur escalating blocks performed by uninvolved admins, or have other reasonable restrictions placed on them in relation to these topics.
  • Francis as en experienced contributor should known by now the meaining of page probation, and what 1RR probation, means: If someone reverts your change, don't re-revert it, but discuss it with them (per Wikipedia:1RR).

[edit] Francis Schonken takes a surprising lenient attitude towards WP:NPA

Witnessing a vicious personal attack by User:PatW [9], this is what Francis had to say to him "Pat, Jossi interprets your comment above (and other comments on this page) as a personal attack." diff, instead of refactoring, or at minimum placing a warning in his talk page or at WP:WQA as customary.

[edit] Francis Schonken does nothing when asked to intervene in a BLP violation

When a BLP violation was posted by an anon user,on Feb 29, 2008) I asked Francis as a "non-involved" editor to take action and refactor the offending comment.[10] He did not respond, and did nothing. After no one did anything I refactored it myself,[11].

[edit] Summary

Francis Schonken came to help with the article upon the publishing of the The Register article, and despite his claims that he came as a neutral editor, he has injected himself in the dispute, and has shown very poor judgment in his interactions with editors he openly describe as "POV pushers", by applying the mistaken behavior that it is OK to revert their contributions because of his negative assessment of them. Most, if not all, reverts and ANI complains have been exclusively about editors that he has assessed as having a pro bias, while being overtly lenient about others. It seems that for Francis, dispute resolution does not apply to him. He objected to the attempts to dispute resolution, such as the negotiated community-enforced 1RR probation, and when the proposal passed it was not too soon that he sabotaged the probation on the basis of poor wording and by violating it, showing again a disregard for WP's dispute resolution process.

[edit] User:Momento applies a narrow interpretation of WP:BLP

Momento (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log), edits almost exclusively on Prem Rawat and related articles

  • Momento has a tendency to apply a narrow interpretation of WP:BLP which got him into trouble despite warnings.
  • Since Feb 8 (date of the The Register article), Momento performed approximately 148 edits to Prem Rawat
  • Momento has been recently blocked twice for WP:3RR, based on his narrow interpretation of WP:BLP upon AN/3RR notices placed since that date, about which he argued he was acting in applying BLP policy.

[edit] Replies to other evidence presented

[edit] @User:Matthew Stannard

  1. Multiple "press releases" have been posted under my name, but have not been posted by me or by the Prem Rawat Foundation. Evidence of this is the email addresses used in these postings: Example 1 [12] posted October 2007 using an email address associated with a critical site (drek.org) drek.maharaji@gmail.com. Example 2: [13] with an email address of a free email service maharajitprf@gmail.com. With the exception of one link, all these "press release" sites are free services that anyone can post to under any name.
    As far as I can see the Foundation's press releases are made through PRWeb [14] and linked from their press releases on their website. Example [15] which links to PR Web [16]. The email address featured in these press releases are from the tprg.org TLD.
    I can only speculate why someone would want to associate my name with these press releases.
  2. Regarding this redirect, check the diff. I was just correcting a mistake. The previous version contained a redirect and the text of an old version of that article.
  3. Regarding user Prem Rawat (talk · contribs), he was not "banned" as Matthew Stannard alleges, but softblocked[17] and encouraged to register with a different name [18], due to obvious impersonation and other shenanigans which can be read on his talk page. See User_talk:Prem_Rawat#Register_with_a_new_name.

[edit] @User:Francis Schonken

  1. PatW's behavior: PatW has been warned numerous times, and has been unable to stop the recurring personal attacks and abuse of talk pages, despite previous claims that he will stop, or that he will stop participating.[19]
  2. Kim Bruning's advice: Kim's advice and interaction with PatW was very useful, although it was not a symmetrical issue and should not be framed as such. WP:CIVILITY is not optional, but a requirement.
  3. Have a well-written article on Prem Rawat — Finally something we agree on. I would only add "and stable."
  4. Do what I can to keep Wikipedia out of negative press. — Negative press from the likes of The Register's Cade Metz [20], where there before this and will continue after this despite any thing you or I could do.
  5. there were more personal attacks by Jossi, for the convenience of this case, and unless compelled, I will limit myself to a single example) I hereby challenge and compel Francis to present such evidence.
  6. History of editing restrictions: Wikipedia works by the building of consensus through talk page discussions. If these fail, there is dispute resolution. People have the right to decide not to edit or not to participate in discussions, but that does not give them the right to complain that the article is not of quality if they chose not tpo participate. Yes, we know it is sometimes a hard and tedious process, but that is the way it works in Wikipedia and until a better way is found, that is the way it is.
  7. Jossi's conduct during Momento's third WP:AN3 listing - Francis forgets to mention Luna Santin's comment on that discussion, and forgets to include the evidence that he and others were also engaged in edit wars during that time. I proposed that a uninvolved admin consider page protection as a temporary measure to encourage editors to discuss and seek consensus. The diffs that demonstrate the edit-warring by several editors, are available here.

[edit] @User:John Brauns

  1. Please see Conduct on Arbitration pages. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 22:22, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  2. Jossi now claims to be a wide-ranging Wikipedian, but his beginnings on Wikipedia tell a very different story. Aye! I will neither be the first nor the last person, to start editing Wikipedia narrowly, only to get bitten by the bug! I took the test, and I'd better not share the results :) ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:15, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] @User:Maelefique‎

  1. My response to the question about the reliability of sources has been consistent with other cases. Namely, I have always asserted that editorial judgment about suitability of material, in the context of all other existing policies needs to be exercised, in particular in BLPs.[21] See the lead of WP:NPOV for a good formulation about this. You can also read an essay I worked on with others; Wikipedia:Evaluating_sources, which derives some of its text from Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view#Neutrality and verifiability
  2. I have nominated several editors for adminship. And yes, you are more "verbose" when you nominate a user, than when you are expressing your supporting for a user.
  3. Thanks for the clarification regarding your use of a sockpuppet account to participate in this case, but please see Wikipedia:SOCK#Alternative_account_notification. Please note that neither me or ArbCom would have known this unless you disclosed it. My comments regarding your evidence stand, regardless. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:58, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] @User:PatW

  1. Unfortunately most of your evidence is to archive pages and not to diffs so it is difficult, if not impossible, to evaluate your comments against the evidence.
  2. I will respond only to this one: Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_24#Jossi.27s_Conflict_of_Interest posted by User:Sylviecyn. You can see there the comments by Jayjg: [22], Vassyana, and JPGordon (by some reason some diffs from May 17 are not obtainable, so I have anchored these comments, for easy access.) ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:01, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
  3. RE: Ex-premie "Hate Group" Allegations. What is the point of bringing diffs from November 2004? Should we bring also as evidence the disruption created by the many SPAs of that time. I don't think so. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 14:46, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] @User:Cla68

I do not know what is the relevance of Citizendium in this arbitration, but in any case, see the the whole thread - The initial post was by a "Nik w", who signs as "A. C." ("Andrew Carpenter", maybe?) [23]; the reply was given by Dr. Robert H. Stockman, Religious Studies, DePaul University,[24], followed by my reply [25].

[edit] @User:Msalt

  1. Thank you for the diffs at Actions of User:Jossi Have Encouraged This Tendentious Editing (I know it is a lot of work). I thank you for that evidence , as anyone looking into the diffs (rather than just your commentary on these diffs) will see that I have acted appropriately. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:21, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
  2. Furthermore, anybody reviewing the 190 or so diffs presented as evidence, would easily note the massive gap between what these diffs show and the assertions made about them.

[edit] @User:Will Beback

The table of edits can be improved for a better representation:

  1. to weight the percentages over the years that editors have contributed to the article
  2. or to display last 12 month edits

[edit] Evidence presented by User:John Brauns

[edit] Backround to Jossi's role on Wikipedia

I am the webmaster of websites ex-premie.org and prem-rawat-talk.org where former followers of Prem Rawat give testimony on their time as followers of Rawat and discuss the topic. I also front other websites where the true owners are unwilling to risk the inevitable harrassment by current followers of Rawat by publishing their names.

It is my assertion that Jossi has no ‘conflict’ of interest in posting on Wikipedia because a conflict implies two or more interests. Jossi’s sole reason for being on Wikipedia is to present his Master, Prem Rawat, in as positive a light as possible, and he has done what is necessary to reach admin status to help do this. I’ll try to explain why I make this assertion. It is impossible to understand Jossi's role here without understanding more about the Rawat cult in a wider context than Wikipedia. From the early 80s to the late 90s, Rawat deliberately and pretty much successfully avoided all publicity. Until ex-followers started posting on usenet in 1996, an internet search for Rawat under any of his names would have yielded no results. I heard Rawat himself diss the internet as of no value. Then the ex-followers presence became one that the cult could not ignore, so in 1999 Rawat changed his mind, and put up his first website, and followers followed suit. Around this time the cult embarked on what is called the 'legitimacy' campaign to change Rawat’s image from the rich child guru from the 70s. I can give evidence of this campaign if the committee require it. Part of this campaign has been to denigrate Rawat's former followers that post on the internet. Again, I can give evidence of this if required.

I mention all this because Jossi has been at the heart of the attempt to establish legitimacy for Rawat on the internet from the start. He was the webmaster of Rawat's first website in 1999, as well as the webmaster of related websites such as Rawat's A/V company, Dunrite, and a followers' music website, Eversound. Again, if Jossi denies this (I doubt he would), I can provide evidence.

Jossi now claims to be a wide-ranging Wikipedian, but his beginnings on Wikipedia tell a very different story. His first 500 Wikipedia contributions, over 7 months, were almost exclusively on Rawat related articles:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions&dir=prev&limit=500&contribs=user&target=Jossi&namespace=0

The only exceptions were a handful of edits to articles related to graphics design, and, tellingly, an edit to the WP:Hate Group article establishing that apostates of new religious movements could be viewed as hate groups. It is clear that during that time his was a prime example of a single purpose account that he repeatedly criticises others for. It is only later that Jossi widens his editing to other articles, although a check of the articles he authored will show that many are close to stubs. See Some of the Articles I have Created, -

One of the three important tenets of the Rawat belief system is service to Prem Rawat. Jossi is a dedicated follower, and is willing to do what it takes to please his Master.

Regarding Jossi's evidence above, I am sure it is largely accurate. What is missing is that when he acknowledged in 2004 that he is a 'proud student' of Rawat's, he declined to mention his involvement in Rawat's websites, which was a clear breach of WP:COI. Also, in all his edits, I have never seen him revert a pro-Rawat edit, regardless of the quality of the source. I have asked him to show me such a revert and he was unable or unwilling to do so. I have been asked to produce diffs to support this allegation. It is difficult to prove a negative, but here are two recent minor examples of poorly sourced pro-Rawat statements that had been in place some time before I edited them:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Prem_Rawat&diff=prev&oldid=149642855

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Prem_Rawat&diff=prev&oldid=181822308

It would be much easier for Jossi to produce, from his thousands of edits to Rawat related articles, a few examples where he has reverted, without being prompted, pro-Rawat edits. If he does so I will withdraw this allegation.

I appreciate that my evidence is not the kind that is expected here, and some of the committee may dismiss it as anecdotal or simply untrue, but I believe it is important that you understand the context of Jossi's involvement here. If Jossi really does believe in the Wiki project, he should be happy to avoid any possibility of further tarnishing Wikipedia's reputation by absenting himself from all Rawat related articles. This should apply to other long-time Rawat followers such as Momento and Rumiton. Myself, and, I believe, other former followers, would be happy to do the same and allow the article to be edited by neutral editors. The problem is that until the Register article, no else was interested in the subject.

A final word about my own contributions to talk pages. I have occasionally made comments to other editors about publishing information on them outside Wikipedia, and I have made other comments not related to the articles in question, that I have apologised for, and do so here again. --John Brauns (talk) 01:14, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Missing Sources from the Rawat article

Someone asked me which sources are not represented in the Rawat article, so here is my answer.

1. Press Articles. Genuine press articles about Rawat have usually been fair, and have usually been critical. Because of the publicity blackout that Rawat instituted from the mid 80s to the late 90s there have been very few recent press articles, but there are many from the 70s. The articles on Rawat's foundation's website (http://www.tprf.org/press-room/magazines.htm) are all paid advertorials in obscure magazines, but there is a good collection on my website, http://ex-premie.org/pages/press_room.htm and http://www.ex-premie.org/gallery/news/index.html - none of which are listed on Rawat's site. There were links to a couple of these articles in the Wikipedia Rawat article but these have been removed.

2. The book 'Who is Guru Maharaj Ji'.

This book by follwer Charles Cameron published by Bantam in 1973, includes the text on the front cover 'The authentic authorised story of the 15-year-old Guru...'. Copyright was owned by Shri hans Productions which was one of the trading names of Divine Light Mission (now Elan Vital). The back of the book includes the text 'Why do more than six million people around the world claim he is the greatest incarnation of God that ever trod on the face of this planet?'. Rennie Davis writes in the intro 'Guru maharaj Ji is the Lord of the Universe...'. This book should be the basic source for how Rawat presented himself in 1973.

3. Elan Vital/Divine Light Mission Publications from the 70s.

These include transcripts of Rawat's speeches and those of his followers, including his wife. Whenever discussion of using these publications as sources has been discussed on the Rawat talk pages, the argument against is that everyone can pick out quotes supporting their point of view. Some of the quotes, however, leave the reader in no doubt that former followers' version of Rawat's history is the correct one.

4. The website, ex-premie.org.

The basic problem with Rawat as a notable person is that his notability stems from his claim in the early 70s that he could show people God face to face. Without that claim few would have come to him, and we would not be here having this discussion. Unfortunately there have been few press articles and no academic studies of Rawat in recent years. I have no doubt that were a reputable academic to research a paper on Rawat now, and were to examine dispassionately the claims made by former and current followers, using Rawat's speeches from the above mentioned publications, the resulting paper would pretty much support the version of Rawat's history that former followers put forward. Unfortunately, no such academic has found Rawat interesting enough to write such a paper, so the best information we have is the over 100 first hand testimonies of former followers on ex-premie.org, including his former right hand men. This site is currently excluded as a source because of WP:BLP, and I understand why those rules are in place. But my site has been in existence for over 10 years, and the most damaging allegations against Rawat have been published for over 7 years. This is not a transient blog, but a well documented account of Rawat's history, including named, corroborated eye-witness accounts of Rawat's behaviour. Elan Vital claimed copyright on the text of Rawat's speeches and other historical documents, but failed in their legal attempt to get them removed. This adds provenance to the content. I believe WP:BLP should be amended to cater for situations such as Rawat, where clear evidence of his life is available, but he is not sufficiently notable for an independent study to have been taken. --John Brauns (talk) 00:38, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

5. The website, mikefinch.com

Mike Finch was one of Rawat's earliest western followers, and was the person who organised Rawat's first trip to the UK, and helped organise his first trip to the USA. He was an instructor authorised by Rawat to reveal the 'secret' meditation techniques, and was a loyal followers for over 30 year. He has a PhD, and his website should be considered a reliable source for the Rawat article.

[edit] Replies to other evidence presented

[edit] @User:Jossi

Jossi suggests that I summarise this evidence. As I explained, it is impossible to understand Jossi's role on Wikipedia without understanding the background. This is already a summary, and I will not further summarise. Of course if the clerk deletes this then there is nothing I can do, but this arbitration will be the poorer for that. --John Brauns (talk) 21:23, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

I thank Jossi for recommending yet another link to Wikipedia policies/guidlines/rules, etc, but I have read that particular link and my evidence does not transgress it one iota. --John Brauns (talk) 00:40, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] @User:Isabella

Refering to my discussion forum Isabella states:- "Although they (the forum administrators) now moderate postings and edit comments by its members that may bring a criminal liability upon this forum or cross the line into hate speech". For the record, in the over two years the forum has been in existence we have never had to edit or delete posts for the reasons Isabella claims. --John Brauns (talk) 23:51, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] @User:Jayen466

I have looked at the diffs Jayen posted that supposedly show Jossi reverting poorly sources pro-Rawat edits, and frankly for some of them I can't see much difference between the two versions in terms of which is more pro-Rawat. Other edits appear to be part of edit wars where Jossi, to maintain his admin status, had to intervene. I am refering to poorly sourced pro-Rawat edits such as those I linked to above, where no neutral or anti-Rawat editors were active, where Jossi, unprompted, recognised that the edit did not meet WP:BLP and reverted the edit. --John Brauns (talk) 01:18, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] @User:Momento

Momento falsely claims that I will do what ever I can to denigrate Rawat. This is untrue - I will not lie, unlike Rawat's supporters. The critical information on my website is true. Momento also claims; 'As an editor he usually confines himself to the "Talk" page. He never removes any vandalism or obvious BLP violations.' I have made very few edits (about 100) in the four years since I first contributed to Wikipedia, so it is not my place to police the articles. However, I did support the removal of the picture of Rawat's house on copyright grounds, and in the early days of the article I supported not including Rawat's protection of his paedophile lieutenant, Jagdeo, in the article. For the record, given the grossly distorted picture of Rawat's life in his Wikipedia article, I have little faith in the accuracy of any other Wikipedia article. My only purpose here is to do what I can to make the Rawat articles a little more reflective of the truth than they are, but I do not think that even this aim is worth much of my time. --John Brauns (talk) 01:18, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by user:Andries

[edit] Brief history of the article

Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_28#Brief_history_of_editing_principles_used_for_this_article

After user:Vassyana's failed Good article review a complete condensed re-write had been made by user:Momento and user:Rumiton, supported by Jossi that replaced a longer version that had a degree of consensus. They rejected all my and User:Sylviecyn's objections to their version, both in the draft period and afterwards. 12:51, 13 May 2007 Diff comment by Andries on Momento's and Rumiton's complete rewrite Numerous other re-writes had been made and proposed by other contributors but the version by Rumiton and Momento remained unreverted in spite of my many criticisms. Then I decided that mediation was necessary. When the mediation between Momento and I was rejected. See Wikipedia:Requests_for_mediation/Rejected/28#Prem_Rawat_3, I became powerless to prevent the article becoming one-sided. Then the article received well-deserved bad publicity from the register. (I had no prior knowledge of the register article until it appeared.).

This register article brought in some new people in among others Francis Schonken who had little prior involvement in the article. Andries (talk) 09:46, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Momento's behavior

Momento repeatedly removed undisputed sourced facts 29 November 2007, 29 November 2007 Andries (talk) 19:03, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Andries' behavior

Andries has occasionally made mistake in paraphrasing sources, both in Rawat related articles and in unrelated articles. [26] He attributes these mistakes to his habit of quick but not very accurately reading of sources. [27] [28]Andries (talk) 09:24, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Andries hereby denies that he is a (former) follower of Rawat. Andries (talk) 08:25, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jossi's attitude towards Andries

Jossi has repeatedly been unwilling or unable to assume Andries' good faith regarding his contributions related to Rawat. [29] 14 October 2007 "You have zero credibility in this project as it pertains to any assumptions of good faith, Andries."


