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Re: WP:AGF and defenestrations

Thanks for the heads-up, I'm already on it: . I'm still formulating the post, but it will appear soon.

Cheers and thanks again! pedro gonnet - talk - 01.02.2008 09:05

Ta-da! pedro gonnet - talk - 01.02.2008 09:27

Nahum Shahaf

As Elonka already warned you, articles in the relating to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, broadly construed, are under a ruling of discretionary sanctions.

Your recent edit warring over Nahum Shahaf is unacceptable, and you have persisted despite numerous warnings and expressed BLP concerns. Given that you no longer attempt to resolve the dispute through the talk page, you are hereby banned from editing the Nahum Shahaf article entirely for a period of 60 days (not including the associated talk page).

Please note that further disruption, including persisting with incivil edit summaries or more edit warring, will lead to stronger sanctions up to and including complete topic ban and blocks of increasing duration. — Coren  18:35, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

"I have persisted despite numerous warnings"? What are you on about? Since Elonka posted a warning in relation to civility in edit summaries on my talk page, I made two edits to the article, here and here, while at the same time being engaged (as I had been for a long time) on the talk page about the broad issues involved. Both were reverts to restore sourced, albeit critical, information which other editors then removed. I have not attempted to restore it since. You do realise, do you not, that it takes two (or more in this case) to edit war, and that I in fact backed away from continuing that edit war, while other editors did not? You don't seem to have contacted or barred any of the others involved.

Having said all that I'm not going to contest the ban as I had already decided to return to my original position in respect of this page, which was not to edit it anyway, as per here. It's a waste of time when the usual bunch of nationalist North American and Israeli editors will just weigh in to make sure that any related article reflects their favoured narrative of Israeli-Palestinian issues, while ignoring or excluding the conclusions of any reliable sources that question that view. It's too exasperating, as my edit summaries (very) occasionally give away. And I have better things to do. --Nickhh (talk) 16:15, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Hi Nickhh, I was doing a spot-check, and am very pleased to see that you're back in the swing of things on other articles: Nickhh (talk · contribs). Thanks for all the great work! Accordingly, if you'd like, I'd be happy to lift the ban and restore your editing privileges on Nahum Shahaf? I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't want that, but did want to check with you first. So, any preference either way? --Elonka 01:39, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not that bothered either way to be honest, especially when it comes with slightly patronising comments suggesting that I'm somehow back on the correct path after a naughty deviation, or that editing here is a "privilege" of some sort, to be conferred on people from on high. As I've said I'm happy to leave that article as the plaything of those who have a political agenda here, and equally to continue doing what I've always done here - which is making occasional small edits to amend obvious errors or problems in articles I come across where I have a degree of interest and/or knowledge (which in reality of course is all I was attempting to do with the Nahum Shahaf page as well). --Nickhh (talk) 11:42, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Alright, up to you. If you change your mind, let me know.  :) --Elonka 18:45, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Extraordinary rendition and the United States

Today you wrote: "I am not going to discuss anything else with you on this page. Do not take this as tacit consensus that the arguments you've made above (and will no doubt continue to make here) hold any water. In fact assume that I would probably rebut every single point you have made on the talk page, with specific arguments and examples, if I had the time. Also do not take this to mean that you have the right to continue to muck about with the main content. Where this will leave the article, who knows. Hopefully other editors may take on some of the challenge. --Nickhh (talk) 22:48, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Why not agree to post our dispute, and ask have one (or both) of us banned from the article? We could amicably agree to this, and then the article could be improved more than with more pointless debate? If you are correct they will ban me and everything will be fine. What could be more fair? (Even if will be a total waste of time).

You could just drop yourself, and save everyone a lot of energy (including yourself). It would be better if you can work on the article, but if not, then bye bye.

