Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/HanzoHattori

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Strangely, the set up for these doesn't automatically create a link back to the specific RfC this talk page is for. So I'm adding a link here: the RfC this talk page goes with is Wikipedia:Requests for comment/HanzoHattori. --Yksin 20:09, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Contents 1 Disregard for RfC 2 Responses to votes on Biophys view 2.1 Yksin replies 3 Biophys re: personal attack (moved from RfC page)

[edit] Disregard for RfC

I find this editor's blatant disregard of this RfC as well as the opinions of his fellow editors to be of great concern. His edit-warring and uncivil behavior must be stopped. Right now at least two articles are having to be long-term protected to save them from HanzoHattori's disruptive behavior. His latest response to my suggestion that he focus efforts on this RfC instead of continuing his edit war is very disturbing.

• My suggestion that he focus on this RfC instead of pushing to have the article unprotected so he can begin to make his disputed edits again: [1]
• Hanzo's response to that suggestion: "Thanks but no thanks."
• When asked about his intentions to continue his edit warring [2], HanzoHattori responds with unclear answers, [3], [4]
• Hanzo has not even bothered to particpate in the straw poll regarding the disputed edits: [5].
• Yet he continues to leave numerous WP:SOAP comments on the talk pages [6], [7], [8]

Something definitely needs to be done to address this issue. – Dreadstar † 17:42, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Note that the links above refer to two different disputes: on the articles Battle of Washita River, and The Holocaust. --Yksin 20:09, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Responses to votes on Biophys view

<moved comments>

Reply. I agree with the "Desired outcome" of this RfC, as was initially formulated by Yksin. That is enough. Let's not make the problem bigger. Honestly, I do not understand some of you. There are no long-standing disagreements between HanzoHattori and Yksin. In fact, they only edited Battle of Washita River together. I edited several articles with HanzoHattori, and I had no any problems negotiating with him. To the contrary, he is a very knowledgeable editor on military subjects.Biophys 05:51, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I do agree with many points by Yksin below, but we must stick to a rigid format to be productive. What is the goal? To prevent these two editors from editing this specific article? O'K, I am with you. To do something with Holocaust article? That is a different subject for discussion and RfC. To discuss behavior of HanzoHattori? Then let's say it from the beginning, and please tell what is your "Desired outcome". Otherwise, we are waisting our time. Sorry, but that is what I think.Biophys 06:04, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Per instructions on the bottom of this RfC, Threaded replies to another user's vote, endorsement, evidence, response, or comment should be posted to the talk page. So I will make my reply to this there. --Yksin 07:00, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

<end of moved comments>

[edit] Yksin replies

Point 1. The real purpose of this RfC. The strange thing about all of this is that I've never had a big huge disagreement with HanzoHattori ever -- except in regards to his incivility. (We do disagree on the issue of plagiarism of public domain texts, but I can live with that; I would never have made an RfC about it.) To compound the strangeness: HanzoHattori has never been uncivil to me. He's tried to pull me into his animosity towards Custerwest, sure; he's tried (& had some measure of success) to pull me into WP:POINTless discussions, yes -- but he's never been uncivil to me. And yet I initiated this RfC.

Why? Because the question of incivility isn't only just about "s/he called me names" or "s/he was mean to me." Incivility is about the other people too: the people who are not directly involved in the trading of oh-so-clever witty barbs, sarcasm, nasty namecalling, etc. All that is unpleasant enough for the parties who are exchanging these unpleasantries with each other (though they must've gotten some kind of hit off it, because the yuckiness of it never stopped them from keeping it up) -- but it's also unpleasant to the other editors involved. It creates an unpleasant, even a hostile, working environment. It's also very tedious to be around. And disruptive.

Read the desired outcome of the RfC again. Our goal was not to ban HanzoHattori or Custerwest from editing the Washita article. That was just a last resort. Our goal was to make a civil working environment at that article & its talk page, in which these two users, along with all the others, committed to adhering to all Wikipedia's policies, both about personal conduct (such as civility) and about content (such as NPOV, NOR, etc.). I don't think that either Murderbike or I had as our highest goal with either of these RfCs to ban HanzoHattori or Custerwest from editing the Washita or any article: we only called for that if they proved unable or unwilling to abide by Wikipedia policies. As it is, both have apparently just decided to take themselves out of that article, for reasons I can only speculate about. Because they're unwilling to commit to following Wikipedia policies? Then they have no business being here to begin with. Because the thought of apologizing or saying "I'll try to do better from here on in" sticks in their craws? I frankly don't understand why it is so difficult for some people to be civil, or to comprehend why it's important or how their incivility ruins things for everyone. But y'know, if I really had my druthers: both users would still be editing the Washita article, both having changed & both having agreed to abide by all of Wikipedia's policies, & living by that promise. But neither of them want to do that. So there you have it.