Andries thinks that Jossi's attitute towards him is partially due to his occasional mistakes in paraphrasing sources in combination with the hypersensitivity of the subject and opposing POVs of Jossi and Andries. Andries hereby admits that he has sometimes focused on providing sources for statements that can be intended as critical, but this grew partially out of the habit of Momento to challenge anything critical. Andries hereby vehemently denies that Jossi's opinion that Andries is a bad faith editor has any basis in reality and hereby states that the fraction and seriousness of the mistakes that he made in Rawat related articles is lower and less serious than the mistakes that he made in in unrelated articles. Andries (talk) 09:56, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Maelefique

[edit] Opening Statement and Observations

I have no doubt, that on unrelated topics, Jossi is, as described, a great Wikipedian, however, we are talking about one topic, and one topic only, and that would be the sphere of articles that reflect on Prem Rawat. Other unassociated articles should not be included in this discussion here, they have no bearing whatsoever on the claims made against him here. I have no grudge against Jossi personally and was completely unaware of his and Prem Rawat's existence until earlier this year. Unlike other editors who seem to have left out some pertinent information[30][31], I do not have a conflict of interest that I am aware of. I have never been a premie, am not a premie now, and have never knowingly worked for any organization that is run for, by, or in association with, Prem Rawat. Nor do I have any prior affiliation of any kind with any of the other editors I have interacted with on this topic.

[edit] COI and Common Sense (arguably the least common of the senses...)

On a common sense basis, if I work for a company, and I also do some freelance journalism, and I spend some of my time criticizing my employer, is it not somewhat obvious that the vast majority of companies would frown on this practice, possibly leading to career problems? On the other hand, if I was to only write glowing reviews of my employer, I'm sure they would be fine with it. I have never seen Jossi write anything critical of Prem Rawat, this is basically what the term "Conflict of Interest" refers to, whether he admits it or not.

[edit] Administrator Influence

Whether Jimbo thinks so or not, there is a certain prestige that comes along with being a WP admin/janitor, especially for editors familiar with the system. So when Jossi makes a suggestion that editors should change certain things it should be in no way surprising to see other pro-Rawat editors jump in to help out minutes later, 3 minutes later in this case. As well as a similar effect here, leading, again, to another Pro-Rawat editor doing Jossi's bidding here 2 hours later. As an analogy, it's like having the cool guy from your high school in the car with you, egging you on. And conversely, when he admonishes someone else, it naturally has a momentary chilling effect. Rightly or wrongly, these things happen[32][33]. Ironicly Jossi says above that he has never exerted "administrator influence" (quotes are his), and then immediately says "(whatever that means)"... well if you don't know what it means, a) you should find out, and b) you can't really claim you haven't done it, can you?!

Another example of his attempt at influencing the process is here[34], where he is defending a pro-Rawat editor who was nominated for admin status, nothing wrong with that, except there is a lot of criticism for someone who Jossi seems so enthusiastic about. In fact, Jossi uses 163 words here in support of this pro-Rawat editor, who apparently engages in this exact same POV pushing issue with Rawat. Attempting to marshall his forces? (for reference,In terms of words typed, it takes his next 21 votes[35][36][37][38] [39][40][41][42][43][44] [45][46][47][48][49][50][51] [52][53][54] in support for admins, combined, for him to equal the verbosity he shows for this single pro-Prem Rawat editor.

[edit] Jossi attempts to subvert the "Lord of the Universe" article as well

Jossi indicates he worked on the Lord of the Universe (documentary), reading the talk page shows more of the same POV pushing that we are discussing here.

  • Jossi tries to change the context of the article [55].
  • Jossi tries to have the film removed from the "Documentary Film" category[56],[57],[58]and placed in a less prestigious category.
  • Jossi, having successfully removed a director's name, without providing a source, attempts to have a quote removed from the cover of the video.
  • Jossi wants a statement about levitation removed, distorts the issue, with facts not in evidence.

[edit] Jossi is not helpful unless it suits his POV

Above, Jossi says "During the same time I engaged in vigorous debates in talk page, providing sources when requested,".

[edit] Not Even-Handed When Dealing With Advocates and Critics of Prem Rawat

Jossi is no stranger to making threats of censure, or of pointing out WP policy violations on the talk page to people who seem critical of Rawat, or opposed to his POV,as shown by other editors on this page. And yet, the only time I can find any reference to any pro-Prem Rowat editor being reprimanded in any way, is somewhat privately, on that user's talk page, not the in the article's talk page, in public as it were, where all the dissenting voices are challenged by Jossi.

[edit] Behaviour Regarding the Ex-Premie Disambiguation Page

[This] was posted on the Prem Rawat talk page, I think it speaks strongly towards jossi's bias, and pretty much speaks for itself when you look at the diffs for the disambiguation page, specifically, [[59]][[60]][[61]] Edit summary is "this is the correct meaning". So if I beome a premie, and then quit, unless I complain about it, I'm not an ex-premie? And if I do, I become a member of a "small group" (ambiguous term at best)? How is that the "correct meaning"?

[edit] Closing observations

Jossi says he has attemped to enforce civility and WP's behavioral/editing policies. I would say he is engaging in WP's version of Vexatious Litigation in an attempt to slow down the altering of the article, and to grind down the other authors, to "wait them out". Sooner or later, as is evidenced by the amount of editors that come and go on this article, many editors who do not have a "personal" connection to the subject get tired of bashing their head against the wall, and leave the article, Jossi however remains ever-vigilant.

My apologies, I am also a little over my 1000 words.

[edit] Replies to Jossi's rebuttal of my evidence

(I checked with the clerk, this is allowed, and kept as brief as possible)

  1. You were obviously evasive on the LA Times issue, you were quite aware of the context, and specifically asked about it for a specific piece of information. Assuming you hadn't lost your "common sense and good editorial judgment", you should have been able to easily say "Yes, in this context, the LA Times should be a credible source", or less believably, "No I don't believe the LA Times is a credible source for this". Either way probably would have ended the discussion and avoided taking the issue to another forum for a ruling. Which of course found it to be credible (diff links to all this supplied previously, above). However, you would have had to disagree with a pro-Rawat editor to accept the legitimacy of the LA Times.
  2. Interesting, that of the first 22 (more, but I only counted that far), only 1 was nominated, and he/she happens to be someone who supports your views and had the very same claims made during his review, as those claimed against you here.
  3. Completely false[62]. Jossi and I have had this conversation before on his talk page. There is no purpose to discussing my other edits on WP, I have stated above that this account is my sole interaction with Prem Rawat's sphere of articles, I will go one step further and say I have never edited any article that I am aware of who's subject was any religion/religious figure with any user account (or anonymously). I have read the link Jossi is referring to, and I am not in violation. An observation, Jossi sure has a penchant for pulling out WP policy when it suits his needs, goes further to my point about vexatious litigation above.

[edit] Reply to Jayen466

Re the ex-premie disambiguation, you fail to mention in your reply that while other topics are covered in those searches, under the book search, in the top 10, Rawat's ex-premies appear twice, at 6, and 7, and under your scholar search, they appear at number 2 on the list. Certainly prominent enough to warrant a disambiguation page. Interestingly, you neglected to include a standard google search where the entire first page (1-10) are all Rawat's ex-premies.

[edit] Evidence presented by user:Francis Schonken

My motivation:

  1. Have a well-written article on Prem Rawat;
  2. Do what I can to keep Wikipedia out of negative press.

[edit] Jimbo Wales' comment

Jimbo Wales' single known edit on the issue (diff) was divisive while it contained straw man argumentation (see discussion at User talk:Jimbo Wales/Archive 33#break 0). As such the edit was gefundenes fressen for yet another Cade Metz article (see link included in 4th paragraph of 'That's some catch, that catch-22' section at Why you should care that Jimmy Wales ignores reality: 'A great Wikipedian'). I don't like my name to be linked from some bad journalism, when this is the result of someone else's superficial comment (even if the 'someone else' is Jimbo Wales in this case). --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:15, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kim Bruning's role

Kim Bruning (talk · contribs) carefully negotiated with PatW to see his behaviour improved. [63] [64] It's quite possible to stand your ground in a civil fashion, after all. Would you be able to manage that? - PatW's reply: "Absolutely yes of course ... I am coming to realise that I have violated a number of rules here - eg 'soapboxing' which I only recently even heard of, and of course being occasionally horribly rude to Jossi and Momento. ..." 11:06, 11 March 2008

Wikipedia is not a vindicative system. I don't see any necessity to "prove" errors recognised by PatW, and for which he promised to improve. Was there uncorrected or incorrectible behaviour by PatW after this recognition (11:06, 11 March 2008)? --Francis Schonken (talk) 06:35, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] A personal attack by Jossi

(note: there were more personal attacks by Jossi, for the convenience of this case, and unless compelled, I will limit myself to a single example)(update: challenged by Jossi above in #@User:Francis Schonken, point 6, I sent additional evidence regarding my points below to the ArbCom mailing list):

[edit] The merging of Criticism of Prem Rawat

At Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Prem Rawat/Workshop#General discussion Merzbow wrote: "Why and how the [ Criticism of Prem Rawat ] article was turned into a redirect, but the material not actually merged (or merged and deleted), should be a key question here." Trying to clarify some things (I have done before, but some of it seems to have gone lost in the discourse):

  1. 19 January 2007 I merged Criticism of Prem Rawat into Prem Rawat#Reception:
  2. Later Cade Metz would write: "Working in tandem with others, [Jossi Fresco ...] eventually had [the 'Criticism of Prem Rawat' article] deleted". [65]
  3. From 19 to 26 January 2007 I continued with several edits to the article, participation in talk page discussion, translation of Dutch sources, etc so that by my last 2007 edit to the article the "Reception" section looked like this: [66] (more or less in good health, although I never found it a good idea to treat the criticism "by critic" - I thought it would've been better to treat it e.g. by topic [67]). Anyway, at the time I was rather confident I could back out, not keeping the article on my watchlist, leaving it to among others an editor with broad experience, Jossi.
  4. Early February 2008 I realised (like many others) that the criticism had virtually vanished from the article. For an analysis of how and when the criticism disappeared from the Prem Rawat article, I refer to bainer's synopsis here: Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Prem Rawat/Evidence/History. The removal of the "Reception" section containing the criticism apparently happened in May 2007. For the "why" of this removal there are several other comments, e.g. the (failed) GA review (see e.g. Vassyana's evidence below at #My participation and the editing atmosphere), "walled garden" allegations (e.g. User talk:Francis Schonken#I think that you start to understand why I could no keep Prem Rawat balanced), etc. I had no part in these discussions throughout 2007, anyhow I re-introduced the Reception section, basically how I had left it in January 2007, on 8 February 2008 (including a re-redirect of the "Criticism" article [68]). Whatever the intermediate actions and discussions, they could not in my view justify the removal of the criticism from the Prem Rawat article, producing an unbalanced article (see my edit summaries of the merge diffs).
  5. Jossi's only interference with the Criticism of Prem Rawat page a few weeks later [69] (since more than a year), after some unmerging/re-redirecting by others was a trivial clean-up not influencing the nature of the redirect (which it was at the time of that edit). Note that Matthew Stannard below uses this diff in #Criticism of Prem Rawat to demonstrate that Jossi was "involved in turning this into a redirect": he wasn't as far as that edit shows: the page was a redirect before and after Jossi's edit. Also, that was a 27 February 2008 edit, postdating the Cade Metz article, so this part of the story couldn't have been told in the 6 February 2008 Register article (as Matthew erroneously contends - notwithstanding Metz' prophesising style there was no language to that effect in his article).
  6. Although Jossi participated in the revert warring in the two days from the publication of the Cade Metz article to 8 February 2008 (e.g. [70]) he stopped editing the Prem Rawat article later that day. This is his last edit thus far: 23:43, 8 February 2008. So if Jossi had influence over the presentation of criticism in the Prem Rawat article, that influence could only have been indirect from that time on. --Francis Schonken (talk) 16:03, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jossi's conduct during Momento's third WP:AN3 listing

Jossi's conduct during Momento's third WP:AN3 listing in February 2008 was experienced as inappropriate by the blocking admin:

  • "absurd that this was delayed by an involved admin." [71]
  • "I consider the interference by an involved admin on that report to be inexcusable" [72]

I felt offended too: "As far as I'm concerned you'd better remove the list of 5 edits in 3 days you composed on me above, it is offensive, [...]" [73]

I'd like arbitrators to look in to this and see whether the uninvolved admin's assessment needs reviewing. --Francis Schonken (talk) 17:14, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] General evidence and analysis

[edit] Prior discussions at various noticeboards

Moved to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Prem Rawat/Workshop#Prior discussions at various noticeboards ("Analysis of evidence" subsection)

[edit] History of editing restrictions

Moved to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Prem Rawat/Workshop#History of editing restrictions ("Analysis of evidence" subsection)

[edit] Analysis of history of editing restrictions

Moved to Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Prem Rawat/Workshop#Analysis of history of editing restrictions

[edit] Discussion of other evidence presented on this page

[edit] Jossi's evidence on me

  • "has injected himself in the dispute" - injected? Empty term, no evidence presented by Jossi.
  • "disrupted editing" - What does Jossi mean? No clue, no evidence presented.
  • "sabotaged the community enforced article probation" - No sign of me sabotaging anything. No evidence presented.
  • "Francis Schonken (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · block user · block log) has tried to cast himself as a "neutral editor"" - I never did. You may find a diff that I state myself "relatively uninvolved" (while not really interested in the subject of the article), or that I think Wikipedia:Neutral point of view of highest importance: casting myself as neutral - never, I don't even believe in that sort of stuff. Note that Jossi presents no evidence to support this point.
  • "has failed to assist editors in the content dispute" - empty phrase. I took part in the content dispute, like anybody else. Apart from that, I assisted many editors, e.g. "Thank you so much, that is very helpful" (thx to Francis)
  • "Rather than offer help he seems to have decided to take it upon himself to "fix" the article" - what sort of an allegation is that? No evidence presented. I edit the article. My talk page involvement more than doubles my mainspace edits for this article [74]. No "wrong" is demonstrated.
  • "Being bold is a good thing sometimes, but dismissing other editors as "POV pushers" is unhelpful, as it is edit-warring with them" - What kind of a conflation is this? Yes, I was bold, and am prepared to defend, if must on WP:IAR grounds, that I called POV pushers what they are. But why the incorrect conflation "... as it is edit-warring with them"? No evidence presented.
  • "Evidence follows" - well, in fact it doesn't.
  • "reverting to his last edit at the time" - Incorrect, and I already told Jossi so: "note that I used your version of the article of 31 January 2007 as the basis for my revert: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Prem_Rawat&oldid=104600180 " ([75])
  • "Several editors, (involved editors and others as well) alerted him of the mistake he was making in deleting hundreds of contributions and losing many sources and material" - I've only seen Jossi giving that interpretation as far as I can recall, so diffs please (note: I checked my e-mails, and found nobody else that gives that interpretation).
  • "The article was protected on Feb 9 due to the edit-warring" - I was not involved in the edit-warring that led to the Feb 9 protection, argument founded on guilt by association. Please provide the diffs that led to Feb 9 protection.
  • "reverting a very unhelpful step in the consensus process" - with hindsight it wasn't all that unhelpful, but that's my interpretation. Anyway, the "uninvolved editor" did, as far as I can remember, not participate in the "consensus process". It was a drive-by revert. The qualification "Rather than offer help he seems to have decided to take it upon himself to "fix" the article" might apply.
  • "Since returning to edit the article (Feb 8, 2008), Francis made 128 edits to Prem Rawat, 22 marked as minor edits. From the remaining 106 edits, 20 were reversions of other editors' contributions. diff" - What Jossi calls a "[diff]" is in no way what is described in Help:Diff.
  • Re. #Francis Schonken sabotaged the community-enforced 1RR probation:
    • "Francis Schonken objected to the 1RR probation proposal [76], on the grounds that it it bends good guidance in all sort of directions in order to give POV-pushers an unjustifiable advantage." - I gave more reasons than that one.
    • "After the probation was implemented, he dismissed the probation on grounds of "wikilawyering" and "confusing wording"" - no diff given by Jossi. I don't think I implied that. As far as I can remember I commented on those who were spreading confusing wording and were embarking on wikilawyering. I may even have been commenting on those who built confusing wording into the probation formulation, that doesn't mean I "dismissed the probation" on whatever grounds.
    • Re. "First 1RR parole violation AN/I Report" - "restoring a fix (such as the ISBN numbers) will not be considered a revert in any case" [...] "I would be very surprised if an editor here will go to ANI to report 1RR probation violation on such edits" (according to Jossi [77]). I was restoring a fix to the footnotes which had become severed from the sentences they were meant to be attached to.
    • Re. "Second 1RR parole violation AN/I report" - not more than one revert: "Consecutive reverts by one editor are generally treated as one revert for the purposes of this rule" (WP:3RR#What is a revert?)
    • Re. "The 1RR probation wording was unambiguous", no: "one revert per editor per day" is not the same as "If someone reverts your change, don't re-revert it" (which is "ZeroRR" on your own changes), see WP:1RR. Jossi exploited that ambiguity in the discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive385#1RR on Prem Rawat, in order to obfuscate Momento's real breach of the 1RR probation with something that simply wasn't.
    • Re. "Francis as en experienced contributor should known by now the meaining of page probation, and what 1RR probation, means: If someone reverts your change, don't re-revert it, but discuss it with them (per Wikipedia:1RR)" - no, this was a scam based on a description of voluntary actions in an essay, that were in no way implied by the probation rules ("one revert per editor per day"). I exposed the scam: "So, no, this is not how 1RR is going to be used: allowing POV-pushers to perform an indefinite number of edits, and allowing other editors to revert only "one". This is a POV-pusher's scheme of unseen breadth." [78]
  • Re. #Francis Schonken takes a surprising lenient attitude towards WP:NPA - "There is no official policy regarding when or whether most personal attacks should be removed" (WP:RPA). My comment to PatW was entirely appropriate. See also discussion about removing PA's at User talk:Jimbo Wales/Archive 33#Importing an outside conflict.
  • Re. #Francis Schonken does nothing when asked to intervene in a BLP violation - A question was asked on the talk page. I answered it ("this has no place in the article on Prem Rawat") after Rumiton, PatW and Cirt [79] [80], before Jossi's talk page refactoring [81]. I didn't share Jossi's feelings about a need to refactor. Neither did any other editors apparently. There's no ArbCom issue about an interpretation made only by Jossi. And under no circumstances should Jossi attempt to commandeer me into performing a refactoring: I can think for myself. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:16, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Re. Momento's #User:FrancisSchonken

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Matthew Stannard

[edit] Criticism of Prem Rawat

There was a well-produced page with a good set of citations providing criticism of Prem Rawat and his business model at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Criticism_of_Prem_Rawat&direction=prev&oldid=195507682. This page was originally set up by User:jossi in order to prevent criticism appearing on the Prem Rawat page itself. User:jossi was then involved in turning this into a redirect to the Prem Rawat page, without placing the criticism back on that page. This effectively resulted in the criticisms becoming hidden and lost to the type of reader who might be a likely prospect for Rawat's business. This story is told in some detail in the Register Article, which is well-researched, contains useful links to wikipedia diffs and should be read, I think, by anyone involved in this arb, particularly since that article has the propensity to bring wikipedia into considerable disrepute unless wikipedia arbitrators are seen to do something about the blatent POV-ineering that has so far been allowed to take place.