I would prefer that you decide to engage in normal editorial discussions and attempt to refrain from insults. We are not primary school children, and can be expected to find some way to work productively together. So Nickhh, what do you say to just working on this article to bring it into compliance with WP policy? Why waste other peoples time because we can't work together? Raggz (talk) 23:16, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I have not insulted you. I have merely pointed out that you do not seem to understand the WP policies you throw around and order others to read, and that you do not understand most of the subject areas you have chosen to edit in. To take two specific and fairly egregious examples - you have recently claimed the European Parliament is not directly elected, and have confused "extradition" with "extraordinary rendition" when the two are more or less the direct opposites. Yet you drag others into endless talk page debates about non-points and assume the right to delete huge amounts of well sourced, relevant material from articles claiming that this will "assist the reader" or that the material is in breach of the latest WP policy you've stumbled across and taken a cursory glance at. I don't want to have either of us banned, I just want you to edit sensibly within the limits of your expertise. I do not dive in and start making major edits or removing parts of science articles, because I am pretty ignorant about scientific issues. Please could you extend the same courtesy to articles about international law and politics? --Nickhh (talk) 09:53, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Nickhh, you just edited the article without using Talk. There is an ongoing discussion on these sections which you are ignoring. Please engage in the discussion. Raggz (talk) 09:49, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

There is not an ongoing "discussion", there is simply you posting reams of non-sequiters, logical fallacies and misinterpreations of WP policy on the talk page. You then delete lots of material, on the basis of those essays. I have engaged on the talk page up until now, but you are impervious to rational debate and continue to butcher the article regardless. --Nickhh (talk) 09:53, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

You don't get to drop out of the editing discussions on Talk, and then continue to edit. Do you claim that you can do this? Which will it be? Raggz (talk) 10:59, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes I do get to do that (as does any other editor) if I am merely reverting the wholesale blanking - on utterly spurious grounds - of entire paragraphs and sections together with the sources contained within them. These mass deletions are borderline vandalism on your part. All editors are free of course to take out individual pieces of information which are demonstrably false, and to amend or add material where they think existing content could be corrected or improved (assuming there is consensus for that) - but you cannot continue as you are. Now please leave my talk page. --Nickhh (talk) 11:16, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Hi i've talked to Raggz and i've negotiated a "cease fire", then it seems from his answer and his posts on the articles' talk page that the most important point from his POV is the scope of this article, starting with what is ER. So i'm going to start a section on talk about that as it has come up before. I'd like you to join in this discussion. 00:36, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks for this - I'll set out where I stand on the article talk page. I'm really not going to do too much beyond that. The problem is (I'm genuinely trying to be factual here, not rude!) that he has difficulty taking fairly simple points on board, will always find another bizarre angle from which to attack anything he wants to attack and also simply doesn't read or understand sources properly a lot of the time. --Nickhh (talk) 09:01, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Good job with the re-write of the lead to increase clarity. 01:07, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

are you serious?

you don't think that:

a) one of hezbollah's primary goals is to wipe israel off the map? b) that this fact should not be included in the fist paragraph?

I can provide ample proof if you don't accept this basic fact about the organization.

--Einsteindonut (talk) 04:13, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Please go away and read

1) What I said on the article talk page, both about your edit and about people trying to write this article from one perspective.

2) Policies WP:OR & WP:SYNTH

3) The rest of the lead, where it both sets out what the organisations three main goals supposedly are in their own words (none of which refer to the destruction of Israel) and also covers the ground you are trying to repeat, but in a more sober, accurate and encyclopedic fashion.

4) The sources you have cited in support of your claim, none of which actually make this claim themselves (this should be quite a simple process, no?)