Point 2. Why this RfC is still relevant, and actually simplifies things rather than complicating them. I'm glad that you're able to work with HanzoHattori with no problems between you. Civility is nice. It's too bad, though, that a lot of people who've had contact with HanzoHattori don't have such a good civil working relationship with him, whether because of his's habit of uncivil personal attack behavior & edit warring, or the other person's, or (as in the case of the Washita article between HanzoHattori & Custerwest) a combination of the two. In any case, this RfC is a user-conduct RfC, not an article content RfC. Per WP:RFCC, This process is for discussing specific users who have violated Wikipedia policies and guidelines. Which most definitely HanzoHattori has done, not just at the Washita article, but at The Holocaust and other articles as well. It's pretty typical (I know, because I've read other user-conduct RfCs) that the outside views that come in on an RfC are about other disputes that other people have had with the same user on other articles. Particularly with incivility: that kind of inconsiderate behavior tends to travel with the person wherever s/he goes. Now, you seem to be arguing that every user who has these same set of problems with HanzoHattori should write their own RfC on him. Assuming that they can also get a second user who can also certify the same dispute. Having done the RfC prepwork for two users, I can tell you that the work involved in is not trivial. Which is actually a good thing: RfCs are a big step, & they shouldn't be undertaken for trivial reasons. But at the same time -- many people never undertake them when they should, because of the work involved. They'd rather be editing articles.

But I don't think that the in-built screening against trivial complaints was ever intended to block additional complainants with different disputes from the original from "hitching a ride" as it were on the first complaint. It was just to ensure that the original basis of the RfC was substantive. And for those additional complaints about the subject of the RfC that might hitch on through outside views -- some will get endorsed, & others will not.

So, look at the number of people who latched onto this RfC when they saw it. Why did they? Because HanzoHattori is a busy editor who works on lots of articles & carries his special style of disruption through incivility & edit warring with people he disagrees with wherever he goes. (Custerwest hasn't had so many outside comments -- though I think his offenses against Wikipedia policies are far wider & deeper -- only because his interests are so narrow. But travel to any Custer-related message boards or mailing lists on the internet, & I reckon you'll find he's cut a wide swath of incivility & personal attack and faulty scholarship there as well.) The result for HanzoHattori has been, in part: disruption on Battle of Mogadishu (for which HanzoHattori got a 3RR block on 11 October 2006; disruption on Talk:Battle of Najaf (2007) [9] [10] [11] (personal attack block on 20 Feb 2007); disruption on Battle of Hue (3RR block on 17 April 2007); disruption on Becky Gable[12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] (block on 2 May 2007 for breach of WP:CIVIL, including calling an admin a fag); disruption on Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad (3RR block on 12 June 2007); disruption on Battle of Washita River (3RR block on 1 July 2007, plus those noted by me & Murderbike in this RfC); not to mention other disruptions noted by other editors in their responses to this RfC; not to mention other disruptions noted by other editors elsewhere, many of them documented on HanzoHattori's talk page; not to mention the possibility of other disruptions experienced by other editors who never complained because they didn't know how to, or because the experience was so unpleasant that they just went away somewhere else.

See the pattern? This isn't just a Battle of Washita River problem. Nor does recognizing that the problem is much bigger make things "bigger": it was HanzoHattori who made things bigger by habitually engaging in that behavior; I just didn't know how much bigger it was until other people brought their stories of contact with him in. Recognizing the problem is bigger than we thought is just recognizing facts. And I think it's a lot less complicated to gather the complaints into one place & try to end the problem once & for all, than to force each dispute to be handled one by one by those editors who have the time or energy or insanity or whatever to do what I did in writing up the histories for this RfC. In my opinion, To be productive is to let those editors forgo the minutes and hours necessary to put together an RfC (because I've already done it) and use that time instead to improve articles or live their non-Wikipedia lives. To be productive is also put a stop to HanzoHattori's habit of uncivil, battleground-style behavior, once and for all, so that nobody has to deal with this time-wasting, productivity-harming disruption from him again.

That doesn't mean my goal is for him to be banned, or even blocked. My goal is for him to change his behavior, so that he can continue as a productive editor without simultaneously disrupting the productivity of others through his habitual incivility and edit-warring. But if he doesn't want to do that -- well, what other option would there be? If he does not wish to abide by Wikipedia policies, he doesn't belong here. It's his choice. It shouldn't have to be ours to put up with his continued abuses.

Now, I've never seen a rule about RfCs that says that only the exact dispute originally brought up by the original certifiers can be discussed in the RfC, or that its hoped-for outcomes can't be modified as involved users acquire more information from other users about the activities of the RfC's subject. But if there is such a rule, seems to me that there is overwhelming reason here to ignore it. And so I was bold and decided to demand more than I did initially: that HanzoHattori change his behavior and commit to abide by fundamental, 5 pillar Wikipedia policies not just in the vicinity of the Battle of the Washita, but everywhere on Wikipedia. Just as most of us already do, without any apparent difficulty. --Yksin 09:12, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Biophys re: personal attack (moved from RfC page)

<moved from RfC page>

I do not know who called me "meatpuppet" here, but this is very uncivil. And you are trying to teach others how to behave? You should know that "A meatpuppet is a new Internet community member account, created by another person at the request of a user solely for the purposes of influencing the community on a given issue or issues acting essentially as a puppet of the first user without having independent views and actual or potential contributions."Biophys 00:41, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

</end moved material>

You are right, Biophys, this was unacceptable language. And it was my error. I thought that it was the actual language that Custerwest had used in his accusation, & because I forgot to locate & include the diff when I first wrote the RfC, I didn't check the language then. Had it been so, I should have put the term in quotes, as his term. But in fact it wasn't his term, it was my incorrect interpretation of his term. When I added the diff today (having realized I'd forgotten to add it before), I did have his actual language, & saw my error, & should have changed the language of the RfC then. I apologize that I did not do so then. I have no excuse.

I did change the RfC language just now -- see diff. I'm very sorry, & hope you will accept my apology. --Yksin 00:58, 16 August 2007 (UTC)