[edit] Removal of links to perfectly good and useful material

A much better story, in my opinion, of the pioneering phase of Prem Rawat's business than has ever appeared in wikipedia is provided at http://www.rickross.com/reference/vital/vital15.html, an article with a reference Sociological Review, 27, Page 279-296/1979, which I haven't checked but I've no reason to doubt its veracity, particularly since it gets an unlinked mention as Note 1 on the Prem Rawat page itself. A link to a page on the Rick Ross website, listing that Sociological Review Article was put on the Prem Rawat page but then removed, after User:jossi had made a contribution on the Prem Rawat talk page. The difficulty here is that the subscribers to Prem Rawat's services hold that any site that contains material that they don't like means that any link to anywhere on that site should be removed from wikipedia, regardless of whether a particular link is to something useful and informative [111] [112] [113] [114] (lovely bit of double-think) [115] (more double-think, and confusing the concept of 'reliable' with the concept of 'appropriate').

Hence User:jossi argues against Rick Ross in what is effectively an ad hominem attack, without taking account of the fact that the page linked to contains the material given in another reference on the Prem Rawat page (as I already mentioned).

[edit] The circularity of the discussion

Such circularity (repeated arguments) as is indicated on the Prem Rawat talk page between what I would suggest as representing, on the one side, secular, reasonable wikipedia contributors and, on the other side, those who overtly and covertly represent a POV in favour of Prem Rawat (in all cases, I would hazard, by being subscribers to Prem Rawat's services), is itself evidence that the neutral point of view sacred to the wikipedia project is being systematiclly abused by the latter group. This has been going on for years. My personal stance, if such be relevant, is that I am neither a subscriber nor an ex-subscriber to Prem Rawat's services, but I am conscious of the warning given by Richard Feynman that mind control is the most serious threat facing mankind, and when I see the victims of mind control desecrating the fine institution of wikipedia, which action is plain for all to see in the Prem Rawat article, I really feel that something should be done.

[edit] That subscribers to Prem Rawat's services wish to use wikipedia as part of their marketing campaign

This link shows that Jossi Fresco, aka User:jossi, acts as a press contact for Prem Rawat's marketing machine. To allow such a person to be a wikipedia admin and involved in the shameful controversy surrounding the the Prem Rawat page, and other pages in the category of the same name gives rise to a very bad smell. The fact that he may do good works at the same time should not distract you from analysing what he is really up to, and it doesn't stack up to acting in good faith, in my opinion. Just a small point on whether we can accept User:jossi's word. He says here that he has never used his admin privilege to ban anyone anywhere. This link shows that he did. Matt Stan (talk) 22:16, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Jayen466

[edit] Deletion of the rickross.com external link

The rickross.com link referred to above by Matthew_Stannard (talk · contribs) was deleted by myself from the Prem Rawat and DLM articles – not because of Jossi's comment, but because I realised, after having linked to the site myself in another article, that it is in violation of WP:EL#Restrictions_on_linking. I discussed my concerns on the talk page, and Msalt (talk · contribs), considered neutral by all contributors to this article (I believe), concurred. Jayen466 22:40, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] The revert in the lede

Just because this has been a point of discussion between Momento and MSalt, here a description of that bit of edit history: The first edit was an attempt to arrive at a compromise version to address the various concerns people had expressed on the talk page

This edit had three components:

  1. Changing the wording from
    Rawat has been criticized for a lack of intellectual content in his public discourse
    to
    Rawat's public discourses have been described as lacking intellectual content ...
    (Sourcing remained unchanged, to Schnabel, though neither wording was actually particularly representative of the source.)
  2. Inserting
    and as emphasizing the superiority of direct experience over intellect.
    sourced to Barrett
  3. Changing
    and for leading a sumptuous lifestyle.
    to
    He has been criticised for leading an opulent and materialistic lifestyle.

The compromise version still didn't address all concerns; Francis was unhappy with the insertion of Barrett, because he felt Barrett was characterising Rawat's DLM movement rather than his teaching, and Momento felt the lede did not give enough room to add the context within which the Schnabel had made his statement.

I agreed with Momento's view here that Schnabel had made his comment in the specific context of contrasting Rawat's style to that of another charismatic teacher and that the statement in the lede was not a good use of that source. In addition, various editors had made the point that Rawat does not seek to present an intellectual teaching; his teaching is, rather, that the meditative experience happens outside of the intellect.

I then shortened the passage to Rawat has been criticised for leading an opulent and materialistic lifestyle. with the edit summary (self-revert as per talk, let's leave the analysis of his teaching out of the lede then).

This deleted the sentence Rawat has been criticized for a lack of intellectual content in his public discourse that had previously been present and reverted my own insertion of and as emphasizing the superiority of direct experience over intellect. sourced to Barrett.

I announced the edit on the talk page in my response to Momento, saying OK; I have self-reverted now and taken the critique of his teaching out of the lede.

This description was inadequate. I did self-revert to the extent that I took out again the phrase sourced to Barrett that I had inserted and to which Francis had objected. Taking the critique of the teaching out of the lede was not a self-revert however, because it removed the sentence Rawat has been criticized for a lack of intellectual content in his public discourse that had been present before. On the other hand, both the edit summary and the talk page comment made it clear that I had done so. I also retained the revised wording opulent and materialistic compared to the earlier version by Lawrence which had sumptuous.

Francis pointed out to me on my talk page that my edit description was misleading. I agreed, apologised and crossed out "self-" on the talk page. Jayen466 12:31, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to User:Nik_Wright2

Bryan R. Wilson's Times obituary is interesting. He is described as an "influential sociologist who offered new and enduring insights into sects and religions ... one of the most brilliant and influential sociologists of religion of the past century". This is not a fringe figure, he is as mainstream in sociology of religion as you can get. To describe Massimo Introvigne as an obscure self-published author is likewise off the mark. His representation on Google Scholar is respectable for an author who writes much of his material in Italian, and he was one of the experts consulted by the German government's Enquete Commission on NRMs a few years back. J. Gordon Melton is I believe among the top five most prolific contributors to Encyclopedia Britannica and very widely published. Again, these are mainstream scholars, though it is true that they are a source of irritation to many self-appointed anti-cult campaigners. Jayen466 17:12, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Replies to User:Msalt

Re the section "one edit war", the first diff you cite and comment on is this: - Momento deletes criticism of Rawat (with scholarly source) under edit summary “(As per talk "Lede")” [116].

What Momento removed was this: "Rawat has been criticized for a lack of intellectual content in his public discourse." You say, he deleted criticism of Rawat based on a scholarly source. But if we look at the source quoted, we find it says something totally different than what our article said there. Schnabel said,

"The purest examples of charismatic leadership are at this moment, still, Bhagwan and Maharaj Ji. This shows immediately that personal qualities alone are insufficient for the recognition of the charismatic leadership. The intelligent, ever-changing Bhagwan who gives daily performances is not more a charismatic leader than the pampered materialistic and intellectually quite unremarkable Maharaj Ji. As charismatic leaders, they, by the way, both have their own audience and their own function."

Now, where here does Schnabel criticise Rawat for a lack of intellectual content in his public discourse? In my view, this was not appropriately sourced, and Momento was absolutely correct to remove it. It needed revising, sourcing to another source, or whatever. As it stood it was at best an example of WP:SYN. Jayen466 01:27, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Re the scholars page: What I supported here [117] was the edit you made to the article, rather than the edit to the scholars page, which I had not been aware of. Having said that, I find your comment fair that Jossi seems to have been concerned about the copyright implications of reproducing a negative article in full, but appears to have been less concerned about any such implications of reproducing positive articles in full. Perhaps he is human after all ;-) Jayen466 01:11, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jossi reverting pro-Rawat edits

It has been claimed ([118], [119]) that Jossi has never reverted a pro-Rawat edit and would never do so. Trying to get a sense of SylvieCyn's and Jossi's interaction in the editing history of Prem Rawat just now, I happened to come across a series of edits in which Momento removed the section with links to various critics' sites [120] (justifiably so, in my view, as they fall short of the requirements outlined in WP:BLP and WP:EL), and in the next edit [121] Jossi reverted, restoring three of the four critics' sites (the fourth being dropped for copyright reasons). I was not making an effort to look for such an edit ... Jayen466 15:09, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

I was sufficiently intrigued to waste an hour making such an effort. Here are five more reverts by Jossi of "pro-Rawat" edits:

  • [122] IP deletes criticism section, Pjacobi restores [123], another IP deletes it again [124] (by mistake, judging by the edit summary), Jossi restores it again [125]
  • [126] [127] (restoring criticism section blanked by Errol Vieth)
  • [128] [129] (partial revert of a deletion by Momento, restoring the "embarrassing" kissing of Rawat's lotus feet)
  • [130] [131] (revert of "illegal" polemics by Momento)
  • [132] [133] (reverting Momento who sought to emphasise the Christian affiliation of critics) Jayen466 00:54, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Replies to User:Maelefique

Re the ex-premie disambiguation, note that according to books.google.com and scholar.google.com, by far the most common meaning of the word, as used in published literature, appears to be the one Jossi indicated: [134][135] Jayen466 20:13, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

It was my specific intent to illustrate the distribution of the word in published literature. (I actually thought, wrongly, that what your diff presented was the google result.) Internet usage is not always an accurate reflection of general language usage, especially where a term is used in the name of a website. Jayen466 12:37, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Momento

[edit] My editing

I see this issue as a battle between editors who think BLP policy should apply to the Rawat article and those that don't. Since The Register article, the Rawat article has been inundated with "Unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material about living persons" that " should be removed immediately and without waiting for discussion". I have done that. Likewise, Jimmy Wales writes on the WP:VER policy page -"I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons". I will always remove "Unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material about living people" as frequently as editors put it in. And that includes links that violate WP:BLP and WP:EL and including "conjectural interpretations of a source" [136]? Some editors characterize this as "edit warring" it is not, it is following BLP policy :Examples -

1. Conjectural interpretations of a source - that is forming "an opinion or conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information". In this case, making a summary of an article using only that portion of the information that suits your POV. WillBeBack summarized an article in the LA Times with this edit in the Rawat article [137] [138]. I wrote this entirely different summary in the talk page using the same article [139] (last paragraph in green section but note Jayen466's opinion above mine),
2. Unsourced material. I remove unsourced material from the Lede [140] and Francis reverts[141]. I remove it again[142] and Lawrence Cohen puts it back [143]. Francis reports me to ANI but Random832 disagrees with his claim [[144] Jayen466 then steps in with a compromise version and then removes it entirely[145]. Jayen agrees with me here [146] My reply to ANI [147] and Francis's final words [148].
3. POV choosing of a source. Two articles about Rawat visiting UC Berkeley were written on successive days. Wowest simply picked the one that suited his POV. He used this article from the Daily Californian[149] to make this edit [150]]. The following day's article in the Daily Califronian presented an entirely different POV [151] [152]. I removed it.


Virtually every criticism of my editing involves me "aggressively removing unsourced or poorly sourced" material. I am not so much pro- Rawat as fiercely pro BLP policy [153]. And here I am reverting an undiscussed pro-Rawat edit [154].

[edit] My blocks

Blocked for 24 hours by Nakon [155] after report by Cirt for repeatedly deleting photo of house [156] and links to anti-Rawat sites [157]]. Reviewing admin B agrees that photo should be removed [158] and is exempt from 3RR but links should not be removed. I stated my case [159] and repeat it here - BLP policy - "Editors should remove any contentious material about living persons that relies upon sources that do not meet standards specified in Wikipedia:Verifiability. The three-revert rule does not apply to such removals". The anti-Rawat sites are self published blogs full of slander, OR and unverified material, all violations of BLP policy. I should not have been blocked.

Blocked for 24 hours by Vsmith[160] after report by Francis [161] for removing "Rawat also turned away from asceticism, and no longer denounced material possessions" 3 times in 24 hours. As I explained in talk [162], the Hunt summary is completely distorted. It violates BLP -Editors should remove any contentious material about living persons that is a conjectural interpretation of a source. The three-revert rule does not apply to such removals". I should not have been blocked.

[edit] User:Jossi

Jossi has done an excellent job as an admin on Rawat articles, he calms the waters and insists on Wiki policy. The level of criticism that he has been subjected to is appalling. Never the less, I don't believe my interpretation of BLP policy is "narrow", I believe it is "conservative". And that is in perfect accord with BLP policy which says "Biographies of living persons (BLPs) must be written conservatively". Every person is entitled to a "presumption of innocence" and "an important rule of thumb when writing biographical material about living persons is 'do no harm'". Wikipedia isn't going to be damaged by being conservative, it is going to be damaged by BLP's that slander and misrepresent their subjects. My involvement in Rawat articles is almost entirely dependent on the amount of BLP violating vandalism that occurs [163]. When things are quiet I am happy to involve myself in other articles where the subject is not being treated fairly.

[edit] User:John Brauns

John, the webmaster of two anti-Rawat sites, is clear about his POV. He will do what ever he can to denigrate Rawat. As an editor he usually confines himself to the "Talk" page [164]. He never removes any vandalism or obvious BLP violations.

[edit] User:Andries

Andries has always been upfront about Rawat, he thinks he’s a fraud. This is somewhat colored by the fact that Andries was a devotee of Sai Baba. He was indefinitely banned from that article for his behaviour. Like Johns Brauns, Nik Wright, Wowest and SylvieCyn, Andries is a poster on the anti-Rawat forum. As an editor, his poor English creates real problems. I’ve had too many conversations and disputes with Andries about his incorrect paraphrasing; coincidently, always on the wacky side[165]. To his credit, he once removed an obvious BLP violation which deserves mention[166].

[edit] User:FrancisSchonken

When it comes to "disruptive editing" Francis Schonken takes the prize. He has tried to dominate the article since his first Rawat edit of 2008 on Feb 8. Without one word of discussion he inserted 30,000 bytes of undiscussed material into the article[167], I reverted it [168], onefinalstep reverted back and was reverted by DavidD[169] and he was in turn reverted by Francis Schonken [170], all without one word of explanation from Francis Schonken. On Feb 12, Francis Schonken again inserted 26,000 bytes of material [171] without discussion which was promptly reverted by Sarcasticidealist with the summary "reverting a very unhelpful step in the consensus process"[172]. On Feb 13, after discussion [173] WillBeback removed all links except for one [174] where upon Francis Schonken kept reinserting defamatory links to anti-Rawat sites whenever they were removed [175],[176],[177][178][179][180][181][182]. At the same time he has filed numerous complaints against me from "slightly disruptive editing" [[183]] to 3RR [184] to 1RR [185] with only one negative result against me (see above).

[edit] User:Jayen466

Jayen is a great editor. His editing is intelligent and neutral. He is clear in the talk page, he has a real passion for the underlying issues and he knows what "eschews" means. One of my two suggestions for remedy is that only Jayen466 be allowed to edit the article, he would do an excellent job.

[edit] User:Msalt

One Edit War Msalt has made three false assertions in this section that fundamentally distort what occurred.

1. I didn't delete Francis's paraphrase because it contained "mild criticism of Rawat with a scholarly source" [186].
I deleted Francis's paraphrase because, one, the lede is supposed to be a summary of the article not a place to give one side of the story. And two, Schnabel doesn't actually refer to Rawat's "public teachings" and Kent says only that one talk was "banal". Therefore Francis's paraphrase is inaccurate as well, which I explained in talk [187]. Jayen466 also disagreed with Francis's one sided paraphrase and replaced it with a compromise version that gave important context [188].
2. Msalt claims Jayen466 "accidently re-installs Momento's version" when his summary "let's leave the analysis of his teaching out of the lede then" [189] shows his removal of the analysis was deliberate.
3. Msalt claims I "reverted Francis" and gave a "misleading summary 'added context'”. In fact, I did not remove one word of Francis's one sided paraphrase and I did add reliably sourced context[190].

Simply put, Msalt is prepared to make things up to attack discredit me. Here he is stating that "Momento, you delete and add material 10 times every single day, usually with no discussion" [191]. In fact, I made less than 20 edits in the week previous to that comment and 21 in the week before that [192]. In the same period I made more than 150 posts to "Talk" and that's a 4 to 1, "talk" to "edit" ratio. No apology from Msalt.

One Talk Page Thrash

The photo failed on Copyright/not fair use grounds but I would still argue that inclusion in a BLP violates invasion of privacy, OR, verifiability, contact information and other grounds. For example, would giving the address of the house next door constitute giving "contact information", I would say so. Anything that provides a means to contact the subject of a BLP should be avoided, particularly when stuff like this appears on John Brauns anti-Rawat forum [193].

Sock puppeteer?

In Feb 2007, I was accused of being a sock puppeteer by Mael-Num[194], is that a relative of Maelefique (talk)[195], and blocked by Betacommand. Here's the argument but where is the evidence,not even a user check. Decide for your self [196][197].

[edit] User:PatW

I endorse everything Jossi said. PatW's sole contribution to Rawat articles is to abuse those he sees as pro-Rawat.Momento (talk) 03:09, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] User:Nik Wright2

Nik Wright2's sole edit this year was his undiscussed insertion of 10,000 bytes of badly written OR[198]. It was reverted by Janice [199] and immediately reverted by Nik [200] and the article protected by Nandesuka. NikWright2 maintains below that his edit was "adequately discussed", but here is the tally of his talk comments which prove otherwise [201]. I totally reject the idea that students of Rawat have a COI in editing the article, whilst people who run and post on the anti-Rawat forum have none.

[edit] User:Rumiton

Here's Rumiton deleting some pro-Rawat puff [202]

[edit] User:WillBeback

Admin WillBeback came to the Rawat article with one purpose in mind, to add more criticism. In doing so he has abandoned NPOV and compromised his admin role. And since then he continues to complain about me including his latest that I don't show "good faith" towards him.

WillBeBack supported disruptive editing

The most extraordinary disruption to the Rawat article and the beginning of its current turmoil was created by Francis Schonken's undiscussed insertion of 30,000 bytes of badly written BLP violating OR [203]. This extraordinary action was condemned in the talk page and reverted by three different editors [204],[205],[206]. WillBeBack did and said nothing. And then without one word on the talk page he reverted back to Francis's "massive insertion" with the edit summary "no explanation for massive deletion" [207]. He now gives his reason that Francis Schonken is "a longtime and respected WP editor".

WillBeBack began making edits with "conjectural interpretations

A "conjectural interpretations of a source" is forming "an opinion or conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information". In this case, making a summary of an article using only that portion of the information that suits your POV. WillBeBack summarized an article in the LA Times with this POV edit in the Rawat article [208] [209]. I wrote this entirely different summary in the talk page using the same article [210] (last paragraph in green section but note Jayen466's opinion above mine).