Please also understand that it makes no difference what you or I think about anything (although as it happens I disagree with you on both of your points). WP is based on proper, sourced, verifiable information in serious reliable sources, not on the whims and random opinions of its editors, even if they can find one or two things somewhere on the web which appear to back them up (and you haven't even managed to do that yet). Articles also need to be written so they are not repetitive or contradictory. Whenever editors start justifying subjective viewpoints and arguable interpretation with claims like "it's a basic fact" or "an undisputed truth", I know I am dealing with someone who is certainly not serious about contributing here in a neutral way. --Nickhh (talk) 08:24, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

The UK's position on terrorist designation has not changed...It is still only the external security organisation...that is what is on the Homeoffice web page...The whole of hizb'allah military wing is not considered as a terrorist organisation...the change in the UK gov position has been on the emphasis....Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:26, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Sorry yesterday morning it was the Hizb'allah ESO today it is the Hizb'allah military wing...yes I did check just prior to you putting the site address for the Homeoffice (which I already knew as I was the person that put it up on the Hizb'allah page)...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:44, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I've just read the above and it sounds waspish....That was not the intent...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 09:49, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

No problem .. --Nickhh (talk) 11:25, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Like you, I also want accurate and reliable information on wiki....If we only put one POV then you loose readers...as soon as they start looking up the "facts" for themselves it becomes apparent if there is only one POV. I looked at wiki about 3 years ago and very quickly stopped using it for that very reason. I only started editing to try and get a balanced view into wiki...Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 10:02, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree that most I-P articles are off the scale in terms of bias, and half the time I think there's little point in trying to do anything about it. Any editor who suggests that those pages are biased against Israel in some way needs to stand back and do a quick count respectively of a) the number of Israeli and North American editors active here, and b) the number of Palestinian and other Arab editors active here. I know it's a pretty simplistic game (not least because not all Israeli and American editors subscribe to the narrow right-wing nationalist ideology expressed by some of them), but it's a starting point. The problem is that a lot of editors who make the complaint of anti-Israel bias, will, with a straight face, claim that CAMERA and HonestReporting etc are neutral organisations. I mean, you can agree with what they say and do or not, but it's flying in the face of reality to suggest that they are not partisan groups. Equally I have seen editors claim at times that Haaretz, The Guardian and the BBC are not reliable sources because they are "anti-Israel" (whatever that means), even though they are mainstream news organisations. Admittedly the first two are of a fairly open left-liberal persuasion, and that affects their reporting and comment pages up to a point - but it doesn't mean that they simply make up news stories, or that they are partisan propaganda sheets.

Having said that, when I do occasionally get involved, I don't see editing as a struggle between opposing points-of-view, which will somehow then lead to overall neutrality - that way the main articles just end up a battleground, and the talk pages as particularly vicious message boards or forums. And of course the numbers are stacked anyway. Instead the ideal scenario is everyone putting their individual views to one side, and just trying to contribute as neutrally as they can on the basis of verifiable fact, while avoiding loaded terminology and/or excessive analysis or interpretation (which will inevitably favour one side or the other). That way the more aggressive nationalists stand out more and reveal themselves for what they are. There's no such thing as truly neutral of course, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try. --Nickhh (talk) 11:25, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

I know that I have a bias, this is why I stick it in my pocket when editing, but it does lead me to identify very quickly where there is the "opposing" bias... most aggressive nationalists seem to want to scream their POV out, while not realising that that method only turns reader off (another good reason for keeping POV out)....unfortunately I've never learnt the art of diplomacy thus I make comments on the talk pages that can appear as a bit..........I'm in too much of a hurry, I want the POV gone and I want it gone Now....I will always endeavour for a neutral article with as much information from RS as possible. My aim has always been for 1 RS ref for each sentence....Ashley kennedy3 (talk) 13:44, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

JIDF

Hi, did you check your name here? They even quoted you, funny. Imad marie (talk) 18:24, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks - I knew they'd listed my name, but I didn't know they'd actually quoted something I'd said. I'm at a loss of course to understand what exactly is "anti-Israel" about asking people to use normal, factual terminology for things. But there you go, they're a weird lot. I mean they post "tribute" videos of men toting guns and balaclavas, as if that all rubs off on them by association. Kind of childish and pathetic really ... --Nickhh (talk) 07:59, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Like you said, so childish. Unfortunately some of their members are active here.Imad marie (talk) 12:00, 13 October 2008 (UTC)