Recent example of WillBeBack's improper editing

On April 6 Will added this summary to the DLM article - "A 1980 article in The Washington Post reported that a Congressional Panel had singled out, among other controversial groups: "Guru Maharaj Ji's Divine Light Mission...as cults that employ manipulative techniques and turn children against their parents."" [211]. In fact, Will's summary has four major errors. First, it wasn't a "Congressional" Committee. Second, the Committee didn't "single out" DLM. Third, the Committee didn't describe DLM as a "cult that employs manipulative techniques and turn children against their parents". And fourth, the Committee didn't describe DLM as a "controversial" group [212]. I pointed this out talk, removed the flawed summary and provided an accurate one [213] in talk to discuss. Will restored the flawed version having corrected the "Congressional" error and swapped "singled out" to "listed"[214], even though the the Committee hadn't "listed", "singled" or "uttered" one syllable on the matter.[215]. The summary now falsely claims that "The Maryland House of Delegates committee listed, among other controversial groups: "Guru Maharaj Ji's Divine Light Mission ... as cults that employ manipulative techniques and turn children against their parents.". I pointed this out once again [216] and finally WillBeBack removes "controversial" and his false claim that the "Committee listed" anything.[217] But only to be replaced by new weasel words which still claim DLM was "listed" at the hearing.

Claims I opposed adding criticism to the Rawat article

WillBeBack started this talk page discussion by rudely and incorrectly claiming that I was opposed to adding criticism before he even asked me [218]. Within 24 hours of WillBeback's false assertion that I didn't want to add criticism, I was asking him what materiaI he wanted to include since some of the material is clearly in breach of BLP policy[219]. I have continued to discuss the issue, commenting five times on the subject before he made this recent claim, including this clear and unambiguous agreement to include criticism "There shouldn't be a "Criticism of..." article about Rawat or any other BLP. In order to not give undue weight, criticism should be included in the article ".[220],[221][222][223][224]

Accusing me a making a Point

My widely discussed and long held POV is that "Criticism of (Name)" articles are inappropriate and a blight on Wikipedia. However, since WillBeBack was supporting a "Criticism of Rawat" article, I put aside my POV and wrote for the enemy. If "Criticism of (Name)" articles are the way of the future for Wikipedia then a good place to start would be with Jimbo Wales, so I created a "Criticism of Jimbo Wales" article in Good Faith. I created the page once and once only [225], objected to the "speedy deletion" as per the notice (which apparently counts as another creation) and made one comment on the talk page before Jossi cautioned me [226] and I took no further action. I have made no other comment to the talk page or any other Jimbo page. Fortunately the tide is turning and some people who supported "Criticism of (Name)" articles are having a rethink, so I applaud WillBeBack's request to merge "Criticism of Prem Rawat" with the main article.

Alan Watts

Contrary to Will BeBack's claim, I haven't said Watts is "an unacceptable, disreputable source". What has been said is that Watts quote as reported in the NYTimes is confusing and needs context. This quote was discussed over a month ago by half a dozen editors and the consensus was to leave it out.[227] Will insists it should go in a different Rawat article and if you don't agree, you're being "ridiculous" (see below).

Assumption of bad faith

Will BeBack gives an example of my bad faith, and he's right and I removed it. However during the discussion about Watts, Will BeBack is happy to say my opinion is "one of the most ridiculous arguments I've heard" [228]and tells another editor my argument is "plain ridiculous" [229].

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Nik Wright2

[edit] Article ownership

Prior to publication of The Register article [230] the WP Rawat articles were in a state of sustained ‘ownership’ WP:OWN. Ownership by its very nature is rarely demonstrable by quoting sets of diffs and Arbitrators are therefore referred to the volume of edits and talk page contributions specific to the Rawat articles, most notably by User:Jossi, User:Momento and User:Rumiton. User:Jossi has quoted above, his total contributions to Wikipedia, however the statistics relevant to this Arbitration are those related to the Rawat articles only. The issue is not simply the sheer volume of Jossi’s edits and talk page contributions from April 2004 ( Momento’s from 2006 and Rumiton’s from 2007) but the percentage of the totals made by these editors singly and collectively, compared to all other contributors. The ratios are even more stark when editors who have predominantly agreed with User:Jossi and who had/have little or no WP involvement other than with the Rawat articles, are removed from the calculation.

Prior to February 2006 the ‘agreeing editors list’ comprised the now inactive users 64.81.88.140, 24.21.194.205, and User:Zappaz, the first two were Rawat article ‘specialists’ while User:Zappaz did have some other WP interests. In addition three other editors who are still active, share the “Jossi consensus” User:Janice Rowe, User:Rainer P. and User:Armeisen; again their User contribution logs show that they are predominantly only interested in the Rawat articles. In January 2006 User:Jossi was joined in active WP:OWN by User:Errol Vieth and in February 2006 by User:Momento; User:Errol Vieth became inactive in December 2006; User:Jossi and User:Momento were joined by User:Rumiton in March 2007. Following publication of The Register [231] article other editors arrived at the judgement that the Rawat articles were in urgent need of improvement. The difficulties related to the Rawat articles since the beginning of February 2008 can properly be characterised as a clash between those editors who are seeking to protect their ‘product’ of WP:OWN and those who are intent upon achieving a balanced and encyclopaedic article.

[edit] COI of editors

There have been frequent charges and counter charges by various editors for several years over the position of either current ‘students’ (followers) and of former followers of Rawat as editors of WP. The relevant part of WP:COI would seem to be: Examples/Close relationships [[232]] Both current and former followers/students of Prem Rawat must be considered to be ‘caught’ by the “close relationship” provision of WP:COI, the only question is to what degree is the individual editor inhibited from working to NPOV. In this respect as ‘students’ of Prem Rawat both user:Rumiton and User:Momento are wrong to claim in their ArbCom statements that they have no WP:COI; User:Rumiton gives a clear statement of his COI on his User page [[233]]

[edit] COI of Jossi

User:Jossi clearly is affected by WP:COI Examples/Close relationships, in addition he has a very specific COI related to his personal financial and career interests. When combined with culpability under WP:OWN, Jossi’s financial COI together with his COI Examples/Close relationships clearly brings WP:DUCK into play.

[edit] Religious affiliation of Sources and COI

A source of contention, which has been used in a manner of sustained disruption by pro Rawat editors, has been the issue of the religious affiliation (or claimed affiliation) of academic commentators upon Prem Rawat .See [[234]]. This issue arose because in response to the use of reference to the the work of Ron Geaves it was pointed out that Geaves was not only a long term follower of Prem Rawat but was instrumental in Rawat becoming exposed to a western audience. In a ‘tit for tat’ response pro Rawat editors kept demanding that the religious affiliation of other academics must be made explicit or their work be excluded on the grounds of COI .

Geaves continues to assist in the public promotion of Rawat as per [235] Film of Prem Rawat + Prof Ron Geaves of Liverpool Hope U & St Ethelburga’s and as such his work is a compromised source. Additionally Geaves is a source for other encyclopaedists such as Hunt, Barret and Chryssides, the latter of these has co-authored with Geaves while Barret is strongly associated with a Sociological perspective on New Religious Movements closely aligned to Geaves’ own. Geaves, Hunt, Barret and Chryssides have all been preferred in the WP:OWN editing of the Rawat articles over other references. See: [[236]]

The combination of WP:OWN, and WP:COI together with the use of a compromised academic source aligned with a particular academic perspective raises very particular WP:NPOV issues. It would be expected that [[237]] would resolve this, however the WP:OWN problems have involved consistent citing of [[238]] as a basis for excluding references to research authorship.

[edit] Partial Administration

User:Jossi has chosen to be both editor and administrator to the Rawat articles, as an editor and talk page contributor he may be entitled to work from a partial perspective but as an administrator he must be expected to act impartially at all times; this he has not done. As evidence of a wider problem, Jossi’s respective treatment of User:Momento and User:PatW is useful to consider. User:Momento has a long history of uncooperative editing, only recently being properly sanctioned [[239]] however User:Jossi, other than some rather mild ‘scolding’ has never threatened User:Momento with any sanction, and most tellingly given Jossi’s very active administration of the Rawat articles he makes no mention in his evidence here regarding Momento’s attrocious behaviour. In comparison User:Jossi singles out User:PatW for a full listing of his crimes. --Nik Wright2 (talk) 10:54, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Response to Other Users

[edit] IsabellaW

User:IsabellaW’s evidence has the appearance of web stalking rather than the ‘research’ that is claimed, and had he/she actually looked at Wikipedia rather than sources extraneous to this case, would have found my authorship of an article critical of Ron Geaves, to be acknowledge, on my WP talk page [[240]] on Jossi’s talk page [[241]] and both acknowledgements linked from the Prem Rawat article talk page[[242]]. Being critical of a ‘source’ is surely part of the necessary process of producing a sound article and I am puzzled that User:IsabellaW considers http://www.prem-rawat-critique.org/geaves.htm to be problematic in the context of the Rawat articles. The WP article on Geaves is not currently at issue here but, I have never edited there, unlike Jossi who as a co-religionsist of Geaves might be consider to have a COI. It is notable that Geaves is critical of the authors Foss & Larkin and that Jossi has been resistant to including Foss & Larkin as a source in the Rawat articles [[243]]. As User:IsabellaW has introduced criticism of Geaves as an “ideals balance, fairness and NPOV” issue into this case, the Arbitrators may wish to consider whether the WP article Ron Geaves should now become part of their material consideration. --Nik Wright2 (talk) 12:01, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

User:Sylviecyn has asked for the material posted by User:IsabellaW to be removed, and as it stands the User:IsabellaW material barely counts as more than an ‘attack’. If the arbitrators do deciced that the User:IsabellaW material should remain as part of this case, then the following issues come into play.

[edit] Narrow Field of Academic Reference serving a particular POV

[User:IsablellaW]] refers to Brian Wilson, presumably meaning Bryan R. Wilson. Wilson advocated an approach to apostasy that was not universally accepted by sociologists (anti = Benjamin Zablocki) but which was enthusiastically adopted by a small group of ‘sociologists of religion’. The ‘Wilson’ position was vigorously promoted on the Prem Rawat talk page by User:Zappaz in terms that seem designed to create a ‘rule’ that notable Rawat apostates – Mishler, Hand, Finch etc, can under no circumstances be referenced or even refered to. In rebuttal of the postion advocated by User:Zappaz. User:Andries quotes a personal email from David G. Bromley, an academic who may be considered sympathetic to Bryan R. Wilson, in which Bromley effectively dispels the basis of User:Zappaz’s argument [[244]]. It should be noted that Jossi was active in consistent argument with User:Andries and at no time contradicted User:Zappaz. Despite Bromley’s letter, the editorial direction of the Prem Rawat article remained firmly linked to references favouring academics sympathetic to Bryan R. Wilson, including those academics who have a connection to CESNUR and Massimo Introvigne, that latter is not as User:IsabellaW claims a “Professor” and his own work is all self published. Ron Geaves (see [[245]] is a regular contributor to CESNUR conferences, his submitted papers include From Divine Light Mission to Elan Vital: An Exploration of Change and Adaptation [246] also connected to CESNUR are J. Gordon Melton and George D. Chryssides. User:Jossi has been an active editor on the WP Geaves, Melton and Chryssides articles, in itself that may not be an issue but it is problematic if an enthusiasm toward certain academics translates into over reliance upon those academics as sources in a given article.

[edit] Reference to an Attack Site

The affidavit that User:IsabellaW was previously linked from the Prem Rawat article, the link was removed by admin User:Vassyana as being to an “attack site” [[247]] The affidavit was the basis of complaint which I sought to have resolved in a number of ways – [[248]] which includes the following salient points regarding the affidavit: Authenticity: The linked .pdf document has no proof of authenticity. There is no identifiable named Notary, neither is there any identification of a legal case in which this document has been tested, nor any evidence that the claimed respondent has even received case papers, let alone lodged a response. There is no means for a Wikipedia reader to verify the existence of the document, other than as an item published by Elan Vital. It is acknowledged by the publisher of the .pdf document – Elan Vital, that at the time this affidavit is claimed to have been taken Elan Vital was seeking substantial costs from the claimed author of the affidavit, raising serious questions about the freedom of expression available to the claimed author. Subsequent to writing the above, a copy of the affidavit was added to a list of documents at [249] bizzarely the submission date is 18 months ! after the case was closed, the affidavit is item 59 while item 58 is 25/07/2005 Notice of Discontinuance (Whole Proceeding); the affidavit remains untested in the Australian Courts. Further the respondent’s name does not even accord with case number. User:Jossi’s attitude in relation to the use of the affidavit can be judge by [[250]] [[251]] [[252]]

[edit] Jossi’s introduction of Attack site material

User:Jossi’s resistance to a challenge to the validity of the affidafit is not surprising as it was Jossi who included it in the article text [[253]] as well as adding the web site that was subsequently described as an attack site [[254]] Although not tested in Australian courts the affidavit was submitted by the defendant in a US case [[255]] in which User:Jossi was a named party, this case was current at the time User:Jossi was including the affidavit into the Prem Rawat article text. The case concerned defamation of one of the individuals named in the affidavit by the webmaster and owner of the website quoted by User:IsabellaW. The judge in the US case rejected the affidavit as having no validity; the website owner was required to publish an apology. --Nik Wright2 (talk) 15:32, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Strike through

User:Jossi has objected to the use of the term 'party' [[256]], in the absence of any documentation readily available to the arbitrators I have struck through the term "party" in case its use should have any misleading implications. --Nik Wright2 (talk) 09:06, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Momento

Re:User: Momento evidence = [[257]] My edit, which I believed had been adequately discussed, caused significant annoyance to the majority of active editors and User: Momento’s consistent failure to adopt WP:Assume good faith is evidenced by his casting all those who do not agree with his position as “the anti-Rawat crew”. The assertion that followers/students do not have a COI is plainly wrong. It is not my evidence that former followers/students have no COI, and I specifically acknowledged my own in my RfA statement. That Rawat’s current followers are so unwilling to acknowledge a COI is in itself a ‘good faith’ problem.--Nik Wright2 (talk) 11:47, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rumiton

Re:User: Rumiton evidence = [[258]]User:Rumiton begins by claiming that the ‘article’ (Prem Rawat) is “difficult to work on”. This attempted impostion of a paradigm is unhelpful in the extreme. The Rawat articles a very easy to work on because in large measure there is ample source material, the only difficulties have been those arising from chronic failures under WP:COI and WP:OWN. Using some highly partial pointsUser:Rumiton goes on to construct a form of apologism for Rawat, while otherwise extraneous to the case in question, it does help reveal the mindset and COI of a committed follower, for example he writes “The 1970s stuff that we have was commissioned by or written from a Christian religious point of view or a sociological standpoint, and neither is very helpful in gaining a fair understanding of his life and work.” To take this as a standard for editing WP would restrict the available sources only to those that are, in a highly POV sense, ‘helpful’. It is not the role of WP editors to assess sources in terms that “help” an “understanding” of a biographical subject’s “work”. It is the role of WP editors to critically assess sources so as to provide an accurate historical presentation of a ‘subject’. --Nik Wright2 (talk) 11:57, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jayen466

Re:User:Jayen466 evidence = [[259]] usefully demonstrates the problem of ‘preferred’ academics. Bryan R. Wilson may be a useful source but his work is ‘particular’, no matter how glowing his obituaries were. I did not describe as User:Jayen466, states that Massimo Introvigne is “obscure”, but Massimo Introvigne also represents a ‘particular’ view, and whatever his ‘expert’ credentials are, he is not a professor as is claimed.

J. Gordon Melton is yet another academic of a very particular view, and further, is indeed an encyclopaedist. Articles such as those related to Prem Rawat require broad based referencing; reliance upon sources which either represent a narrowly selected academic view, or which rely on mere reconstructions of other encyclopaedias will not provide the necessary broad base to make a good WP article. User:Jayen466's comment that “these are mainstream scholars, though it is true that they are a source of irritation to many self-appointed anti-cult campaigners.” rather suggests that User:Jayen466 may have her/his own WP:COI to acknowledge. Turning this case into a cult versus anticult question seems unlikely to add any elucidation. --Nik Wright2 (talk) 12:12, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Vassyana

Re: User:Vassyana evidence = [[260]]

[edit] Jossi's alleged COI

Vassyana contends that: "A long list of diffs was provided during the COI noticeboard discussion in the wake of the Register article. The links intending to demonstrate that Jossi's COI is a recurring issue don't do much to impugn Jossi. This contention is supported by quotation of six diffs which Vassyana contends show “Jossi adding or restoring criticism to the article”."

In both cases Vassyana’s contentions seem partial toward Jossi’s often very clear bias (insertion of references approriate to supporting the Rawat party line) or otherwise unrelated to what actually the diffs are concerned with. Further WP:COI can not be adequately tested on the basis of comparison of limited particular diffs but upon behaviour over time; the diffs given at [[261]] are not well sorted on the basis of relevance but as a collection do contribute to the evidence of Jossi’s own partiality in editing the Rawat articles. The fact that some references may contain some material that is not wholly complimentary to Rawat does not make them ‘critical’ or provide evidence of Jossi 'writing for the enemy' if the overall terms of the specific reference accord with the ‘official’ line promoted by the biographical subject and his advisers and representiatives. See [[262]]

As Vassyana notes, the case refered to was closed as “baseless” however given the volume of evidence now before the Arbitrators the dismisal of the evidence in the earlier case seems to have been overly hasty and deserves to be considered within the context of all the evidene in the present case.

[edit] participation and the editing atmosphere

Vassyana refers to: [[263]] This is appropriate to the present case because it deals directly with attempts to achieve clarity over the editing of the Rawat articles under the tag team control of Jossi, Rumiton and Momento. Vassyana’s reply unfortunately did not address my concerns. However I am grateful to Vassyana for an intervention which he has not listed but which is also relevant to the current case: [[264]]

--Nik Wright2 (talk) 13:20, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Isabella W.

I have been doing research about Prem Rawat and his students, and about his detractors, and I have found valuable substantiated information which may be of interest in these proceedings.

I am not familiar in the rules of evidence of these proceedings, and I would be grateful for some guidance.

While Prem Rawat has been known to have students that were overly passionate about his teachings, his detractors also appear to be, at times, overly determined in their profile and actions. My research indicates that Prem Rawat has had for about 10 years a small group of active opponents/detractors who have repeatedly resorted to unethical and at times illegal methods to prevent him from sharing his message of peace, and to prevent people interested in this message to cultivate their interest.

The members of this fringe group appear to be the same people who are now battling here on WIKI on an effort to inject a negative bias into the Wikipedia entries about Prem Rawat.

This group at times, have manipulated the media. One of them from Bristol, UK, posting under the alias Andrew Carpenter, gave an interview to the leading Bristol Evening Post on June 17, 2003 and managed to get a full page cover article with his in silhouette to protect his anonymity (http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-14218076.html). He claimed that he had discovered grave financial irregularities in the accounting of the Elan Vital UK Charity, which promotes Prem Rawats message of peace in the UK and that he had just filed a complaint with the UK Charity commission. He indeed filed a complaint with the charity commission, but the investigation found no wrongdoing by Elan Vital: the complaint was frivolous, the journalist was duped and Elan Vital was found by the Charity Commission to be in good compliance with rules and regulations. Similar fictitious tax complaints have been sent by this small group to regulatory authorities in India, Australia and more. In each and every case, they resulted in the complaint being dismissed by the authorities. This "Andrew Carpenter" also posted several "articles" in IndyMedia websites (http://india.indymedia.org/en/2003/10/8160.shtml). There is evidence that this Andrew Carpenter is one of the active critics participating in this WIKI article with the user name Nik Wright2, (http://lists.indymedia.org/pipermail/imc-india/2006-March/0322-d4.html) and has also published on anti-Rawat sites critical articles, under his real name. (http://www.prem-rawat-critique.org/geaves.htm)

In 2001-2004, on the forum/chat room on the internet where they gather, they have made threats against Prem Rawat and his family. Some postings incited people to drug and kidnap members of Rawats family, to poison the water of the resort where he holds events, and even to broadcast false alerts that anthrax had been found in the conference hall. One posting even included a picture of a large butchers knife, saying it was intended for Prem Rawat (http://www.one-reality.net/hate_speech1.htm). The small group also published the private phone numbers and floor plans of Prem Rawats house, and more.

The current owner and managers of that forum are the two persons that appeared in The Register article (one is named here as John Brauns). Although they now moderate postings and edit comments by its members that may bring a criminal liability upon this forum or cross the line into hate speech, (they have learned that it does not serve their cause), their destructive obsession with the subject matter is still evident.

In October 2006, this group discussed publicly intentions to conspire against Wikipedia. For example, one of them posted: "the way for exes to deal with Wiki should be 'all or nothing. It would make sense if every forum member joined in the editing there, if only to make Jossi Fresco work for a living and discredit Rawat in the process. Just join in, add a phrase here and there, change or remove things that are false, add things that are missing, generally raise hell? I say just either dive in and edit the fu*cker silly, however you see fit, hit-and-run style, or leave well alone. But do it for fun, if you do it at all. Wiki is not as important as its editors would have us believe." This posting provides a sense for the intent of the members of this group. (http://www.prem-rawat-talk.org/forum/posts/10027.html)

My sense, after conducting a lot of research, is that the topic of Prem Rawat attracts not just the mainstream but also people with polarized, extreme views, and threatening behaviors. It is important to not allow operatives of a handful of fringe detractors to take advantage of Wikipedia's name equity to lead their own, no-cost, self-serving campaign against Prem Rawat and his students. These people should instead use their own websites for that, where they can air their own grievances and critiques as much as they want, under our fair speech laws.

In light of the above, it is even more incumbent upon the arbitrators to uphold the WIKI standards and ideals and ensure that balance, fairness and NPOV prevails. IsabellaW (talk) 19:25, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] More evidence presented by Isabella W.

Some of persons posting against a fair article on Prem Rawat claim to be apostates and some appear to be apostates. Quite a bit of academic literature has been written about apostates and their reliability and credibility.

Brian Wilson, a professor of Sociology at Oxford University, challenges the reliability of the apostates' testimony: according to him, “apostates are to be seen as one whose personal history predisposes him to bias with respect to both his previous religious commitment and affiliations, the suspicion must arise that he acts from a personal motivation to vindicate himself and to regain his self-esteem, by showing himself to have been first a victim but subsequently to have become a redeemed crusader.”

Prof. Massimo Introvigne from CESNUR (www.cesnur.org) the Center for the Study of New Religions, distinguishes between three level of apostates: level 1, where the person exits the movement without any negotiation and in a manner that minimizes damage for both parties. level 2 is when the departure of the person involves negotiation, but there are no ill feelings left afterthat. Level 3 apostasy, according to Introvigne, is when the ex-member dramatically reverses his loyalties and becomes a permanent enemy of the organization he has left, join a group fighting the movement, and often claims victimization.

In light of the above, it appears that the group opposing Prem Rawat on the internet, and of which members are trying to shape the Wikipedia article, is made of Type 3 apostates, with all the related issues of limited credibility and ulterior motives.

For example, Gordon Melton. director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion and is a research specialist with the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, said that when investigating groups, hostile ex-members invariably shade the truth and blow out of proportion minor incidents turning them into major incidents (http://www.hightruth.com/experts/melton.html)

In addition to the ones previously mentioned, other persons from this apostates' group include:

1. User:TGubler, from Brisbane, Australia, who admitted to stealing information from a computer belonging to a student of Prem Rawat that contained Elan Vital financial data and other personal data. (http://elanvital.com.au/faq/article.php?id=024) He was also found guilty of contempt of court, and sentenced to two months in prison.

2. User:John Brauns, User:Wowest, User:Sylviecyn aka User:Another Ex-Premie, User:Jim Heller, User:Nik Wright2

Note that an award winning investigative journalist in Australia, himself an interviewer of three Australian Prime Ministers, in an authenticated affidavit with the Queensland Supreme Court in 2005, acknowledged having been duped by this detractors group and stated: “The goal of the group are often obsessive, malicious, and destructive in nature. Through the use of the internet, they interfere with the rights of people to experience their own spiritual discovery and for the purpose of harassing individuals who are students of Rawat. The group’s actions have included contacting of employers of students of Prem Rawat, sending letters to regulatory agencies and the media with unsupported allegations and rabid personal attacks on the character of individuals. … and the internet publication of false and defamatory stories about Rawat designed to cast him in a false light.” (http://www.elanvital.org/faq/JMG_AFFIDAVIT.pdf) The affidavit signed by this reputable investigative journalist includes the names of several of the persons named in this arbitration.

Another core person in this group also from Australia (http://www.ex-premie.org/pages/neville2.htm), tried to disrupt a convention near Brisbane, and was later arrested with $25Million of drugs—the largest seizure in the history of Queensland-- as well as unsecured and unlicensed firearms. (http://www.elanvital.com.au/faq/PDF/ackland_drug_bust.pdf)

I also note that John Brauns removed the posting in which his small internet group was called to action and conspire against Wikipedia. Last time I checked this posting was there, but has just been removed. It was posted by a "Nigel" on 08/20/2006, 11:27:13. Maybe Mr. Brauns could check his backup or archives and confirm this.IsabellaW (talk) 03:24, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by 84.9.49.223

[edit] Summary and partial analysis of Isabella W's Evidence

With comments in brackets

  • http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-14218076.html - Valid link providing independent confirmation that there was a complaint against Rawat in 2003. Contended that this complaint wasn't successful but no evidence presented to support that contention
  • http://india.indymedia.org/en/2003/10/8160.shtml - Valid link to interesting and informative article headed The Three Faces of Prem Rawat. Isabella claims that Andrew Carpenter wrote several articles in this vein but only cites one of them. (It would be interesting to see the others too)
  • http://lists.indymedia.org/pipermail/imc-india/2006-March/0322-d4.html - Valid link to a postings site where people argue about who Nik Wright and Andrew Carpenter are. Someone called Nik Wright posts a denial but who can tell whether that is the "real" Nik Wright
  • There is the useful contention that John Brauns moderates postings on his ex-premie websites, thereby preventing them being hate forums. (Well done, John!)
  • http://www.prem-rawat-talk.org/forum/posts/10027.html - bad link, ostensibly to support notion that there had been exhortations to gang up in wikipedia. Nothing verifiable to support this
  • http://www.one-reality.net/hate_speech1.htm - valid link to a discussion between people who really do seem to hate Prem Rawat. (Interesting that there should be such venom posted about someone who only promotes inner peace. Isabella's "researches" don't indicate what went wrong)
  • Isabella asserts "It is important to not allow operatives of a handful of fringe detractors to take advantage of Wikipedia's name equity to lead their own, no-cost, self-serving campaign against Prem Rawat and his students." (Indeed, but a disinterested researcher might be curious to find out about the existence and rationale of such people. Isabella doesn't throw much light on this.)
  • Isabella asserts "My sense, after conducting a lot of research, is that the topic of Prem Rawat attracts not just the mainstream...". No evidence presented that the topic of Prem Rawat attracts the mainstream. (Why would it?)

84.9.49.223 (talk) 13:34, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Msalt

Note: I've flagged later additions (aside from replies) with the word Add:

[edit] One edit war

This detailed look at the edit war behind the second revert in Jossi’s 2nd 1RR ANI report on Francis [265] illustrates the dynamic well:

- Momento deletes criticism of Rawat (with scholarly source) under edit summary “(As per talk "Lede")” [266].
- Francis reverts “Undid revision 198191994 by Momento (talk) misunderstanding: read talk page again” [267]
- Momento reverts, “Deleted according to BLP. See talk ‘The Lede’” [268];
- revert by LAWRENCE [269];
- compromise by Jayen466 [270];
- self-revert by Jayen466 per talk accidentally reinstalls Momento’s version [271];
- reverted by Francis to LAWRENCE’S with honest summary [272];
- reverted by Momento with misleading summary “added context” [273];
- reverted by Francis with other changes (“undid revision by Momento”) [274];
- reverted hours later by Janice Rowe [275] with misleading summary (“This is a better, more accurate revision”).

[edit] One talk page thrash

Pro-Rawat editors wanted to remove a picture of Rawat's home for POV reasons (its extravagance emphasized his wealth). Their arguments and policies change as they fail (in 5 separate talk threads mercifully refactored by Francis) but the goal remains the same. Overall thread [276]. Momento and others were edit-warring throughout [277] [278] despite ongoing dispute resolution [279]-- warned [280] defiant [281]:

1) Invasion of privacy (Momento) [282] [283]
2) Verifiability (Jossi) [284]
3) Self-published (Jossi) [285]
4) Wrong house (Momento [286], Armeisen [287])
5) Public record that includes personal details (Momento) [288]
6) Unsourced (Momento) [289]
7) L.A. Times not a reputable source (Armeisen) [290] [291]
8) Copyright / not fair use. This argument, raised elsewhere, finally stuck after dispute resolution [292] (and I supported that deletion [293])

[edit] Tendentious editing by User:Momento, User:Rumiton and User:Janice Rowe

[edit] Overview

3 pro-Rawat, single purpose account editors who aggressively move to block any changes away from a pro-Rawat POV on these pages acknowledge strong ties to the subject -- long-time devotees Momento ([294] in answer to [295]) and Rumiton ("as a practicing premie" [296], plus [297] [298]), and recently Janice Rowe, (“I know several followers of Prem Rawat” [299] ; coy about herself.)

At least one of these -- usually Momento -- is involved in essentially every edit war on this page, with Talk page support from Jossi and the other two. They are supported by less frequent editors such as User:Rainer P. ("when I joined the ashram") [300] and User:Armeisen ("I've practised knowledge since I was 22.")[301]

[edit] Tag-teaming

Momento openly brags about "editing while blocked” [302] soon after 12 Janice Rowe article edits in 45 minutes [303] [304] [305] [306] [307] [308] [309] [310] [311] [312] [313] [314] -- her first edits since October 6, 2005 [315].

[edit] Disrespectful replies by Momento to warnings, blocks and refused unblocks from admins

To Vassyana [316] to Vassyana [317] to Lawrence [318] to B [319] to Sandstein [320] to Will Beback [321]

[edit] Add: Wikilawyering

Momento et. al. aggressively use Wikipedia policies such as Biographies of Living Persons, Exceptional Claims [322] and Sockpuppets of Zoe Croydon [323]) to justify edit-warring with exemption from the 3-Revert rule. They stretch logic severely to reach these havens e.g. "It is clear that in reducing two articles in the LA Times to two sentences Will Beback has made 'a conjectural interpretation of a source'." [324]

[edit] They reject consensus and collaboration

Out of many examples:

Momento:
1) repeatedly deleted an image during its Image For Deletion process without comment [325] against consensus [326] [327] [328] [329] even after a neutral editor warned that BLP does not justify removal [330]].
2) After very picky complaints including "Hunt doesn't say 'critics alleged', Hunt says 'critics have focused on'" Momento says "I am not going to spend my time repairing other editors distorted and inappropriate edits. I'm going to delete them.” [331] and s/he did [332], line 68.
Add: 3) "There aren't two sides to the truth. It's either true or it isn't. So a compromise isn't a compromise, it's a failure." [333]

Janice Rowe:
1) She reverted several edits with at once, possibly to avoid a 1-Revert Rule violation technically, with summary "Too many changes to be able to follow them" [334].
2) Reverted 7 of my relatively uncontroversial edits, with misleading edit summary (describing 1 of the 7)[335] and refuses to discuss on Talk. [336] On her user page, says "I disagree with your edits. It's that simple." [337]

Rumiton:
1) discussing scholarly sources: "Well sourced, Andries, means, among other things, unbiased. None of your miserable Dutch Protestants, no Catholics or Lutherans, no Buddhists even. No members of competing theologies." [338]
Add:2) "There are no 'comparatively unbiased' editors here... We have no choice now but to keep contesting." [339]

[edit] Actions of User:Jossi have encouraged this tendentious editing

[edit] Jossi fails to assume good faith

Jossi frequently fails to assume good faith when opposed on content [340] [341] [342] even with Will Beback. [343] Admits as much [344]. Claims editors must earn good faith; [345] "Show us that you are not biased." [346] Accused me of sock puppetry without any grounds ([347] spelling out [348]) even after a warning [349], and mocked my reminder about good faith. [350] My replies. [351] [352] He apologized [353] [354] but refused to acknowledge me as a "comparatively unbiased editor." ([355] in reply to [356])

I acknowledge that Jossi is usually very polite even under fire, in general and to me personally (even flattering[357]).

[edit] Mixing roles of admin and editor; aggressively pursues sanctions against editors (but only those opposing his POV)

Jossi speaks in a "voice of God" tone of authority on Rawat-related Talk pages, brandishing Wikipedia policy [358] [359] [360] [361] [362] [363] and often threatening or reporting less pro-Rawat editors, [364] [365] [366] sometimes resulting in Administrators Noticeboard reports by Jossi [367] [368] or blocks by outside admins[369]; in at least one case that admin felt they had not been told the full story and unblocked. [370] As far as I know, Jossi has never threatened or reported a pro-Rawat editor. Where Jossi has cautioned Momento, his tone is softer and often sounds like coaching. [371] [372] [373] [374] The strongest criticism Jossi has for Momento in this arbitration is "narrow interpretation of BLP".

When Momento is reported by others, Jossi always defends.
1) AN [375] -- explicit defense [376] [377] [378]; argued against sanctions [379]; rebutted criticisms. [380], [381], [382].
Add:2) 1RR [383] -- explicit defense [384] [385]
Add:3) 3RR [386] -- defends by attacking Francis [387]; vainly seeks page protection instead of block [388]. The admin wrote "Blocked 24 hours, absurd that this was delayed by an involved admin." [389]
4) BetaCommand lifted a block for sockpuppetry despite considerable evidence, solely on Jossi's word. [390]

Add: Even during this ArbCom proceeding, Jossi is continuing to speak as if he represents Wikipedia management and the ArbCom itself (including threats of "harm" to those who disagree) [391] in his opposition to good faith efforts to improve the page, [392] (In this case he is asserting that [WP:BOLD] editing is disruptive and not allowed, and all changes must be made point by point.) This is the crux of his misbehavior. Msalt (talk) 17:46, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Momento's intransigence appears to be fed by a sense of administrative support. In one edit war, Momento threatened "I will apply to have any person who puts [this photo] back blocked". [393]

[edit] Jossi's double standard on 1-Revert Rule violations

Jossi seeks punishment of Francis for reverting two unrelated edits in one day under 1-Revert Rule protection. Janice Rowe reverted 7 of my relatively uncontroversial edits at once with a misleading edit summary (above). Jossi refused to criticize and defended her edit [394], complaining about “multiple edits in rapid succession” (below); Jossi's comment actually encouraged people to revert for disagreement. I reintroduced 6 of the 7 edits later without controversy, haven't had time for 7th but plan to.

Janice reverted 2 edits at once under 1-Revert Rule [395], including one of the edits that Jossi attacked Francis for – no 1-Revert Rule complaint or warning by Jossi.

[edit] Jossi's double standard on edit warring

See "One Edit War" above. Jossi seeks sanctions on Francis here while ignoring Momento's clearly worse behavior. He frequently attacks opposing editors for edit warring, somehow having no problem with the pro-Rawat editors they war with. He has been cautioned about his double standards and fails to reply. [396] [397]

[edit] Jossi's double standard on multiple edits in rapid succession

Jossi defended Janice Rowe's disuptive edit as a response to "multiple edits in rapid succession", Add: [398] which are, "in an article under 1RR probation, a very bad idea." [399].

Later, Jossi had no complaint (even when asked directly about the double standard [400]) about much more contentious edits by pro-Rawat editors: Momento edited the article 7 times in 63 minutes the next day [401] [402] [403] [404] [405] [406] [407] and 11 times on March 15. Janice edited 8 times in 89 minutes on March 16th, including reverting one of Francis’ edits in Jossi’s 1RR complaint [408] [409] [410] [411] [412] [413] [414] [415].

Add: Jossi himself has been described as following controversial edits with multiple further edits in a way that makes reversion more difficult. See [416], point 3.

[edit] Jossi and tendentious editors exhibit ownership of Prem Rawat pages

Jossi and Momento openly complained when uninvolved editors got involved. [417] [418] [419] What is wrong with that?

They use subtle techniques to effectively own the page, starting multiple Talk threads on same issue, [420] [421] [422] tieing up other editors with minor disputes [423], long ref tags that include POV statements[424] ; misleading, vague or missing edit summaries ([425] [426] [427]); and obstructing consensus when it works against their POV. (EG Jossi won't admit a huge argument = controversy [428]; won't concede L.A. Times is reliable [429], second half of section from "Jossi, can you please give us your opinion"). For Momento et. al. see "These Users Reject Consensus and Collaboration," above).

Momento and Jossi spend many hours daily monitoring the article, which Jossi admits and defends. [430] Add: Together, Jossi, Momento, Rumiton and Janice Rowe have made 43.6% of the 3,748 article edits on Prem_Rawat, and 41.7% of the 10,014 Talk edits. [431] [432].

[edit] Limiting Sources

Add:Another technique: pressure to restrict sources beyond Wikipedia policy to only certain scholars. (Cf Nik Wright2, [433] and [434], see also Jayen466 [435] and IsabellaW. [436]) Momento, going further, argues against any news media sources and aggressively deletes edits that don't match his/her standards, claiming BLP. [437] Dispute resolution was necessary even to use the Los Angeles Times as a source. [438] This too is a double standard -- compare Jossi's comment about a non-scholarly pro-Rawat book [[439].

Add:Jossi created a Talk subpage (/scholars) with summaries or full text of articles, which he puts forth as a fair repository of acceptable sources. [440] [441], point 5. Most are very difficult for the average editor to access. At least one source is non-scholarly, [442]; another (Downton, Sacred Journeys) was described as not scholarly in several reviews in journals. 3 of the scholars included are devotees of Prem Rawat, (Geaves, Messer and Dupertuis, [443]) though two don't mention that in their articles. When I looked up one article, I found that the excerpting removed mostly material critical of Rawat. After I added it all to the subpage, [444] (supported by Jayen466 [445]) Jossi asked me on my User:Talk to self-revert on copyright grounds, [446] even though the subpage has full texts of articles favorable to Rawat [447] [448] [449] (still there) -- and Jossi offered another. [450] Only when pressed [451] did he allow that I could add "some passages." (I re-excerpted instead.) Jossi also discouraged me from moving that discussion to Prem Rawat Talk. [452] Earlier, Nik Wright2 presented a detailed and neutral list of additional scholarly sources on Talk. [453] Jossi ignored a request to add them to /Scholars [454], then attacked Nik's effort as "spam-linking" and "disruption." [455] Momento threatened to delete it from Talk under BLP. [456] [457]

All these tactics drive off neutral and opposing editors, perhaps by design. [458] Several neutral editors apparently have given up -- sarcasticidealist, David P., Pax Arcane, relata refero, Jim62sch and John Broughton. In this very proceeding, Jossi apparently seeks to block two of the most active voices challenging him, Francis and Pat W (who, while obviously unable to avoid personal attacks, has at least recused himself from editing.)

[edit] Replies to other evidence presented

[edit] @User:Jayen466

1. Re: Deletion of the rickross.com external link, I put that link there myself as a compromise, and agree that removal was fair.

2. Re: The Revert In the Lede, thank you for shedding light on those events. In my reply to Momento, I assumed that Francis shared my thinking, which of course I don't know, so I struck those words.

3. Re: @User:Msalt, Momento's first deletion in One Edit War, I don't want to rehash the content argument. In a sense it doesn't matter -- reasonable people disagreed, and continue to disagree. Momento was reverted or changed by different editors and kept edit-warring, without seeking compromise or pursuing dispute resolution, and without being forthright in edit summaries about what s/he was doing. S/he does this again and again, hence two blocks for edit warring in the last two months.

[edit] @User:Jossi

1. Re: Jossi's second 1RR Parole Report on Francis, the first revert was deleting unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material in a BLP, exempt from 1RR. For context of the second, see my section "One Edit War" above; this was the second-to-last edit there.

2. Re: Jossi's "Background" on Francis, Francis' large revert had significant talk page support: [459] [460]

3. Re: "Francis Schonken takes a surprising lenient attitude towards WP:NPA", I understand the indirectness of Francis' Talk page response ("Jossi interprets") to refer to that fact that the comment in question is directly addressed to Momento and some undefined "bunch", and does not mention Jossi. It's not clear why this situation upsets Jossi so much, given that Francis is not an admin and was the only person who DID say anything. But Jossi has justified his double standard with Francis vs. Momento as retaliation for this one comment [461].

4. Generally: Francis' big revert was very bold indeed, and he has at times succumbed to edit warring, though not to the extent of Momento, Janice Rowe, etc. and then only in an attempt to restrain them. Even Jossi has apparently edit warred on these pages, pre-recusal. [462] I also think that, speaking frankly, Francis is not very effective at explaining himself in DR, possibly due to English not being his first language (which, on the other hand, has made him valuable as a translator).

In all cases though Francis operated in a good faith effort to keep the page neutral, as expressed forthrightly here, [463] operating for the interests of Wikipedia not himself.

Unlike those he attempts to restrain, Francis has made many edits and comments that favor the opposing (pro-Rawat) POV, when that serves neutrality or Wikipedia in general. [464];[465] (second part); [466]; [467](last part, line 2,239); [468] This has been recognized even by Rumiton and Momento on a number of occasions. [469] [470] [471]

[edit] @User:Momento

1. Momento's words -- "fundamentally distort", "make things up to attack me", "false assertions" -- are very close to personal attacks, and unfortunately typical. See also [472].

2. Re: "you delete and add material 10 times every day", I concede that my Talk page comment overstated Momento's editing frequency, but when I wrote that, I sincerely felt it to be accurate (and many days it is). Note my Talk page reply. [473] Using the statistics of Jossi (148 edits from 2/8 to 3/25)[474] and Momento (4 to 1 Talk to Edit ratio) [475], and not counting 15 days the article was protected, the actual numbers are 19 edits per day, 4.78 of them in the main article. I further concede that Momento's edits are not "usually" (though often) without Talk comment.

3. Re: One Edit War, Jayen466's revert, "his summary... shows his removal of analysis was deliberate", good point. That would have been a strong argument in Talk, had you made it instead of reverting without comment (unless I'm just not finding it, always possible with all these archives). In good faith, Francis and I both took Jayen's edit to be a mistake. Note that Jayen's edit summary, and talk page comment, both said "self-revert" which contradicts your point, since Jayen changed from LAWRENCE's version initially. [476] Since you mentioned it here, though, I went back and noticed that Jayen later crossed out the word "self" on the Talk comment, [477] inidicating that he probably did intend to change and not just revert to LAWRENCE. He couldn't change the edit summary though, of course. (Note: I struck my conjecture above that Francis shared my thinking; of course I don't know that, and Jayen466 added information in his reply to me.)

4. Re: one Edit War, Momento's point 3 - "I did not remove one word", this is disengenuous. It is obviously reverting if you re-add material after you add it a first time, and another editor reverts -- whether you click the Undo button or do it manually. The edit summary was misleading because Momento made it sound like a new edit, not reverting a revert -- in fact, he continues to do so right here. Francis can fairly be criticized for reverting, but at least he was forthright about what he was doing.

5. Re: Double standard, "What's wrong with these edits?", I won't rehash the arguments, but there was extensive talk page controversy over the first 5 of these 7 edits, as well as the burst of edits overall and Jossi's lack of response. See the Blind Revert section of Archive 32 [478] from first outdent on, and the Teachings Section section of Archive 33 [479] from "One of Momento's sudden burst" [480] on.

[edit] @User:Rumiton

Rumiton claims to have never edit warred. Here's a recent, cut and dried example (and I can find more if anyone likes; he's not disputing this one though.) Note that he does not even claim BLP exemption from 3RR and edit war restrictions; the edit he kept reverting simply condensed pro-Rawat material.

1. 1980 tour details summarized by Msalt 19:54 Feb. 17, 2008 [481]
2. Rumiton reverts 04:00 Feb 18 [482]
3. Cirt reverts 04:59 Feb 18 [483]
4. Rumiton Reverts 05:48 Feb 18 [484]
5. Cirt Reverts 16:32 Feb 18 [485]
6. Louise.Po (new user) reverts this and another edit war (“Balyogeshwar”), 19:32 Feb 18 [486]
7. Msalt reverts 20:53 Feb 18 [487] with invitation back to Talk page [488] . This edit held (to date). Msalt (talk) 05:19, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Rumiton complained about my characterization of him as a single purpose account. I will concede that calling someone a single purpose account is subjective, and that Rumiton has edited a number of other pages. I still think the description is fair but clearly reasonable minds could disagree. I also revised my original comments about "3 SPA editors involved in essentially every edit war" to be more precise. Msalt (talk) 17:46, 29 March 2008 (UTC)


I thank the Committee for indulging the delay and the length of this evidence; I worked as hard as I could to keep it tight. Msalt (talk) 03:29, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

My reply moved. Rumiton (talk) 03:34, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Cla68

[edit] Reason why Jossi shouldn't be allowed to participate even on the talk pages on the Rawat articles

  • Selectively archives portions of the Rawat talk page [489]
  • Edits the Rawat article after his promise not to do so any longer because of his COI issues; reverts the deletion of pro-Rawat, problematic source material [490] and deletes a link to an anti-Rawat website [491].

[edit] Off-wiki evidence of Jossi's significant pro-Rawat POV

  • Beginning in February 2007, Jossi attempted to post a sanitized version of the Prem Rawat article to Citizendium, first by directly copying over the Wikipedia version of the article [492] then by removing material from the Wikipedia version that he apparently objected to [493]
  • Jossi then adds more pro-Rawat information to the article, and reverts an attempt by another Citizendium editor to identify Jossi as having a related-COI (called Topic Informant on Citizendium) [494]
  • Another Citizendium editor then notices what Wikipedia editors have noticed, that the article as written by Jossi has significant sourcing and POV problems [495].
  • Larry Sanger agrees that the Rawat article and Jossi's conduct with relation to it are problematic and comments on the Rawat talk page [496].
  • On a Rawat-related article that Jossi has written, Jossi removes an edit that he doesn't apparently, approve of [497]
  • Sanger reads the Register article, apparently confirming his suspicions that Jossi has an unacceptable level of COI and POV concerning the Rawat articles, and moves the articles from main space to development space [498] [499].
  • Jossi gives up and leaves Citizendium [500] (Note: if only it was this easy in Wikipedia. Sanger and Jimbo apparently have different management styles.)

Although Jossi could have edited about any subject on Citizendium, he chose Rawat. Why? Because apparently his purpose for participation in Wikipedia, Citizendium, or most any other place is to promote the Rawat religion and ensure that everything said about Rawat is as positive as possible. If Wikipedia is serious about its credibility, Jossi represents a classic example of someone we need to prohibit from editing certain articles or article discussions for COI reasons.

[edit] Evidence presented by PatW

[edit] My User Page (to illustrate was not intended as 'soapbox')

Please see all Talk contents here. The arguments on this page are continuations from Prem Rawat Discussions page (so as not to disrupt those discussions). They are not deliberate soapboxing but arguments that were germane to the article. I defend this here and exemplify here and here.

[edit] Contention

For many the contention that Prem Rawat has a revisionist agenda here is hard to deny. They say 'history is written by winners'. In Wikipedia are winners those who are supported by the most wealth (with most time & commitment)? Jossi is a self-confessed current employee 'of a related organisation' (presumably The PremRawat Foundation' or 'Elan Vital') and was certainly past web-master for Prem Rawat, whose wealth is not disputed.

My 'diatribes' have been criticised for being 'too lengthy'. Put that down to me not being 'A Renaissance Man' like Jossi, but merely a historian of a rather more old-fashioned style. I have been thanked by many people for my contributions and for challenging Jossi, Momento and Ruminton's spin on the past.

"I have been following your posts on Wikipedia...Most of my adult life has been as a premie...but I feel the revisionism that is going on is outrageous. I was very much around in those years that are being revised and my memories are so different. It was a brilliant time and I loved it and can see no reason to cover it up....this was a big chunk of my life that is being told in untrue way"

I observe Jossi and Momento driving reasonable voices from talk Pages associated with Prem Rawat through persistent passive-aggression.Their tireless resistance simply wears down patience. Their combined arguing style amounts to filibustering and frustrating consensus. There is public amazement that Wikipedia tolerates someone so clearly conflicted being an administrator on the PR article.

When I accused Jossi and Momento of being 'horrible liars' I unwisely chose to call a spade a spade. The Rawat discussion page is full of outright lies to which sometimes the only response is to say as I have done: "I was there, you were not - what you are saying is completely untrue" as illustrated in the last few days here and in the previous thread here. My involvement from the outset (April 2006) was civil and constructive. Over the next 3 years the 'elephant in the room' for most people was mainly Jossi's perceived COI. I became increasingly frustrated.

[edit] My involvement with Prem Rawat article from April 2006 was constructive but always resisted by 'Premies'

'It also looks like a whitewash. You can't just revert to a no criticism version if there is in fact significant criticism. Undue weight does not mean delete, but reduce.' David D. (Talk) 20:00, 6 February 2008 "It's a well-documented fact -- that Rawat claimed to be the Perfect Master, Lord of the Universe, who encouraged followers to surrender everything to him as their object of devotion. It's inexcusable to leave this historical fact out of the article." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.180.142.2 02:05, 8 February 2008

  • Guarding an article by deleting all criticism is not policy at wikipedia."
  • "This article as it stands is doing a great deal of harm to the credibility of Wikipedia." Sarcasticidealist (talk) 15:11, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
  • "We have had suggestions above, from those I guess to be followers of Rawat, that any criticism from members of other faiths cannot be included because it's biased. That's bullshit and unworkable, I've taken a look at Criticism of Prem Rawat's article history, and that included sourcing from religious scholars. The redirect's edit summary showed "Revert according to Wiki policy on verifiability/foreign language sources" as a reason for essentially deletion, but there is no policy against foreign language sources, and the sources can be easily verified. If Prem Rawat started a religion, and proclaims himself as lord of the universe, then some criticism of the religion will inevitably fall back onto Prem Rawat. I've seen "do no harm" quoted above, but a whitewashing of the subject does even more harm to the project and to the readers." - hahnchen 18:01, 7 February 2008
  • Deletion of any critical commentary deeply disturbing
  • Also Disturbed
  • "What a ridiculous whitewash the article is." "I was obliterated within minutes and warned by jossi that I was going to get banned after a slew of absurd "verifiable" arguments which held absolutely no water. These editors are rabid defenders of this guy." Onefinalstep 23:00, 8 February 2008
  • "There's really another article called Criticism of Prem Rawat, but the only link to it comes in the infobox at the bottom of the page? And people are alright with that?.....Lame". 90.187.55.29 (talk) 13:25, 8 February 2008
  • I join in on Claims of Divinity
  • 10 Feb2008 Jossi's declaration of intent.
  • Permission to assume Momento is a hostile editor
  • Momento carries on upsetting people
  • Proposal for Momento to be blocked
  • 11 February 2008 John Broughton questions NPOV
  • Will Beback 22:28, 11 February 2008 'Momento, I think you are misreading WP:NPOV.'
  • This latest series of edits by Momento seems to use selective quoting in a weasel wording style.
  • I complain of Momento's weasely changing of original wording of quote and accuse Jossi of turning a blind eye. Long discussion ensues where I am told to 'take deep breaths'. Msalt comments: "Yes, PatW is showing a bit of emotion here, but so are the three people arguing against him, and to my eye his comments are more respectful and less personal than yours, Memento's and Jayen's."
  • Ruminton accuses me "I find that the material you just inserted to be a most disreputable tactic in this debate, guilt by association" when I reply to Jayen.
  • Jossi defends Prem Rawat vanity publication.
  • Francis Schonken argues Jossi's reading of BLP is flawed.
  • This is mainly Jossi defending his view of BLP to exclude links that are critical.
  • Jossi again accusing me of personal attacks: "You have been warned already, several times for personal attacks." Msalt replies 07:01, 21 February 2008 "I also think PatW has a fair point that his mention of COI was not really a personal attack the way you describe it." "As you note, the proof of COI is in the pudding (of an editor's actions, to butcher a metaphor) and I don't think it's unfair to describe Momento in particular as someone who appears to be consistently editing in the service of a private interest rather than the Wiki project. Are we not allowed to point out that elephant in this room?"
  • Jossi 15:06, 21 February 2008 Totally unsolicited poke at me: "I invite you to to take people like Wowest, PatW and all others abusing this page to account for blatant personal attacks."
  • Jossi archives my post for being 'off-topic'
  • 15:26, 23 February 2008 Jossi accuses Francis Schonken of taking sides and continues to chastise me "PatW, for a person that has abused this page, you have some chutzpah to come here and speak of disruption of others".
  • 11:44, 28 February 2008 Ruminton tries to insert lie: "perhaps we should point out that Prem Rawat has never practised or advocated renunciation.."
  • 14:26, 29 February 2008 I refer to response to VivK on my Talk Page (politely continued there): "With regard to my discussion with Rumiton and VivK above. I have posted a response from a current follower of Prem Rawat (who was at the Alexander Palace meeting referred to above) called Tim Hain here: Letter from Tim Hain in response to VivK (and Ruminton) I thought it best to put it on my Talk Page rather than in here." PatW (talk)
  • 03:37, 27 February 2008 "Imagine you were left to finish this article on your own or maybe with help from Momento... do you think it would be an unbiased article when you'd finished?" PatW
  • Jossi's curt refusal to answer:"Not interested, PatW."
  • Refer to Prem Rawat's own personal webpage where he proclaimed descent from a list of Indian Gurus. I knew Jossi had authored this page and asked: "Why is it suddenly not important to describe a self-proclaimed Perfect Master's beliefs about how and where his Knowledge came down to him? 12:54, 2 March 2008 In this thread I ask "Jossi please would you tell us when this website last had this info please?" Jossi ignored my question.
  • 20:45, 8 March 2008 Jossi tries to shut down important argument for this reason: "There are numerous archives in which this was discussed."
  • 16:06, 9 March 2008 and then archives my link to ex-premie.org with this: "Are we going to continue allowing the misuse of these pages for soapboxing?" How many times needs PatW be warned about the misuse of talk page discussions?"
  • I raise objection on Wales' page (soliciting comment from Kim Bruning on Jossi not addressing issue in situ)

[edit] Reply to user: Jossi

Add: NB. This was in response to a statement by Jossi. Since I wrote this reply Jossi removed the statement from his evidence. Next link has been updated to correct Diff. PatW (talk) 18:31, 28 March 2008 (UTC)


Above here Jossi quotes me as making this comment to Momento after the peer review:

So you agree with "everything Vassyana wrote"? You really are stretching the boundaries of belief there. Could that possibly be a cynical comment? Let's get this straight because your words and actions so far suggest quite the opposite.

In fact Momento had said he agreed with everything Vassayana wrote and I was challenging him on this. Jossi above conveniently omits to include my next sentences which listed Vassayana's comments which plainly ran contrary to Momento's beliefs - otherwise surely he and Jossi would not have been so keen to submit the article for a 'Good Article' merit. Judge for yourselves whether Jossi is fairly representing my meaning. Here is what I actually wrote:

So you agree with "everything Vassyana wrote"? You really are stretching the boundaries of belief there. Could that possibly be a cynical comment? Let's get this straight because your words and actions so far suggest quite the opposite. Please don't play games with us here. Please confirm that you really agree that:


  • this article spends a lot of time on fawning over the subject and his POV.
  • the criticism section was simply tacked on to appease complaints, without balancing the tone and sources for the rest of the article.
  • for such a controversial figure, the overall balance between positive POV and critical views is way off.

  • the criticism section is very neutral in tone, while much of the article is written from a very positive POV.
  • disturbing ...use of antagonistic sources to support pro and simple fact claims.
  • This is 'dishonest to say the least.'

  • including "anti" sources to support a claim of NPOV is a dishonest presentation of the use of those sources. By failing to use sources in their proper context, a casual reader is easily mislead.

  • negative information from other sources used is also notably absent from the article.

(from 11 March Article fails GA Review with cynical reaction from Momento) PatW (talk) 02:46, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Riposte to suggestions that I am part of ex-premie group

Although years ago I discussed Rawat on the ex-premie forum along with many others, there seems to be the suggestion that I and other editors are somehow acting on Wikipedia as part of a planned 'activist' assault. This is simply untrue in my case. NB. I do not reciprocate their accusation. I do not suggest that followers of Rawat are conspiring any more or less than their opponents. My sole contention is that Jossi being bother player and referee upsets the balance and that as an employee of a related organisation, he seems to have more COI than other more individualistic editors.PatW (talk) 23:17, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] More Ex-premie 'Hate Group" Allegations from Jossi

  • I agree with Pjacobi who argued here "Elan Vital itself (by feeling obliged to response on their website). This will guarantee ex-premie.org its mentioning in the article..."
  • Prem Rawat's organisation 'Elan Vital' present the public FAQ that specifically targets ex-premies as a 'hate group' (and to which Pjacobi refers) here.
  • We all know that Jossi goes along with this characterisation as is obvious here. where he accuses even Andries "It is important for you to know...that Andries is a representative of the ex-premie group and that he works with them to push their POV in WP and remove any negative information about them. Jossi continues "Read this: maybe you will understand with what kind of people we are dealing with here:" (he links to page from this controversial site

[edit] Single purpose editors

It would seem that if you come to Wikipedia with a single purpose you can quite easily exploit a loophole that exists in the policy to appear otherwise. If you have enough time you can apply yourself to other articles and thus escape being branded as a single-purpose editor - even if you truly may be so. I would argue that, since Jossi's historic commitment to the Rawat articles far outweighs his other activities, he is equally single-purposed as I or Momento, Ruminton or Sylviecyn etc. If not far more so.

  • I have a broad interest in many subjects and am actually a minor historian outside of Wikipedia (at least that is what the Imperial War Museum think). I also have a full-time job in businesses totally unrelated to Rawat. I maintain many websites devoted to music and World War One history and Art etc. Easily less than 1% of my internet activities are taken with Rawat edits and discussions, and none of my time in the real world is taken with matters remotely related to Prem Rawat.
  • Jossi obviously has broad interests too. However in contrast to me, Jossi's outside job is for organisations related to Prem Rawat and 90% of his internet activities seem to be related to promoting the latter. His contributions on Rawat related articles far outnumber any other editors.

These facts simply speak for themselves: Who has the more single-purpose here, him or I?PatW (talk) 23:38, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Further to Ruminton's evidence and treatment of eye-witnesses

  • Ruminton has touched on an important consideration. Rawat withdrew from public attention in the 80's as a reaction to prior adverse publicity. That resulted in a dearth of reputable sources from then on. NB. since then there is little to draw from apart from primary and secondary sources like Divine Light Mission publications. Rawat's shyness about publicity in this period went so far as to collect and destroy the latter in the 90s. Furthermore since 70s, he and his organisations have limited their interactions with press to rather controlled situations. They prefer to write their own history. Hence we see Jossi and Momento recently using vanity publications and papers from Ron Geaves (controversial scholar and folllower) to endorse their POV.
  • All this affirms the importance of Rumintons point below that "well-considered input form people who were there would be helpful". So far (for whatever bizarre reasons) ex-followers seem to be the only people who have the "chutzpah" to come forward to bear witness- apart from the odd current follower who is conscientious enough to counter the party line.
  • Jossi abovechooses to use this recent post of mine as an example of what Ruminton considers "pompous, long winded rants that seem not intended to help the article, but to highlight how clever and important the writer is". Note that my so-called 'rant' closed the discussion. Contrary to his negative opinion neutral newcomers clearly consider my personal experiences interesting and even a valuable guide to what editors might want to be seeking references for. If ARBCOM ban people like me there will be less witnesses to counter the revisionist thrust of Prem Rawat's organisations. If Jossi is banned, the latter will replace him with an equal partisan ASAP unless WP community create sufficient safe-guards.

[edit] Evidence presented by Will Beback

[edit] Table of total edits

  • Table of total edits to Prem Rawat-related articles by parties to this case, compared to total edits to all topics, sorted in descreasing order, as of April 3, 2008.
Mainspace Edits to PR articles- Total mainspace edits- %
Jossi 2307 22811 10%
Momento 1125 1278 88%
Andries 1114 8474 13%
Rumiton 674 1465 46%
Francis Schonken 146 13171 1%
John Brauns 92 109 84%
Jayen466 81 2031 4%
Msalt 76 508 15%
Janice Rowe 67 128 52%
Will Beback (combined) 59 36213 0%
Sylviecyn 47 51 92%
PatW 22 22 100%
Nik Wright2 16 16 100%
Talk pages Edits to PR talk Total talk edits %
Jossi 3891 11625 33%
Andries 2286 8149 28%
Momento 1577 2362 67%
PatW 747 805 93%
Rumiton 554 1363 41%
Sylviecyn 414 444 93%
Francis Schonken 383 1166 33%
Will Beback (combined) 377 15258 2%
John Brauns 307 362 85%
Msalt 296 493 60%
Jayen466 162 543 30%
Nik Wright2 37 53 70%
Janice Rowe 27 40 68%

[edit] WP:POINT violation by Momento

One of the points of contention with the Prem Rawat article has been the inclusion of criticism. Jossi himself started "Criticism of Prem Rawat" ("COPR") and would not allow any critical material to be placed in the main article. Later he endorsed the merger of that material into the main article, but over time most of it has disappeared. There is now a debate over whether to expand the main article in order to include more critical viewpoints, or resurrect the "Criticism" article. Momento has opposed both options. In order to make a point about it, he twice created a Criticism of Jimbo Wales "COJW" article.[501][502] Since then he has refused to participate in discussions over the "COPR" article because he claims to be too busy working on the "COJW" article.[503][504] This is despite that fact that he's never shown any interest in the biography or criticisms of Jimbo Wales, and despitethe opposition of other editors working on that topic. He has defended the creation of "COJW" even though he says that "COPR" is inappropriate.[505] Therefore it appears that he has been acting disruptively in order to illustrate a point about "COPR". ·:· Will Beback ·:· 01:24, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to Momento

Momento asserts that my 21 edits are the source of some of the trouble with the article, while he and his 774 edits are presumably blameless. He writes 1) that I've made false claims about his creation of Criticism of Jimbo Wales, 2) that I've supported disruptive editing, and 3) that I've used "conjectural interpretations".

1) He has not denied trying to make a point. He only denies creating the article twice and being disruptive. Despite having edited here for years he seems ignorant of basic standards.
2) A discussed-edit was made by a longtime and respected WP editor, Francis Schonken. It was reverted by a single purpose editor who had barely edited in years, Janice Rowe. Her sole explanation for reverting the significant changes was "better".[506] I reverted her revert, just once, with the comment, "no explanation for massive deletion".[507] This isn't the "most extraordinary disruption" to the article, as Momento suggests. The fact that he makes a mountain out of this molehill, while ignoring the massif in his eye, is typical of his behavior.
3) Momento is essentialy a single purpose editor. He has made at least 88% of his mainspace edits to this topic. He accuses me of using a "conjectural interpretation" because I used a reliable source as a citation for some facts, rather than summarizing the entire newspaper article. There's no requirement that all points made in all sources must be included. That would be unworkable. Making such a requirement is more an example of tendentious editing and article ownership than of responsible editing.

Contrary to the points he's tried to make, I assert that Momento's behavior in this arbitration goes to show that he is a POV-pusher, a tendentious editor, and an article owner. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 08:46, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Fresh problems

I the past few days, perhaps as a response to the appearance that the ArbCom is taking little action, there has been a noticeable increase in tendentious editing, article ownership, and incivility by the "pro-" editors.

  • Assumption of bad faith:
    • Let's face it, if Randi had said "Rawat is a Sant guru" Will wouldn't bother using it. It's only Randi's rudeness that makes it valuable to Will. [508]
  • Tendentious editing and ownership
    • Jossi, Rumiton, and Momemento assert that Alan Watts is an unacceptable, disreputable[509] source, and imply that the New york Times, where he's quoted. is an unreliable source.
    • We had decided that this cherry picked quote is inappropriate.[510]
    • Watts is reputable and his opinion is interesting but we're not quoting Watts, we're quoting what some reporter said Watts said. [511]
    • What happened to good and sound editorial judgment? Policies and guidelines have to be respected, but not at the expense of sound editorial judgment. We still have WP:IAR, thank goodness.[512]
  • Forum shopping.
    • Jossi, Momento, and Rumiton insist that James Randi is an unacceptable, unreliable, disreputable, and error-filled source. I posted a question about it on the RS/N. Every uninvolved editor who has posted there has agreed that Randi is a reliable and acceptable source.[513] Jossi uses the article talk page to try to overrule the RS/N consensus.[514]
  • Tag team editing
    • While Jossi has said he doesn't edit these articles, in fact he has done so through the "back door".
    • Jossi writes a draft for the subsection.[515]
    • I ask for time to review it.[516]
    • Rumiton indicates the need for more review.[517]
    • Jossi says he's fine with me taking more time to review.[518]
    • Rumiton uploads the draft just hours later.[519]
    • When I discover that the draft has I been uploaded despite the lack of consensus I revert the change
    • Rumiton reverts it and claims there is a consensus in favor of it.[520][521]
    • The draft is full of errors and pushes a POV through careful choice of sources, careful choice of quotes (including one that does even concern the subject), and an overall lack of balance. Moving it out of the draft page and into the article makes it hard to make major revisions.
  • Asking for input, but ignoring it
    • Jossi says there are problems with the ref formats: Unless there are objections, I would want to wikignome the article and move all citations using the proper format[522]
    • I reply that I'd prefer he not edit the article.
    • Jossi does so anyway.[523][524]

[edit] Evidence presented by Sylviecyn

I had prepared another statement with some links and diffs but have decided to not to post it in strong protest of IsabellaW's comments on this page. This is the last time I’m willing to tolerate any use of Wikipedia by followers of Prem Rawat to defame me.

Some background: This is the second time in two weeks IsabellaW has posted her so-called "research" that includes a link to a premie website that uses the real names of former Rawat followers (ex-premies) including photos, to defame them (myself included). The first time IsabellaW posted her libellous garbage was on March 11th on the Prem Rawat talk page. See diff. For your information, the only people in the world who accuse former followers of being a hate-group are the current followers of Prem Rawat, and his supporting organization, Elan Vital on its websites. What IsabellaW has posted isn't evidence of anything, nor is it rearch by any stretch of the imagination. I want it removed from this page and the Prem Rawat talk page.

The owner of the website IsabellaW cited, called "One-Reality.net," is Wikipedia user Gstaker, who also was the "John Doe" defendant in a California defamation lawsuit, the settlement of which required him to remove all defamation material and photos of San Francisco Attorney Marianne Bachers, who was the plaintiff in the matter. Jossi Fresco was a subpoenaed witness in that matter. The link to that website remains on the Gstaker user talk page, although Staker had been sternly warned by Vassyana last summer to remove it, after I complained then. See GStaker. By the way, while you're there, take a good, long, hard look at the history pages and diffs of Gstaker’s talk pages, just to give you a sense of the type and style of personal attacks I've been subjected to on Wikipedia by the devotees of Prem Rawat, with no action or reaction by Jossi Fresco, other than to warn me on my talk pages not to threaten legal action and to watch what I say. I’m not planning legal action now, nor am I threatening it. I simply want the defamation of my name removed from Wikipedia and I want it removed now. This is a very serious matter that has gone on long enough.

If anyone wants to ask me questions about this, please feel free to do so on my userpage or on the discussion page of this ARB. Thank you. Sylviecyn (talk) 01:25, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Rumiton

[edit] This is a difficult article to work on

I'll keep this short, but will have to discuss the subject to some extent to do so. Prem Rawat has led a controversial life. He was born into an intense Sant Mat family in India and groomed as the successor to his father, the previous leader of his particular group and considered a satguru. In an extraordinary act, the audacity of which seems to escape most observers, he left his country and his family more or less permanently at the age of 13 and established himself in the USA. Inevitably he brought with him some of the ideas and customs of his homeland, and equally inevitably these ideas caused some havoc when applied rigorously in the west (hence the critical blogs from some ex-followers today.) After the initial, largely mocking media response, he withdrew from seeking any further publicity, and as a result of this, neutral, scholarly articles from the last 28 years or so are rare, though he has been very active internationally during this period. The 1970s stuff that we have was commissioned by or written from a Christian religious point of view or a sociological standpoint, and neither is very helpful in gaining a fair understanding of his life and work. That is why well-considered input from people who were there would be helpful, and it is why I personally feel disappointed that discussions so often end up like schoolyard hair-pulling matches. Either that or pompous, long winded rants that seem not intended to help the article, but to highlight how clever and important the writer is. I know I am not Snow White myself, but I hope my edits have shown at least an attempt to deal with the subject encyclopedically. Rumiton (talk) 14:55, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to Msalt

Many of the statements you make above are unsupported by the refs you provide, as the Committee will find for themselves. I will just answer the allegation you made against me, as one of: 3 pro-Rawat SPA editors involved in essentially every edit war... I am not a SPA. I have made over 3000 edits on Wikipedia to a wide variety of articles of personal interest. I have concentrated on the Prem Rawat articles as they seemed to have needed the most help. I have never been involved in an edit war. Rumiton (talk) 13:09, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the apology, Msalt, but you have now created another problem. You point out [525] that at 1357 on Mar 10, I deleted a ref from Time Magazine on the subject of his family's "demonstration of worship". Yes, I did. You omit to note that 2 minutes later at 1359 I pasted it into a more appropriate section of the article. How on earth does moving text around to create readability have the effect of "subtlely deleting" it? You also say: "I will also concede that Rumiton does not edit war nearly to the extent that Momento does..." As far as I know, I have NEVER edit warred on any Wikipedia article, and Momento's revertings have almost all been in defence of WP:BLP and therefore are not edit warring either. Rumiton (talk) 13:10, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Now you again accuse me of edit warring. Edit warring occurs when an editor “..repeatedly reverts content edits.” I restored text that you deleted without discussion which named the 10 overseas cities Prem Rawat spoke at in one year (1980). You had changed it to, “He also spoke at several cities in Europe and South America." This was not, in my opinion, “simply condensed” material, it was negative POV. My edit summary said "rv undiscussed deletion which included interesting and important information. Pls discuss." You later wanted to insert details about a house he bought 34 years ago and an arrangement arrived at with the Los Angeles Fire Department, not because it had anything to do with his notability but because it could be presented critically.

You further say, “I will concede that calling someone a single purpose account is subjective.” No it isn’t, it is clear-cut, and this is just another of your insults. SPA means someone who confines him/herself ONLY to one subject, and therefore lacks a wider Wikipedia perspective. I have made hundreds of edits to a wide range of articles, and have acted successfully as a mediator (on the Jesus Army page.) I hold a Master’s License and a degree in Nautical Science, and have edited maritime articles as an expert editor including Titanic related. See my Talk Page for the details.

[edit] Reply to Maelefique

You have said regarding the notability of ex-premies, "Certainly prominent enough to warrant a disambiguation page. Interestingly, you neglected to include a standard google search where the entire first page (1-10) are all Rawat's ex-premies." You must be running a different copy of Google to me. When I search for "Prem Rawat" only 2 sites come up that are negative about him, ex-premie.org and prem-rawat-talk.org. In the first ten, they appear as 6 and 7. After that they fade from the pages, and by the third page the hundreds of positive sites dominate. Sorry, I misunderstood. You were comparing ex-premies to premature babies and questioning the need for disambiguation. Disambiguate away! Rumiton (talk) 09:36, 1 April 2008 (UTC)Rumiton (talk) 10:42, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to Cult Free World

Looking at the Sahaj Marg page you are apparently trying to restore, the refs you give are all either promotional (issued by the organisation), unreliable internet sites (blogs), or primary documents (courtcase precis etc.), which require interpretation by a reputable secondary source before becoming acceptable to Wikipedia, see WP:PSTS. There appear to be no reputable secondary sources who have looked at the Sahaj Marg, which no doubt was why the article was deleted in the first place. Jossi was only serving the stated goals of Wikipedia by redeleting it. You say: "he may not be able to properly use the administrative tools, given his direct involvement with controversial subjects." I can only say: Nonsense. He has shown himself to be extremely capable of neutrality. Rumiton (talk) 13:24, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

If you still feel the sources you have are reputable and this article should be reinstated, your next step as I understand it is to make a request for comment, not attack the admin. Rumiton (talk) 14:27, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to Windy Wanderer

Thank you. I concur absolutely. Rumiton (talk) 14:45, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply again to Will Beback

You now say I called Alan Watts an unreliable source. No such thing. I said his use of oxymoron ("sacred ignorance") made his meaning unclear and misleading. Rumiton (talk) 13:16, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Further views on the problems faced

I believe the problems associated with this article are mostly those of content. In any other article I am sure we could all cooperate, working within Wikipedia rules and guidelines, but it is not happening here. The article has become a growing mishmash of contradictions inserted by editors to support their POVs and counter the opposition, and the truth is not in it. The following is a summary of Prem Rawat’s work as I see it. Please don’t shout OR and SYN at me. I have heard these things before, but I believe the only way to make a stable article of this is for editors to think and act intelligently and independently, even if it means circumventing some of Wikipedia’s precepts. (Though I believe there is even somewhere a rule that says the rules should be disobeyed if it is necessary to create a good article.)

1.Prem Rawat is the heir to an Indian tradition of Sant Mat masters. It is a respected tradition, but not an uncontested one.

2.His title has variously been Guru, Satguru, Teacher and Master.

3.The tradition involved the teaching of Knowledge, (a set of four techniques for spiritual development and inner peace), Satsang), (keeping in touch with the guru and other practitioners), and seva, (service, helping the guru propagate the Knowledge.) Service extends to regarding the guru as an embodiment of divinity, referring to and serving him in that manner, and to him referring to himself the same way.

4.These four techniques, see particularly khecari mudra, and the practice of guru service are part of a long Guru-Disciple tradition which is respected, in fact revered, in India.

5.Another part of the tradition was the providing of accommodation and a renunciate, serving lifestyle to those who chose it. These houses were called ashrams. This tradition is also revered in India.

6.At the age of 12 he apparently unilaterally made the decision to take his message to the west.

7.Initially he and the other assistants he brought with him tried to apply traditional Indian methods, such as ashram living, to the spreading of his message. This provided benefits but also problems. Lacking a renunciate tradition, many westerners found themselves unsuited to the ashram lifestyle, and the ashrams were often seen as work houses and worse by the public.

8.As the Guru-disciple tradition was almost entirely unknown outside Asia, the publicity the adolescent guru received in the 70s was largely negative. Service was seen as servitude, he was criticised for not himself living a renunciate lifestyle, and the techniques, as they became publically known, were ridiculed.

9.In the early 80s, Prem Rawat closed the ashrams, abandoned the Indian peripherals and changed his public style to a more internationally acceptable presentation, while keeping what he saw as the essentials; service, satsang and meditation on the techniques. In recent years he has concentrated on airing videos of his public speeches, with an open invitation to proceed further only if people wish to.

10.From around 1980, Prem Rawat proceeded by word of mouth, not encouraging inspection by academics and journalists, so the sources that are available to us today in English are mostly from the very early period, often written by religious scholars or tabloid journalists, largely people with little understanding and scant respect for Indian traditions and practices. They misunderstood (and in some cases cynically misrepresented) the Indian terminology and the guru-disciple relationship itself. Even the very few that were fair and scholarly are now nearly 30 years out of date. If we are to create a good Wikipedia article we cannot rely on them.

Comments, please.

[edit] Evidence presented by Vassyana

A large number of accusations, rebuttals and counter-accusations are flying about. I will be presenting evidence that reviews that other evidence and details my experiences with the topic.

[edit] Jossi's alleged COI

A long list of diffs was provided during the COI noticeboard discussion in the wake of the Register article. The links intending to demonstrate that Jossi's COI is a recurring issue don't do much to impugn Jossi. (You may find the thread in question at: Wikipedia:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard/Archive 22#Jossi COI diffs. I will not repeat all of the discussion and diffs present in that thread, but rather leave the archive link as evidence.)

Addressing the long list of diffs (one of the diffs is not Jossi's [526]), I didn't find very much that is even vaguely questionable. Most of them seem to be copyedits, revisions and expansions following reliable sources, removing unsourced claims, reversions of vandalism, etc. It seems like he's generally doing exactly what any Wikipedia editor should be doing when editing an article.

Jossi reverted another editor's addition of {{credibility}} tags for a particular source using a dismissive edit summary (calling the addition "silly").[527] The tagger restored the tags, was reverted by another user, again restored the tags and then self-reverted. This, by far, is the most potentially problematic diff I could find in the lot. It seems to be as isolated incident and it occurred nearly a year ago.

Jossi added some personal information about Prem Rawat that could be construed as promotional, but that seems perfectly normal for a bio. The material was added with sources and the edit summary encourages others to revert and/or object if they disagree with the addition.[528]

Jossi did remove a few categories, which was accompanied by a talk page explanation.[529] The categories have not been restored to the article.

Jossi engaged in some reverts against opponents, but these seem to be clear cases of BLP enforcement.[530]

For such a long list of diffs and strong accusations, I would expect clearer indications of wrongdoing and more than a few isolated instances.

Interestingly, the diffs provided include several instances of Jossi adding or restoring criticism to the article.[531][532][533][534][535][536]

For the record, I have only reviewed the diffs up to the one numbered "62". After reviewing 55 diffs, with only two that could be construed in any rational way as remotely problematic (removed tag with dismissive summary; potentially promotional addition) and six showing willingness to add critical material, I stopped reviewing them due to the trend. The long list of diffs purporting to show Jossi's violation of WP:COI instead show little but (at worst) a few isolated instances. On the contrary, they appear to indicate that Jossi has edited within the rules of Wikipedia, even going so far as "writing for the enemy". It should be noted that this COI complaint was closed as baseless, which is consistent with how previous complaints about Jossi in relation to COI have been handled (see for example Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive 24#Jossi's Conflict of Interest). Vassyana (talk) 16:04, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] My participation and the editing atmosphere

What follows is a general overview of my participation, and discussions surrounding it, in the Prem Rawat article. I have linked to diffs when necessary for ease of reference. However, I am linking to the archive sections in question to avoid misrepresenting the exchanges and to avoid taking undue space here. Also, the context of my participation and the discussions surrounding my comments are important to consider.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 23#GA Review (Failed). My initial good article review that failed the candidate.

Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive 23#Comments on GA Review (Failed). The discussion immediately following, including the exchange between PatW and Momento mentioned multiple times above.

Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_23#Progress. After some initial work done on the article, I was asked for feedback and responded positively, seeing improvement.

Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_23#Moving on. (Diff: [537]) I provide some further clarification and feedback, noting flaws remain and commenting about appropriate sources.

Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_23#Primary sources. I recommended some guidelines on dealing with Divine Light Mission primary sources. Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Discussion. The main discussion about the proposed idea and related issues. Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Please. I implore people to focus on building the article, some further discussion.

Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive 24#Please 2. Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive 24#Cool down. I further implored people to work constructively. There was little response to my pleas. Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_24#Truce and Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Comments. A proposed "truce" and limited comments.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Current state of things. After an absence due to some computer issues, I returned to touch base. In the discussion, it is explained by some participants why they disagreed with the truce proposal. The explanations are important, as they reflect the broader concerns of some editors.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Prem_Rawat/Bio proposal - New Edits- Vassayana please comment. I was invited to comment in this section, and I did (diff: [538]). I noted that some editors on both "sides" seemed to be supporting a biased presentation (diff: [539]). Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Outside neutral source about the guru's divinity. I presented a source as an example of what I meant in the earlier section. Only Jossi responded.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Some thoughts. In this section, I defend Sylviecyn's right to disagree with me and object to my suggestions. I pressed some editors for more detailed and constructive feedback to little avail.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Important questions and Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Responses. Momento worked on a draft in an article talk subpage and imported it into mainspace. There were objections to the changes and I solicited explanations.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#BLP violations. I addressed what I felt at the time were BLP violations. I also expressed deep disappointment in the article, feeling it had become worse by way of advocacy from both supporters and detractors.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Moving right along. Accusations and bad faith were flying about. I made further pleas for peace. (The "comment above" mentioned in the thread is this: [540].)

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Removal of invisible message. I was involved in a minor dispute (of WP:LAME caliber had it continued) over an invisible message. (I was wrong and being more than a bit silly over such an inconsequential thing.) However, it is the discussion that follows that is important, as it reveals the editing atmosphere at that time.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#Principles of Neutrality in Language. Nik Wright2 raised some concerns to my attention and I replied.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 25#DECA. A discussion regarding a business/material goods reportedly owned by Rawat. Another discussion important for understanding the atmosphere and context of the dispute and its participants. Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 25#Updated Version. A similarly important section to review.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 25#Mediation. I explained that formal mediation should not be used as evidence or a weapon against another editor. Snark flows freely throughout this thread from multiple parties.

Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 26#NPOV Criticism. In the archived section, I once again implore everyone involved to drop unproductive/snarky issues. Also, the section generally involves some back and forth between editors.

After that, my participation and awareness of the issues on the article declined, though my GA review and other comments were sporadically mentioned by editors on both "sides". In general, it seems as though there are a few new faces, but that the same issues with the editing atmosphere and behavior currently persist at the Prem Rawat article. Also, many of the same issues are being continually retread, which is a sign of the lack of progress in terms of atmosphere and consensus building. My apologies for the length of the linked material, but I feel overall it provides a good snapshot of my participation and of the ongoing dispute present at the article. If the arbitrators or participants need specific diffs or further elaboration, please leave a message on my talk page and I will do my best to assist. Vassyana (talk) 18:18, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Replies to other editors

[edit] Nik Wright2

The removal of a site is mentioned by Nik.[541] The accompanying talk page discussion is: Talk:Prem Rawat/Archive 24#BLP violations. Vassyana (talk) 14:00, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cult Free World

Jossi was perfectly correct in deleting any repost of the Sahaj Marg article under Wikipedia:CSD#G4. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sahaj Marg demonstrated a clear consensus for deletion. Unless significantly improved with independent reliable sources, reposts will be subject to speedy deletion without further discussion. This is a standard accepted practice on the wiki. Vassyana (talk) 14:43, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Revera

On his userpage ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jossi/About ) Jossi declares himself to be "a proud student of Prem Rawat". An impartial student? No. A proud one. Not exactly NPOV for starters is it?

Then, in his disclosure - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jossi/Disclosure - Jossi declares his intention "to continue to ... correct mistaken or out-of-date facts" What exactly is he trying to say here? How can a fact become 'out-of-date'? When revisionists get to write the history books?

That's precisely what he and other 'students' of Rawat have been trying to do in an article that predominantly portrays a whitewashed picture of Rawat and the claims to divinity that he undeniably made yet which he now wants to see expunged from the historical record.

More of Jossi's revisionist tendencies are evidenced here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3AJossi&diff=130324547&oldid=130293611

Revera (talk) 22:07, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Hohohahaha

I have read the Register article. I don't know if it is an accurate portrayal of the situation or not.

What I do know is that Prem Rawat has received a lot of press coverage [542], a lot of it critical. This is not adequately covered in the article.

I hope the arbcom committee, after reviewing all the evidence will be able to answer the following questions:

1) Given Rawat's large press and scholarly coverage, why is there so little of this criticisms in this article?

2) Should Jossi have any participation on these pages?

Question #2 is very important. After reviewing the page, it appears that that Jossi participates in every decision for the Prem articles, from something as mundane as word choice: Talk:Prem_Rawat/Archive_34#Is it accurate to say that Rawat tours 'extensively'? to something as intricate as how to handle criticisms: Talk:Prem_Rawat#Criticism_of_Prem_Rawat.

The situation is a bit surreal. We have an admin, with extensive participation and influence in Rawat articles...and we have a press release which says, contact this admin at the Prem Rawat foundation? [[543]] And this editor despite being asked, has not disclosed his affiliation, though he is willing "to consider" disclosing further information if asked by the arbcom committee?

The situation gets even more surreal as we look at the COI policy page. Here is Jossi's first edit to it: [[544]], where he starts right in on "religious leaders." His first edit to the page is to change the COI requirements for teacher/student relationships for editors! You can follow the diffs. Here is another I found alarming: [[545]]

Hohohahaha (talk) 15:39, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Windy Wanderer

Clarification of the COI policy will be critical in this case, and it must be cautious. The COI policy should not exclude members of groups (paid or not), because these same members often know the most about topics they are writing on, and, they are often more neutral than ex-members or disgruntled members.

For instance, CDC epidemiologists know about CDC policies and findings regarding disease and health produced by their agency, Catholic teachers know much about Catholicism, professors at Harvard University know much about Harvard University (as do students), and so forth. Should any of these be banned just because they are a member of a certain group? Absolutely not.

I think in particular of one of the more productive Wiki editors who is a Lutheran pastor and writes frequently on those topics. He is getting paid to be a Lutheran pastor, so is a paid member of the group, and he has studied various aspects of Lutheranism for years and years, so offers an invaluable level of detail and accuracy to Wikipedia. Should he be banned? Absolutely not.

When I examine edit wars and conflicts across Wikipedia, those "anti" a group/topic/person are usually the ones most stridently promoting a POV when compared to other editors. More often than not these "anti" persons (e.g., ex-members, disgruntled members, etc.) are prone to what can be referred to as the Rush Limbaugh effect -- exaggeration and mis-representation of selectively chosen statements or content to promote a POV. Often, these claims have a small kernel of truth in them (i.e., an initial statement that is true) but they are taken so out of context and twisted and turned so much that they bear little resemblance to what a reasonable, knowledgeable layperson would get from the initial statement if read in context.

Another group that runs a strong risk of COI is bloggers (both for and against a topic). Editors who also run blogs and engage in other opinion-promotion activities seem to have the most difficult time abiding by Wikipedia's policy of neutrality and verifiability. (I am not saying that is the case with Prem Rawat as I have not examined the diffs carefully enough; I am just writing this because the COI policy that comes out of this case will affect us all.)

Here are some suggested policy statements:

  1. Members of groups have just as much right to edit an article as ex-members, disgruntled members, or never members.
  2. Being a paid member of a group is not an inherent COI, as some of the most knowledgeable persons on a topic are employed by organizations and/or engaging in employment related to the article.
  3. Bloggers should not edit topics on which they have blogs, because their avocation is to promote a specific point-of-view on that topic, an inherent COI.
  4. Public relations/advertising employees should not edit the same topics for which they provide public relations or advertising services, because their vocation is to promote a specific point-of-view on that topic, an inherent COI.

Windy Wanderer (talk) 22:40, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by Cult Free World

Jossi has established himself as promoter of one particular view on wikipedia, this I have noticed when one of the user approached him (only) for deletion of one article here [546], and jossi promptly deleted the same without any discussion about the topic, I noticed that arguments given for previous deletion of the same cult related article was notability issue and lack of secondary sources, which are/were absolutely untrue as i found plenty of secondary sources [547] and even found one complete category about the same topic on French wikipedia. [548]. This approach (as it appears to me) is highly discouraging for philosophy with which wikipedia was established, to give information and not to hide it. Most surprising aspect of all the discussion that i had so far, with members having direct involvement with the group in question, is they cannot tolerate any critical information about the subject, and as a result, the page then experiences edit wars and 3RR violations and looses stability. The most efficient way of dealing with COI (direct involvement) is NOT to block the user from editing to the article, but to make sure, that the user having COI do not remove any information from the article, but only add to the page with the domain s/he is more comfortable with, as removal of properly sourced information, blocks the complete picture of the article, If there are two contradictory information available about the subject which can be properly sourced then both should be added in the article.

Given users approaching Jossi for deletion of information (without any discussion or notice to others who may have interest in the related topic) seriously undermines the ethics expected from an administrator on wikipedia, Jossi's contribution to wikipedia as an editor are most welcomed, but he may not be able to properly use the administrative tools, given his direct involvement with controversial subjects.--Cult free world (talk) 12:14, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] re: Sahaj_Marg_India

There are 17 ref's i am able to find till now [549], still searching and will add more. Out of these 17 can you point out which one exactly is:-

  • promotional (issued by the organisation) (I have tried to avoid organizations references to best of my ability)
  • unreliable internet sites (blogs), (which one is a blog!!) there is none if you have really gone through the ref's.
  • primary documents (courtcase precis etc.), to give reference for a dispute, we do need a court docket, but if we wish to interpret, we need a secondary source, we are not interpreting anything, links for court cases are presented, that’s all.

On analyzing the history deeply, i found this delete was against the philosophy of wikipedia, first deletion was nominated by Jossi only [550], and second time, when someone tried to push back the cult promoters on wikipedia, the page was deleted by Jossi [551], Why Renee approached Jossi only ? and requested him to delete the page ?[552], which Jossi deleted promptly [553] if Jossi had not established himself as promoter of one particular view on wikipedia, why would people approach him for help in cult related articles ? Why no AfD tag on the page for other's to see and participate in deletion discussion ? To my understanding, Jossi's edits and usage of admin tools must have been highly biased, which gave members of groups (referred as cults) free will to manipulate wikiepdia article to suit their POV.I will try and explain the situation (Jossi with admin tools) with a very crude example, joy of jihadi terrorists when pakistan became nuclear nation.[554] A nuclear Pakistan need to be very careful and guard its nuclear facilities with 10000 troops,[555], else there is US [556]--Cult free world (talk) 06:50, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reply to user:Vassyana

Kindly note, nomination for deletion was done by jossi, and who all are present in the nomination process ?[557]

Now my concern. Any person involved with one group, will have a POV towards other similar groups, and as such neutrality of usage of admin tools related with similar articles cannot be confirmed. I do not believe that deletion of a page by me is a neutral act if I have previously nominated the same article for deletion, that is over and above a declaration. Jossi's contribution are important for wikipedia, but his usage of admin tools may not be neutral. Can neutrality of a wikipedia article be confirmed which is written by all the above mentioned user's (with exception of don) ? --talk-to-me! (talk) 15:59, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence by user:Mukadderat

Evidence by unsuspecting passer-by user:Mukadderat who got himself into trouble for nothing:

Regular participants of the editing in these topics throrughly forgotten what is wikipedia for and are engaged in thick wikipedia:Wikilawyering for whatever political purposes in lieu of discussion of editing merits. And user:jossi is among prime ocrhestrators of this.

Proposal 1: user:Jossi must be banned from any participation in this topic whatsoever, including discussion in talk pages, both becuse of his conflict of interest and behavior incompatible with position of administrator.

Proposal 2 the 1-RR rule must be revised that is someone's edits are reverted then if there are no valid objections stated in the talk page after a reasonable timewhen demanded, then the original athour has unconditional right to reinstate it and keep it there without any quotas until content objections (not simoply formal objections) delivered. I believe this proposal will decrease power of wikipedia:Wikilawyering in favor of content discussion.

Brief history While doing word search I occasionally run on this topic and did some minor changes, withoud adding any new content, mostly trying to provide various links between various pieces of info. In particular I added an innocent sentence into Criticism of Prem Rawat saying that the organization Divine Light where he was guru was also criticized. After a while I noticed it disappeared from the text. Looking into history, I noticed there was reversal of anons and I decided that disappearance of my text was "collateral damage" of fight with anon vandals, so I restored my piece without making much fuss. Next thing I see my text deleted again with ridiulous editu summary "removed unsourced material as per talk". I looked into the talk page and did'n notice any explanation. I restored my text and demanded explanation wich exactly reference they want, which was rather ridiculous request IMO: why would anyone need a reference to phrase "The Divine Light Mission with Prem Rawat as its guru was also criticized as a sect or cult." -- The article "Divine Light Mission" has a screenfull of references to this end. After that I received a notice on my talk page that the article in on 1RR probation and exact pointer where my edits were discussed.

After looking there, the first my feeling was that of a fly which occasinally flew into a dining room and being swatted. Rather than discussing any merits of my rather trivial edit, great energy was spent on desire to revert my edit whatever it costs on formal reasons. And it was started by user:Jossi, who is obviously vigilantly watches the aticle, and while not editing it himself, calls his army to arms against unwanted intruders. What happened next is a shame to wikipedia community: someone emitted a cry: "I already spent my 1 revert! Please, someone revert him!" If it is not shameless meatpuppetry then I am Jesus Christ.

Next thing and user:Jossi starts threathening me with sanctions if I not behave how in wants. And after 12 minutes!!!!' since his warning he implements his threat: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User:Mukadderat_1RR_probation_violation. In this page I defended myself with analysis why I consider this act as extemely inappropriate and frivolous, so I will not repeat myself.

Conclusion This extremeny brief edting episode demonstrates several acts of inappropriate beaviour of user:Jossi

  • While reclusing from editing the article because of COI, he still orchestrates POV pushing in the talk page by mobilizing meatpuppets in revert wars for purely formal reasons while avoiding factual discussion of edits
  • Hypocrisy: I see an edit war going on about "The Divine Light Mission with Prem Rawat as its guru was also criticized as a sect or cult." There are no sources for this in this article, so I am wondering experienced editors keep re-adding this. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:20, 11 April 2008 (UTC) -- As a very interested person he knows only very well that references are abound. And if, e.g., he wants these refereces copied from Divine Light Mission into this article, the {{fact}} tag would be suffcient. Mukadderat
  • Aggressive theats combined with refusal to discuss the article content: when I asked in the talk page which exactly references are necessary, his repy was: "It does not matter, really. You are welcome to contribute, but note that there is a 1RR probation on this article. You can self-revert, and save all of us a trip to WP:AN/I, were it will be reported if you don't. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 23:24, 11 April 2008 (UTC) " In other words, article content does not matter to him.
  • Exsessive impatience: he implemented his threat after 12 minutes after issuing it, while I was still bewildered by an unexpected aggressive altack and was reading talk pages to understand what this fuss was all about.
  • Insulting language: "self-revert and save yourself from getting dinged"
  • Clear misunderstanding the WP:BLOCK: it is intended to prevent abuse, not to punish. But Jossi threatened that I will be "dinged" for my past actions.
  • While recusing from editing, he in fact acts as self-appointed moderator of the topics in question, indirectly executing ownership of the page

I am a rather tolerant person and not edit warrior, as may be verified in some other controversial articles I edited, such as Islamophobia, Pontian Greek Genocide or Goy. But I see this beavior of user:Jossi as utterly incompatible with the position of an admn and here I decided to increase my levei of intoleance and I will be closely watching his editing activity to verify whether it is time to initiate a motion of desysopping this person. Mukadderat (talk) 18:21, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by User:Hypnotist uk

I've been following this case with interest from afar, but I just wanted to add a note at my disappointment in seeing User:Jossi suggesting during this case that several people who don't share his POV might want to leave the article. Namely User:Francis Schonken [568], User:Maelefique [569] and (more subtly) User:Will Beback [570].

This more or less sums up the feeling I've had about the page from following the article and talk page for some months. If there's absolutely no element of WP:OWN here, then I'm a banana. Hypnotist uk (talk) 12:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Evidence presented by {your user name}

before using the last evidence template, please make a copy for the next person

[edit] {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.